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Create a Company Culture That Takes Cybersecurity Seriously
With the damages from cybercrime growing ($16 billion in U.S. damages in 2024 alone), human error remains the leading cause of breaches—but also the greatest opportunity for improvement. Companies need to invest in building a human-centered security culture. Leaders can do so by following a three-step strategy that builds on Neidert’s Core Motives Model and Cialdini’s influence principles: (1) Connect by building trust and rapport; (2) Reduce uncertainty through modeling and peer examples; and (3) Inspire action using nudges, public commitments, and incentives. The authors emphasize that awareness alone isn’t enough—leaders must foster real behavioral change. When done right, security becomes a shared cultural norm, not just a compliance task.
The AI Revolution Won’t Happen Overnight
AI will transform industries. However, this transformation will happen on enterprise time: longer, slower, and with far more friction than most expect, and much slower than Silicon Valley is selling. Right now, companies are getting six fundamental things wrong about how AI will create value and how long it will take—and risk wasting resources, overpromising results, and eroding trust. 1) AI’s real impact will take much longer than we think. 2) We’re being wildly optimistic about enterprise AI adoption. 3) The market is overestimating the value of AI companies. 4) The real money isn’t in the models. 5) We’re over indexing on startups. 6) We’re obsessed with generative AI but it’s not the future. Enterprise leaders need to be asking fewer questions about what AI might do—and more about what it’s actually doing in your business.
The Iran Crisis: What Leaders Need to Know
In this week’s edition of the HBR Executive Agenda, editor-at-large Adi Ignatius reports on the global economic impacts of conflict between Israel, the U.S. and Iran. To understand what disruptions businesses should start planning for, Ignatius spoke to Ian Bremmer, president of Eurasia Group and an expert on global politics.
Research: Products Labeled as Sustainable Sell Better
A comprehensive analysis of Amazon sales data reveals that sustainability labels like “Climate Pledge Friendly” increase consumer demand by 13–14% for up to eight weeks after adoption. This sales boost is not driven by pricing or advertising, nor by improved search rankings or filter usage. Instead, consumers engage in passive search—opting for labeled products when given the choice, even if they’re not actively looking for sustainable options. Labels that highlight specific features, such as carbon neutrality or reduced harmful ingredients, are especially effective. For brands and platforms, this underscores the commercial value of clear, credible sustainability messaging.
Recalculating the Costs and Benefits of Gen AI
Gen AI has the potential to create a tremendous amount of value for organizations and individual employees. By focusing on the value of the output that AI produces, however, we tend not to think much about other sources of value. We rarely ask: In what way does each activity we do create true and unique value? It’s time for leaders to take a cold, hard look at their organizations and ask that question so they don’t destroy more value than they create in adopting gen AI. An AI value audit can help leaders make an objective and holistic assessment of benefits and costs.
Leading Through Continuous Change
While change has always been difficult, we have now entered an area in which it is continuous rather than episodic. Employees are tired and morale, productivity, and innovation all suffer as a result. This playbook offers executives strategies for anticipating their workforce’s emotions, handling communication, and managing the pace of change to help their teams embrace transformation rather than resisting it.
Marketing Faces Its Future
It’s one of the most important questions of our time: How much will AI disrupt business? Writing in from the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity, HBR editor at large Adi Ignatius found mixed answers among the world’s leading CMOs and experts. Still, he wanted to understand how CMOs who want to tap into this new technology’s benefits can do so. For this week’s HBR Agenda, Ignatius connected with three of Google’s AI and marketing experts—Marie Gulin-Merle, Alison Wagonfeld, and Erica Matthews—to learn how marketing executives can start to make AI truly central to their business. Plus executive leadership consultant Ann Hiatt on how top executives manage their energy.
How 6 Companies Approached Digital Transformation
What exactly is a digital transformation, and how can you lead one successfully? Often guiding a digital transformation requires rethinking how your company creates value, its strategy, and the processes by which your employees get things done. Yet while many companies face similar problems, the specifics of their organization, industry, and staff can make it hard to translate big ideas into practice. To better understand how companies succeed in digital transformations, consider the inside perspective from six legacy companies: Moody’s, Honeywell, IKEA, Levi’s, Adobe, and Intuit.
What Gets Measured, AI Will Automate
In the age of AI, what gets measured gets automated. As models grow more powerful, any task that can be turned into data—from spreadsheet analysis to therapy sessions—is increasingly within reach of automation. The underlying playbook is clear: define the task, feed it data, attach rewards, and apply compute. As AI slashes the cost of measurement, even minor activities become economically viable to automate, expanding the reach of AI into nearly every industry. What remains defensible are tasks defined by ambiguity, creativity, or uncertainty—places where outcomes can’t be easily quantified or where human judgment still prevails. For leaders, the challenge is to manage both the measurable and the unmeasurable, investing not just in automation, but in the intangibles—taste, trust, vision, and adaptability—that AI can’t yet replicate.
How Circularity Can Be a Strategic Response to Tariffs
As geopolitical tensions, trade restrictions, and resource nationalism upend global supply chains, companies are searching for new strategies to build resilience. While familiar tactics like near-shoring and inventory buffers remain important, circularity—reusing, repairing, remanufacturing, and recycling—offers a powerful but underutilized lever. Firms that adopt circular models can reduce dependence on volatile imports, tap into secondary markets, diversify revenue through services, strengthen customer and supplier relationships, and align with emerging industrial policy incentives. Far from being a sustainability luxury, circularity is proving to be a commercially savvy response to the fractured landscape of global commerce.
An International Travel Checklist for U.S. Employers
As organizations navigate an increasingly unpredictable global environment, experts recommend building a checklist that covers both technical and people-related business travel policies. Here’s how to get started: 1) Clarify which employees are working under temporary authorization. 2) Establish a framework for weighing the necessity of each trip. 3) Brief employees on entry requirements and provide guidance on potential challenges. 4) Devise contingency plans for policy shifts affecting travel. 5) Balance cautious awareness with practical decision-making.
5 Steps for Leading a Team You’ve Inherited
The mark of a great leader is not how quickly they act, but how wisely they decide. When you inherit a team, you’re not just managing headcount; you’re shaping or reshaping culture. How you show up in those early days sets the tone for your leadership brand. Do you lead with empathy and insight, or ego and impulse? The best leaders lead with both urgency and patience. They make decisive moves, but only after gathering the right information. They bring fresh vision, but also honor the work that came before them. And they recognize that performance, trust, and culture are intertwined with each one shaping the others. Lead with a vision and the same thoughtfulness you hope to inspire in them.
In Turbulent Times, Consider “Strategic Subtraction”
In an era marked by constant uncertainty and where every competitor is racing to add more features, channels, data, and spend, the real differentiator for companies is the courage to remove. Subtractive actions can be a powerful way of dealing with emerging situations where resources are tight. However, they’re shortsighted if the goal is only to improve efficiency at the cost of other objectives. Rather than simply using subtractive tactics to make indiscriminate cuts, strategic subtraction can help you innovate in a way that positions your organization to withstand the tumult and even rebound. For any innovation to thrive in 2025’s complex landscape, the use of subtraction must include three interrelated business performance goals: efficiency, resilience, and prominence. There are six ways to apply subtractive thinking while meeting those underlying goals.
How Private Equity Firms Are Creating Value with AI
Like many other companies, private equity firms are interested in AI as a tool for faster value creation. And like other companies, the results have been mixed, as few report significant returns on generative AI investments so far. That said, some firms are developing more structured approaches to improve outcomes. These efforts begin with securing executive buy-in and bringing in relevant talent, including operating partners who understand both business and implementation. Rather than over-investing in hard-to-retain data scientists, firms often rely on consultants or full-stack engineers. Before acquiring companies, leading firms assess how AI may affect entire industries and conduct diligence on a target’s potential for AI-driven gains. This includes evaluating workforce automation opportunities, data readiness, and competitive positioning. While methods vary, firms that take these steps early are better positioned to align AI initiatives with their investment goals.
Research: Do You Know What Signals Your Logo’s Colors Are Sending?
Color is one of the most powerful tools in branding, but most businesses overlook how context alters its impact. New research shows that logo colors don’t communicate in isolation: background color, design style, and framing all shape consumer perception. A red logo on white may feel lively; on black, it may seem dangerous. Abstract logos are especially vulnerable to these shifts. Relying too heavily on color symbolism charts can mislead rather than guide. To build stronger brand identities, leaders must understand how color operates within context—and design intentionally to ensure their brand sends the right message, every time.
Organizations Aren’t Ready for the Risks of Agentic AI
As companies move from narrow to generative to agentic and multi-agentic AI, the complexity of the risk landscape ramps up sharply. Existing AI risk programs—including ethical and cyber risks—need to evolve for organizations to move fast without breaking their brand and the people they impact. The good news is that organizations don’t need to solve everything at once. They need to honestly assess where they are on the complexity curve, build the capabilities required for their current stage, and create the infrastructure to evolve safely to the next. This means investing in comprehensive employee training, developing robust monitoring systems, and creating intervention protocols before they’re desperately needed. This task is difficult, but the reward is the safe, wide-scale deployment of truly transformative technologies.
Navigating the Jump from Manager to Executive
Becoming a leader of leaders is a change of both scope and attitude. Your decisions may now affect dozens (or hundreds) of employees. Your results depend on how well other experienced professionals do their jobs, not on what you can personally make happen. Stepping into these shifts doesn’t happen overnight and it can feel nerve-wracking for a while. This article outlines three key shifts you need to make: 1) Going from expert to coach, 2) Moving from execution to driving impact through others, 3) Evolving from oversight to scalable systems. Leading leaders isn’t “more of the same” just with bigger teams and budgets. In reality, you have to fundamentally shift how you think about your role, how you spend your time, and how you measure success.
You’re Not Prepared for the AI Revolution
GenAI capabilities are improving exponentially every six months or so, and yet most companies are adopting models at a linear pace, at best. That means the y’re constantly falling behind and failing to unlock AI’s expanding skills. That’s the view of Karim Lakhani, an HBS professor who’s a leading expert on AI in the workplace. In this edition of the HBR Executive Agenda, HBR editor at large Adi Ignatius talks to Lakhani about what leaders must do now to get AI right. And Ann Hiatt, a Silicon Valley veteran and executive leadership consultant, looks at the growing involvement of fractional C-suite leaders in strategy-making—and the ensuing operational challenges.
4 Mistakes Leaders Make About Psychological Safety
Psychological safety—a shared belief among team members that it’s ok to speak up with candor—is critical for effective decision-making and forward momentum on senior teams. Yet as the concept has gained traction, so have common misconceptions. In this HBR Executive Masterclass, HBS leadership professor Amy C. Edmondson outlines what we get wrong about psychological safety and offers practical guidance for leaders looking to build a culture where people feel safe to take smart risks.
The Skills and Habits Aspiring CEOs Need to Build
Today’s CEOs have a fresh set of challenges that the standard management playbook is ill-equipped to address. As a result, many are heading for the exit. And executive recruiters report that fewer people are interested in, or ready to, replace them. Are we at an inflection point in what future CEOs need to be successful? Is enough being done to equip up-and-coming CEOs to navigate these evolving dynamics? How can companies ensure future leaders are prepared to make tough decisions in chaotic times, and lead diverse, tech-first, and global workforces. Three experts share their views.
Our Favorite Management Tips on Dealing with Conflict
Our Management Tip of the Day newsletter continues to be one of HBR’s most popular newsletters. In this article, we list six of our favorite tips on managing through conflict, covering topics like encouraging healthy conflict on your team, dealing with a jealous coworker, leading an emotionally charged meeting, and more.
Tech Companies, Nuclear Power, and the Problem of Strategic Timing
Big tech’s recent embrace of nuclear power highlights a shared strategic challenge between AI firms and energy providers: managing time. As AI-driven data centers send electricity demand soaring, companies like Microsoft, Meta, and Amazon are investing directly in nuclear to ensure a stable, carbon-neutral power supply. Two core timing problems anchor this shift: energy providers struggle to predict when demand will justify massive infrastructure investments, while AI firms need suppliers to meet aggressive build timelines. The article argues that solving both requires rethinking time as a strategic asset. To predict market readiness, energy firms must get closer to customers—via partnerships and physical proximity—to reduce risk and align investment with real demand. To set enforceable deadlines, AI firms must take credible, financial stakes in supply chains, signaling commitment and urgency. The piece offers lessons for other industries: use tools like contracts, integration, and co-creation to align stakeholders; and treat timing not as a constraint, but as a strategic variable critical to delivering the future on schedule.
Research: Why CEOs Should Start with the New Year
Careful succession planning is a key aspect of board governance. But it can be difficult to know how to set a new CEO up for success. New research suggests one thing boards can do is align their CEO’s start date with the beginning of the calendar year or a firm’s fiscal year. A study of 690 successions in the S&P 500 found that the firms whose CEOs’ start dates aligned saw stronger returns on assets compared to firms whose CEOs started at other times of the year. The researchers suggest that this stronger performance was driven by heightened alignment between a CEO’s new vision and firm and employees’ natural planning and goal-setting cycles. Additionally, they found that the impact on performance was even stronger when new CEOs were women, under 46 years old, members of racial or ethnic minority groups or firm outsiders.
Research: When Help Isn’t Helpful
Asking for and receiving help at work can boost employees’ creativity, help them learn new skills, and strengthen their interpersonal ties. Yet a years-long study at a global design consultancy found that even in organizations with strong helping cultures, a significant portion of help is perceived as unhelpful. This is often due to nonspecific asks, a lack of accountability, and the potential of a charged aftermath. The researchers offer insights for leaders looking to overcome common pitfalls and create the kind of culture where teams are able to collaborate effectively without fear of looking incompetent or asking for too much.
6 Short-Term Strategies for Doing Business in a Trade War
Interviews with supply chain leaders at more than a dozen manufacturers and retailers inside and outside the United States yielded insights into how companies are trying to navigate the extreme uncertainty generated by the tariffs war. There were six actions that others might find useful: (1) keep stakeholders informed about the lack of clarity; (2) reopen the war rooms created during the Covid-19 pandemic and bring together functional experts; (3) change the formulation of products to make them subjected to lower tariffs; (4) change the locations of where products are assembled; (5) alter the makeup of a bundle of items sold together; (5) build on moves taken during the pandemic.
We Asked HBR Readers to Have Lunch with Their Coworkers. Here’s What We Learned.
Food has historically played a critical role in bringing people together or welcoming strangers into a community. This practice of eating together (or commensality) is also a part of some work cultures around the world. However, it is also an alien concept for many. Modern workplace cultures can make shared eating somewhat difficult. Whether or not people eat with others at work can vary based on many factors such as company and industry norms, workplace-timing arrangements, or even job status. So, what would happen if people who don’t normally share a meal at the office did so more regularly? We invited HBR readers to volunteer to collaborate with us on a 4-week experiment. The ask was simple: If they usually ate alone at work, we wanted them to reach out to a few colleagues to have lunch (nothing fancy; just their regular home-cooked meal) together at least once a week over a period of one month and send us their responses to three questions. We found some interesting patterns.