The Harvard Business Working Review Article, written by Rachel Lane, shares the insights and tips for the so-called deadline issue, given by Andy Wu (RCC at Harvard Executive Program Speaker, he is Assistant Professor of Business Administration in the Strategy Unit at Harvard Business School, where he teaches in the MBA and Executive Education programs) and Aticus Peterson (Ph.D. candidate in the Strategy Unit at Harvard Business School. He conducts research on how entrepreneurs and investors can overcome cognitive constraints to better manage unknowns and achieve competitive advantage). In fact, both researchers came out to work on this study from their own frustrations: Peterson’s as a venture capitalist and Wu’s as an entrepreneur. 

 “After a successful launch, entrepreneurs struggle to anticipate the complexities of product upgrades, says research by Andy Wu andAticus Peterson. They offer three tips to help startups avoid disastrous delays”

Becoming a Customer-Centered Company

Via Harvard Business Review, content sponsored by Salesforce

All these elements working in harmony add up to a human-centered culture, focused on optimizing customer centricity with speed and agility.

THE TRANSFORMATION PLAYBOOK

By Bret Taylor, President, Chief Operating Officer, Salesforce.

The question for all of us is how best to act when there’s still so much uncertainty. The key thing we’ve learned, alongside our customers, is that COVID-19 is an accelerant — an accelerant for change that had already begun. It supercharged a pivot to customer-centricity, to rethinking how you serve your employees and customers, the importance of employee experience, and how to reinvent yourself for the all-digital, work-from-anywhere world. Yet conventional attitudes, silos, and legacy systems often stand between leaders and customer-centricity. And while technology can help, it alone is not the answer. Simply applying new technology to old ways of doing things won’t magically change the way your teams deliver a great customer experience at scale. I’ve noticed transformation happens when leaders stop focusing internally on technology, products, departments, or systems — and recenter around their customers.

Get the best Out Of Anxiety | New Harvard Article

by Francesca Gino, Professor of Business Administration at Harvard Business School

Expect to do well

“This phenomenon holds true outside of medicine. How I expect to do at something beforehand—whether a meeting with a potential client, a joint project with new colleagues, or teaching a class full of executives—actively influences how I actually do. When I expect to do well, I feel more comfortable and excited, and as a result, I perform better. Not only that, research shows that I am also judged by others as more competent”

Reframe your anxiety as excitement

“This is how I ultimately made the turn with my stressful teaching gig: As I kept walking across campus to face the room full of executives, I decided to think of class as a great learning opportunity—even if I bombed. My anxiety about all the ways I wasn’t like the other instructors, I told myself, was really excitement about being included among such an accomplished team. This reframing worked: I felt far less stressed, and the program went well. I did learn from the experience, and eventually I became a regular teacher in the executive education programs”.

Focus on your strengths

“In the face of a challenge, then, one of the best strategies for engaging with our anxiety is to recall, and steer into, what we’re good at. Think of how coaches work with professional athletes: They might do some work on “weaknesses,” but mostly they are building on areas of tremendous skill. In the same way, when we turn our attention to our areas of greatest competence—rather than focus on all the ways we fall short—we allow our true selves to shine. This authenticity makes us more likely to secure jobs, higher ratings in our presentations, and money for entrepreneurial ventures or deals“.

How To Lead When Your Team Is Exhausted

Via Harvard Business Review Article, Written by Merete Wedell-Wedellsborg

Don’t Underestimate the Power of a Walk

Via Harvard Business Review Article, Written by Deborah Grayson Riegel

Culture and leadership are not two separate entities but are intimately connected. One influences the other and vice versa. This powerful information can be an important driving force in creating and maintaining the culture your organization needs to be successful.

The article is written by Meghan Stone (Axialent) is framed into the Culture Transformation and goes directly to the intimate relation between Culture and Leadership, how they go hand in hand shaping one another and bringing some useful tools such as the  OCI^® (Organizational Culture Inventory^®) and OEI^® (Organizational Effectiveness Inventory^®) in combination with the LSI^® (Life Styles Inventory^®). 

Axialent is created in 2002, with a dream to help individuals, teams, and organizations connect with their true selves skillfully at work and beyond. With its presence in Europe, LatAm, the U.S.A., and Australia, they are a leading global provider of culture transformation expertise for companies in the financial services/insurance, technology/IT and pharmaceutical industries.

Today we bring attention to our customers. We all know by now that business will be nothing like before, during and after the COVID-19 crisis when the ‘new normal’ arrives. People are worried about their health and anxious about the economic situation, and many companies are “going dark, fearful of offending or of being accused of taking advantage of an unfortunate situation for corporate gain” (Jill Avery and Richard Edelman, Harvard Business Working Knowledge).

Many brands have turned off their marketing efforts during the pandemic, but Jill Avery and Richard Edelman argue that now is the time when customers need to hear from you most. But what do you say?

“What Customers Need to hear from you during the crisis”

Harvard Business Working Knowledge Article

But of course, customers want to hear from us. It would be a mistake to disappear or be silent now. However, the communication coming from the companies to their customers must be comforting and reassuring, and it is key as well to communicate how companies are responding to the pandemic.

Executives are typically approaching customer experience by creating seamless, convenient and engaging customer journeys; however, the needs of customers at the moment have shifted dramatically towards more essential concerns

Fabricio Dore, McKinsey article

This crisis generates the need to build confidence. Customers want to see how the brands do what is right and best for their employees, customers, suppliers, and society at large: “without regard for how much it costs, with 90 percent of consumers stating that brands should be willing to suffer substantial financial losses to ensure the well-being and financial security of others”(Jill Avery and Richard Edelman, Harvard Business Working Knowledge).

Seven McKinsey’s actions

Recommended by Fabricio Dore, an associate partner in McKinsey’s São Paulo office, Oliver Ehrlich, a partner in the Dusseldorf office, David Malfara, a specialist in the Miami office, and Kelly Ungerman, a senior partner in the Dallas office in the Mckinsey article “Connecting with customers in times of crisis”, with the contributions of authors Tiffany Chan and Alex Levin as well 

1. Minimize risk by reducing physical interaction

2. Actively contribute to safety by innovating the product portfolio

3. Provide pragmatic help to customers in financial distress

4. Bring joy and support the emotional needs of customers ‘trapped at home’