HBR IdeaCast

By Harvard Business Review

Business

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A weekly podcast featuring the leading thinkers in business and management from Harvard Business Review.

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CEO Series: Mary Barra of G...

05.06.2021

Mary Barra, chair and CEO of General Motors, says that electric vehicles are the future for the company and the automobile industry. GM has said it will phase out vehicles using internal combustion engines by 2035 and go carbon neutral ...

HBR IdeaCast episodes:

05.06.2021 CEO Series: Mary Barra of General Motors on Committing to an Eco-Friendly Future Mary Barra, chair and CEO of General Motors, says that electric vehicles are the future for the company and the automobile industry. GM has said it will phase out vehicles using internal combustion engines by 2035 and go carbon neutral ...
05.04.2021 How Tech Adoption Fuels China’s Innovation Boom Zak Dychtwald, founder of the advisory firm Young China Group, believes that the perception of China as a copycat and not an innovator is outdated. Instead, he argues the willingness of Chinese consumers to try new things is powering the ...
04.27.2021 Quit Overthinking Things Ethan Kross, professor of psychology at the University of Michigan, has spent years studying how people talk to themselves and the effect that this "chatter" has on our performance. From professional athletes to top students and senior executives, even the ...
04.20.2021 Streamlining Your Company’s Strategy Felix Oberholzer-Gee, professor at Harvard Business School, says many organizations spend so much energy on strategy that it overwhelms with conflicting priorities. Instead, he argues companies should simplify and focus on two value drivers: customer satisfaction and employee satisfaction. By ...
04.13.2021 The Career Rules You Didn’t Learn at School Gorick Ng, career advisor at Harvard, tried to learn about the world of work at an early age, helping his mother search job listings and send out resumes. To launch his own career, he studied hard in school, secured an ...
04.06.2021 How the Creative Economy is Changing with Covid-19 Scott Belsky, chief product officer at Adobe, says that creative workers are a bigger part of the economy than ever, thanks to new technologies, more gig work, and shifting norms following the pandemic. He recommends that leaders at all companies ...
03.30.2021 Building a Company While Battling Depression Melissa Bernstein, cofounder of the toy company Melissa & Doug, spent decades hiding her struggles with depression even as she launched and led a booming business focused on bringing joy to children and raised six of her own. She finally ...
03.23.2021 The Competitive Advantage of an Offboarding Program Alison Dachner, management professor at John Carroll University, and Erin Makarius, management professor at the University of Akron, say that an organization can become more competitive by implementing a stronger offboarding process. Their research shows that similar to the way ...
03.16.2021 Workplace Design, Post-Pandemic Anne-Laure Fayard, associate professor at NYU’s Tandon School of Engineering, was studying the effects of workplace design on employees long before the Covid-19 crisis. Now, she says, the trend of flexible schedules and hybrid offices - where some people come ...
03.09.2021 New Recruiting Strategies for a Post-Covid World Lauren Smith, vice president at Gartner Research, says the pandemic is accelerating several key recruitment trends. She led a survey of thousands of job candidates and hiring managers that details the shift to virtual interviews, but also identifies other ongoing ...
03.02.2021 What Black Leaders Bring to the Table Chad Sanders, a former tech executive and entrepreneur, says that people of color, especially Black men like him, often feel the need to assimilate to white corporate culture. They learn to code switch and downplay their race. But Sanders realized ...
02.23.2021 How CEOs Can Drive Sales — or Kill Deals Christoph Senn, marketing professor at INSEAD, has spent years studying how top executives involve themselves in B2B sales. Some are very hands-off. Others make only social calls. Still others sit at the negotiating table. Outcomes vary widely. Senn explains the ...
02.16.2021 Bill Gates on How Business Leaders Can Fight Climate Change Bill Gates, philanthropist and founder of Microsoft, argues that, even as we work to end the global pandemic, we can't lose sight of another existential threat: climate change. He says that we need to take aggressive action to get to ...
02.09.2021 Taking on a Senior Leadership Role Remotely Muriel Wilkins, cofounder of the executive coaching firm Paravis Partners, says that starting a leadership role at a new company or via internal promotion is demanding. Doing so remotely during the Covid-19 pandemic is even more challenging. She says that ...
02.02.2021 How Many Managers Does It Take to Change a Lightbulb? Jennifer Aaker, a Stanford professor, and Naomi Bagdonas, an executive coach, say that, even in times of stress and crisis, leaders should use and encourage good humor and levity at work as a way of building employee morale and engagement. ...
01.26.2021 What Sets Family Businesses Apart Josh Baron and Rob Lachenauer, cofounders of BanyanGlobal Family Business Advisors, say that a family-run company has more flexibility than its publicly-traded counterpart to build a legacy and grow sustainably for the long term. But making critical decisions when there ...
01.19.2021 Goodbye Bureaucracy, Hello Common Sense Martin Lindstrom, founder and chairman of Lindstrom Company, says that many companies are still held back by doing things the way they've always done them, or failing to break down bureaucracy. For Lindstrom, it's not just about getting away from ...
01.12.2021 How Empathy Helps Bridge Generational Differences Mimi Nicklin, a business coach and executive, has seen many leaders blame poor performance and communication on generational differences. But she argues managers should spend less time forcing Millennial and Gen Z employees to conform to company culture and more ...
01.05.2021 What Kind of Networker Are You? Marissa King, professor at Yale School of Management, has studied the strengths and weaknesses of different types of social networks. She argues that most of us have a natural style of networking: we favor tight social circles, or brokering across ...
12.29.2020 Stop Micromanaging and Give People the Help They Really Need Colin Fisher, associate professor at University College London's School of Management, conducted in-depth studies at several companies to determine how managers can effectively help employees who need assistance without demoralizing them. He found that the most effective helpers were the ...
12.22.2020 Better Ways to Manage Up and Out Nashater Deu Solheim, a forensic psychologist and leadership coach, says many people struggle to gain influence with those in their organization who don't report directly to them. That has only become more difficult in virtual office settings. But she says ...
12.15.2020 Why Burnout Happens — and How Bosses Can Help Christina Maslach, professor of psychology at the University of California, Berkeley, has been studying the causes of burnout, and its impact, for decades. She says that, in a year when everyone feels overwhelmed and exhausted, it's more important than ever ...
12.08.2020 When to Team Up with Your Competition Barry Nalebuff, professor at Yale School of Management and cofounder of Honest Tea, says too many companies shy away from cooperating with a competitor, and they’re leaving value on the table. He says even when working with other companies to ...
12.03.2020 Race at Work: Lessons in Diversity and Culture from Mastercard Race at Work is an HBR Presents podcast hosted by Porter Braswell about the role race plays in our careers and lives. In this episode, he speaks with Donna Johnson, former chief diversity officer at Mastercard, about leading the charge ...
12.01.2020 What Business Leaders Should Know About Cryptocurrency Jeff John Roberts, an author and journalist, dug deep into the world of cryptocurrency to figure out what the rest of us really need to know about it. He acknowledges that the proliferation and volatility of digital currencies can make ...
11.24.2020 Why Companies and Skilled Workers Are Turning to On-Demand Work Joseph Fuller, professor at Harvard Business School, and Allison Bailey, senior partner at Boston Consulting Group, say that the Covid-19 pandemic is only accelerating a recent trend of companies turning to digital talent platforms for highly skilled workers. The need ...
11.23.2020 Women at Work: Too Shy to Be a Leader Women at Work is a podcast from Harvard Business Review that looks at the struggles and successes of women in the workplace, hosted by HBR's Amy Bernstein, Amy Gallo, and Emily Caulfield. In this episode, you'll hear about the tension ...
11.17.2020 How Jeff Bezos Built One of the World’s Most Valuable Companies Sunil Gupta, Harvard Business School professor, has spent years studying successful digital strategies, companies, and leaders, and he's made Amazon and its legendary CEO Jeff Bezos a particular areas of focus. Drawing on his own in-depth research and other sources, ...
11.10.2020 Managing Working Parents During the Pandemic Ellen Ernst Kossek, management professor at Purdue University, is researching how the pandemic is putting an enormous strain on working parents and the new challenge that poses for their managers. She shares how supervisors can offer much-needed consistency and predictability ...
11.06.2020 Defining and Adapting Your Leadership Style Suzanne Peterson, associate professor at Thunderbird School of Global Management, says many talented professionals get held back from leadership roles because of relatively intangible reasons. She argues aspiring managers can intentionally alter their everyday interactions in small ways to have ...
10.27.2020 How Those With Power and Privilege Can Help Others Advance Tsedale Melaku, sociologist at The Graduate Center, City University of New York, and David Smith, professor at the U.S. Naval War College, have been looking at the ways people with the most power in society and organizations can become better ...
10.20.2020 Why Work-From-Anywhere Is Here to Stay Prithwiraj (Raj) Choudhury, associate professor at Harvard Business School, was studying the growing work-from-anywhere movement long before the Covid-19 pandemic forced many more of us into virtual work. He says that more and more organizations are adopting WFA as a ...
10.13.2020 The Fundamental Human Relationship with Work James Suzman, an anthropologist and former executive, says one way to better understand the future of work is to learn from the history of it. He has studied an ancient hunter-gatherer society in Namibia and says our modern notions of ...
10.06.2020 How to Build Workplaces That Protect Employee Health John Macomber, senior lecturer at Harvard Business School and a veteran of the real estate industry, was studying ways to make workplaces safer for employees long before the Covid-19 crisis hit. Now that issues like air and water quality are ...
09.29.2020 When Efficiency Goes Too Far Roger Martin, professor emeritus at the University of Toronto's Rotman School of Management, says that for decades the U.S. corporate system has been obsessed with eliminating inefficiencies. There's a point, his research shows, when these efficiency gains come with even ...
09.22.2020 The Subtle Art of Saying No Bruce Tulgan, founder of the management training firm RainmakerThinking, says that the key to career success isn't only embracing opportunities; it's also declining projects, tasks, and requests for help so you create time for the most value-added work. He explains ...
09.15.2020 Cultivate a Trans-Inclusive Workplace Katina Sawyer, assistant professor at the George Washington University, says transgender workers continue to be overlooked even as organizational diversity initiatives become more widespread. Her research shows that many trans employees experience ongoing discrimination, from microaggression to job loss. Sawyer ...
09.08.2020 Creating More Resilient Supply Chains Willy Shih, professor at Harvard Business School, says that the complex, global, and just-in-time manufacturing processes we've developed in recent decades are highly susceptible to breakdowns, especially during a global pandemic. He explains why the shortages we’ve seen in 2020 ...
09.01.2020 To Build Grit, Go Back to Basics Shannon Huffman Polson, a consultant and former military pilot, experienced early on how to build grit. At 19, she was the youngest woman to summit Denali, North America’s highest peak. Then she overcame many obstacles to fly U.S. Army attack ...
08.25.2020 Why Work Friends are Worth It Shasta Nelson, relationship expert and author, says that work friendships are critical to individual and organizational success but acknowledges that it's not always easy to build these personal -- but still professional - connections, especially when work is virtual. She ...
08.18.2020 Breaking Down Bureaucracy and Building Up Workers Gary Hamel and Michele Zanini, cofounders of the consultancy Management Lab, say that even though we all lament how rigid, parochial, and time sucking bureaucracies can be, they still seem inescapable. The managers who’ve excelled in them often don’t know ...
08.11.2020 Mastering the Art of Persuasion Jonah Berger, professor at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, says that most of us aren’t approaching persuasion the right way. Pushing people to behave how you’d like them to or believe the same things you do just ...
08.04.2020 Adapting Negotiations to a Remote World Leigh Thompson, professor at Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University, studies negotiations to understand the path to the "sweet spot" where all sides of the table come away happy. And she says there are more pitfalls on that path ...
07.28.2020 Future-Proofing Your Strategy with Scenario Planning Peter Scoblic, cofounder and principal of the consultancy Event Horizon Strategies, says that too many companies are short-sighted in their strategy-making and don't effectively plan for different potential futures. Using examples from the U.S. Coast Guard, he explains how thoughtful ...
07.21.2020 Every Business Can Be a Subscription Business Robbie Kellman Baxter, a strategy consultant, says that subscriptions aren’t just for newspapers and Netflix. She says they can help companies from local retailers to giant industrial manufacturers earn more consistent revenue and develop stronger customer loyalty. And she explains ...
07.14.2020 Helping People Move from Trauma to Growth Richard Tedeschi, a psychology professor and distinguished chair of the Boulder Crest Institute, says that crises like the Covid-19 pandemic and its economic fallout as well as the recent racial violence and social unrest in the United States, can yield ...
07.07.2020 Pricing Strategies for Uncertain Times Rafi Mohammed, founder of the consulting firm Culture of Profit, says a crisis or recession is not the time to panic and slash prices. He says leaders should instead reevaluate their price strategy — or develop one for the first ...
06.30.2020 AB InBev CEO on Adapting in the Face of Crisis Carlos Brito, the CEO of Anheuser-Busch InBev since 2008, has worked to build a culture of adaptability and customer centricity at the global brewer. Many of his leadership principles are paying off during the Covid-19 pandemic, as empowered employees have ...
06.23.2020 Applying Porter’s Five Forces to Fix U.S. Politics Katherine Gehl, a former CEO and the founder of the Institute for Political Innovation, and Michael Porter, a professor at Harvard Business School, apply his Five Forces framework to explain why U.S. politics are dysfunctional. They argue that the Republican ...
06.16.2020 Megan Rapinoe on Leading — On and Off the Field Megan Rapinoe, U.S. women's soccer star and World Cup champion, knows how to perform under pressure, motivate her teammates, and advocate for the causes she believes in. In addition to her stellar play as a professional athlete, she's been outspoken ...

Older episodes

HBR IdeaCast

What's HBR IdeaCast about?

Download our free app to listen on your phone

HBR IdeaCast episodes:

CEO Series: Mary Barra of General Motors on Committing to an Eco-Friendly Future

How Tech Adoption Fuels China’s Innovation Boom

Quit Overthinking Things

Streamlining Your Company’s Strategy

The Career Rules You Didn’t Learn at School

How the Creative Economy is Changing with Covid-19

Building a Company While Battling Depression

The Competitive Advantage of an Offboarding Program

Workplace Design, Post-Pandemic

New Recruiting Strategies for a Post-Covid World

What Black Leaders Bring to the Table

How CEOs Can Drive Sales — or Kill Deals

Bill Gates on How Business Leaders Can Fight Climate Change

Taking on a Senior Leadership Role Remotely

How Many Managers Does It Take to Change a Lightbulb?

What Sets Family Businesses Apart

Goodbye Bureaucracy, Hello Common Sense

How Empathy Helps Bridge Generational Differences

What Kind of Networker Are You?

Stop Micromanaging and Give People the Help They Really Need

Better Ways to Manage Up and Out

Why Burnout Happens — and How Bosses Can Help

When to Team Up with Your Competition

Race at Work: Lessons in Diversity and Culture from Mastercard

What Business Leaders Should Know About Cryptocurrency

Why Companies and Skilled Workers Are Turning to On-Demand Work

Women at Work: Too Shy to Be a Leader

How Jeff Bezos Built One of the World’s Most Valuable Companies

Managing Working Parents During the Pandemic

Defining and Adapting Your Leadership Style

How Those With Power and Privilege Can Help Others Advance

Why Work-From-Anywhere Is Here to Stay

The Fundamental Human Relationship with Work

How to Build Workplaces That Protect Employee Health

When Efficiency Goes Too Far

The Subtle Art of Saying No

Cultivate a Trans-Inclusive Workplace

Creating More Resilient Supply Chains

To Build Grit, Go Back to Basics

Why Work Friends are Worth It

Breaking Down Bureaucracy and Building Up Workers

Mastering the Art of Persuasion

Adapting Negotiations to a Remote World

Future-Proofing Your Strategy with Scenario Planning

Every Business Can Be a Subscription Business

Helping People Move from Trauma to Growth

Pricing Strategies for Uncertain Times

AB InBev CEO on Adapting in the Face of Crisis

Applying Porter’s Five Forces to Fix U.S. Politics

Megan Rapinoe on Leading — On and Off the Field

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