MIT Sloan Experts

Don’t be a zombie organization — Steven Spear

mitsloanexperts — Thu, 23 May 2013 13:03:49 +0000

From Huffington Post Zombies are all the entertainment rage. They’re terrifying, but only if there is a mass of them in pursuit. Mindless, they keep coming despite the flame-thrower and Gatling gun fired at them. They are easy targets once they reveal themselves. Facing them are our human heroes. Outnumbered, they nevertheless prevail because they are agile and constantly learning. They adapt as they assess situations—seeing problems, developing new schemes—solving problems, to clobber the zombie hoards. It’s not just TV that has plodding zombies massed against agile, adaptive people. Organizations also display either zombie or agile hero qualities. In zombie organizations, engineers, doctors, nurses, mechanics or managers encounter problems like missing information, missing documentation, unclear assignments, missing materials or even missing colleagues. Yet, not really seeing them as abnormalities, they don’t solve them, unrelenting when something is amiss, not pausing to investigate and develop solutions. Read the full post and … Read More »

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What Is the True Cost of Government-Backed Credit? — Deborah Lucas

mitsloanexperts — Mon, 20 May 2013 13:33:35 +0000

From The Huffington Post The U.S. government is arguably the largest financial institution in the world. If you add the outstanding stock of government loans, loan guarantees, pension insurance, deposit insurance and the guarantees made by federal entities such as Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, you get to about $18 trillion of government-backed credit. Through those activities, the government has a first-order effect on the allocation of capital and risk in the economy. The question of what those commitments cost the public is important; accurate cost assessments are necessary for informed decisions by policymakers, effective program management, and meaningful public oversight. My research and that of others has shown that if one takes a financial economics approach to answering that question — one that is consistent with the methods used by private financial institutions to evaluate such costs — it leads to significantly higher estimates than the approach currently used … Read More »

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Why an MBA is conducive to launching a startup — Max Faingezicht

mitsloanexperts — Thu, 16 May 2013 15:11:48 +0000

Why an MBA is conducive to launching a startup A lot of discussion in the media recently has focused on whether or not entrepreneurs should spend valuable time and money pursuing an MBA degree versus gaining experience on the front lines of a startup. Some commentators such as Vivek Wadhwa even insist that an MBA subtracts from a candidate’s value. Shortly after earning an MBA from MIT Sloan School of Management, I co-founded a startup called ThriveHive (http://thrivehive.com ), which offers a guided marketing solution for small business owners. I met my co-founder Adam Blake, a fellow Sloan MBA candidate, in an entrepreneurial-focused course at the School. While neither of us believes an MBA can transform someone into an entrepreneur, earning an MBA provides a great framework for tackling the uncertainties that inevitably occur at a startup. Here’s why: Tools for Thriving amongst ‘Structured Chaos’ A startup is a completely … Read More »

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Your Business Is Never Too Small For A Cyber Attack, Here’s How To Protect Yourself — George Westerman

mitsloanexperts — Tue, 14 May 2013 19:39:04 +0000

From Forbes A few years ago I was working with a small consulting firm, and one of our up and coming salespeople left for a competitor. No big deal. It happens. But several months later, the management team noticed a disturbing trend. The company kept losing bids for new business to this very same competitor. It had happened four times in a row when finally we realized that we’d forgotten to turn off the former employee’s network access. He had been logging into our network, stealing our information, and then undercutting us. As cybercrime reporting goes, this may be small potatoes. But it wasn’t small to this company. It illustrates a problem that plagues many small and medium-size businesses: When it comes to Internet security, a lot of people aren’t paying attention. They think they’re too small to be the target of a cyber threat. They’re wrong. According to a … Read More »

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Making good = profitable — Managing Sustainable Businesses–Thomas Kochan

mitsloanexperts — Thu, 09 May 2013 13:42:38 +0000

From off-shoring good jobs to the great and growing income divide, finance-driven decision-making has long been at the core of many of our economic problems. It’s not that financial analysts and operatives are necessarily evil or uncaring – rather, they believe they have a fiduciary responsibility to generate maximum returns for their funds, even when the results have worker and society-unfriendly consequences. Changing this mindset has proven a tough nut to crack even for union pension fund managers, who are aware of the social consequences of investment decisions. But there are glimmers of hope and interest. On June 7, for example, some of the nation’s largest institutional investors and the biggest single pension fund investor – the California Public Employees’ Retirement System (CALpers) — will hold a conference to explore ways to transform socially and environmentally sustainable investment criteria from a perceived liability to an asset. CALpers has a commitment to … Read More »

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Malpractice Litigation’s Effect on Electronic Medical Records (EMR) Adoption — Catherine Tucker

mitsloanexperts — Tue, 07 May 2013 18:48:13 +0000

In the last few years there has been a tremendous push by the U.S. government to encourage healthcare providers to transition to electronic medical records (EMR). The 2009 HITECH Act offers incentives of roughly $44,000 per physician to promote EMR adoption. While that has enticed many providers, we are still nowhere near the government’s goal of eradicating paper records in the process of patient care. In research I conducted with Prof. Amalia Miller of the University of Virginia, we studied EMR adoption by hospitals from 1994-2007 and found that a significant deterrent to EMR adoption is malpractice litigation. Our evidence showed that hospitals located in jurisdictions that facilitate the use of electronic records in malpractice litigation were one-third less likely to adopt EMR. Proponents of EMR systems maintain that they allow providers to store and exchange information about their patients’ medical and treatment histories, improving patient care and reducing administrative … Read More »

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Climbing a Wall of Worry — John DeTore

mitsloanexperts — Thu, 02 May 2013 15:06:09 +0000

The U.S. stock market is now at new highs. So why are average Americans continuing to struggle and not feeling this prosperity? What causes this apparent disconnect between market highs and citizen well-being? As the expression goes, stocks are climbing a wall of worry. And by our estimates, despite economic malaise, the stock market hasn’t peaked, and we’re still on the way up. Here are some reasons why: The market largely reacts early in the cycle (and just remember: We are largely no higher than we were at the 2000 peak); We’re stimulating the market fiscally with low interest rates for some time to come; Businesses have cleaned up their balance sheets after the financial crisis and are now liquid (in fact many are sitting on huge cash reserves); and Companies are finding ways to achieve higher earnings despite a difficult political and regulatory environment. In fact, strong availability of … Read More »

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Spender or Saver? The Choice May Not be Yours — Joshua Ackerman

mitsloanexperts — Mon, 29 Apr 2013 19:46:43 +0000

From Marketwatch During a recession, why do some people spend money while others save? Money issues can be grounds for conflict in relationships. One person may be a spender while the other is a saver. Throw in financial stress such as an economic recession and one person’s preference can seem completely irrational to the other. How can people be so different when it comes to the “right” decisions? Recent research shows that our childhood economic environments have a lot to do with how we make financial decisions and handle financial risk later in life Read the full post at Marketwatch Joshua Ackerman is assistant professor of marketing at the MIT Sloan School of Management and co-author of “When the Economy Falters, Do People Spend or Save? Responses to Resource Scarcity Depend on Childhood Environments,” published in the Feb. 8 issue of Psychological Science.

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We Are One MIT, One Society, As We Pay Tribute To Officer Sean — Tom Kochan

mitsloanexperts — Thu, 25 Apr 2013 13:33:31 +0000

From WBUR, Cognoscenti “Today, and in the days ahead, we will come together to give new meaning to President Rafael Reif’s call to be ‘One MIT.’ The many comments of students who had gotten to know Officer Sean Collier as a friend, peer, and respected professional are heart-warming and a tribute to him and to our community-of-one culture. By celebrating that as we grieve for Sean, his family, and for MIT we might just demonstrate the spirit of solidarity so badly needed in other parts of our society.” Read the full post at Cognosceniti Thomas Kochan is the George Maverick Bunker Professor of Management and co-director of the Institute for Work & Employment Research at MIT’s Sloan School of Management.

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Where Should You Launch Your Startup? — Charles Kane

mitsloanexperts — Tue, 23 Apr 2013 14:15:48 +0000

From Forbes.com There is a lot of buzz lately about entrepreneurship hotspots across the country. We hear about successful startups in many places, from Austin, Tex., to Reston, Va. What does this mean for entrepreneurs? If you’re launching a startup, does it really matter where you locate? Yes, it does matter. If you’re starting out, it’s by far best to be in either Silicon Valley or the Boston area. They remain the hottest centers of entrepreneurship and venture capital, so you’ll be in an inherently supportive ecosystem where entrepreneurship is as natural as drinking water. You’ll also be closer to funders, whether you need a few thousand dollars or millions. With a long history of investing, many of the angels and venture capitalists in these areas are bigger risk takers than investors elsewhere. With their successes, they look to roll their money from one big hit into others. These places are where the … Read More »

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