INSEAD Knowledge Podcast

What does it take to transform the idyllic Greek island of Tilos into the first zero-waste island? Can this circular model be extended to other islands and even other parts of the world? These are questions the INSEAD Sustainable Business Initiative seeks to answer in its first research collaboration with Polygreen – a network of companies that offers integrated and innovative circular economy solutions worldwide.INSEAD Knowledge speaks to Atalay Atasu, Professor of Technology and Management and academic director of the Sustainable Business Initiative at INSEAD and Imran Gill, CEO for the Middle East at Polygreen. Our guests speak about the Just Go Zero Tilos initiative and how Tilos could well be the role model to help organisations take sustainable and circular systems from inspiration to execution.

Love them or loathe them, Chinese tech giants such as ByteDance, Alibaba and Tencent have become global household names in e-commerce, digital payments, social media and gaming in a few short years. Relatively little is known about these firms, but a new book may just change that.Written by INSEAD Professor of Strategy Guoli Chen and Jianggan Li, founder and chief executive of venture capital firm Momentum Works, Seeing the Unseen: Behind Chinese Tech Giants' Global Venturing shines a light on the success – and failure – of the likes of TikTok, Shein and WeChat beyond their home market of China.Make sure to visit INSEAD Knowledge for the latest in impactful research and cutting edge thought leadership from INSEAD, the Business School for the World.

From the challenges of hybrid working to the quiet quitting trend, the Covid-19 pandemic has had a seismic impact on the workplace, leaving many companies struggling to understand how best to understand and meet employees' needs and motivations. In this INSEAD Knowledge podcast, Associate Professor of Organisational Behaviour Mark Mortensen proposes a more holistic approach to understanding employees’ needs, while offering practical solutions to ensure that they remain fully invested in their organisation and its goals.This conversation is based on research Mark co-authored with Amy C Edmondson and first published in the January 2023 HBR Magazine article Rethink Your Employee Value Proposition. Listeners can access the free survey tool discussed in the podcast here: Integratedevp.org.Make sure to visit INSEAD Knowledge for the latest in impactful research and cutting edge thought leadership from INSEAD, the Business School for the World.

The engine a multinational uses to create novel ideas is often an "innovation outpost". In this INSEAD Knowledge podcast, INSEAD Professor Felipe Monteiro shares his research on these outposts and the ways that multinationals manage to integrate innovation.

Does taking photos during an experience helps us enjoy it more, or not? Alixandra Barasch, INSEAD Visitor Professor of Marketing, joins us to discuss the interplay between immersion in an experience and common fears of being judged on social media. Barasch also shares advice on the type of photos we should share online if we want observers to feel more connected to us. In addition, tech can influence our well-being through reinforcing the repetition of good behaviour. For instance, when apps draw our attention to streaks, it increases the odds of us continuing. But, as Barasch’s research shows, it can be a double-edged sword.

Why is it so hard to lose weight and keep it off? Is it because willpower is a scarce resource? Or could there perhaps be a biological component? Hilke Plassmann, Octapharma Chaired Professor of Decision Neuroscience at INSEAD, joins us to discuss how newly discovered connections between the gut and the brain are making scientists rethink the issue of food choice. As researchers like Plassmann discover more about this complicated system, we may be edging closer to developing ways to hack it. And this would give us far more powerful weapons than mere willpower in controlling junk-food cravings and temptations. It may also help societies conquer the spreading obesity epidemic and ease the burdens of its current sufferers.

In this INSEAD Knowledge podcast, Professor Morten Bennedsen, the Academic Director of the Wendel International Centre for Family Enterprise at INSEAD, talks about how the experience of bringing in talent from outside the family can rejuvenate family firms. Professionalisation is “about having the right leadership skills at any level in the organisation and moving the family firm from a one-man band, from this famous creative person with very little corporate government structure to the full symphony orchestra” – including a CEO and the board – of a well-managed firm. Bennedsen views the process as the development of organisational structure that encompasses all the firm’s human resources towards a common goal, like an orchestra.

Unlike men, CEOs are not all created equal. Whether it’s due to national culture, industry, personality and timing, captains of industry or public service run the gamut between powerful leaders or symbolic figureheads. INSEAD Professor of Strategy Guoli Chen draws on nearly two decades of research into chief executives, leadership teams and corporate strategy to illuminate the factors that determine CEO impact, and how such impact manifests in corporate activities and performance. A narcissistic CEO, for instance, will engage in vastly different mergers and acquisitions and corporate social responsibility compared to an executive of lesser ego. Chen also sizes up increasingly prominent members of the C-suite such as the chief financial officer and the chief sustainability officer. But whatever the power of any one person, as Chen tells it, few can live up to the “romance of leadership”. Read more: https://knowledge.insead.edu/strategy/do-ceos-matter-16456

Our relationship to products and brands is complicated. Our opinion of them is shaped by how they make us feel as much as what they do for us. Tim Kobe, founder of strategic design firm Eight Inc., knows this all too well. Starting with his pioneering work on the initial Apple Store concepts, he's helped global brands find their voice -- and new heights of profitability -- by leveraging the emotional experience they provide to customers. Kobe and Roger Lehman, INSEAD Senior Affiliate Professor of Entrepreneurship and Family Enterprise, wrote the new book Return on Experience, which explains how and why great experiences are what move the needle most for companies these days. Essentially, it's all about empathy, expressed through great design that provides "extraordinary human success". Example: the contagious creativity and innovative spirit infused in the first iPhones. But too many executives are suspicious of leveraging empathy as a business value. Consequently, they risk missing out on the greatest source of value they could bring to their customers and organisation. Read more: https://knowledge.insead.edu/entrepreneurship/whos-afraid-of-the-experience-economy-16411

Many executives have a nagging sense that something is amiss in their lives. But not all of them find the courage – or the tools – to tackle what needs fixing. In his new book, The CEO Whisperer, Manfred Kets de Vries, INSEAD Distinguished Professor of Leadership Development and Organisational Change, shares lessons and insights he gleaned from decades of helping CEOs and executives become their best selves. First and foremost, he encourages leaders to know themselves and to step away from their manically busy schedules in order to self-reflect. He also discusses the tools he has been using in his long-running INSEAD seminar, The Challenge of Leadership. These include the storytelling-based life case study, dream analysis and a thorough examination of one’s inner theatre. A fully trained psychoanalyst, Kets de Vries has pioneered the art of team coaching as a way to promote better behavioural patterns. His experience has taught him that most changes are incremental, but they do share an element of pain, as a critical motivator. To those who worry about making mistakes on their journey of change, he offers an important reminder: Life is not a rehearsal.Read more: https://knowledge.insead.edu/blog/insead-blog/what-it-means-to-embark-on-a-journey-of-change-16071