MIT Sloan Management Review Sustainable Innovation
- Build Better Pay-for-Performance (PFP) Compensation Plansby Gordon M. Sayre, Brice Corgnet, Roberto Hernán González, and Simon Gächter. <p>Gordon M. Sayre is an assistant professor of management at Emlyon Business School, where he studies the ways work impacts employee well-being. Brice Corgnet is a professor of organizational economics at Emlyon Business School, whose research uses lab and field experiments to study work incentives and workplace behavior. Roberto Hernán González is a professor of behavioral economics at the Université Bourgogne Europe, Burgundy School of Business (Dijon, France), doing research on work incentives, motivation, and workplace behavior. Simon Gächter is a professor of the psychology of economic decision-making at the Centre for Decision Research and Experimental Economics at the University of Nottingham, doing research on behavioral consequences of incentives. </p> on January 8, 2026 at 12:00 pm
Carolyn Geason-Beissel/MIT SMR | Getty Images An increasing number of companies are tying employees’ compensation to their performance, and for good reason. The pay-for-performance (PFP) model has always been common in sales but has expanded in recent years to public school systems and even doctors’ offices, where 45% of doctors now receive PFP, up from
- Your People Are Not All Rightby Melissa Swift. <p><a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/swiftmelissa/" target="_blank">Melissa Swift</a> is the founder and CEO of organizational consulting firm Anthrome Insight. She is also the author of <cite>Work Here Now: Think Like a Human and Build a Powerhouse Workplace</cite> (Wiley, 2023) and the forthcoming <cite>Effective: How to do Great Work in a Fast-Changing World</cite> (Wiley, 2026).</p> on January 7, 2026 at 12:00 pm
Alice Mollon “People are not OK,” professor and author Brené Brown told an audience in October. She’s right. The mood she points to — “emotionally dysregulated, distrustful, and disconnected” — is visible everywhere you look. We’re seeing public CEO meltdowns, as well as pervasive well-being challenges on a worldwide workforce scale. In one stunning study,
- Five Trends in AI and Data Science for 2026by Thomas H. Davenport and Randy Bean. <p>Thomas H. Davenport <a href="https://x.com/tdav" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">(@tdav)</a> is the President’s Distinguished Professor of Information Technology and Management and faculty director of the Metropoulos Institute for Technology and Entrepreneurship at Babson College, and a fellow of the MIT Initiative on the Digital Economy. His latest book is <cite>The New Science of Customer Relationships: Delivering the One-to-One Promise With AI</cite> (Wiley, 2025). Randy Bean (<a href="https://x.com/RandyBeanNVP" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">@randybeannvp</a>) has been an adviser to Fortune 1000 organizations on data and AI leadership for over four decades. He is the author of <cite>Fail Fast, Learn Faster: Lessons in Data-Driven Leadership in an Age of Disruption, Big Data, and AI</cite> (Wiley, 2021).</p> on January 6, 2026 at 12:00 pm
Carolyn Geason-Beissel/MIT SMR | Getty Images Organizations tend to change much more slowly than AI technology does these days. This means that forecasting enterprise adoption of AI is a bit easier than predicting technology change in this, our third year of making AI predictions. Neither of us is a computer or cognitive scientist, so we
- Stop Making Hollow Apologies at Workby Jim Detert. <p><a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/jimdetert/" target="_blank">Jim Detert</a> is the John L. Colley Professor of Business Administration at the University of Virginia’s Darden School of Business and the author of <cite>Choosing Courage: The Everyday Guide to Being Brave at Work</cite> (Harvard Business Review Press, 2021).</p> on January 5, 2026 at 12:00 pm
Harry Haysom/Ikon Images Chad repeatedly undermined Sue by sharing private information behind her back to her subordinates. When Sue confronted him, Chad said he was sorry in order to move past the issue. Brenda continuously micromanaged her subordinates, leading to feelings of disrespect and low morale among her team members. When they talked to her
- Calm: The Underrated Capability Every Leader Needs Nowby Lynda Gratton. <p><a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/lynda-gratton-3b179813/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Lynda Gratton</a> is a professor of management practice at London Business School and founder of HSM Advisory. Her most recent book is <cite>Redesigning Work: How to Transform Your Organization and Make Hybrid Work for Everyone</cite> (MIT Press, 2022).</p> on December 30, 2025 at 12:00 pm
Chris Gash As companies push for greater productivity, an uncomfortable truth is emerging: Many employees no longer have the capacity to keep up. Leaders describe the same pattern everywhere — too many meetings, too little time to think, constant digital interruption, and a pace that leaves no room for recovery. Beneath these symptoms lies a
- The Top Five MIT SMR Videos of 2025by MIT SMR Editors. on December 29, 2025 at 12:00 pm
Our most-watched video of the year took on a tough topic: the hype surrounding artificial intelligence. MIT economist and Nobel laureate Daron Acemoglu grabbed readers’ attention with his no-nonsense take on what AI will and won’t do to the modern economy and employment — earning hundreds of thousands of views and sparking a spirited discussion
- Three Steps Toward Fairer Talent Managementby Binna Kandola. <p><a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/binnakandola/" target="_blank">Binna Kandola</a> is a business psychologist and senior partner at Pearn Kandola, a U.K.-based consultancy. He is the author of <cite>Designing for Diversity: Developing Inclusive and Equitable Talent Management Processes</cite> (Kogan Page, 2025).</p> on December 23, 2025 at 12:00 pm
Carolyn Geason-Beissel/MIT SMR | Getty Images Despite decades of effort to improve diversity, most organizations continue to struggle with ensuring fairness in how they identify, develop, and promote talent. Traditional approaches still rely on narrow leadership prototypes. Opaque processes and behaviors subtly reinforce exclusion. Practices often replicate existing power structures, unintentionally marginalizing individuals from underrepresented
- From Crisis to Coopetition: What Leaders Can Learn From Anesthesiologistsby Halle Tecco. <p>Halle Tecco is a health care investor and a professor at Columbia Business School. This article is adapted from the forthcoming book <cite><a href="https://www.massivelybetterhealthcare.com/" target="_blank">Massively Better Healthcare: The Innovator’s Guide to Tackling Healthcare’s Biggest Challenges</a></cite>, by Halle Tecco, published by Columbia Business School Publishing © 2026. Used by arrangement with the publisher. All rights reserved.</p> on December 22, 2025 at 12:00 pm
Matt Harrison Clough In 1982, millions of Americans tuned in to the ABC news program 20/20 to watch an exposé that shook the medical world to its core. The segment, titled “The Deep Sleep: 6,000 Will Die or Suffer Brain Damage,” told harrowing stories of patients harmed by anesthesia errors. The narrator warned viewers, “If you are going to
- AI Coding Tools: The Productivity Trap Most Companies Missby MIT Sloan Management Review . on December 18, 2025 at 12:00 pm
Have your engineering teams embraced generative AI for coding projects? If not, they likely will soon. But there’s a paradox: While these tools can deliver real productivity gains, they can also create hidden risks that could cripple your systems months or even years later. In this video, MIT Sloan Management Review features editor Kaushik Viswanath
- How Procter & Gamble Uses AI to Unlock New Insights From Databy Thomas H. Davenport and Randy Bean. <p>Thomas H. Davenport (<a href="https://x.com/tdav" target="_blank">@tdav</a>) is the President’s Distinguished Professor of Information Technology and Management and faculty director of the Metropoulos Institute for Technology and Entrepreneurship at Babson College, and a fellow of the MIT Initiative on the Digital Economy. His latest book is <cite>The New Science of Customer Relationships: Delivering the One-to-One Promise With AI</cite> (Wiley, 2025). Randy Bean (<a href="https://x.com/RandyBeanNVP" target="_blank">@randybeannvp</a>) has been an adviser to Fortune 1000 organizations on data and AI leadership for over four decades. He is the author of <cite>Fail Fast, Learn Faster: Lessons in Data-Driven Leadership in an Age of Disruption, Big Data, and AI</cite> (Wiley, 2021).</p> on December 17, 2025 at 12:00 pm
Carolyn Geason-Beissel/MIT SMR | Getty Images Few organizations can legitimately claim to have been doing analytical research for over a century. But in 1924, Procter & Gamble CEO William Cooper Procter asked Paul “Doc” Smelser, an economist at P&G for 34 years, to find out how many customers used Ivory soap to clean their bodies
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