Marina Gorbis's Blog, page 1557

Moviegoers May Be Losing Interest in 3-D

The proportion of movie gross receipts from higher-priced 3-D showings is trending below 40% for the first time since the technology became widespread in 2009, says Entertainment Weekly. The 3-D percentages for recent releases Monsters University, World War Z, The Great Gatsby, and R.I.P.D. have been in the 30s, with Despicable Me 2 and Turbo in the 20s. Compare those with Avatar, whose 3-D share during its opening weekend in 2009 was 71%. Consumers may be tiring of the format, and of the hefty surcharges. Fox, Paramount, Disney, and Universal collectively spent $700 million on equipping theaters with 3-D projectors.

Bill Ackman Is Just Doing God's Work

Everybody has been piling on to hedge fund manager Bill Ackman lately. I'm not joining in. The man may have bitten off more than he can chew, dug himself in too deep, played with fire and gotten burned, or whatever other folksy metaphor you favor. But he's doing God's work. Or at least the market's.

Ackman's short-selling campaign against vitamin distributor Herbalife has blown up in his face, with the company's stock up more than 75% since he unveiled his position last December and some of his most prominent hedge fund competitors profiting from his misery.

Then there's JC Penney, where Ackman's push to remake the retailer under the leadership of former Apple Stores chief Ron Johnson has ended in red ink and recriminations. After 17 bold but financially disastrous months, JC Penney's board fired Johnson in April and reinstated his predecessor, Mike Ullman, as interim CEO. Last week Ackman wrote (and leaked) pair of letters in which he pushed for quicker action in finding a permanent replacement for Ullman and demanded the resignation of board chairman Tom Engibous. That led iconic Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz (who knows Ullman from Starbucks' board) to weigh in, telling The Financial Times that Ackman "has blood on his hands for being the one who brought Ron Johnson in" and arguing on CNBC that Ackman and Johnson had "ruined the lives of thousands of JC Penney employees and fractured shareholder value."

Schultz is may be right about that. But the choice of Johnson was a bold bet that didn't pay off — or at least didn't pay off in time. Sometimes that happens. And the whole reason Ackman jumped in at JC Penney in the first place is that the company's fortunes had been in decline. That's what activist hedge fund managers like Ackman do. They identify companies that they think could be worth a lot more than their share price indicates, and push for changes. Often these changes involve straightforward moves like spinning off subsidiaries, which Carl Icahn pushed Time Warner to do seven years ago and the company is finally getting around to now. Occasionally they get much more involved, as with Eddie Lampert's seemingly permanent (and not exactly successful) takeover of Sears and Kmart. And sometimes, when they think a company's stock is overvalued, they sell it short and try to convince the rest of the world that they're right.

Here's the thing. On balance, this stuff seems to work. That's the finding of a big new study by Harvard's Lucian Bebchuk, Duke's Alon Brav, and Columbia's Wei Jiang, which shows that companies targeted by activist hedge funds as undervalued markedly improve their operating performance in the subsequent five years. What's more, the authors write:

These improvements in long-term performance, we find, are present also when focusing on the two subsets of activist interventions that are most resisted and criticized — first, interventions that lower or constrain long-term investments by enhancing leverage, beefing up shareholder payouts, or reducing investments and, second, adversarial interventions employing hostile tactics.

It is of course a bit disturbing to see that five years is now considered the "long term." It also doesn't follow from Bebchuk, Brav, and Jiang's evidence that more hedge fund activism would necessarily be a good thing. The very rarity of such interventions helps make them successful. If there were thousands of Bill Ackmans out there, the results of their activism would presumably be far less impressive. But Ackman's current struggles illustrate why his extremely hands-on brand of investing will never become common. It involves going way out on a limb — and limbs (tree limbs, at least) are liable to break or get chopped off.

Now it is true that Ackman's behavior over the past couple of weeks has been petulant in the extreme, and Bill Cohan's epic Ackman profile in April's Vanity Fair makes clear that the guy is not always fun to hang out (or go biking) with. But a normal, well-balanced person would never go into this line of work. And it does appear to be useful work. Which is more than be said of a lot of other financial-market endeavors.

Hedge funds are often criticized as short-term speculators. Some are, some aren't. The particular brand of investing that Ackman and a small number of other hedge-fund managers practice is best described as medium-term. Ackman is no Warren Buffett, who holds on to companies for decades, but he's not obsessing over day-to-day market moves or quarterly earnings reports, either. He started developing his famous case against bond insurer MBIA in 2002, and had to wait till 2009 for it to pay off. At JC Penney, you could argue that it was the rest of the company's board that was too short-term-oriented to give Johnson's big plans a chance to play out (I'm not going to argue that, because things really were going terribly, but Ackman was on the long side of that particular disagreement). If you're concerned that a lot of mischief is wrought by Wall Street's obsession with short-term shareholder returns (and I am), Bill Ackman and his fellow activists really aren't the problem.

Become More Data-Driven by Breaking These Bad Habits

Becoming data-driven is a big, profitable deal, as recent academic work shows. I am delighted to see that more and more companies are looking to become more "data driven," and that the term is penetrating the lexicon ever more deeply. But not every manager is jumping on board with data. Many are threatened by data and work, perhaps subconsciously, to subvert its penetration into the culture. I call them "anti-datas."

But this post is not directed at the anti-datas. They're lost causes, beyond redemption and, frankly, on their way out. Instead, it's directed at those who are trying hard to become increasingly data-driven and in so doing build stronger futures for their companies, but who may have picked up some bad habits along the way. Over the years I've had the good fortune to work with plenty of individual decision-makers and groups, some terrific and some simply awful. From that work, I've distilled six bad habits that stymie managers and companies from taking full advantage of their data.

You prefer intuition over the data. We've all met managers who say things like, "I've been working in this industry twenty-five years and I've seen it all. I know I can trust my gut." They are proud of their experience and are skeptical of anything new. Interestingly, I find many managers who behave this way to be solid in most respects—they care about their companies and people. They desperately want to do the right things, and they are smart. But they go to great lengths to ignore, downplay, or subvert any evidence that suggests a better way. Some even re-interpret the data to reinforce their long-held mental models. The near-certain results are processes, operations, and teams that are increasingly out-of-date.

You rig the system. For some, the decision-making process involves developing the case supporting a decision after you've made it, while ignoring other evidence along the way. It is an especially perverse form of trusting one's intuition, which some might call "CYA." The Internet has made it easier—no matter what the opinion, there is always some data to support it. People figure out what you're up to and develop a healthy mistrust pretty quickly. So even when you are right, it becomes much more difficult to gain the support needed to execute your decision.

You second-guess others. The true spirit of second-guessing involves withholding potentially useful information, then pouncing the minute a decision goes wrong. We've all made mistakes and practically all of us have been second-guessed. Just because the trait is common, does not mean it is not destructive. Withholding information breeds mistrust and pouncing leads many to make more conservative and easily-defended, but sub-optimal, decisions. One observes this trait all the time in overly-political individuals and companies.

You have analysis-paralysis. Analysis-paralysis plagues people and companies that don't deal well with uncertainty. They can fall into the trap of seeking "just one more bit of confirmation" before deciding. They delay, delay, delay, seeking to make the perfect decision. It is easy for the paralyzed to argue that they are data-driven—after all, they are seeking more data! They don't realize that not making a decision is a decision in itself and can have consequences. Delay too long and the competitor may introduce that new product line first; a great candidate may go elsewhere; and an investor may withdraw its offer.

You employ group think. Group think involves packing a decision-making group with people who think in the same way and ignoring those with divergent views or data that points in a different direction. To illustrate the impact, imagine a situation in which there are one hundred options, several of which are "good" and one that is "best. Group think is akin to limiting yourself to only ten options. You greatly reduce your chances of arriving at a good one.

You have misconceptions of or arrogance about data quality. The antis are not opposed to data quality per se. More generally, they truly believe the little data they do use is of high-quality, even though they have no facts to back it up. But in some respects, these points don't matter, as they have great faith in their own abilities to detect and discount bad data, saying things like "I can spot an error a mile away." Finally, in some cases, they don't worry about data quality because they have such high opinions of their own intuition that they don't use the data anyway. Misconceptions about data make it easier to fall into all other bad habits.

Now take that hard look in the mirror. Look at the full list above and ask yourself, "Do I ever do that?" And if so, stop. It is of course, difficult to break multiple bad habits all at once. So if you're going to pick one to start, stop second-guessing others. More specifically, stop withholding and start sharing potentially useful information every chance you get. Doing so pays great dividends in the form of increased trust, better teamwork, and others sharing with you (though don't expect everyone else to be so forthcoming!).



Second, break the group think habit. This may be difficult, especially if you've hand-picked your management team and their careers depend on you. It helps to have a colleague who will provide direct, independent perspective. Give him or her a fair chance to "tell you you're full of it" before finalizing any important decision. And seek far more diverging opinions when they tell you this!

Finally, engage your management team in doing exactly the same thing for your organization. Make a pact with yourselves to call each other out any time you observe the trait. You need to provide true leadership here, as others will follow your example. Snap back at someone who tells you you're second-guessing and you've ended the exercise for good!

Instead, give and take feedback in an open, supportive manner. It's the only way to advance, and reap the benefits of, a data-driven culture.

The Eight-Minute Test That Can Reveal Your Effectiveness as a Leader

How can I determine if I am a good leader, or perhaps even a great one? What are my strengths, and do any rise to the very highest levels? I know I have some weaknesses (as everyone does), but are any of them so appalling as to derail my career?

Many people have asked us those questions over the years. For a truly comprehensive answer, we always recommend a well-constructed 360 evaluation, in which your own views of your strengths and weaknesses are enriched by those of your boss, your direct reports, your colleagues, and other associates.

But as a first step that you can do on your own, we've developed an abbreviated self-assessment which you can take here. That will give you some sense of what your leadership skills may be and how they compare to others, right now.

It will take you about eight minutes, and you will promptly receive a feedback report, which will compare the way you've rated yourself with similar self-scores of 45,000 leaders in our global database. The survey will also measure your current level of engagement and satisfaction in your leadership role.

Obviously, a brief self-assessment is not as valid as a more-extensive assessment that includes feedback from 10 or more of your colleagues, but it will help you understand which of the 16 leadership competencies we measure — such fundamentals as thinking strategically, displaying integrity, focusing on results, taking initiative, developing others, championing change, exhibiting expertise — are your likely strengths.



A score in the 90th percentile means you have an outstanding strength. A score in the 10th percentile (meaning you're worse than 90% of the people taking the test) may indicate a flaw so profound it could derail your career. We expect most of your scores will be somewhere in the middle.

But the answers may surprise you. You may think, for example, that your strong points are your technical skills only to find your own responses score you far higher on inspiring others than you might have believed.

With such an understanding you might embark on a personal development plan in which you move toward the goal of becoming an outstanding leader by developing a few of your middling strengths to the very highest levels. Sadly, we've found that fewer than 10% of leaders take the initiative to create a personal development plan with the explicit goal of becoming a better leader. Yet without a plan you are relying on luck and circumstance to make yourself more effective.

More's the pity since, as is often the case, we find a straightforward approach to be most effective: Once you identify your strengths, we've found, the surest path to improving your overall leadership effectiveness is to pick one and focus on improving that.

Which one should you start with? Think about which of the leadership competencies you have the passion and energy to pursue. Working to improve a competence that you're passionate about makes the possibility of change much more likely. At the same time, though, consider what your current organization both expects and needs from you. The intersection of your strengths, your passion, and your organization's needs defines the ideal place for you to target your development.

Once you identify a competence that meets those criteria, what's the next step? Can you turn a moderately scoring competency into a profound strength? The answer is yes, though perhaps not in the way you'd expect.

To improve a weakness, people typically use a linear approach. If you were a novice, for instance, who wanted to gain some technical expertise, you might take a class at the local university, read up on the subject, or ask an expert in your firm to be your mentor. But if you're already strong technically you won't get very much better with further classes or reading more than you already do.

Instead, you might use your already-strong technical skills to improve your leadership effectiveness if you learned, say, to communicate your expertise more effectively or teach those skills to your team. That is, you could strengthen your strength by developing skills that complement it, just as elite athletes do when they improve their already formidable talents through cross-training.

We have discovered in our research that between eight and 12 of these companion behaviors are associated with each competency. (You can see the entire set for all 16 differentiated competencies, and a fuller explanation of how to apply them, in the October 2011 HBR article "Making Yourself Indispensable.") By focused attention to applying these companion behaviors, leaders can and do make striking improvements.

What are your own greatest competencies? We look forward to hearing your thoughts about the results you discover.

How Apple Stores Can Keep From Turning Sour

What follows is a customer experience cautionary tale, illustrating the kind of lapse that can happen even at a company with a global reputation for being customer-centric. I suppose if it can happen at Apple Stores — meant to be a beacon of customer service — it can happen anywhere. But take note: beyond the caution is a tremendous opportunity, for Apple and other retailers.

I recently set up a Genius Bar appointment at my local Apple Store, for 9am sharp (when the store opens). I was the second person to take a seat at the Bar. While waiting — and waiting — for my Genius to show up (about 15 minutes) two or three groups of Geniuses came to the bar, looked intently at some device together, discussed, looked some more — but never said a word to me. When the Genius helping the first customer got done, he began tapping on his iPad. I was just a few feet away from him. After a few moments, I announced, "My man, I'm feeling invisible." The Genius, with a wry smile and hardly looking up from his iPad, assured me someone would be with me shortly. At that early hour, the store had many more blue shirts hanging around than customers. Yet at no time did anyone say, "Are you being helped?"

Since then I've mentioned the episode to two friends who themselves are avid Apple users. Instead of responding with, "Wow, that's never happened to me," they immediately related their own "Bad Apple" story.

Coincidentally, a recent article in the Wall Street Journal reports, among other things, that the last head of Apple Stores (post Ron Johnson) had changed the emphasis from customer service to sales and cost cutting. That's an old story in the business world, that typically doesn't end well — and one you don't expect a firm like Apple to illustrate. Sure enough, it's resulted in declining customer satisfaction, and Apple Stores' famous per square foot sales (the highest in retail) has declined this year.

Apple is now looking for someone to head up its retail operations, but some candidates have expressed wariness, saying that the company's top brass lack clear plans for the stores. Here are some suggestions to help Apple Stores fulfill their original promise, and get beyond it to a new kind of relationship with customers:

Build Real Community

I'm not talking about a social media effort of some sort. I'm talking about the real thing, live and in person. Apple now has more than 400 stores worldwide, an unmatched level of penetration into local communities. Those local communities, of course, contain legions of passionate Apple customers who are doing amazing things with Apple products. The stores, together with these customers, are potentially a customer community-building resource that could dwarf anything that Starbucks is doing.

Find Your Local Rock Star Customers

Instead of pushing the blue shirts to sell, push the stores to attract local "Rock Star" customers, who will in turn, introduce new life, and new motivated buyers into the Stores. In particular, find the customers who are doing amazing things with movies, gaming, workflow productivity, design, blogging, presentations — whatever your customers are most interested in. Find ones who are articulate, who like helping others, are appealing in appearance and demeanor. No doubt many of these folks already like to affiliate — perhaps they're blogging and drawing strong audiences. Get ready to deploy these customers using your Stores as a base. And don't worry about the cost of finding and engaging such folks. First, they won't be hard to find — these natural advocates have a way of making themselves known. They're always interested to build their "social capital." Second, when you invite them into your community building events, you'll find that they'll do amazing things to draw audiences and customers, and they won't cost you a thing.

Organize Live Presentations by Your Rock Stars

The Apple Store in my neighborhood is open from 9am to 9pm Monday through Saturday. That leaves wasted time and space. Why not try a morning commute presentation at 7am on "Seven Ways to Dramatically Increase Your Productivity." A Genius might be able to make such a presentation, but much more effective would be a local Rock Star entrepreneur — an impressive "peer" of other creative and successful customers — presenting cool things he's doing to improve his productivity using his iPad and iPhone. Then many more local entrepreneurs and business people would likely show up. Or try a "Late Show" (9 pm) by a local Rock Star developer showing how he's created amazing Apple-worthy Apps. You get the idea. And by the way, you can be sure that as soon as a high-profile customer knows he's been invited to present at an Apple Store, he's going to let all his friends know.

About Those Video Screens

During my extended wait time, I couldn't help but be struck by all the screens behind the bar containing staid looking Apple content that I had no interest in. Another wasted opportunity. Perhaps the most attention-grabbing business communications today are videos by customers showing how they're using new products they've purchased: Teenage girls on a shopping spree. Skateboarders showing their moves. Researchers showing how they conducted the experiment. And of course, Apple users showing the cool things they're doing with their iPhones, iPads or Macbooks.

Why didn't I see any of this during my recent visit? Also, if Apple were to start having interesting events in its stores, it could get fabulous video of those, too. Show customers who come into your store that it's not just a store, it's a community gathering place with all kinds of interesting things going on. Such activities will get local customers to sign up for your email lists so as not to miss out.

Orient the Customer Experience Around What Customers Can Accomplish

When the first Apple Stores were opened, they were organized around the firm's product lines as well as the things customers would want to do with the products — such as importing and editing movies. I don't see this in today's Apple stores. They look more like product displays you'd see in an ordinary retail store — iPads here, Macbooks there, iPhones to the left. I should see something that shows me how to Photoshop pics on my iPad; or how to configure Apple products for my kids; or the top 10 things I can do with my Mac/ iPad / iPhone to organize my life. There could be a couple of community tables in the store, with daytime presentations on these topics.

Such measures would, of course, require experimentation. But the results could be well worth it. There are three areas of huge, latent wealth that the Stores could play a central role in tapping: First, all of the capabilities and expertise that we Apple customers are carrying around. Second, going beyond the use of the physical Stores as mere ABS (always be selling) machines to build them into hubs for customer communities. And third, activating and leveraging the hundreds if not thousands of local Rock Star Apple customers who would jump at the chance to get involved, and to help build such communities. When this potential is unlocked, the devices would almost sell themselves.

IT Has To Deliver Great Tools — and Teach People to Use Them

In a workplace that is increasingly collaborative and knowledge-intensive, many CIOs plan to create value by delivering these capabilities effectively. No wonder collaboration and analysis tools make up the single largest category of IT project spend. But much of this value is being lost because employees lack the skills to use these resources effectively. In response, CIOs must rethink how IT provides employee support and training.

A recent CEB survey of 25,000 employees globally found that about half of an employee's contribution to business performance comes from their "network performance" — the ability to collaborate, to help others and, in turn, be helped by others, through activities such as teamwork, knowledge sharing, and peer coaching. Interestingly, network performance accounted for only about 20% of an employee's contribution to business performance a decade ago. Despite the growing importance of these skills, our survey found that only one in five employees is an effective network performer, the rest struggle to assist colleagues or make an impact when working in teams.

A similar story emerges around the ability to use data to make decisions. Another CEB survey found that more than 80% of employees collect data or use data for decision making. Even in traditionally transactional and process-centric fields such as manufacturing or customer service, more than half the employees undertake at least some knowledge work. Although almost everyone now does knowledge work, not everyone is effective at it. In fact, only 38% of employees have the skills and judgment to use data for decision making. The rest either blindly trust data regardless of its quality, or they are overly skeptical and ignore sound analysis altogether and go with their guts.

Here's the challenge for CIOs: IT is asked to deliver ever more capable tools for collaboration and analytics, but no one is responsible for ensuring employees have the skills to use them. The result is wasted investment, and an IT team that once again faces questions about value.

The whole C-suite has a stake in fixing this problem, and we believe that IT must play a part. We have seen progressive CIOs switch the focus of IT support and training from teaching employees about the functionality of a tool, to teaching them the skills they need to use the tool effectively in their jobs. Consider the following examples:

Assess Team Readiness for Collaboration. Before setting up a collaboration tool, the IT group at a leading industrial company provides the team requesting the tool with a simple checklist to assess their readiness to collaborate. The checklist measures the clarity of the team's objectives and workplans, and the strength of the relationship and communications between team members. It is used to flag potential problems within the team that can be remedied before the tool is deployed.

Hire Quants Who Can Coach. Many IT teams include a group of analysts who conduct analysis and produce reports. These individuals are highly skilled in analytic techniques and know the data inside out, but very few have the coaching skills to help others benefit from their expertise. However, a handful of organizations are redefining these analyst roles and changing the hiring criteria so that coaching and communication skills become as important as technical skills.

Teach the Decision, Not the Tool. The business intelligence team at a leading retailer revamped the training it offers the company's employees. In the past, employees were taught how to use the latest BI tools, now they can access a portfolio of resources to help them use the company's data to make smart decisions. For example, IT runs roadshows where employees learn how to capture new customer insights from a particular data asset, and provides e-learning with tips and tricks on spotting when data may be misleading.

While many IT leaders are reluctant to involve IT more deeply in training, these examples are all ways in which CIOs are taking capabilities IT already has — teams dedicated to collaboration and BI, expert data analysts, spending on employee training and support — and adapting them to ensure that money spent on collaboration and analytics pays back through greater employee productivity and insight.

Reinventing Corporate IT
An HBR Insight Center





The Building Blocks of Successful IT
Move Beyond Enterprise IT to an API Strategy
It's C-Suite Problem
Avoiding the Schizophrenic IT Organization

"Feminine" Values Can Give Tomorrow's Leaders an Edge

A Pew Center study released in May revealed that working mothers are the sole or primary provider in a record 40 percent of U.S. households. Only a few days before, hedge fund billionaire Paul Tudor-Jones created a stir by remarking at a conference that women will never rival men as traders because babies are a "focus killer".

Here we have the dynamics of a new economy colliding with the old establishment like tectonic plates. But as developed nations restructure from manufacturing to knowledge and services, my bet is on the moms, or more specifically, women — and men who can think like them. Survey data my colleague Michael D'Antonio and I gathered from 64,000 people in nationally representative samples in 13 countries — from the Americas and Europe to Asia — point to widespread dissatisfaction with typically "male" ways of doing business and a growing appreciation for the traits, skills and competencies that are perceived as more feminine.



The results, published in our new book The Athena Doctrine, reveal that 57% of people were dissatisfied with the conduct of men in their country, including 79% of Japanese and South Koreans and more than two-thirds of people in Indonesia, Mexico, U.K and the United States. This sentiment is amplified among the millennial generation (young men and women age 18-30) of whom nearly 80%are dissatisfied — most notably in highly masculine societies like Brazil, South Korea, Japan and India.

If people have grown cold on male-dominated structures and leadership, they offer a solution: Two-thirds of survey respondents felt that "The world would be a better place if men thought more like women", including 76% of the French and Brazilians and 70%of Germans. Those stats include majorities of men who equate masculine incumbency with income disparity, continuing high levels of unemployment and political gridlock.

Curious as to how leaders could "think more like women," we asked half our sample — 32,000 people around the world — to classify 125 different human characteristics as either masculine, feminine or neither, while the other half rated the same words (without gendering) on their importance to leadership, success, morality and happiness. Statistical modeling revealed strong consensus that what people felt was "feminine" they also deemed essential to leading in an increasingly social, interdependent and transparent world.

We next visited 18 countries, interviewing over 100 innovative women and men in medicine, politics, education, start-ups, NGOs and other sectors of the economy. Here are two of many examples we came across that show how anyone can lead with a more feminine ethos:

Empathy Is Innovation. While leaders spend considerable time and effort trying to envision markets and pushing out innovation, empathy can often generate simple, yet breakthrough ideas. In her years working as an advocate for charities in Britain and abroad, Anna Pearson noticed a pattern: there were many people who wanted to volunteer — but were too busy (or had schedules too varied) to commit to a cause. To bridge the gap between what volunteers could give and what people need, Anna re-imagined volunteering on a very small scale. Her London-based non-profit Spots of Time connects organizations with people who can give an hour or so at a time, and often at a moment's notice. The lesson? Anna trained her empathy not just on beneficiaries of charity but also on volunteers. That kindness and sensitivity to others was the catalyst for creativity.

Vulnerability Is Strength.You can't read a business article today without hearing about "learning from failure". (A Google search for the phrase yields 129 million results.) But maybe there'd be less failing if we were willing to admit what we don't know in the first place. In Berlin we met Dr. Ijad Madisch, a Harvard-trained virologist who kept "getting stuck" in his experiments. When he asked his colleagues for help, he was chastised. Big-time scientists were supposed to project an image of supreme competence. Madisch realized that science needed a global community where the work took precedence over egos. So he started ResearchGate, a social network for scientists, which now has some 3 million members across 200 countries. The lesson? By letting down his guard and showing candor and humility, Madisch not only helped himself but also inspired others to join his cause. This advanced research far more rapidly than the old approach of working in cubicles and meeting at conferences.

Today's work requires a new leadership paradigm. Look at the list of competencies above and — whether you're a man or a woman — start working on them.

Car Density on China's Roads Rivals That of Los Angeles

Every kilometer of road in China has an average of about 200 cars, as many as in Los Angeles, one of America's most congested cities, according to a Wall Street Journal report quoting UBS Securities. The average speed of car traffic in 14 Chinese cities is less than 20 kilometers per hour, and in Beijing it is significantly lower. Chinese cities are taking steps to restrict the number of cars on the road. Shanghai, for example, issues 9,000 to 10,000 license plates per month, auctioning each at an average price of 82,000 yuan ($13,400).

Seven Tips for Shifting a Mindset in Your Organization

We're all fascinated by new ideas and how they can grab hold of us, influencing how we think and affecting how we take action. How does Atul Gawande (the checklist doctor) get inside my head, when others don't? Why does Gwyneth Paltrow make me adjust my behaviors, when others can't?

In business, especially, we're inundated with new ideas—so many we can hardly process or evaluate them.

If you have tried introducing a new idea into your organization or community—especially if it's an abstract idea like sustainability, diversity, or innovativeness—you know it's tough. People may ignore your idea, pooh-pooh it, or just steal it. You put your energy, your reputation, and maybe your future, on the line.

Still, when you have an idea you think is valuable and could change things for the better, some inexplicable force may compel you to "go public" with it. You want to change a prevailing mindset and you're willing to stick your neck out, at least a little, to do it.

The question is how, especially when you're not Gawande or Paltrow, to change an organization from the inside when you don't necessarily have a ton of formal authority on your side.

Take a look at what the "idea entrepreneur" does. This is the new type of cultural player—idea-driven people like Gawande and Paltrow, Michael Pollan (food), Cesar Millan (dogs), Blake Mycoskie (business = philanthropy), and many others—who reach large audiences and gain widespread influence.

These are independent operators. They're wealthy and famous. They publish books and appear on TV. But do their methods of idea-spreading apply to the office-dweller, the organizational citizen, the manager or executive? The answer is yes, with some modifications.

To illustrate, let me introduce Samantha Joseph, who works for Iron Mountain Incorporated, a leader in records storage and information management services. Sam is young, ambitious, and idea-driven: she believes that for-profit companies can drive significant business value when they take a strategic approach to social and environmental sustainability. After earning her MBA from MIT in 2009, Sam could not find a position in sustainability, so she joined Iron Mountain as a manager in strategy, knowing the company had no sustainability function and hoping to build it.

Sam saw opportunity. She plunged into the strategy job, but also began to work on bringing the idea of sustainability to Iron Mountain—an exciting if daunting task, considering the number of employees, locations, facilities, trucks, and other real assets involved.

Here are some of the things that big-time idea entrepreneurs do that Sam adapted for her quest:

Accumulate evidence. To gain influence for an idea, you need an awful lot of supporting material—data, references, cases, stories, and analysis—which can take decades to gather. Sam didn't have that long, but she did accumulate enough material to make her the "resident expert." It took her a year to develop her case—largely on her own time—before she started talking about sustainability in public. But she was talking privately with lots of people all the while: gathering opinions, refining the ideas and practices, making connections and gaining supporters.
Develop practices. An idea is an abstraction that won't produce change until you provide people with specific, practical ways to put it into everyday use. Cesar Millan's ideas get their teeth from his training methods of "calm assertiveness." Sam worked with colleagues from across Iron Mountain to develop a volunteer program, a solar energy pilot, and a strategic charitable partnership—which got people doing sustainability without having to pledge allegiance to a theory first.
Create a sacred expression. Practices without theory are nothing more than tips and techniques. You need to find your best form and use it to create a "sacred" expression—a talk, a video, a written piece, a visual—the most complete, authoritative, and compelling articulation of your idea that you can manage. Sam put together a short video that made the case, showed how Iron Mountain was involved with the community, and got people energized and emotionally engaged.
Encourage "respiration" around your idea. Sam did not expect to do a TED talk or appear on Colbert, but she needed to engage with the audiences who would be most affected by, and most able to implement, the sustainability idea. The only way to get an idea breathing on its own is to show up, in person. Sam put together a road-show and visited many of Iron Mountain's corporate departments and facilities, conversing and responding to questions. After she left, people kept talking. The idea started to come to life.
Include your personal narrative. Idea entrepreneurs always present their idea in the context of their own life story. Dr. Berry Brazelton, expert on babies, relates anecdotes about himself as a kid. Sam talked about how her fascination with sustainability arose from an early family relationship. She presented the business case first, but the personal story gave the idea personality.
Align with a metric. Influence cannot be definitively measured in financial terms, but people need some way to calculate its the value. People associate Malcolm Gladwell's idea of mastery through the "10,000 hours of practice" metric. As the sustainability practices took hold at Iron Mountain, Sam measured and reported on key performance indicators—particularly cost savings—along with non-financial measures, such as volunteer participation rates, that demonstrated its success.
Expect backlash. When you propose a new idea, expect an intense response—from useful debate to useless sniping. Sam didn't experience direct backlash, but she did come up against some challenges. She spent almost a year talking and debating, pushing and being pushed, before respiration began to take hold. She realized (as all idea entrepreneurs do) that an intense response—positive and negative—is a sign that people are taking the idea seriously. No challenges, no point.

Each path to influence, and each change of mindset, looks different. Within two years, Iron Mountain had reduced its carbon footprint, helped archive the blueprints of some of the world's most historic sites, and donated 65,000 volunteer hours to community efforts, among other initiatives. And today, corporate responsibility activities are started and driven by employees all over the country.

Sam most directly knows the idea has gained influence when someone says to her: I'm so proud of what we're doing. One-on-one validation is a powerful metric.

How Motivational Focus Drives Performance

Every person is motivated differently. Great managers know this and adjust their leadership style based on motivations. In her book Focus, Heidi Grant Halvorson identifies two types of motivational focus that drive behaviors. She groups people as:

Promotion-focused. People motivated by promotion want to advance and avoid missed opportunities. They see goals as a path for advancement. They are eager, comfortable taking chances, work quickly, dream big, think creatively, and play to win. Unfortunately, they can be prone to error, may not think things through, and can be unprepared if things go wrong.

Prevention-focused. These individuals see goals as responsibilities and concentrate on staying safe. They worry what might go wrong and play to not lose. They work slowly and meticulously, aren't the most creative, but often have excellent analytical and problem-solving skills.

By understanding your focus and that of others, leaders have the power to better motivate themselves and everyone around them.

In this interactive HBR webinar, Heidi Grant Halvorson explains how to identify a person's motivational focus, how to change this focus, and how to use it in the right way to get results.