Winning Moves Blog

Yahoo CEO Marissa Meyer deserves praise. She is saying the right things about what Yahoo must do to regain momentum and put itself on the path to success. Based upon my 25+ years researching business success and failure patterns, what Meyer says she wants to do fits the patterns of success–at least on a big picture level. This is a plus since many companies stumble largely because Continue reading “Can Yahoo Succeed by Returning to Its Roots?” »

Both Southwest Airlines and Google began as entrepreneurial start-ups that grew rather rapidly into major corporations. Both have been extremely successful, even after growing quite large. Both were the subject of articles in the January 14, 2013 issue of Fortune magazine, and both articles included the founders’ views on change.

It is easy to come away from those two Fortune articles with the impression that Continue reading “Should Businesses Make Big Changes or Stick to What They Know?” »

I enjoyed the reader comments about data scientists that Harvard Business Review published in its December print edition. These comments addressed articles Harvard had published about Big Data. Some of these comments agree with my earlier blog post where I explained that not all data scientists are required to have computer coding skills, although others felt coding skills were integral to the success of Big Data.

It is encouraging that some Continue reading “Follow-Up on Data Scientists” »

As someone who has studied and analyzed histories of many companies over the past 25 years, I want to praise the article in the December 2012 issue of Harvard Business Review “History as a Leadership Tool” by John T. Seaman and George David Smith. In my work, I analyze and interpret business history, to identify and understand why companies succeed or fail. But, unlike the authors of the Harvard article, Continue reading “Business History Teaches Valuable Lessons” »

The October issue of Harvard Business Review featured articles on Big Data. One of them, “Data Scientists: the Sexiest Job of the 21st Century” by Thomas H. Davenport and D.J. Patil, discusses the role and skills of data scientists, the professionals charged with making discoveries from Big Data. The article lays good groundwork regarding who data scientists are and what they do.

Yet, the article misses the mark in a key area, since Continue reading “Success with Big Data Requires More than High Tech Skills” »