INSEAD Knowledge

Loading the Elevenlabs Text to Speech AudioNative Player... Have you ever noticed how talkative many CEOs can be, and how quickly they seize an opportunity to wax lyrical about their organisation, its products and services, and the markets it operates in? You might think some CEOs have sizeable egos that need to be maintained by seeing themselves featured in prominent media outlets. You might be right.

What can give the wisdom of the crowd a boost? And with AI now in the picture in many aspects of decision-making, is it enabling us to truly make better choices? This month, INSEAD faculty offer insights across the fields of leadership and organisations, marketing, as well as finance. These include how group discussions improve team performance and what happens to the quality of decisions when AI isn’t well-designed into the process.

Loading the Elevenlabs Text to Speech AudioNative Player... Leaders today must grapple with a complex world. Technological advancements have concentrated power in the hands of a few, deepening existing structural inequalities. Much of the internet runs on algorithms designed to amplify alarm and suppress complexity.

Loading the Elevenlabs Text to Speech AudioNative Player... “There is a special place in hell for women who don’t help each other.” Former United States Secretary of State Madeleine Albright’s enduring quip captures a widespread expectation that women who reach the top should pull others up behind them. Yet, it’s not uncommon for junior female employees to encounter women in senior roles who seem distant, unsupportive or even actively competitive.

Social media can help companies facilitate culture change by making the “invisible” aspects of culture more observable. But according to research by INSEAD faculty, this visibility can backfire if organisations aren’t careful. Another paper examines algorithmic pricing, now a norm in many industries, in relation to firms’ marketing strategies and regulatory frameworks.

When a CEO tells me they wished their employees were more capable at “self-organising”, I usually ask what exactly they mean. The answer matters for more than academic precision; leaders drawn to the notion of decentralisation routinely turn to self-organisation as the mechanism that will deliver it. The appeal is clear: Give people more autonomy, reduce bureaucracy and allow coordination to emerge naturally rather than through layers of management. In other words, let them “organise themselves”.

Should you judge a company’s performance by its earnings or cash flow? Cash flows are highly volatile and seasonal, while earnings are far smoother. That’s why accrual accounting – recording transactions when they occur, regardless of when money changes hands – can produce a clearer picture of financial performance. However, some recent studies have concluded that the timing role of accruals has largely disappeared.

Loading the Elevenlabs Text to Speech AudioNative Player... One of my patients, let’s call him Johan, came to my office complaining of burnout, although “complaining” is perhaps too lively a word for what I saw. With the mild embarrassment of a man returning a defective piece of equipment, he simply said, “Something in me no longer works.” Burnout, we are told, spans many domains. Emotionally, the person feels drained, cynical or just plain numb.

In a webinar hosted by Andrew Shipilov, Professor of Strategy at INSEAD, Liam Goodman, Chief Technology Officer at FIDEMI, referred to 2025 as the "transistor moment" for quantum computing – a tipping point where years of incremental progress have quietly shifted the technology from experimental to strategic. Investment in the sector grew 50% year on year, with public funding across more than 30 countries already passing .

Loading the Elevenlabs Text to Speech AudioNative Player... Everyone wants to make better decisions. To do so, many leaders turn to decision analysisto bring clarity, structure and speed to the process. But without certain foundations in place, even the most sophisticated analysis can produce misleading conclusions and ultimately prove ineffective. In a previous article, we explored three essentials for effective decision-making: bandwidth, purpose and options.