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ChangeThis
ChangeThis is our weekly series of essays from today's thought leaders that are meant to evoke conversation by bringing forth new and unique ideas.
ChangeThis
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Blog / ChangeThis
Turning Points: The Key to Success and Accomplishment in Life
By Bernie Swain
"In less than a decade, the company I co-founded and built, the Washington Speakers Bureau, became the world's biggest player in that business—and remains so now, more than 30 years after I took the sharp turn that reshaped my life. We have represented world leaders—including Presidents Reagan and both Bushes and four Prime Ministers of Great Britain—as well as business visionaries, sports legends, and leading journalists and authors. Over the course of the years, I have gotten close to many of my clients. And yes, they are a spectacularly accomplished group. But the secret sauce that is responsible for so much of their success isn't their talent per se. Instead, it is how they have dealt with the key turning points in their lives."
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Blog / ChangeThis
It's Your Turn
By Porchlight
"Diversity is not currently the norm on most corporate boards, though all the evidence says that the trend is moving in the right direction, however slowly. Along with the regulatory climate, there has been a seismic societal shift. Women are cracking the glass ceiling at an increasing rate, and we even have our first female Presidential candidate. New research says that having women on boards changes the way decisions are made, and it changes it for the better. Women should be on boards, and they are needed there. That pressure is also opening previously closed doors to allow more women on boards."
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Blog / ChangeThis
Hollywood's 'Moneyball' Moment: Why Entertainment Leaders Need Big Data Now
By Michael D. Smith, Rahul Telang
"For nearly a century, industry executives have relied on the same script: use industry experience and gut feel to pick the right products; sell these products to customers in a series of staggered release windows; and hope to win by creating blockbusters. For movies, this meant first selling high-priced tickets for single viewings of films in the theaters; then selling DVDs three months later that could be watched repeatedly at home; and then, six months to two years after that, licensing films to cable TV, where they could seemingly be watched for free. This method of selling content wasn't arbitrary. In an analog world it represented the most profitable way of make money from consumers who placed very different values on the movie. [. . . ] In recent years, however, a perfect storm of technological change has hit the entertainment industries. It involves the convergence of user-generated content, long-tail markets, and digital piracy, and it has diminished the profitability of the industries' traditional business model.
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Blog / ChangeThis
Why a Business Education? A Business School Dean's Manifesto
By Porchlight
"Why a business education? Why do students enter into business school, and what are their expectations? [...] I was surprised and pleased to see in the very first survey that the number one reason why students choose a business school education was that they wanted to make a difference in the world. 83% of respondents either agreed or strongly agreed with making a difference as a reason for entering business school. The "make a difference" response even beat out "I want to make a lot of money" (76%). Now we have something to work with—students who want to learn the skills and knowledge that will help them change our world. Wow."
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Blog / ChangeThis
The Midlife Gap Year: Why More Companies Should Offer Employee Sabbaticals
By Porchlight
"It's time to make a midcareer gap year an accepted part of people's working lives. The academic world has long recognized the importance of sabbaticals as a way to press the refresh button on one's life and work. Some companies (including Deloitte, Genentech, General Mills and Kimpton and PriceWaterhouseCoopers) offer sabbaticals to their employees, but these tend to last a few weeks to a few months—not enough time for a complete break from the daily grind. Rather than call a break from a nonacademic job a sabbatical, I think we need to call it a gap year—so that it is modeled after the year that some students take off between high school and college. For these young people just starting out in life, taking a gap year is a time to explore new interests and develop of sense of independence. For middle-age aged people, it can be a similar journey, but with more of the richness of the past to inform it. A midcareer gap year is an important step to incorporate into people's professional and personal lives because of two major societal changes: extended longevity and a transformed work world.
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Blog / ChangeThis
Advertising Isn't Dead, It's Just Woefully Overfunded
By Porchlight
"Brands will always need ways to communicate compelling messages to their target audiences, and consumers will always accept a certain amount of ad interruption if it means they can get free, or lower cost, access to content they want to consume. Also, believe it or not, consumers sometimes even enjoy advertisements. I know people who requested Ikea's catalog, opted in for Victoria Secret's emails, watched the Super Bowl solely because of the commercials, and I even admit to once voluntarily clicking on a Facebook ad. BUT, rest assured all is not well in ad-land. An awakening of sorts is happening amongst enlightened brand leaders who are starting to ask a different question. Rather than debate the viability of the craft, many are now wondering, "How little advertising can my brand get away with. " This is perhaps a bit scary for those who make their living in ad-related disciplines, but this is truly a better question. No business owner started a company because they wanted to advertise. Rather, they wanted to manufacture or sell a great product or service, and engage customers in meaningful ways.
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Blog / ChangeThis
Leadership Lessons from Poetry and Prose
By Bob Vanourek
"I have a life-long love of leadership, literature, and poetry, and I've realized over time that literature and poetry have a lot to teach us about leadership."
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Blog / ChangeThis
Leading Innovation From the New Middle
By George E. L. Barbee
"There is a new wave of innovation taking place inside many organizations that gives people an opportunity to make important, innovative contributions to business and to society. My beliefs about innovation have evolved and are now centered on three basic tenets: Most of us can be far more innovative in business than we give ourselves credit for—especially when we realize innovation is a lot broader than just invention. We can quickly learn to more innovatively observe and then transfer these innovations from one category to another. Being more innovative is, in fact, learnable and even self-teachable. [...] Innovation is more than an "I" thing... it's a "WE" thing. It is true that we must make a real, conscious effort to improve our own innovation skills. But there are also important changes that we can and should bring about in the organization. Together, this will allow us to begin leading innovation from the new middle."
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Blog / ChangeThis
How to Start When You're Stuck
By Jason W. Womack, Jodi Womack
"Maybe it's a career change, a health and fitness transformation or a personal project or side business you want to start, but for some reason—whatever it is—you haven't started yet. 'Not enough time.' 'Not enough resources.' 'Not enough support.' Statements like these not only limit your potential but hinder your productivity. In order to find the time, the resources and the support you need, you first need to GET MOMENTUM. You need more than a little motivation, but a true forward movement. Momentum means you're moving, and things are happening. It means you're making progress, and it feels good! Momentum is as personal in nature as it is different for everyone and for every project. What works for someone else may not work for you. The key is to practice thinking bigger and more creatively to put yourself in a position to move beyond the inertia that is holding you back from you dreams."
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Blog / ChangeThis
Networks Are Eating the World
By Barry Libert
"In the age of digital networks, businesses' abilities to create and share intangible assets, such as ideas, software, and relationships that are owned by each of us—the Network—has grown exponentially. Further, digital networks allow organizations to access assets that exist outside of their traditional boundaries. Uber is a transportation company without cars. Airbnb is a hotelier without properties. Amazon is retailer with stores. Network orchestrators—as we call them—are eating the world as we know it, changing the very nature of industries around the world. The key is their ability to reach and leverage each and every one of us and all our relationships, information and assets. This access to and relationship with us and what we have (cars and homes), do (labor) and know (relationships and expertise) are critical to their success—as are the digital platforms that they use to enable us to share what we have with others. In short, where Thomas Friedman wrote the book that laid the ground for this network revolution—The World is Flat—and Marc Andreessen followed on with his 2011 article—'Software is Eating the World'—it is now clear that those were the foundation for today's reality—networks are eating the world.
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The original idea behind ChangeThis came from Seth Godin, and was built in the summer of 2004 by Amit Gupta, Catherine Hickey, Noah Weiss, Phoebe Espiritu, and Michelle Sriwongtong. In the summer of 2005, ChangeThis was turned over to 800-CEO-READ. In addition to selling and writing about books, they kept ChangeThis up and running as a standalone website for 14 years. In 2019, 800-CEO-READ became Porchlight, and we pulled ChangeThis together with the rest of our editorial content under the website you see now. We remain committed to the high-design quality and independent spirit of the original team that brought ChangeThis into the world.