Lately companies have come to recognize the limitations of the view that they must create value only for shareholders. Recognizing that every stakeholder has an impact on other stakeholders-engaged employees improve customer satisfaction, which in turn spurs growth, and so on-many CEOs are pledging to generate benefits for all their constituents: customers, workers, suppliers, communities, and investors. But few leaders have explicit strategies for doing so; most seem to rely on intuitive approaches. The good news is, firms can use data to design and implement effective stakeholder strategies. They should start by exploring outside perspectives of the value they produce-specifically, the ratings of agencies like the Drucker Institute and Just Capital. Firms must then bolster data from such third parties with inside insights and gain an understanding of the interdependencies among their particular stakeholders. Armed with that, they can develop a clear description of their purpose, establish criteria for evaluating progress toward it, set priorities among stakeholders, and start measuring value creation for each group. The last step is sustaining the new strategy through cultural change and by developing supporting processes and organizational structures.

When the dot-com bubble burst 10 years ago, the ensuing collapse wiped out half of all online retailers. Today, e-commerce is well established and much digital retailing is now highly profitable. As it evolves, digital retailing is quickly morphing into something so different that it requires a new name: omnichannel retailing. The name reflects the fact that retailers will be able to interact with customers through countless channels--websites, physical stores, kiosks, direct mail and catalogs, call centers, social media, mobile devices, gaming consoles, televisions, networked appliances, home services, and more. If traditional retailers hope to survive, they must embrace omnichannel retailing and also transform the one big feature Internet retailers lack--stores--from a liability into an asset. They must turn shopping into an entertaining, exciting, and emotionally engaging experience by skillfully blending the physical with the digital. They must also hire new kinds of talent, move away from outdated measures of success, and become adept at rapid test-and-learn methodologies. A successful omnichannel strategy should not only guarantee a retailer's survival--no small matter in today's environment--but also deliver a revolution in customers' expectations and experiences.

With so many management tools out there, from benchmarking to outsourcing, it's hard to decide which ones to try. To help executives make informed choices, the authors compare levels of use and satisfaction for the most popular tools, and chart the evolution of a select few.