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In 2007 Enterprise was celebrating its 50 years in business and its ranking as the largest car rental company in the world--one that had always concentrated on "home city" rather than airport rentals. But when Vanguard (which owned National and Alamo) and the Dollar Thrifty Automotive Group approached agreement on a merger that February, Enterprise decided to step in. By acquiring National and Alamo, the company could radically boost its airport presence. It would, however, face big operational and cultural differences. Vanguard accepted the Enterprise offer, and Taylor's company began what he describes as a "deliberate integration." Being a family-owned organization, Enterprise could resist short-term financial pressure; Taylor announced that as part of the integration process, Vanguard would operate as an autonomous subsidiary for at least a year. During that time Enterprise learned a lot about airport operations--and taught a lot about achieving high customer satisfaction. It also came to see that each of the three brands was positioned to serve a well-defined segment, so it worked to reinforce the distinct character of each while looking for operational ways to leverage joint ownership. The decision to adapt Enterprise's highly decentralized organizational structure meant that its general managers would have to be equipped to oversee big, factorylike operations at airports, and Vanguard managers would need a better understanding of the home-city market. The deliberate approach was a great success: The deal paid for itself in less than three years; total revenue now surpasses $13 billion; and combined market share climbed from about 28% to more than 33%.

Managing resource constraints, controlling health care costs, training the 21st-century workforce, implementing smart-grid technologies--challenges of this scope can't be addressed unless government, business, and NGOs work together. But how? Such problems need solutions designed and implemented by what the Kennedy School professor Joseph Nye has called "tri-sector athletes"--people who can bridge the vastly different cultures of the three sectors. Bill Gates is one, and so are Sheryl Sandberg, Bob Hormats, and Hank Paulson. But these leaders are a rare breed, the authors found, at once pragmatic and idealistic. Motivated by a strong sense of mission, they forge uniquely effective career paths by applying their widening range of cross-sector skills, sensitivity to context, open-mindedness, and powerful networks to some of the world's most intractable problems. To encourage more people to follow in their footsteps, the authors suggest how academia, government agencies, and private enterprise can do more to overcome systemic barriers, which include the obstacles presented to those in the private sector by the arduous and seemingly capricious government confirmation process; the level of transparency and public scrutiny that public service entails; the tremendous and growing disparity of pay between the private sector and both government and public service; and the sheer difficulty of hearing about cross-sector career opportunities. Aspiring leaders need both an intellectual foundation and practical pathways that will give them tri-sector experience throughout their careers without slowing their forward momentum.

Even when CEOs make gender diversity a priority--by setting aspirational goals for the proportion of women in leadership roles, insisting on diverse slates of candidates for senior positions, and developing mentoring and training programs--they are often frustrated by a lack of results. That's because they haven't addressed the fundamental identity shift involved in coming to see oneself, and to be seen by others, as a leader. Research shows, the authors write, that the subtle, "second-generation" gender bias still present in organizations and in society disrupts the learning cycle at the heart of becoming a leader. Women must establish credibility in a culture that is deeply conflicted about whether, when, and how they should exercise authority. Practices that equate leadership with behaviors considered more common in men suggest that women are simply not cut out to be leaders. Furthermore, the human tendency to gravitate to people who are like oneself leads powerful men to sponsor and advocate for other men when leadership opportunities arise. The authors suggest three actions to support and advance gender diversity: educate women and men about second-generation gender bias; create safe "identity workspaces" to support transitions to bigger roles; and anchor women's development efforts in their sense of leadership purpose rather than in how they are perceived.

Reprint: R1309D Business leaders send a powerful message when they make a commitment to diversity that goes beyond rhetoric. But what motivates them to do so, and how do they actually create inclusive cultures? To find out, the authors interviewed 24 CEOs whose firms were known for embracing people of all backgrounds. These executives saw diversity as a strategic and moral imperative and made promoting it a personal mission. Many had experienced what it was like to be an outsider, which gave them a deeper understanding of the barriers that women, in particular, face at work. The CEOs resoundingly agreed that an inclusive environment was one in which employees contributed to success as their authentic selves, and the organization respected and leveraged their talents and provided a sense of connectedness. Eight best organizational practices for instilling such a culture emerged from their interviews: 1. Measure diversity and inclusion. 2. Hold managers accountable. 3. Support flexible arrangements. 4. Recruit and promote from diverse pools of candidates. 5. Provide leadership education. 6. Sponsor employee resource groups and mentoring programs. 7. Offer quality role models. 8. Make the chief diversity officer position count. It's also key for CEOs to dedicate time to work personally on diversity initiatives. That sets the tone for everyone and helps ensure that organizations attract and develop the best talent.

Research has established that women decide about consumer purchases differently than men do. But does that hold true in a B2B setting? Senior executives at Deloitte, recognizing that an increasing number of potential clients are women but that executives have honed their skills selling to men, decided to conduct some research on the matter. Interviews with experienced buyers of professional services in 18 large organizations--and observations of meetings with hundreds of prospective and existing clients--revealed significant differences between men and women as B2B buyers. For example, women see a meeting with a candidate service provider as a chance to explore options in collaboration with an expert resource, while men see that event as a near-final step in the process, when they are narrowing down and choosing among options. And whereas male buyers expect head honchos to be present at the meeting, female buyers are more interested in talking to the people they will actually be working with. On the basis of these and other findings, Deloitte established a rigorous training program to raise awareness of differences in decision-making styles and of the need to adapt sales approaches accordingly. The training, which Deloitte believes has given the firm an edge in the marketplace, has improved partners' and managers' interactions with all prospects and clients. It has also increased respect for diversity inside the firm.

A variety of recent research by business, psychology, and sociology scholars offers a window into women's collective experiences at work. Some of these studies confirm widely held assumptions: that women are paid less than men; that the numbers of women drop dramatically the higher you go in organizations; that women are more ethical. But some cast doubt on other popular notions: that caring for their families is a major reason that high-achieving women leave their careers; that female MBAs are less likely to get job offers than male MBAs are; that being disliked is a disadvantage in the workplace. And some studies bring to light forms of discrimination that are less obvious but pernicious: the way men receive more plum assignments, more key sales accounts, and other marks of favor, while women get more praise but not necessarily the big promotions. One of the most disturbing studies? One that reveals the extent to which both women and men are biased against working mothers.

Companies have long emphasized touchpoints--the many critical moments when customers interact with the organization on their way to purchase and after. But this focus can create a distorted picture, suggesting that customers are happier with the company than they actually are. And it distracts from the more important picture: the customer's end-to-end experience. In their research, the authors--partners at McKinsey--have found that organizations able to skillfully manage the entire customer journey reap enormous benefits: enhanced customer satisfaction, reduced churn, increased revenue, and greater employee satisfaction. To realize these benefits, companies need to embed customer journeys into their operating models in four ways. They must identify key journeys, understand how they are performing in each, redesign and support those journeys, and change mind-sets to sustain the initiatives at scale. Journey-based transformations may take years to perfect. But they create a culture that engages the organization across functions and from top to bottom. It's a culture that's hard to build otherwise, and a true competitive advantage goes to companies that get it right.

At its best, business is about innovating to meet society's needs and to build a profitable enterprise. But many corporate leaders are struggling to achieve those twin goals. In a study of more than 30 companies that have succeeded in creating so-called shared value, the authors identified five mutually reinforcing elements: (1) Embedding a social purpose. This may involve reemphasizing a firm's founding mission, as Danone's CEO did in 2000 to refocus the company on its origins as a manufacturer of healthy food. (2) Defining the need. Some firms conduct extensive research to develop a comprehensive view of the social problem. Before launching a micronutrient-reinforced spice product for low-income consumers in India, Nestle studied nutritional deficiencies in the country and visited 1,500 households to understand cooking customs and diets. (3) Measuring shared value. To monitor an initiative in Brazil to increase the employability of youth, Coca-Cola spent months planning how to achieve business and social goals and then established intermediate measures to track progress. (4) Creating the optimal innovation structure. The right structure for a social enterprise depends on whether the firm already has a clear social purpose, understands the targeted problems, is able to solve them, and builds a strong business case for doing so. (5) Co-creating with external stakeholders. Effective social innovators enlist external stakeholders in their efforts to understand social needs and to execute their strategies.

During the past decade, some of Japan's most dominant companies have been quietly turning their supplier relationships into a tool that helps them innovate faster while radically cutting costs. This is the new keiretsu--a modern version of the traditional system in which buyers formed close, collaborative associations with suppliers. Toyota provides a compelling example of how keiretsu, which lost luster during the cost-cutting of the 1990s, is being revived and reinvented. The company today has vendor relationships that are more open, more global, and more cost-conscious than traditional keiretsu ever were and that provide even stronger bonds of trust, cooperation, and educational support. The authors examine the evolution of Toyota's keiretsu and explore the numerous lessons for developed-world and emerging-market companies seeking to improve their supplier relationships for lasting gain. Such companies should think short-term and long-term; know their suppliers well and develop trust with them; balance implicit and explicit communication; identify the suppliers most worth improving; and involve suppliers in developing new products. Those elements are critical even in a hypercompetitive, cost-obsessed environment, because as they speed production and boost innovation, they reduce the hidden costs of the arm's-length supplier relationships prevalent in the West.

More hours in the day. It's one thing everyone wants, and yet it's impossible to attain. But what if you could free up significant time--maybe as much as 20% of your workday--to focus on the responsibilities that really matter? The authors have spent the past three years studying the productivity of knowledge workers and discovered that they spend, on average, 41% of their time on activities that offer little personal satisfaction and could be handled competently by others. On the basis of their research, the authors have come up with a process to help knowledge workers make themselves more productive. It involves thinking consciously about how they spend their time, deciding which tasks matter most to them and their organizations, and dropping or creatively outsourcing the rest. The tasks to be dropped are sorted into quick kills (things you can stop doing now, without any negative effects), off-load opportunities (work that can be delegated with minimal effort), and long-term redesign (work that needs to be reconceived or restructured). Once the tasks are disposed of, the freed-up time is spent focusing on more-important work. When 15 executives tried this, they were able to reduce desk work by an average of six hours per week and meetings by two hours per week. They filled the time with value-added tasks like coaching and strategizing.

Lorne Michaels, the creator of "Saturday Night Live," has launched the careers of comedians from Eddie Murphy to Kristen Wiig. Here he talks about the power of absolute deadlines, resolving creative differences, what he looks for in new talent, and more.

A look at the emerging field of "physiolytics"--the practice of linking wearable computing devices with data analysis and quantified feedback to improve workers' performance. Examples include the British grocery chain Tesco, whose warehouse employees have armbands that track the goods they assemble; Bell Canada, whose technicians enter data on wrist-worn PCs; and the French video game publisher Ubisoft, which developed a finger-clamp sensor that measures levels of stress.

How one company successfully dealt with the e-mail glut: After executives underwent training to reduce the number of e-mail messages they sent, the output of other employees fell, too--even though they received no training or feedback. The result was a 7% gain in productivity.

Social media give companies tremendous opportunities to engage with customers by inviting them to participate in value-creating activities, such as brainstorming advertising taglines or product ideas. But co-creation initiatives can backfire if customers view them as a chance to bash the company, and managers need to think carefully about the risks.

Detailed accounting records from the 19th century reveal that U.S. and West Indian slaveholders used scientific management techniques to run their operations.

Usually when companies merge, they get right to work on rebranding. But after his airline Avianca merged with TACA, Villegas decided to unify the vision, culture, and operations of the two organizations prior to launching a single brand.

Recent years have brought an avalanche of indices for measuring the relative strengths of nations and their progress (or decline) over time. As someone who has spent an inordinate amount of time studying these indices and the methodologies behind their conflicting rankings, the CEO of the Legatum Institute offers four things for global executives to keep in mind when confronted with these data.

Every day, hackers use the global network to steal information and compromise businesses. Organizations today have to rethink their defenses and move from reaction to anticipation. In this Vision Statement, Matt Kodama and Bill Ladd of Recorded Future use semantic analysis to track where and when cyber-attacks happen, a method which could help companies predict and head off attacks more reliably.

An introduction to California Management Review's special issue on Intellectual Property Management.

The systematic integrated management of intellectual property (IP) is a recent phenomenon. This is despite the fact that intellectual property has been around for several centuries. Today, matters are more complicated, and integrated IP management is required. By integrated IP management we mean not only that the various forms of intellectual property (patents, trade secrets, trademarks, copyright) are managed together, but that intellectual property management is in turn integrated with overall business model design and corporate strategy. Integrated management is more than simply establishing a licensing model, or manufacturing a product that incorporates new invention.