Accelerated Inspiration: The 60 Best Ideas for Business Leaders

September 14, 2017 at GERBUS German Business Academy, Hamburg, Germany

What are the best new ideas in business?

At this GERBUS Knowledge Day, business professor, author and director of Thinkers50, Peter Fisk brings together the 60 best new ideas in business, making sense of all the new theories and their practical application for business leaders.

Markets of relentless change, exponential technologies, social and political uncertainty, challenge every business. Ideas can change the world, but making sense of this change, and making new strategies happen is not easy. In fact, everything you learn’t at business school has probably changed.

That’s why, even the busiest CEO, the most qualified and experienced leader, still needs to take time out to think, to make new connections, and to explore “where next” and “how better.”

Thinkers50 ranks all of the world’s top business thinkers – academics, leaders, authors, consultants – based on the power of their ideas (how distinctive, relevant, useful and contagious it is). I’ve decoded all of these ideas, brought them together into themes, and made them practical for you to apply in your business.

So imagine listening to the top business gurus, reading all the best books, going to all the elite business schools, and getting the best of the best … all in one day … what could be a better use of you time?!

The Agenda

The day will be structured into 8 fast and intense sessions:

0900 – 0930: The power of ideas … How has business changed since you went to business school? How do the best companies win today? Where do ideas come from? How to use them better?

0930 – 1015: The 10 best ideas on strategy … and what they mean for you and your business.

Enlightened Value … Michael Porter on shared value creation for more impact
Finding Purpose … Simon Sinek says your Why is the purpose, cause, belief that inspires you
Smarter Choices … Roger Martin on the cascade of choices that best shape your future
End of Competitors … Rita McGrath explains how to be more than different
Blue Ocean Shifts … Kim and Mauborgne, shifting to uncontested market spaces
Disrupting the Disruptors … Scott Anthony, how incumbents beat start-ups
Laws of Globalisation … Pankaj Ghemawat, how to win globally
East-West Strategy … Anil Gupta, and winning on the new Silk Road
Diaspora Markets … Nurmalya Kumar on winning in emerging markets
Brand Tribes … Seth Godin on being relevant to customer-centric markets

1015 – 1100: The 10 best ideas on innovation … and what they mean for you and your business.

Disruptive Innovation … Clay Christensen on technology-driven disruption
Business Models … Pigneur and Osterwalder’s one page canvas, and going beyond it
Platform Models … Weiru Chan on the primacy of platform business models
Collaborative Models … Rachel Botsman and the sharing economy
Design Thinking … Tom Kelley on deep diving for richer insights
Sense & Respond … Gothelf and Seiden on listening deeper to customers
Lean Innovation … Eric Ries on the speed and experimentation of start-ups
Frugal innovation … Navi Radjou, simple solutions from emerging markets
Little Ideas … David Robertson on the power of small ideas with big impact
Corporate Startup … Tendayi Viki on how established companies develop innovation ecosystems

1100 – 1130: Coffee …. and Ideas to Grow

1130 – 1215: The 10 best ideas on talent … and what they mean for you and your business.

The 100 Year Life – Linda Gratton on why living longer means more career reinventions
What Drives Us – Dan Pink on how to engage people with your emotional self
Give and Take – Adam Grant talk reciprocity, the more you give, the more you can take
Emotional Intelligence – Daniel Goldsmith summaries why EQ always beats IQ
Collaborative Intelligence – Erika Dhawen on why together we are so much more
Awesomely Simple – John Spence offers an entidote to a world of complexity
Innovators DNA … Hal Gregorson on the new capabilities for innovation
Multiplier Effect – Liz Wiseman explains how to make everyone smarter
Happy Progress – Teresa Ambile on keeping people happy and motivated with small wins
Millennial Work – Karl Moore on how to engage the new generation in the workplace

1215 – 1300: The 10 best ideas on organisations … and what they mean for you and your business.

Corporate Rebels – Minnaar and Morree create the challenges to take you further
Culture Mapping – Erin Meyer explores how cultures work best together at work
Strategic Change – John Kotter on the rights steps to make change happen and stick
Project Business – Antonio Nieto Rodriguez on creating a project culture
Extreme Teaming – Amy Edmundsen on why teams always beat lone genius
Creative Class – Richard Florida dreams of ideas and inspiration in work
Micro Businesses – Zhang Ruimen leads Haier as hundreds of small businesses
Holocratic Organisations – Brian Robertson abolishes organisation hierarchy
Business Storytelling – Jennifer Aaker on how stories engage people more deeply
Viral Communication – Jonah Berger on how to make ideas spread further faster

1300 – 1400: Lunch …. and Ideas to Engage

1400 – 1445: The 10 best ideas on leadership … and what they mean for you and your business.

Authentic Leaders – Hermina Ibarra on leaders who win by being their best selves
Power and Influence – Jeffrey Pfeffer on asserting your impact on others
Humble Leaders – Jim Collins takes us to level 5 leadership, a higher place to be
Executive Presence – Sylvia Ann Hewlett explains how to have more impact
Disrupt Yourself – Whitney Johnson applies disruption to your own self and career
Work and Life – Stew Friedman on going beyond balance to get the best of both
Leadership Triggers – Marshall Goldsmith on finding the trigger to great leadership
Measuring Leaders – Dave Ulrich defines leadership capital, the measure of effectiveness
Being a Super Boss – Syd Finkelstein surrounds himself with great talent to do better
Grit and Perseverence – Angela Duckworth reminds us that nothing beats hard work

1445 – 1530: The 10 best ideas on progress … and what they mean for you and your business.

Creating the Future … Mark Esposito harnesses the mega trends to shape your better future
Exponential Organisations … Salim Ismael inspires your 10x rather than 10% thinking
Machines and Platforms … Brynoffsen and McAfee’s manifesto for the 4th industrial revolution
Blockchain and Wikinomics … Don Tapscott harnesses the power of digital, intelligent networks
3D Printed Production … Richard D’Aveni explains how 3D printing changes everything
Humans and Robots … Kate Darling explores the new roles and relationships of us and them
Global Impact … Alexander Betts reflects on populism, refugees and why global is undemocratic
Circular Economy … Ellen MacArther on create a net positive impact on the world
Social Entrepreneurship … Roger Martin on applying all the ideas for more impact
Emotional Agility … Susan David on how to survive and thrive in a time of incredible progress.

1530 – 1600: Coffee … and Ideas to Inspire

1600 – 1700: The ideas to drive your business … Which ideas matter most? How will you apply them? How to get started?

1800 – 2000: Dinner … and Ideas to Share

See you there!

Here are a few teasers to get you started … some of the best known ideas in business right now (and we’ll be exploring many others which are less well known, but just as useful!):

“Design Thinking” … one of the buzzwords of today’s business, coined by David Kelley at IDEO to capture his deep dives process of gaining deeper insight into customer’s challenges and opportunities, and rapidly turning these insights into practical ideas and prototypes which can then be much more tangibly shaped further. Read more about Design Thinking.

“Disruptive Innovation” … perhaps one of the most overused words thrown around. Harvard’s Clayton Christensen interprets it in a very specific way, about how a new good-enough technology can displace an existing over-engineered one. However it can have many other definitions too, Jean Marie Dru focuses on how a radical new idea to create a mindset step-change in markets. Read more on Disruptive Innovation.

“Blue Ocean Strategy” … one of the most commercialised terms, coined by Insead’s Renee Mauborge and Chan Kim. In simple terms “blue oceans” are the uncontested market spaces – for example, an unserved customer segment, a new application and need, or a redefined space – as opposed to the existing “red oceans” which are fought over by most competitors.

“Reverse Innovation” … sometimes known as “trickle-up innovation” is an innovation seen or used first in the developing world, before spreading to the industrialized world. Vijay Govindarajan wrote a book on it, and worked with GE to apply the principle. One frequent example is Godrej’s battery-operated fridge, which is cold enough to allow people to store fresh food and drink for a short time.

“Business Model” … explains how the business creates, delivers and captures value. Examples of business model innovations include Xerox’s copier’s which were leased rather than sold, Southwest Airline’s low cost model, and Netflix’s subscription to unlimited movies. Most commonly used is the one-page canvas which articulates all of this in one diagram, popularised by Alex Osterwalder and others. Read more on Business Models.

“Viral Communication” … social media has popularised the notion of things going viral, be it an inspiring article or crazy gif, it can spread quickly. Of course, there have always been fashion trends to catchy pop songs that spread contagiously, whether through word of mouth or tribal behaviour. Jonah Berger added science to the concept explained who spreads and the structure of ideas that spread fastest.

“Level 5 Leadership” … Jim Collin’s wrote the bestseller Good to Great which includes this concept, about leaders who are humble, but driven to do what’s best for the company. It champions humility and engagement rather than command and control. Leadership in a digital age requires new approaches, to engage diverse people in new ways, to champion ideas-driven growth rather than operational efficiency.

“Emotional Intelligence” … we all know this one, and the common phrase “EQ beats IQ”, meaning its how you get one with people that matters more than how clever you are. Daniel Goldman described it as the capability of individuals to recognise their own and other people’s emotions, to discern between different feelings, and manage emotions to adapt to environments or achieve your goal.

We’ll also be learning directly from some of the world’s top business gurus (including a run-down of the Thinkers50 global ranking), and about their new ideas – making them clear and practical for you:

Erin Meyer … the American-born, Paris-loving, Insead professor has become a global guru on how cultures work together. Her recent book The Culture Map gives us a fascinating insight into how different cultures get along – both inside business, and in markets. Americans with Germans? British and Japanese? The implications are huge – how to build global teams, how to do business around the world, and more.

Dan Pink … says we’re all in sales now. But sales is not what it used to be. When sellers are in command, and information is accessible by all, then we sell by being more human and more yourself. In his book DRIVEhe illustrates the hidden truths behind what really motivates us at home and in the workplace, and how to build our personal brand for more effective relationships, leadership and happiness.

Erica Dhawan … on the power of connected intelligence. In her book Getting Things Done she focuses on harnessing knowledge and networks to engage with people in better ways – the shift from quantity to quality, how we use knowledge and human capital, to embrace diversity and the power of togetherness – and the there types of people – the thinkers, the idea enablers, and the connection executors.

Don Tapscott … the Canadian guru, author of Wikinomics, explores the potential of networks. Networks have the ability to connect people in exponential ways, to share ideas, to mobilise communities and deliver value in new ways. From blockchain that is set to revolutionise transactional processes, to challenging nation states, Tapscott demonstrates the value of networks is proportional to the square of their nodes.

Antonio Nieto-Rodriguez … the Spanish guru, who grew up in the America, now lives in Belgium and leads the project office of GSK’s vaccines business has a passion for projects. He says that, as business focuses on relentless change and innovation, organisations are more about projects than functions, continually developing and delivering newness, and leaders will become the ultimate project managers.

Martin Lindstrom … the Danish brand guru, who cut his teeth in Lego, and now hosts American TV shows explaining brands to consumers is fascinated by what and how we buy. In the future, he says, you’ll subscribe to brands the same way you currently subscribe to Netflix. Martin is also famous for his concept of Small Data, by which he means the small insights that when addressed can have big impact.

These are just a few of the thinkers and ideas that we will explore. How can you apply them to your business? Which ones matter most to your future?

Sign up now for The 50 Best Ideas for Business Leaders in One Inspiring Day when I will reveal all 50 of the best ideas, and the people behind them. There’s also a practical workbook to capture these ideas, apply them to your business, and develop your personal plan for implementation.

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