3 Takeaways - Harvard Business Review Editor in Chief Adi Ignatius: The New World of Work and the Biggest Trends in Business (#71)

Episode Date: December 14, 2021

Adi Ignatius, Editor in Chief of Harvard Business Review,  shares the biggest trends in the business world right now and how he sees the new world of work – including the future of the workplace, innovation and leadership. As Editor in Chief he oversees editorial activities at HBR, HBR.org, and HBR's book-publishing unit. He was previously deputy managing editor of Time and bureau chief of the Wall Street Journal in Beijing and Moscow. Adi is the editor of two books: "President Obama: The Path to the White House" and "Prisoner of the State: The Secret Diaries of Premier Zhao Ziyang." Both made the New York Times' bestseller list. He is the host of the Harvard Business Review video series “The New World of Work” - candid conversations on talent, tech, and the future of business. 

Welcome to the Three Takeaways podcast, which features short, memorable conversations with the world's best thinkers, business leaders, writers, politicians, scientists, and other newsmakers. Each episode ends with the three key takeaways that person has learned over their lives and their careers. And now your host and board member of schools at Harvard, Princeton, and Columbia, Lynn Thoman. Hi, everyone. It's Lynn Thoman. Welcome to another episode. Today, I'm excited to be with Adi Ignatius, Editor-in-Chief of Harvard Business Review. Before joining HBR, he was Deputy Managing Editor of Time. And before that, he worked for the Wall Street Journal as Bureau Chief in Beijing and Moscow. From his perch as editor of HBR, Adi has a unique perspective. Today, I'm excited to find out the biggest trends in the business world and how he

sees the new world of work, including the future of the workplace, innovation, and leadership. Adi, welcome, and thanks so much for our conversation today. Thank you, Lynn. It's great to be here. It is great to have you. Adi, let's start with HBR. What do you see as your primary responsibility as the editor? I guess to set a tone, Once Upon a Time, HBR was entirely about the timeless. It didn't try to compete with the fortunes and the Forbes of the world, which were doing the newsy, the timely, and that in the digital age, and particularly after the Great Recession, particularly during the age of COVID, it's kind of social justice era that we've lived in. It seemed imperative to be timely. So part of it is just helping to set a tone. Mostly though,

it's to pick good people and get out of the way. And we have great women who edit the magazine, who edit the website, who run our book content division. So then I just deal with the thorny issues that come up, the relationship with Harvard Business School, which is our shareholder. But I think if I'm doing my job right, the people who are really running these platforms don't get a lot of interference from me. As a journalist, Adi, how do you see truth or carefulness today about being non-confrontational or non-controversial? Is that becoming a casualty of our current highly polarized environment? That's a big question. There are moments when I despair about journalism and truth, and there are moments that I think we journalism and truth, and there are moments

that I think we'll pull through that this is an awkward adjustment moment. In some ways, I think journalism has never been stronger in the sense of the diversity of ideas that are out there and are accessible mostly digitally from just a wide range of perspectives. What's missing is some consensus about basic truths. And that's the part I despair about. I mean, I think that could change. It might take a catastrophic event to bring us together again. I don't necessarily mean an alien invasion, but that might help. I guess if you think about, so the mainstream publications that you think

of, the New York Times, Washington Post, I mean, you can look at them and say they're biased or predictable or something like that. On the other hand, and I cut my teeth with institutions like this. I was at the Wall Street Journal. I was at Time Magazine. And whatever you say about bias and slant, what we learned was to take our job seriously, to investigate facts, to not run things unless we had confirmed or double confirmed or triple confirmed the facts that then made it into a narrative. That doesn't mean it's flawless. It doesn't mean that these institutions haven't made mistakes and published things that turned out to be wrong. But that was basically at the core that you have to get it right. Your reputation depends on that and your sense of self depends on that. So I do think discerning readers still appreciate that

and understand the value that publications with that kind of mission can bring. You're getting, it sounds like more into the kind of, I guess, the extreme wokeness and if that prevents us from saying anything because we're too afraid to say anything. And I think that's a real issue and I think academia is dealing with it. Journalists are dealing with it. But I guess I'm still in the camp that thinks

there's a positive side to that, that is getting us away from, I don't know, casual tropes or something like that, or stereotypes that, I mean, we're just a little more conscious about what we say. I think wokeness is excessive and hopefully we've hit peak woke and we'll get back into something a little bit more natural and conversational and human, but I certainly don't think it's a bad thing that that has been part of the debate. Adi, what are the most important business ideas that you have learned as the editor of HBR? One is that leadership counts. That maybe seems obvious, but it really counts. And it is a skill that can be learned as readily as you can learn how to serve a tennis ball. It's not just

that you're born into it and you either have it or you don't. I mean, obviously that matters to general charisma or something, but that you can really learn leadership and you can learn how to get the most out of your employees, how to listen to what your customers are saying. There's a discipline to all this that people should take seriously. And obviously that's self-serving because obviously implicit is places like Harvard Business Review can help you along the way, but they can't. And that's real. Another thing is, so Harvard Business Review, we don't have a point of view the way, say, The Economist does, where The Economist, you know their worldview in each and every sentence

that they publish. And we tend to be eclectic, and we publish the views of the authors, who are usually not staff writers. And what that means to me is, there are different ways to solve problems at work. There are different approaches to innovation. And that inconsistency doesn't mean that the science behind this is junk. To me, it means, so you need to focus. You need to have a strategy that to succeed, you need to have a vision and then think about how do I get there

and how do I test my way along the path and how do I learn from these experiments along the way? My point is there's not one direction to growing a company into innovation, but as long as you have discipline along the way with whatever path you've chosen. The other thing would just be, and this is really what we do, there are different ways to impart ideas. The old days for Harvard Business View was about long form stuff that was based on exhaustive research. And that is one way that people learn,

but there are other ways that people learn. Well, it can be through a podcast like this or video or a simple two by two or a simple data representation or something like that. So I've learned that people have different learnings. I mean, I've talked to CEOs about HBR and they've just said, I would not read an HBR article

if you put a gun to my head. And it's not that they were criticizing us. It was just, that's not how they learn. And there are different learning styles. And if we're smart, we're thinking about different platforms to connect with the different brains out there among our potential audience. And Adi, what is your engagement across different platforms? Which platforms are more important? Which ones are less so? It's interesting. You might think that print is waning. And in some ways it is. We used to do 12 issues a year. We now do six. But print is by far the most premium expression of HBR that's out there. If you look at a print version of HBR, you would

not think we are retreating from print. We really put a lot of our heart and soul into that. So it may be a smaller number of people who really want print, but it's a really valuable group and there are people who still collect copies on it. So print is still very much part of the mix. Podcasts, you're evidence of the explosion in podcasts. We now have a number of podcasts. We have a network where we're bringing an outside podcast and think we can go that further. Video, we have more than 13 million followers on LinkedIn. So LinkedIn

suddenly becomes a very effective platform for us to do video. We have a live show that we go live on LinkedIn and suddenly from that 13 million followers, we will have a really engaged audience of thousands and thousands and thousands of people who will watch, who will post questions. And then the outlier is we've become very active on TikTok, which I find surprises a lot of people just because we're a hundred year old brand and think of TikTok as for teens basically. But we have a sub-brand called Ascend, which is for people who are new to the job market, who are just dealing with work challenges for the first time. So we're not taking HBR content and adapting it. We're really creating new content by people in their 20s for people in their 20s who are just at that stage of their career and are interested and

will engage with that platform. So interesting. What are the mega trends that you're seeing? The biggest is the future of capitalism. Who knows where it's going, but there seems to be evidence or certainly little points along the way that this era of, if you want to call it, Milton Friedman economics that has dominated the corporate scene for roughly 50 years is over or is evolving. That there's a realization that, and Friedman himself was, I don't want to reduce his ideas to a simple line, but in his name, people really push the idea that shareholders come first, that fiduciary duty of CEOs is to deliver to shareholders. And that means to deliver to shareholders in the short term, quarterly with

guidance, all this stuff that I think leaders started to think, well, that's the law or that's the law in Delaware where most companies are based. It's not really. That was a mega trend. And that the law is more complicated and certainly doesn't say that you have to do everything for the short term at the expense, possibly the long term. Fiduciary duty is keeping a company healthy and profitable and responsible to shareholders over the long term. So anyway, it was just a particular approach. So I feel like we're in a different era and there are various proof points. The Business Roundtable talking about stakeholders.

Larry Fink, who runs BlackRock and has more trillions of assets under management than anybody else on the planet and is changing the rhetoric at least. What that becomes, what a multi-stakeholder capitalism really looks like, we don't know yet. I mean, I think that's still happening and it's fair to ask whether action is matching the rhetoric,

but I think in more and more companies it is and employees are demanding it and customers are demanding it. So I feel like that's the mega, mega trend, that capitalism is evolving, business is evolving. Businesses, CEOs, they're comfortable speaking out on social issues. They see governments being feckless and that businesses can and need to step up. And at the very least, in the ecosystems that are a business, they can do the right thing in terms of whatever issues are important to them,

sustainability, diversity, long-term thinking, whatever it is. 10 years ago, no CEO wanted to speak out on social issues or political issues. You think of Michael Jordan, even the sneaker pitchman who said, I don't want to speak out on racial issues because his quote was Republicans buy sneakers too. And now I think with social media,

if you don't speak up, the masses will interpret your silence in whatever way they want. So neutrality almost isn't an option. So then speak up then on the issues that matter to you or to your customers or your employees. So those are sort of related, but I guess two big trends in business right now.

Your new series, Adi, on the new world of work is wonderful. What are the three most important ideas you've learned about the future of work? Well, thank you for asking that. This is a show that we launched a couple of months ago. And the idea is to interview a top tier CEO every episode to really talk about. We're in a transitional moment just in terms of how we work and whether it's hybrid or physical and this evolution of company and all this stuff's happening. And we've had some great guests. We had Satya Nadella of Microsoft and Indra Nooyi,

the former CEO of Pepsi and Paul Hudson of Sanofi and Paul Polman of Unilever. And most recently, Hubert Joly, the former CEO of Best Buy. Anyway, yeah, what have I learned? I think that people want agency. You're sort of learning that elsewhere, but as we think about going back to work, there are a lot of conflicting and contradictory things that people say they want. But one thing that's really clear is that people want agency in their lives. This kind of work-life balance. It's not just younger people. That was almost a cliche about younger employees, but that people had a taste of agency during

the past year and a half plus where those of us who were lucky enough to have the option had been working from home. So they're willing to come back to the office and get that there's some positives, but that agency is really important to be able to decide when you work, where you work and how you work. So that definitely came out of that. Another thing came out of it, that empowering your people can inspire them to do remarkable things. So this was a conversation with Hubert Jolie, the former Best Buy CEO, who just had a beautiful little anecdote of a customer. It was a woman who'd bought a dinosaur for her kid and it broke and the head came off and they went back to Best Buy to exchange it or get it fixed or whatever.

And a standard response would have been, oh, oops, sorry, here's a new one. But the employees who felt empowered and felt inspired did this whole thing where they dressed up as doctors and took the dinosaur into a room to operate on and came back. I probably switched them, but ended up with the studio. So they delighted the customer in a way that would make a customer for life. And the key to that was really empowering people on the front line so that they can do a remarkable thing. And then maybe lastly, the metaverse is probably coming more quickly than we realize. I can't tell you what it is or what it will be, but somebody just asked me the other day if I wanted to buy digital property on the metaverse. And I said, no. And that may be one

of these things 20 years from now. I'm like, ah, so stupid. That was my opportunity to get into the ground floor. So interesting. I have done two conversations relevant to what you've just talked about. One with Robert Cialdini, who is the godfather of influence. And what he says, which I found fascinating, is that I would have thought that flawless service was the goal, but it actually shouldn't be. What is much more memorable is something special done for a customer, like in the case of the dinosaur and the toy, because that is much more memorable than simply getting the toy and having everything work well. Yeah, I think employees have to feel like they can do that and that they have that agency to do remarkable things like that.

That's true. And that is a big change. How do you see innovation changing? So I'll go back to the LinkedIn live show. So into the interview I did with Satya Nadella again, I've asked him and I've asked others, what is the key to innovation? Because it's something HBR readers always want to know how to innovate, how to create a culture where you perpetually innovate. How do you innovate in a way that prevents someone else from disrupting your very business model? And I thought his answer was great. He says the key to innovation is empathy, that it's really when you're inventing something, you're trying to connect with human wants and

desires and create the thing that is desired, but doesn't exist yet. So that to figure that out more than data or more than its empathy and being able to put yourself in other people's shoes and really think about human needs. So I just love that answer. It was a surprise and it got a lot of response where we got people commenting. People just love that because it sounds good. It sounds warm, but it's actually really profound. So that might be what the key to innovation is all about. But on a more mundane level, what I was saying before about experimenting, these are cliches about failing and iterating and all these things, but there's magic in that. And I think the big Silicon Valley startup companies understood that a long time ago, but there's still companies that

are trying to figure out how do I be digital? What does that mean? And part of it, it means having the discipline to iterate your way toward innovation that matters. I think many people don't realize how important trying and failing is. I know. Jeff Bezos always says most people don't realize how many things Amazon has tried and failed at before coming to things that work. Yeah. And part of that is not shaming the team that created the thing that ended up not flying. And we've written about companies that have celebratory funerals for products that are phased out or that didn't work just to sort of put closure on, but also it's a process and it's as natural as anything you do and not something you

sweep under the carpet and don't dare talk about. You're absolutely right. Yeah. I love the comment and I'm not sure who said it, but it's something to the effect that if you haven't failed at anything, you haven't tried enough things. Exactly. How do you see leadership changing? I think it's changing in ways that we've already talked a bit about. There are a lot of people my age, I'm a baby boomer, late boomer, who complain about younger generations of employees who are demanding constant attention. I'm in sort of a different place. I think younger employees are reminding us what management is, what leadership is. It's not just coming to work and sitting at your laptop and, I don't know, answering emails.

That is a lot of work. And I sometimes forget what I did before that was work. But that demand on us to lead people and to be conscious of what individuals are doing and what teams are doing and to acknowledge and to praise and to step in and criticize, adjust if necessary. I think leaders sometimes get into position and then get lazy about all that and forget to do that, forget to walk around and connect. So I think good leadership now is about empathy, is about vulnerability, is about being human as an inspiration, not superhuman. The leader is the superhuman person who knew everything.

That's kind of outdated. But the leader who is superhuman and vulnerable and transparent is, I think, far more likely to connect with employees than the omniscient CEO of the past. And then there are the other issues we talked about, which is engagement in social issues. I mean, we know that employees want to work for companies that share their values. It's overwhelming. We know that customers want to buy from companies that they think share their values. And it may be that it's overstated that at the end of the day, people care about price more than they'll admit in a survey. But certainly it matters what a company stands for. So leadership ends up being a very delicate dance of not only thinking about other things

we talked about, like vision and strategy and how do we innovate, but also who are we in this world? Paul Pullman, who was the CEO of Unilever for years and had the most ambitious agenda, the most ambitious sustainability and UN development goal and agenda of any CEO I've ever seen. It was remarkable even as he led this giant company forward, who has a new book and full disclosure, we're the publishers of it, but it's a book called Net Positive. And the idea is, is the world a better place because your company's in it? So it's not just, are we minimizing the damage we do, but it's a more

aggressive recasting. Is the world a better place because your company's in it? I think more and more companies are realizing they either want to be that because that feels right or that there is pressure from employees, from customers, and even increasingly from shareholders that you need to get it right in terms of the externalities you create in terms of the ESG things we can measure. So I think leadership got a lot more complicated, but it's also, it's more interesting. Good leaders are more inspirational now when they get it right. I also had a conversation with Paul Polman on his idea of companies being net positive. I first heard about him when he was leading Unilever in a very different way from other companies.

So you're right. He's been an absolute leader in thinking about the company, the broader footprint of the company on everybody, on its employees, on its customers, on its shareholders, on the planet, and making sure that the company is what he calls net positive. Adi, before I ask for the three takeaways you'd like to leave the audience with, is there anything else you'd like to mention that you haven't already touched upon? Or what should I have asked you that I did not? Well, the burning issue, both at our company and that our readers want to know, and we haven't really talked about this, is just, is it hybrid? Is it physical? Is it a combo? People need the technology to feel comfortable about this new hybrid world. That companies can say, all right, we're mandating that you come in

or we're mandating that you stay home, or we're going to do something in between. But whatever you decide, you need technology that makes it work. And a lot of people have this experience now where you got some people in the office around a conference table and some people at home and it's all flipped. So the technology is sort of better for the people at home because Zoom is actually very intimate. We talk about Zoom fatigue and say physical is better. And OK, physical is better. But Zoom is a very intimate technology and you can communicate very well one-on-one or with small teams. Now, some of the people around a conference room, you can't really see them and other people.

We haven't solved that. There are solutions, but we haven't adopted that. I think this is a really interesting time where a whole lot of companies are experimenting. I hope they'll share the results of their experiments and the innovations they come up with in HBR and other places. Because we can't just say, oh, we need to experiment and someday we'll figure it out. People want to know what's working quickly. And obviously, as we record this, there's another potentially dangerous variant of COVID-19 that could change things. But we are coming to a place where, or someday this will end and we'll still have the same questions

about hybrid and how do we do it. That is not going to go away. So that's the only other thing I would mention that it's a call for people to come up with and share solutions because everyone else out there is hungry to figure out how to do this right. Adi, what are the three key takeaways you'd like to leave the audience with? Okay, this is a fun exercise. So number one takeaway, these are just personal philosophical things, I guess, is one, act like it matters pretty much in everything you do. Jack Welch had a formulation like that, whatever you think of Jack Welch, but he could be very inspiring. And the way he put it was whatever division you're in, maybe it's not your dream job, but it's where you are. Like make it the coolest place, make it the place to be while you're there.

Otherwise, what are you doing? So I would say whatever you're in, I don't know, you're playing tennis, just act like it matters. I don't mean be hyper-competitive, but just act like it matters. And certainly it works. Okay. Number two, and this I thought about the other day, my father just turned 101. Okay. This is Paul Ignatius and he's doing great. I was trying to think what is the secret to being 101? Part of it is genetics. Part of it is luck. Part of it is diet probably. But I realized one of the things for him, he doesn't hold grudges.

Most people by the time they're 30 or 40 already have a bunch of grudges that maybe animate them. The haters make you want to get better, but I also think it probably eats you up inside. And I don't know why he's this way. And I held more grudges than he does, but he hasn't. And there are plenty of people he could hold grudges against, but he hasn't. And I think that has given him an inner peace that is part of the reason why he is healthy and happy at age 101. And I guess the last thing,

and this is truly silly, but play. I still play softball on teams with 20 somethings. I play tennis as much as I can. I do way too many crossword puzzles. I play a little guitar. I'm not good at any of this stuff, but I just believe in it. That play is something that I think keeps me youngish and reasonably happy. So I would urge everyone to keep that a part of their steady diet. Adi, this has been wonderful. Thank you so much. Thanks, Lynn. This is really fun.

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