Leaders and Strategies in Real Life: 4/17/18

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Instead of studying leadership, why not spend some time studying leaders and strategies in the wild? You can learn a lot from leadership experts, but you always see the leader and what he or she does through the expert’s personal lens. Supplement that learning with studying real leaders in real life situations and draw your own conclusions. The posts in this series will help you.

Every week I’ll point you to articles by and about real leaders in real situations and to articles about how real companies are faring in the marketplace. Read them. Think about them. Draw your own lessons and conclusions from them. Then try to apply those lessons in your own real life.

This week I’m pointing you to articles about Coke, Amazon, GE, Microsoft, and dry cleaners.

From Derek Thompson: Diet Coke’s Moment of Panic

“The problem with the soda is right there in the name: It’s neither healthy-seeming enough to thrive as a diet drink nor tasty enough to thrive as a cola.”

Thanks to Smartbrief on Leadership for pointing me to this story

From Betsey Guzior: Amazon numbers reveal strategy for streaming service — to get more Prime customers

“If you loved Amazon’s ‘Good Girls Revolt,’ but wonder why it was axed after just one season, a new Reuters report might offer an answer. Internal documents obtained by Reuters indicate that the critically acclaimed show didn’t produce enough Amazon Prime subscribers.”

From Greg Satell: How GE Got Disrupted

“The problem with GE, it appears, is that it has become a square-peg business in a round-hole world. It’s not that it’s gotten lazy, but that it invested heavily in getting better and better at things people care less and less about. That’s a problem we rarely talk about. We like to believe that success breeds more success, but the truth is that success often breeds failure.”

From McKinsey: Microsoft’s next act

“In this episode of the McKinsey Podcast, Nadella speaks to McKinsey Publishing’s Simon London about organizational change, the role of culture, the danger of silos, and how companies can confront digital disruption by reframing the business they are in.”

From John Ewoldt: With eco-friendly products, self-serve kiosks and home delivery, dry cleaners hit refresh

“In Minnesota, the number of dry cleaners has fallen even though sales rose modestly from 2015 to 2017. Some are rethinking the experience.”

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