Travel and tourism industry

How an Indian hotel chain’s organizational culture nurtured employees who were willing to risk their lives to save their guests

The void beyond Earth has become an exciting frontier for entrepreneurial ventures. SpaceX, Blue Origin, and scads of other companies are pursuing commercial...

In some cases, they’re worth it.

The U.S. may be the world’s leading innovator, but it won’t be for long if investors, regulators, and the legal establishment continue to penalize companies for risk taking, says Deborah Wince-Smith, president of the Council on Competitiveness. Recently, the council’s National Innovation Initiative, a leadership network of CEOs and university presidents, released a report in […]

Rapidly falling launch costs and fleets of new satellites are opening up big opportunities for business.

The Inn at Little Washington, in Virginia’s Shenandoah Valley, is one of America’s most acclaimed restaurants, rated number one in North America by Travel + Leisure magazine and listed among the top ten in the world by the International Herald Tribune. Yet, as co-owner and chef Patrick O’Connell explains, exquisite food is the norm at […]

Strategies for overscheduled, under-connected employees.

On-demand services to try.

In 1999, Mei Zhang quit her lucrative consulting job to launch WildChina, a small travel company in her native China. Nearly four years later, the SARS...

Getting customers to make impulse purchases at the checkout counter has always been more of an art than a science. Now, though, the fast-food industry is combining psychology and computer technology to increase impulse buying. This new sales strategy exploits what we call the “spare-change effect”—people’s willingness to buy with change goods that they wouldn’t […]

Eighteen months into the pandemic, a panel of experts discuss what’s changed, whether the bailouts were misspent, and if business travel is ever coming back.

No U.S. industry has more sexual harassment claims filed.

Companies aggressively offer discounts, introductory coupons, and other incentives to lure new customers—and, often, those prospects oblige by making an initial purchase. But my research in the financial services, fast food, and automotive sales and service industries shows how these tactics can backfire. In one study, involving 300 new customers of a bank, 71% of […]

Today, the author writes, business can be conducted in English almost anywhere in the developed world, possibly excepting Japan. But when you build or...

Lessons from a luxury hotel chain.

United broke six important rules.

Marketing executives focus too much on ever-narrower demographic segments and ever-more-trivial product extensions. They should find out, instead, what jobs consumers need to get done. Those jobs will point the way to purposeful products—and genuine innovation.

Photography: Eric Leleu Alain Ducasse learned to love food on his parents’ farm. He received his first three-star Michelin rating—for Le Louis XV, in Monaco—when he was just 33 and now runs an empire of more than 20 restaurants (with a collective 19 Michelin stars) in cities from Tokyo to Las Vegas. Interviewed by Patrice […]

Assets like leadership, talent, and speed are what produce superior market value. A capabilities audit can show you how you measure up—and how to build on your intangible strengths.

When Michael Mack was fired from the company he’d built, he was devastated. It would end up being the best thing that could have happened to him.