Does artificial intelligence enable organisations to do things differently, or to do different things?

In the first episode of the new podcast series “The INSEAD Perspective: Spotlight on Asia”, Sameer Hasija, Dean of Asia at INSEAD, speaks to Hyunjin Kim, INSEAD's Assistant Professor of Strategy,  about arguably the most pressing topic affecting business and society today: The impact of AI on business and entrepreneurship. 

There's a spectrum of views about the impact of AI, but where its effect on entrepreneurship is concerned, few share the vantage point with Kim, whose research covers a cross-section of over 500 start-ups and their interactions with AI.


Despite Asia’s relatively young population and drive, the “Asian Century” hasn’t come to fruition, notes Hasija. Kim remarks that the biggest challenges entrepreneurs face are access to capital and labour. AI can reduce these frictions and help build more capital- and labour-efficient businesses, bringing new opportunities to the region.

In a special episode of the INSEAD Knowledge podcast, we shine a spotlight on a sister podcast series, The Age of Intelligence. 

Hosted by Theodoros Evgeniou, Professor of Technology and Business at INSEAD, and Tim Gordon, co-founder of Best Practice AI, the series features insightful conversations with notable guests from a range of different fields. Its aim is to look at how AI is rebalancing our world – from disrupting national powers and influencing business competitiveness to impacting individual lives. 

In this episode, Evgeniou and Gordon speak with computer scientist and MIT professor Pattie Maes. Their discussion centres on Maes’ pioneering work in AI and her unique perspective that technology should be used to augment human intelligence, not replace it.

The "kill zone" refers to the space near a tech giant’s core business where start-ups risk being copied or crushed simply for getting too close. But what if survival were possible?

In this episode, Associate Professor of Strategy Michaël Bikard walks us through a case that begins with a promising partnership between Airbnb and Sofar Sounds, but ends with the two companies going head to head.

London-based start-up Sofar Sounds built its brand on intimate secret gigs in living rooms and other low-key spaces around the world. “It's all about human offline connections through music, bringing together people in a very intimate setting,” said Bikard. “There is some fairy dust there.” A partnership with Airbnb seemed like a perfect match. Airbnb would gain some of Sofar Sounds’ cool factor. Sofar Sounds could scale through Airbnb’s global reach. But the alliance didn’t last.

A few months later, Airbnb came up with their own version of Sofar Sounds, Airbnb Concerts. It looked like the classic tech “kill zone” scenario. “At the time… it felt like they [Sofar Sounds] were gonna be eaten alive, frankly,” said Bikard. “And the interesting thing is that exactly the opposite happened.”

In this podcast, Andy Yap, Associate Professor of Organisational Behaviour at INSEAD, discusses how leaders can inspire and empower others through communicatiion that appeals to both the head and the heart. It starts with listening. 

In today’s globalised workplace, leaders must communicate effectively with diverse groups. Doing this well starts with understanding the context and culture of your audience, which has as much to do with listening, observing and reading the room as speaking.

He gives his take on a authenticity and discusses anticipatory stress. To get better at communicating, we need self-awareness, the space to make mistakes and honest feedback. Communication, as a skill, is well worth honing, he stressed, for it can be your sharpest edge.

“People who eat healthily don’t have that much more willpower. They have just engineered their environment to avoid having to resist temptation.”

Pierre Chandon, Professor of Marketing at INSEAD, challenges the idea that healthy eating is a matter of self-control. On the INSEAD Knowledge podcast, he explains how our surroundings – what we see, where we are and how food is framed – play a far greater role in shaping what we eat.

Chandon explains that there are four ways food products claim to be healthy. Some brands say it’s because they have improved the nutritional properties of the food. They use labels like “enriched” if they have added “good” vitamins and minerals or “diet” if they have removed “bad” sugar and fat. These are the traditional, nutrition-based ways to be healthy.

Other food products claim to be healthy “by nature”. These brands claim they have preserved the food's natural characteristics by either not adding anything “bad” (these includes claims such as “clean” or “free from” additives or hormones) or by not removing anything “good” (these includes claims such as “whole” or “organic”).

“Consumers are less and less interested in the nutritional approach,” says Chandon. Rather, they now favour foods that are healthy by nature.

In a series of studies with his co-author Maria Langlois, he found that nature itself can nudge people towards better choices. When participants walked in a park rather than through city streets, they picked fruit over unhealthy snacks. Even just looking at pictures of green landscapes had a similar effect. “A natural view makes people more willing to trade off taste and diet for natural healthy food,” he says.

He also points to a disconnect between how brands talk about health and what consumers actually want. For instance, his research with Romain Cadario shows that in France, labels on cereal packages align with local preferences. However, in the United States, companies miss key signals. “It’s not enough to say I’m healthy,” he says. “You have to be healthy in the right way.”

Companies looking to succeed in emerging markets must listen to local needs and tailor their proposition accordingly.

That’s the message from Affiliate Professor of Strategy Lite Nartey and digital financial services expert Bruno Akpaka in this INSEAD Knowledge podcast, which examines how mobile payments system Mobile Money was successfully introduced in Ghana.

Akpaka, who oversaw the launch of Mobile Money in 2009 as mobile telecom firm MTN’s general manager for Western Central Africa, explains how the company took the time to speak to all stakeholders involved. Alongside banks and regulators, the MTN sent representatives out to speak directly with market traders and their customers, many of whom had never previously had access to financial services.

This led MTN to eschew the traditional banking route in favour of a distribution model that brought the service to unbanked consumers through a network of agents. This allowed the company to customise their proposition and develop a product that met the needs of local consumers, offering them convenience, security and simplicity.

What started out as a project with financial inclusion goals, has since evolved into a comprehensive financial system. By the end of 2024, Mobile Money had more than 17.2 million users in Ghana – approximately half the total population.

While such a tailored approach might seem obvious, Professor Nartey highlights how many global firms still try to apply strategies from developed markets without fully understanding local contexts. As the Mobile Money case shows, each market has its own challenges – and requires its own tailored solution.      

What’s common across the Boeing 737 MAX debacle, the 1MDB financial scandal and America’s opioid crisis? They are all illustrations of how business leaders, in pursuit of performance, neglected and undermined progress – specifically fairness, well-being and sustainability.

With each such scandal, trust in business frays. While one may blame specific firms and leaders, too much is amiss in modern business to solely blame the actors, says INSEAD Professor of Strategy and Management Subi Rangan in this podcast. Business theory and business education also warrant careful scrutiny and correction.

Can dreaming really help solve waking problems? And could a specific form of dream analysis help an organisation better achieve shared goals and objectives? In this INSEAD Knowledge podcast, Susan Long, Emeritus Professor at the National Institute of Organization Dynamics Australia and Michael Jarrett, Professor of Management at INSEAD offer their perspective on the value of social dreaming for firms.

The roots of social dreaming can be traced back to World War II, and German journalist, Charlotte Beradt's documentation of dreams during the Nazi era. Inspired by her findings, British psychoanalyst Gordon Lawrence developed the concept of social dreaming as a structured method for exploring the unconscious dynamics operating within contemporary social groups.

This method moves beyond the traditional view of dreams as purely personal experiences. While individual dreams often address personal wishes and daily events, social dreaming suggests that groups of people, interconnected within a social system, also collectively dream about issues, desires and problems relevant to the group as a whole.

The conversation goes on to explore the practicalities of running a social dreaming session – from the importance of the Matrix to the role of the host in leading the group through the dream reflection dialogue.

Citing real life examples, Long and Jarrett explain how they have both used social dreaming to work with firms to identify and address the unconscious concerns and emotions that influence behaviour and decision-making. In this way, social dreaming can offer deeper insights into shared concerns. This allows for improved communication, collaboration and a more comprehensive understanding of the complex dynamics at play within groups.

Further reading:

The Third Reich of Dreams: The Nightmares of a Nation, Charlotte Beradt.
Introduction to Social Dreaming: Transforming Thinking, W. Gordon Lawrence.
Social Dreaming: Philosophy, Research, Theory and Practice, Susan Long and Julian Manley (eds.).

For the longest time, businesses have embraced a “product selling” playbook. Typically, this means having a supplier with a product to sell and a customer to persuade to purchase that product based on the price and perceived value.

However, in an increasingly challenging business environment where disruption is the norm, such a transactional approach is no longer fit for purpose. In this INSEAD Knowledge podcast, Christoph Senn, Adjunct Professor of Marketing at INSEAD, and Mehak Gandhi, Head of Research at Valuecreator, discuss an alternative approach to working with your customers, one that involves a deeper partnership and a greater understanding of their client's needs. An approach they've outlined in their new book, Triple Fit Strategy: How to Build Lasting Customer Relationships and Boost Growth. 

You can access more tools about the framework and get further information about the book here.

In a dynamic business environment, leaders often need to implement new strategic initiatives – from new business models to new technologies or workflows. But change is never easy. The success of new initiatives depends on whether leaders win the support of actors within the organisation.

In other words, it is a matter of influence. In this podcast with Vibha Gaba, the Berghmans Lhoist Chaired Professor of Entrepreneurial Leadership at INSEAD, discusses the forces at play when leaders try to drive change. To build support for their strategic initiatives, leaders must understand how support and resistance spread within the organisation's networks.

Despite millions retiring annually, the topic remains taboo for many employers and employees. Every year, millions leave the workforce, yet discussions about this common rite of passage are often avoided.

This INSEAD Knowledge podcast features Graham Ward, Adjunct Professor of Organisational Behaviour and Isabel Lebbe, Partner in the Investment Management practice of Arendt & Medernach, discussing the often-neglected issue of retirement.

Drawing on years of research in this field, the pair highlight the significant impact that retirement can have on both individuals and the organisations they leave behind. They point out that retirement should not merely be seen an event but is, in fact, a complex process that requires careful consideration and planning from both sides. 

Ward and Lebbe argue that with an ageing population, changing demographics also mean firms need to stop viewing retirement as an end. Instead, they must view it as a valuable opportunity to maintain relationships and leverage the experience of retiring employees to ensure a positive experience for all involved. 


Read more: https://knowledge.insead.edu/career/talk-about-making-good-exit  

Rigid hierarchical team designs seem to have fallen out of favour with many contemporary organisations. But making the switch to a decentralised approach, where authority is more evenly distributed between team members instead of concentrated among a few senior leaders, is by no means easy.

In this podcast, Michael Y. Lee, Assistant Professor of Organisational Behaviour at INSEAD, explains the difficulties of dismantling organisational hierarchies. He unpacks the reasons why firms can fail in their bids to jettison hierarchies and suggests two key practices they can adopt to set themselves up for success.

Everyone loves a good story. But storytelling is way more powerful when leaders employ it effectively, according to Manfred Kets de Vries, Distinguished Clinical Professor of Leadership Development and Organisational Change at INSEAD and the Raoul de Vitry d'Avaucourt Chaired Professor of Leadership Development, Emeritus.

In this podcast, Kets de Vries, who authored the book Storytelling for Leaders, discusses the power of storytelling and how leaders can employ storytelling effectively. More importantly, he explains how storytelling can create tipping points – not only to change others but leaders themselves.

The world is becoming more interconnected. Digital platforms and social media are giving us a greater “voice” and more ways to group, which can increase the chances of disagreeing with one another. Unsurprisingly, we are seeing great polarisation and conflicts in many parts of the world.

In this podcast, INSEAD professors and the co-founders of INSEAD’s Negotiation and Conflict Management Collaborative (NCMC), Horacio Falcão, Roderick Swaab and Eric Luis Uhlmann, explain why negotiation and conflict management are ever more important in these times. They discuss what it means to go beyond just a one-time “win”, and the need for more constructive dialogues and sustainable negotiation strategies.

Developing negotiation skills will not only increase tolerance, but also help people transform disagreement into opportunities to work together and create value – in other words, expanding the pie instead of trying to expand their share of a “fixed pie”. Ultimately, if we learn to interact with others with a win-win mindset, we can build a more humane world – one negotiation at a time.

Today’s uncertain and disrupted world has had a major impact on how firms do business. It has led to a gradual strategic shift from the era of “bigger is better” and a narrow fixation on increased sales growth to a more nuanced, broader vision of corporate value growth.

In this podcast, Jean-Claude Larreche, an Emeritus Professor of Marketing and the Alfred H. Heineken Chaired Professor of Marketing, Emeritus, builds on the themes of his new book Value Capture Selling to explore this transformation further, examining the reasons behind the shift and what it specifically means for the role of salespeople within firms.

The concept of coaching has been a hot topic in business circles for a number of years. It now almost seems a given that top executives employ the services of a coach to help them become better leaders and advance their careers. But the rise in popularity of coaching has also thrown up a number of questions: What really makes a good coach? What can and should you expect from your coach? How can you pick someone that’s right for you?  

These are just some of the questions addressed in this new podcast featuring Derek Deasy and Enoch Li, co-directors of the INSEAD MBA Personal Leadership Development Programme. What’s clear is that a need for openness, engagement and a willingness to collaborate with your coach are all essential if the experience is really going to make an impact.

Drawing on their years of experience, they explain why group coaching can be so effective. Better understanding the anxieties and interactions at play within a group can allow people the space to bring a more honest version of themselves to the team, which can benefit both individuals and organisations.

Finding meaning in your work isn't just about loving what you do. The reality is there are many ways to experience fulfillment, even in what might seem like a mundane job.

In this episode, Winnie Jiang, an Assistant Professor of Organisational Behaviour at INSEAD, explains how financial security, connections with colleagues and even the satisfaction of doing a good job can all contribute to a sense of purpose. 

Jiang outlines how meaning can be grown and developed through “job crafting”. This can involve adjusting tasks, choosing to work with certain colleagues or changing how we view the overall meaning of our work. 

Importantly, she emphasises that while passion and purpose can be cultivated in almost any role, you ultimately have control over your experience. You can either change your perspective and approach to a situation, or, if necessary, remove yourself from it altogether.

Jiang then explores the topic of career transitions. She examines why some people find it difficult to move to a new role, while others seem to switch occupations with ease. The key, she says, is to identify and recognise what gives your work meaning and how those elements might be transferable to new roles.

By understanding your own "meaning perception", you can approach career changes with a more open mind and find fulfillment in unexpected places.

Related reading:
Your Dream Job May Not Exist, and That’s Okay
The Secret Ingredient For a Successful Career Change
How to Find Fulfilment by Taking a Step Down

The emergence of large language models (LLMs) is poised to transform many industries, from entertainment and health care to market analysis. Businesses that fail to explore the rich opportunities presented by language technologies may soon find themselves at a significant competitive disadvantage.

We speak to Abhishek Borah, Associate Professor of Marketing at INSEAD, about his new book, Mine Your Language: Influence, Engage, Predict, which offers vital insights on how language can be monetised.

With an engaging mix of anecdotes and research, Abhishek explains how the art of text mining can unlock critical insights from data, a far cry from the expensive and often biased consumer marketing surveys.

Professionals are often told – and mostly convinced – that networking is good for their careers. However, the challenge is plugging the knowing-doing gap. How can people build and manage their networks more effectively? What makes individuals more or less motivated to network?

In this podcast, Ko Kuwabara, Associate Professor of Organisational Behaviour at INSEAD, explains how mindsets can affect peoples' motivation to network. He discusses networking through the lens of a growth vs. fixed mindset – a concept popularised by psychologist Carol S. Dweck.

He also discusses how as the modern workplace becomes increasingly diverse, a growth mindset can help members of an organisation better embrace diversity.

Leaders play an important role in spearheading organisational change. However, INSEAD professor Narayan Pant notes that many leaders tend to rely on the same ways of doing things that have worked for them in the past, even though it may be the wrong approach for a particular situation.

In this podcast, Pant delves into why it can be difficult for leaders to identify and change their behaviours. He explains the four-step process to help leaders overcome this, which includes cultivating awareness, making a commitment to change, overcoming interferences and putting new behaviours into practice.