The 2003 HBR list. Breakthrough ideas for tomorrow's business agenda

International conflict. Bear markets. Corporate scandals. The events of this past year have prompted intense soul-searching in many quarters and led us, in this year's list of the best business ideas, to reassess some of the most basic assumptions about strategy, organizations, and leadership. We began by reconsidering the role of the leader. Whether the boss is a hero or villain, discussions of leadership focus almost exclusively on the CEO. But attention also needs to be paid to the other people who make organizations work, not only to the corporate boards that oversee CEOs but to the followers--to their responsibilities, their power, and their obligation not to follow flawed leaders. And we considered the fate of soft issues, like emotional intelligence, in hard times. It's tempting to dismiss them when your employees will do anything just to keep their jobs. But hard times are good times to employ such tools on yourself. They can arm you with the self-awareness you need to understand, anticipate, and outwit your enemies. Where tools may fail, an attitude adjustment may be what's needed. Despite valiant efforts to lead change and eliminate inefficiencies, organizations stay messy. Perhaps it's better to learn to live with messiness and even focus on its benefits, one of which may be growth. Not the meteoric, effortless illusion we indulged in during the 1990s, but significant gains nonetheless. These can come when managers embrace messiness not just within their organizations but along the boundaries of the firm, blurring the line between their own core assets and functions and those of other companies. There's growth potential, too, in considering the company as a portfolio of opportunities--but only if managers can sell off poorly performing business units as easily as they've been shedding ailing stocks of late.