Nathan Furr

Creating transformative change in big companies may be the hardest task leaders face, especially in a time of digital disruption from rapidly emerging technologies. As the rise of AI tools continues to accelerate the pace of disruption in virtually every industry, immense uncertainty has followed. In this eye-opening presentation, INSEAD Professor of Strategy and co-author of “Leading Transformation,” Nathan Furr, Ph.D., provides leaders with clear-eyed approaches for taking the anxiety out of AI-focused digital transformation. Replacing this fear factor with a focused, fact-based approach to actionable value creation, he shows how the transformation process is much more attainable than many realize. With a framework for anticipating and recognizing when new technologies pose a threat and how to respond in order to profit from them, Furr helps leaders get onboard with testing AI tools, learning from those tests, and bringing their organizations forward during the transformation journey. With new skills for confidently applying practical technology evaluations, attendees will be able to envision valuable new futures and break the decision bottlenecks that hold organizations back from successful AI transformations.

What distinguishes individuals who emerge as effective leaders of innovation? It’s not just being creative or the quality of their ideas. Nikola Tesla was arguably a more brilliant inventor than Thomas Edison; but Edison realized tremendous commercial success while Tesla died penniless. Edison not only developed world-changing ideas, but he also acquired resources in a competitive market to execute and commercialize them. Jeff Dyer says that success hinges on building “innovation capital” through effective leadership. This entails building your “human capital” skills of forward thinking, proactive problem solving and persuasion. To put your ideas into action, you also need “innovative social capital” – a network of influencers, financial benefactors and organization leaders who can help build and promote your brand, product or service. Finally, you need “innovative reputation capital” – the credibility and notoriety that motivates organizational leaders and investors to trust you with their money, and consumers to eagerly await your next idea. Without the network and reputation, your vision will remain an unfulfilled wish.

Based on his book “Innovation Capital: How to Compete – and Win – Like the World’s Most Innovative Leaders” (HBR Press, June 2019), Dyer and his co-authors, through in-depth interviews, unlocks the secrets of how the world’s most successful and well-known CEOs – including Amazon’s Jeff Bezos, Tesla’s Elon Musk and Salesforce’s Marc Benioff – journeyed from their initial idea stage to being touchstones for innovation and dynamism. For entrepreneurs and creative managers, Dyer’s accumulation of wisdom from these towering figures is an invaluable resource in learning how to forge your own innovation capital, and walk in their footsteps.

Growth through innovation is a powerful way to find new opportunities and increase the value of an organization.  Drawing on decades of research into how the world’s most innovative organizations create and profit from new opportunities, Nathan Furr draws on his co-authored book ”The Innovator’s Method” to teach audiences how to apply tools like lean startup, design thinking and business model transformation to build innovation muscles and foster a culture that creates significant growth through innovation. Furr brings these concepts to life in his talks, workshops and advisory meetings, which offer participants the opportunity to apply his frameworks to their own goals and challenges.

Five of the world’s most valuable businesses are platforms, and platform-based businesses consistently outperform traditional product-based business models. Yet most firms offer products and services without platforms. Drawing on his years of research into transformational models, Nathan Furr shares strategies for converting a product or service business into a platform model so companies can multiply the value of their resources. During his talks, workshops and advisory meetings, he explains why platforms offer non-platform firms a chance to become more efficient, agile and profitable, and he shares what it takes to make the leap.

How do great innovators come up with new ideas and create opportunities in an era of increasing uncertainty and intense competition? Having identified behaviors of the world’s greatest leaders – from Amazon and Apple to Google, Skype and more – INSEAD Professor of Strategy Nathan Furr outlines the skills that distinguish the extraordinary from the ordinary. He also discusses how to create and lead a culture of innovation throughout an organization, an advantage that improves their innovation premium and spurs real growth. Drawing on his decades of research into collaborative innovation, Furr teaches how organizations and leaders in any sector can apply these insights and tools to solve problems and create new opportunities.

Although we are wired to fear uncertainty, great leaders, innovators and changemakers recognize that uncertainty always holds possibility. Learning to develop the perspective and skills to be resilient in the face of uncertainty and then lead others to new possibilities is key to great leadership. In this engaging presentation, INSEAD Professor of Strategy Nathan Furr reveals that the most important – and an often missing – skill for bolstering organizational resilience is the ability to confidently lead through change and uncertainty. Drawing from his highly acclaimed book “The Upside of Uncertainty,” Furr presents a comprehensive, customizable toolkit and strategies for delivering calm, reassuring leadership through challenging times that will help reduce employee burnout and build a company’s ongoing durability. Audiences will be empowered to develop “uncertainty capability,” becoming more adaptable, creative, agile, fearless, and better able to strategically pivot in times of change.