Letter from the Editor: Faith-Based Business

Robert Safian — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 13:00:00 -0500

I may be wrong, but I'm never in doubt. That's a line I use with my staff (and my kids) to explain my decision making. It is partly in jest -- of course I have doubts, just like everyone else. But sometimes you need to project confidence and inspire obedience, especially when facing a wall of skepticism.

Letter from the Editor: Attitude Is Everything

Robert Safian — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 13:00:00 -0500

My father-in-law uses an expression, "Attitude is everything." It's his nonconfrontational way of saying, "Stop complaining." This expression has been on my mind lately when I talk to media and advertising executives about the disruption and uncertainty in their industries. I hear a lot of nostalgia, resistance, and barely contained anger as lucrative ways of doing business are undercut by shifts in technology, new spending patterns, and client enthusiasm for ideas that have never been tried before. It's no wonder that AMC's Mad Men has become such a cultural touchstone.

Letter From the Editor: The Best Rivalry in Business, Refreshed

Robert Safian — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 14:00:00 -0400

When you're in the media business, you worry about the cost -- and the risk -- of creating a new product from scratch each time. Movies, music, magazines: We all share the same challenge. In comparison, the idea of creating the same item -- say a can of Coke -- over and over can seem kind of simple. But if you think about it a little deeper, you quickly come to the opposite conclusion: If your product never changes, how do you keep it from getting boring? How do you hold onto your territory when new things are constantly emerging to tempt your customer away?

Letter from the Editor: Lessons of the Edupunks

Robert Safian — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 14:00:00 -0400

Like many teenagers, my son spends a ton of time on his computer. His passion is designing icons to personalize a desktop or iPhone interface. He posts sets of these icons online for people to download. He doesn't get paid for any of this. But he loves doing it.

I sometimes reprimand him for devoting so many hours to this: "Have you finished your Spanish homework?" Yet I also find myself wondering, What's actually the better training for his future, high-school Spanish or honing these self-taught computer skills?

Letter from the Editor: Endless Energy

Robert Safian — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 14:00:00 -0400

When staff writer Anya Kamenetz and her husband, an engineer at Google, went on their honeymoon, they set aside a week to volunteer at an AIDS hospice in Pune, India. The hospice, it turned out, desperately wanted its own Web site. So while her husband crafted the digital code, Kamenetz interviewed patients and staff, putting together the content. The site was fully functional by the time they left.

Letter From the Editor: Think Randomly, Execute Strategically

Robert Safian — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 14:00:00 -0400

A delegation of Scottish CEOs came by our offices recently. They were on a four-day tour of U.S. companies -- Apple, Cisco, and so forth. Their goal was both information and inspiration, about how best to keep their businesses, large and small, moving forward.

Letter From the Editor: What We Can't Live Without

Robert Safian — Fri, 01 May 2009 14:00:00 -0400

When my father was a kid, his family had the first television on the block. Neighbors would come by just to watch the transmission signal. I was reminded of this family lore by Sony exec Steve Haber's comments about e-books in the Fast Talk section (which begins here): "Every time I give a Reader to someone, I never get it back. It's just like when digital cameras came out. At first, people didn't know they needed it.

Editor's Letter: Two Wicked Startups, One Common Thread

Robert Safian — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 13:00:00 -0400

During the past few weeks, I've been making the rounds to top execs at big companies across the country to see how this economic crisis is playing out on the ground. Among the consistent laments I've heard: Firms can't plan and budget for the future because it's so uncertain.

This got me thinking about the illusion we've been living with -- that we could somehow predict the future, at least in business terms. It was, of course, always a mirage.

Presenting the 50 Most Innovative Companies

Robert Safian — Tue, 03 Feb 2009 18:36:06 -0500

You won't find Bernie Madoff in these pages. Or talk of another Great Depression. You won't find unemployment statistics or the word "bailout." We may discuss those topics in another issue, but this month, we pass.

Editor's Letter: What Obama and Shaun White Have in Common

Robert Safian — Wed, 14 Jan 2009 13:45:33 -0500

When we decided to put Barack Obama on our cover early last year, he was trailing well behind Hillary Clinton in the polls. We were cautioned by magazine insiders about the risk, but by the time our article was finished and hit newsstands, Obama had triumphed on Super Tuesday and was the front-runner.