Wharton’s faculty podcast, “Ripple Effect,” introduces its “Meet the Author” series, highlighting recent books published by experts at the Wharton School. The June series examines leadership, customer service, immigration, and the power of data.
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Alberto I. Duran President’s Distinguished Professor Cait Lamberton talks about her new book, “Marketplace Dignity,” which explains why customers want firms to treat them with respect and dignity above anything else.
“We asked consumers to rank the importance of different things that they can experience in their interactions with a firm. Dignity always comes in second. It comes in second to the objective value that you get from your interaction with a firm,” says Lamberton. “But what falls way down the list are the things that we talk about all the time, like whether the firm is sustainable, whether the firm aligns with my political values. What’s second is whether I’m treated with respect. That comes up in the data over and over and over again.”
With political instability rising around the world, now is the time for business leaders to develop a comprehensive strategy to mitigate risk. Vice Dean and Faculty Director of the Environmental, Social and Governance Initiative Witold Henisz explains how in his new book, “Geostrategy by Design.”
“There’s a risk of a greater resurgence of something like the Cold War, where we can’t be sourcing certain products. We’re concerned about the ownership of who owns what company, whether it be TikTok or whether it be semiconductors,” says Henisz. “National identity really matters, and that’s got to be part of the equation. It’s not a new system, but it’s a new set of questions that are going to affect the system in every aspect of global companies’ operations.”
Immigrants have long been cast as outsiders who take jobs and damage the economy. Max and Bernice Garchik Family Presidential Associate Professor Zeke Hernandez dispels these stereotypes and others in his new book, “The Truth About Immigration: Why Successful Societies Welcome Newcomers.”
“We have a lot of research showing that where immigrants go, firms make investment. And these effects last for generations. Where there’s a lot of, say, Germans, historically, a lot of German investment will follow. It’s true for Mexican firms. It’s true for Korean firms. It’s true for every nationality,” says Hernandez. “This is what I call the investment-immigration-jobs triangle. Immigrants arrive, they foster investment from their home countries, those investments create jobs.”
Rather than mining data for insights, companies need to think more strategically about the decisions they need to make, and use data to help them get there. Co-director of AI at Wharton and the Sebastian S. Kresge Professor of Marketing Stefano Puntoni says that’s the focus of “Decision-driven Analytics,” his new book co-authored with Bart De Langhe.
“Nobody argues that using data to make decisions is a bad idea. We need data to make good decisions. What we argue in the book is that the emphasis is wrong,” says Puntoni. “And that the complexity and investments required to get the data systems in place, and all that complex, technical work that has to be done has attracted a lot of attention. At some point, people end up in a situation where we are looking at data and trying to find a purpose for it, rather than looking at the questions that they need to answer and find data for that purpose.”
For a full list of podcast episodes, visit the “Ripple Effect” website.
