MIT Sloan Management Review - Winter 2025

Hey there!

Welcome to my ‘Reading Insights‘ series. Here, is where I share simple takeaways and personal thoughts from articles, papers, and other readings that called my attention.

Together, we’ll explore ideas beyond the “Book Notes” series that help us to improve how we think about management, leadership, and personal growth.

So grab a cup of coffee, and let’s dive into some interesting insights!

And what are we reading today?

Today we will talk about the: MIT Sloan Management Review magazine edition Winter 2025.

Keeping up with the latest business trends isn’t just about staying informed—it’s about staying ahead. The Winter 2025 edition of MIT Sloan Management Review brings fresh insights on leadership, AI, workplace culture, and strategic decision-making.

Whether you’re a manager, a business leader, or someone passionate about improving how work gets done, this issue from MIT Sloan Management Review delivers powerful lessons to navigate today’s fast-changing world.

In this post, you’ll find a bite-sized summary of each article from MIT Sloan Management Review, covering everything from better project management to AI, work design, and leadership strategies.

A Better Way to Avoid Project Delays – Matej Lorko, Maroš Servátka & Le Zhang
Design Work to Prevent Burnout – Sharon K. Parker & Caroline Knight
Craft Schedules That Work for Everyone – Donald Sull & Alexander Kowalski
Improve Workflows by Managing Bottlenecks – Samina Karim, Chi-Hyon Lee & Manuela N. Hoehn-Weiss
A Practical Guide to Gaining Value From LLMs – Rama Ramakrishnan
The Myth of the Sustainable Consumer – Andreas von der Gathen, Nicolai Broby Eckert & Caroline Kastbjerg
How Integrating DEI Into Strategy Lifts Performance – Quinetta Roberson
Know Your Data to Harness Federated Machine Learning – José Parra-Moyano, Karl Schmedders & Maximilian Werner
Why Influence Is a Two-Way Street – Jonathan Hughes, Jessica Wadd & Ashley Hetrick
Make Character Count in Hiring and Promoting – Mary Crossan

A Better Way to Avoid Project Delays

By Matej Lorko, Maroš Servátka & Le Zhang – full article

👉 The Big Idea: Most projects run late because teams rely on rough guesses instead of real data. The best way to set realistic deadlines is to look at past projects and avoid falling into the trap of anchoring bias.

📌 The Summary: Project delays happen when teams make overly optimistic estimates based on the first deadline that comes up. This is called anchoring bias—once a number is set, everyone adjusts their expectations around it, even if it’s unrealistic. Instead of guessing, companies should use reference-class forecasting, which means looking at real data from past projects to create more accurate schedules.

Another common mistake is rewarding teams only for hitting deadlines. This can slow things down because people pace themselves to match the schedule instead of working efficiently. A better approach is to balance speed and accuracy, so teams stay focused on delivering real results without unnecessary delays.

💡 Key Takeaways:
✔ Don’t set deadlines based on the first number you hear—use real project data.
✔ Reference-class forecasting helps avoid unrealistic schedules.
✔ Rewarding teams only for meeting deadlines can create inefficiencies.

Design Work to Prevent Burnout

By Sharon K. Parker & Caroline Knight – full article

👉 The Big Idea: Burnout isn’t just about long hours—it’s about bad job design. Instead of fixing employees with stress management programs, companies should fix the way work is structured to keep people engaged and motivated.

📌 The Summary: According to this article from MIT Sloan Management Review, burnout remains a widespread issue, with nearly 67% of employees feeling disengaged. While many companies offer mindfulness training and flexible hours, these band-aid solutions don’t address the root cause: poor work design.

Parker and Knight propose the SMART Work Design model, which focuses on Stimulating Work, Mastery, Autonomy, Relational Work, and Tolerable Demands. Jobs that offer variety, challenge, and autonomy lead to better performance and higher engagement. Meanwhile, excessive workloads, micromanagement, and lack of support accelerate burnout.

Organizations that redesign work using these principles report higher retention, lower stress, and increased motivation. For leaders, the key is shifting from a “fix-the-worker” mindset to a “fix-the-work” approach.

💡 Key Takeaways:
✔ Burnout isn’t just about too much work—it’s about poorly designed jobs.
✔ Employees need autonomy, variety, and clear goals to stay engaged.
✔ Fix the work environment instead of just offering stress-management solutions.

Craft Schedules That Work for Everyone

By Donald Sull & Alexander Kowalski – full article

👉 The Big Idea: Unpredictable and rigid schedules push employees to quit. Companies that offer flexible, fair, and predictable work hours see better retention and higher performance.

📌 The Summary: Erratic work schedules contribute to burnout, turnover, and low morale. Employees often struggle with unpredictable hours, inflexible shifts, and insufficient breaks. Sull and Kowalski analyzed 3 million Glassdoor reviews to identify seven scheduling attributes that impact job satisfaction: flexibility, predictability, number of hours, standard hours, time off, breaks, and work-life boundaries.

Companies like Marriott and Land O’Lakes have improved retention by redesigning work hours to accommodate employee needs. Strategies such as hiring float pools, offering customizable shifts, and considering worker preferences at hiring improve both employee engagement and business results.

💡 Key Takeaways:
✔ Unpredictable work schedules are a major reason people quit.
✔ Employees perform better when they have more control over their time.
✔ Companies that prioritize flexibility and fairness in scheduling see better results.

Improve Workflows by Managing Bottlenecks

By Samina Karim, Chi-Hyon Lee & Manuela N. Hoehn-Weiss – full article

👉 The Big Idea: Work gets stuck when bottlenecks slow things down. Fixing them isn’t just about adding more resources—it’s about understanding where and why work is getting blocked.

📌 The Summary: Bottlenecks happen when tasks pile up because of dependencies, complexity, or resource shortages. Many companies try to solve them by hiring more people, but that doesn’t always work. The key is to analyze workflows and identify whether the problem is a task bottleneck (too much complexity) or a resource bottleneck (not enough capacity).

For example, according to this article from the MIT Sloan Management Review, some hospitals have centralized blood testing to improve coordination, but this also creates longer wait times. Instead of just adding more labs, a better approach is restructuring the process to balance speed and efficiency. Fixing bottlenecks requires seeing the big picture, not just putting out fires.

💡 Key Takeaways:
✔ Bottlenecks come from task complexity or resource shortages—identify the real issue.
✔ Hiring more people doesn’t always fix the problem—sometimes work needs to be redesigned.
✔ Look at the full workflow to avoid shifting the bottleneck elsewhere.

A Practical Guide to Gaining Value From LLMs

By Rama Ramakrishnan – full article

👉 The Big Idea: AI can be powerful, but not every process benefits from it. Companies need a clear strategy to decide where AI can actually add value.

📌 The Summary: According to the MIT Sloan Management Review, many organizations struggle to achieve ROI from LLMs because they overlook key limitations. Ramakrishnan proposes a three-step framework to assess AI opportunities:

Disaggregate tasks—Break business processes into distinct activities.
Evaluate AI suitability—Analyze whether AI is cost-effective for the task.
Pilot, evaluate, iterate—Start small and refine based on real-world results.

Companies that rush AI adoption without a structured plan often waste resources. Instead, leaders should carefully identify high-impact, low-risk applications before scaling AI solutions.

💡 Key Takeaways:
✔ Not every business process needs AI—focus on where it adds real value.
✔ Start small, test, and refine before scaling AI projects.
✔ AI works best in structured, repetitive tasks with good data quality.

The Myth of the Sustainable Consumer

By Andreas von der Gathen, Nicolai Broby Eckert & Caroline Kastbjerg – full article

👉 The Big Idea: People say they care about sustainability, but most won’t pay extra for it. Companies need to understand different consumer motivations to sell sustainable products effectively.

📌 The Summary: Many businesses assume there’s a huge market for eco-friendly products, but real-world behavior tells a different story. Research shows that there are eight different consumer types when it comes to sustainability. Some care deeply and will pay more, while others only choose green products if it benefits them personally (like saving money or improving health).

Instead of marketing sustainability as a one-size-fits-all solution, companies should tailor messaging, pricing, and benefits to different consumer segments. The key to driving sustainable purchases is understanding what truly motivates each type of customer.

💡 Key Takeaways:
✔ People like the idea of sustainability, but not everyone will pay extra for it.
✔ There are different types of sustainable consumers—companies must segment them.
✔ To sell green products, align sustainability with what customers actually care about.

How Integrating DEI Into Strategy Lifts Performance

By Quinetta Roberson – full article

👉 The Big Idea: Diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) isn’t just about hiring a diverse team—it’s about embedding DEI into company strategy to drive real business results.

📌 The Summary: Many companies launch DEI initiatives without linking them to business goals, which makes them less effective. Research shows that DEI has the biggest impact when it’s built into hiring, promotions, leadership development, and performance metrics. When done right, DEI can improve innovation, employee engagement, and financial performance.

The best companies go beyond just hiring diverse talent—they support career growth, ensure leadership accountability, and use data to track DEI progress. Companies that see DEI as a business driver, not just an HR program, get the best results.

💡 Key Takeaways:
✔ DEI works best when tied to business goals, not just HR policies.
✔ Companies should measure and track their DEI progress with real data.
✔ Diverse teams perform better when they have equal growth opportunities.

Know Your Data to Harness Federated Machine Learning

By José Parra-Moyano, Karl Schmedders & Maximilian Werner – full article

👉 The Big Idea: AI needs good data, but privacy laws make sharing data tricky. Federated learning allows companies to train AI models without exposing sensitive information.

📌 The Summary: According to MIT Sloan Management Review, AI models are only as good as the data they’re trained on, but companies can’t always share data due to privacy concerns and regulations. Federated learning solves this problem by letting companies train AI models on decentralized data sources without ever moving the data.

This technique is already being used in healthcare (for medical research) and finance (for fraud detection). Companies can collaborate on AI development while keeping customer data private and secure. To succeed, businesses need to understand how to structure and manage their data effectively.

💡 Key Takeaways:
✔ Federated learning allows AI to learn from different sources without sharing private data.
✔ Industries like healthcare and banking are already using it to improve AI models.
✔ Data quality and structure are key to making federated learning work.

Why Influence Is a Two-Way Street

By Jonathan Hughes, Jessica Wadd & Ashley Hetrick – full article

👉 The Big Idea: Influence isn’t about convincing people—it’s about collaborating and solving problems together.

📌 The Summary: Many leaders try to influence others by persuading them to agree. But research shows that real influence comes from involving people in the decision-making process. Instead of pushing an agenda, effective leaders frame discussions around shared challenges, get early input, and integrate different perspectives.

Companies that embrace collaborative influence see faster decision-making, stronger engagement, and better results. Influence is not just about speaking—it’s about listening and working together.

💡 Key Takeaways:
✔ Influence isn’t about selling ideas—it’s about co-creating solutions.
✔ Teams make better decisions faster when they feel included in the process.
✔ The best leaders listen as much as they lead.

Make Character Count in Hiring and Promoting

By Mary Crossan – full article

👉 The Big Idea: Leaders are often hired for their skills and experience, but fired for their character flaws. Companies need to prioritize character in hiring and promotions.

📌 The Summary: Most organizations focus on competence when hiring or promoting leaders, but research shows that character is just as important. Many leadership failures come from issues like lack of integrity, poor judgment, or arrogance—not from skill gaps.

The best companies evaluate both skills and character traits like humility, accountability, and integrity. They use 360-degree feedback, leadership coaching, and structured assessments to build a culture of trust and strong values.

💡 Key Takeaways:
✔ Leaders fail more often due to character issues than skill gaps.
✔ Companies should assess integrity, humility, and accountability in hiring and promotions.
✔ A strong leadership culture balances competence and character.

The Winter 2025 edition of MIT Sloan Management Review delivers powerful lessons on leadership, AI, workplace culture, and strategic decision-making.

One of the biggest themes across these articles in the MIT Sloan Management Review is the importance of structure and strategy. The best leaders and organizations aren’t just reacting to challenges—they’re actively designing better ways to work, lead, and grow.

If there’s one thing to take from this edition of the MIT Sloan Management Review, it’s that small shifts in how we plan, organize, and lead can make a huge difference in performance, engagement, and long-term success.

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