The future of public-sector digital services: Achieving intelligent, cost-neutral service delivery

Learned a lot lending an editorial hand here:

PWC Strategy&/Tawakkalna, June 2025

by Hani Zein, Karl Njeim, and Saleh Mosaibah

A key problem facing government service digitization today is the fragmentation produced by multiple, siloed applications that feature separate log-ins, inconsistent user interfaces, and redundant data submissions. This lack of integration results in operational inefficiencies, service delivery delays, and a disjointed experience that diminishes public trust in digital services at a time of rising expectations for seamless, intuitive, and personalized digital interactions—such as those offered by leading private-sector platforms.

For these reasons, efforts are being made to transform the delivery of government services into a single-access, seamless, and virtual constituent experience via one-stop digital channels in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries. One-stop digital channels offer a host of benefits, including enhanced customer engagement and experience, automated service delivery, proactive services, enhanced decision-making, and more efficient fraud detection and prevention.

However, they also demand significant investment in IT infrastructure, interoperability frameworks, cybersecurity, user experience design, and such emerging technologies as artificial intelligence (AI) and blockchain. Additionally, the creation of one-stop digital channels requires governments to digitize and modernize legacy systems, as well as automate existing processes. Thus, the challenge now facing GCC governments is to accelerate initiative time lines and continue to raise the level of digital service delivery in a cost-neutral manner. To meet this challenge, GCC governments should:

• Seek the consolidation of public services and establish a foundation for one-stop digital channels
• Centralize digital services in a manner that improves the citizen experience and benefits all participating government entities
• Adopt an open platform for service development that enables third parties to list existing services and co-create new services
• Exploit AI to improve service delivery across the service value chain and optimize software service development
• Use a cost-neutral approach to underwrite investments in one-stop digital channels through new revenue generation opportunities and public–private partnerships (PPPs) that bring market-driven approaches to service delivery and resource management

Read the rest here.

How to unlock your residential sales strategy to win in tomorrow’s market

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PwC Strategy&, June 2025

by Karim Abdallah, Joe Rached, Zahi Awad, and Maria Geagea




The surge in integrated mega projects in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries is heating up competition among residential real estate developers. Value propositions offering homebuyers distinctive designs and long lists of amenities have become commonplace. Developers need to find new ways to differentiate themselves from competitors, attract buyers, and optimize financial results. In this environment, a winning sales strategy is crucial for both survival and success.

The strong market for high-end residential real estate in the GCC countries is driven in large part by domestic demand for “branded” properties (built in alliance with a famous brand) and rising expatriate homeownership. During 2024, for example, the Saudi residential real estate market recorded a 38 percent increase in transaction volume and a 35 percent rise in transaction value.

The inventory needed to meet this demand is coming soon. Our review of new project announcements in locales such as Diriyah and the Red Sea, and by such developers as Dar Al Arkan and Roshn, shows that a substantial increase in residential units is in the works.

The challenge now facing developers is that many of them are targeting the same pool of middle- to high-income homebuyers. As more and more homes come onto the market, the features and amenities they offer will become increasingly commoditized—providing less opportunity for differentiation. Consequently, competition among developers will intensify.

Developers that want to win in this increasingly competitive residential real estate marketplace need to formulate and execute a sales strategy that strikes the optimal balance of pricing, financing, marketing, and differentiation to drive demand, move buyers through the sales funnel, and deliver sustained growth in an evolving market. This strategy should make full use of innovative tools and approaches, such as digital tokenization, which enhances the liquidity of real estate investments and brings more buyers to market.

A sales strategy for residential real estate developers needs to define the developer’s sales objectives and targets, the value proposition needed to achieve those objectives, the sales operating model, and the enablers that support the execution of the strategy (read the rest here).

Leadership by design: Lessons in mentorship success from Project1932 in Saudi Arabia

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PwC Strategy&/Project1932, June 2025

by Fadi Adra, Dr. Shihab Elborai, Chadi N. Moujaes, and Jana Yamani



As the large-scale transformation initiatives in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries come to fruition, they require newly skilled and expanded workforces and many new leaders. We estimate that economic diversification, advanced technologies, and the shift to knowledge-based work will create the need for an additional 700,000 top and middle managers in the region by 2030, which is 30 percent more than were required in 2024.

GCC governments have prioritized human capital development, principally through education reforms and workforce localization. These efforts have increased workforce participation of GCC nationals and women significantly. However, they are insufficient to equip young professionals with all the practical capabilities and soft skills necessary to meet the coming workforce requirements.

Mentorship programs, which draw upon the Arab world’s historical legacy of apprenticeship, can bridge that gap. When systematically structured and executed, mentoring fosters the functional and industry knowledge of emerging leaders, hones their acumen and soft skills, and prepares them for the technological advances shaping the future of work.

Findings drawn from Project1932, a Saudi-based initiative cultivating emerging leaders by connecting them with experienced mentors, indicate that the design of successful mentorship programs entails five elements and three enablers. The elements are shared purpose, synergistic matchmaking, a structured and relevant curriculum, mentoring for mentors, and community power. Successful programs are enabled by strong leadership, robust monitoring and evaluation systems, and coherent financial sustainability strategy.

Further, surveys and interviews of Project1932 participants have revealed five insights for fostering mentoring success. Successful programs challenge mentees to leave their comfort zones, train mentors in active listening so they can provide tailored guidance, build strong mentor–mentee relationships, encourage calculated risk taking, and empower mentees to question the status quo.

Project1932 demonstrates that systematic mentorship programs conducted at scale can bridge the GCC’s gap between leadership demand and supply. Read the rest here.

Capturing the AI advantage through culture change

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Oil Review Middle East, May 30, 2025

by James Thomas, Shantanu Gautam, and Pavel Evteev



The GCC’s national oil companies (NOCs) must put AI to work if they are to keep delivering the world’s lowest cost and lowest carbon footprint barrels. To achieve this, NOCs need organisational cultures that can quickly produce many small, high-impact artificial intelligence (AI) applications.

AI-powered solutions are the next major cost and efficiency frontier in the oil and gas industry. Leading oil majors are already using them to produce oil faster, at lower cost and resource intensity. For example, AI can accelerate subsurface analysis, reduce uncertainty, and optimise capital allocation. Shell partnered with startup Avathon (formerly SparkCognition) and is using AI-powered deep learning to reduce seismic shots by 99%, maintaining image accuracy while cutting exploration time from nine months to just nine days.

Beyond exploration, AI is transforming well planning, automating drilling, predicting conditions, and streamlining workflows. ExxonMobil, collaborating with IBM, used AI to reduce well planning and design time from nine to seven months, and cut data preparation time by 40%.

Drilling optimisation is another area seeing major gains. AI can now analyse real-time downhole data, optimise rate of penetration, and predict failures. Machine learning can adjust drilling parameters dynamically, reducing non-productive time, cutting costs, and improving well economics. ConocoPhillips used three years of drilling data to develop a machine learning model that improved vertical rate of penetration by 20% and reduced premature drilling-motor failures by 65% – saving US$30,000 per well.

Environmental performance is improving too. AI can track emissions in real time, detect leaks, and increase carbon capture. Chevron deployed AI to optimise methane emissions reduction in upstream operations, helping cut methane emission intensity by 60%.

NOCs across the region are also making tangible progress in applying AI to boost performance. Aramco, for example, deployed 40,000 sensors across 500 wells, enabling AI-driven process control that increased production by 15% and halved troubleshooting time. ADNOC’s Emission X tool helped abate 1 million tonnes of CO2 in one year through AI-powered emissions prediction and optimisation. Read the rest here.

Caring for the Carers: Investing in healthcare workforce wellbeing

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PwC Strategy& Middle East, May 2025

by Irfan Merali, Dr. Christelle Abou Nader, and Andrew AlHamouch

The health of the GCC’s population depends on the wellbeing of its healthcare workforce. It is a key lever for improving the quality of care provided by the region’s 800,000 healthcare professionals, and for reducing the cost of care. Our analysis indicates that improving healthcare workforce wellbeing in the GCC countries potentially could generate US$ 2.5 billion in annual savings.

Healthcare is a rewarding and demanding profession. Long hours, high intensity work environments, and physically demanding tasks contribute to elevated incidences of chronic fatigue, musculoskeletal injuries, and other health problems. Nearly half of healthcare workers globally suffer from burnout. Almost as many experience musculoskeletal issues each year. We find comparable rates in the GCC’s healthcare systems.

These conditions harm healthcare workers and patients. Mental and physical wellbeing challenges drive up absenteeism, turnover, and job dissatisfaction, all of which increase medical errors, lower patient satisfaction, and diminish compassionate care. Research into the effects of burnout among doctors, for example, shows that it is associated with a fourfold decrease in job satisfaction. Doctors experiencing burnout are 2.2 times more likely to have made a recent medical error. Thus, current conditions foster a vicious cycle with systemic and financial repercussions.

As these conditions worsen, healthcare systems become increasingly stretched, with workforce shortages intensifying these pressures. The wellbeing of the GCC’s healthcare workforce is a large-scale issue with system-wide implications that should be investment priorities. Evidence-based research proves that investing in healthcare worker wellbeing yields tangible benefits, including a 17% reduction in absenteeism, an 11% decrease in turnover, and productivity gains of up to 25%. Read the rest here.

The Personalization Imperative: Driving telecom growth with AI-powered marketing

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PwC Strategy& Middle East, April 2025

by GP Singh, Mahmoud Makki, Tarek Matar, and Ankit Kushwaha




Customers in every industry are demanding personalized, real-time engagement across channels, whether it is social media, mobile apps, or retail stores online and offline. They expect to be uniquely understood in the moment.

Marketers know that personalization is critical to relevance and differentiation, revenue growth, and brand value. Leaders are tackling this challenge head-on. First, they are gathering massive, proprietary data sets of customer information. Unilever, for example, is on a mission to create 1 billion one-on-one customer relationships by analyzing interactions across digital and in-store touch points for marketing insights. Second, such leaders are creating integrated marketing technology (MarTech) stacks to enable real-time personalization. McDonald’s integrated its MarTech to deliver personalized drive-through menus, mobile app offers, and in-store experiences, increasing its digital customer frequency by 10 percent and raising customer spending. Third, these leaders are exploiting real-time insights to get their concept into the market faster. Such agility allowed Coca-Cola to quickly move from a concept to the production of personalized bottles and cans in its “Share a Coke” campaign, which it launched in Australia and then expanded globally, and grow sales by 2.5 percent in a year in the competitive U.S. market.

Telecom operators are uniquely positioned to fulfill the personalization imperative. Their data sets, which include real-time location data, usage patterns, and customer service interactions, are broader and richer than those of industries such as finance or retail.

The problem is that many telecom operators are struggling to tap this gold mine of insights. In many cases, they are unable to deliver the right offer at the right place and the right time to their customers. We find that telecom companies typically utilize only 30 to 50 percent of their data. Senior telecom executives worry that disconnected MarTech stacks and skills gaps are holding them back.

Data-fueled, AI-powered marketing engines can unlock the potential for personalization. Such engines can produce the insights needed for personalized engagement, promote more informed decisions, and create the precision targeted strategies needed to enhance returns and deliver competitive advantage. Our analysis shows that for telecom companies in the early stages of their customer value management (CVM) journey, every $1.00 invested in AI-powered, data-fueled marketing can yield up to $5.90 in EBITDA (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization) gains over five years. (Read the rest here.)

Film and beyond: Leapfrogging into the global screen industry

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BroadcastPro Middle East, February 5, 2025

by Tarek Matar, Karim Sarkis and Maansi Sagar



Ongoing transformation in the global screen industry has created an opportunity for GCC countries to establish themselves as prominent players. As the industry grapples with the future of content creation and the demands of a global audience, the combination of an appetite for investment in state-of-the-art technologies and media hubs, a focus on attracting investors and producers, a young and digitally-savvy workforce, and a culture rich with stories and landscapes could enable the GCC region to become a centre of cinematic innovation. Success in this endeavour will require a collaborative effort between governments and the private sector to bridge the silos of geography, technology and media industry verticals.

The screen industry, which has expanded beyond movies and movie theatres, is facing the uncertainties that accompany the impact of new technologies on its production value chain, particularly GenAI (simply defined here as artificial intelligence that can generate video content from text, image and video prompts). Video tools like Runway and Meta’s Movie Gen, along with virtual production and other advancements, are raising questions: Will content be generated versus filmed? Will soundstages and physical locations still be needed? What talent and skills will be essential? How will budgets and timelines be affected?

Creatives are soul-searching. Infrastructure investors are hesitating. Media conglomerates are experimenting. Big Tech is pouring billions into new tools. Yet the value is there to be captured. Strategy& forecasts that global video revenues – cinema, OTT services and TV – will increase by approximately $165bn to $564bn by 2028.

Simultaneously, audience and economic dynamics are changing, driven by shifting viewer preferences and industry budgetary pressures. Audiences are fuelling demand for locally-produced content as they search beyond the once-dominant Hollywood-centric model in search of relatable storytelling, cultural representation and authentic experiences. Film producers must do more with less as distribution and streaming platforms focus on profitability and tighten their budgets, thus making cheaper international content more appealing.

This uncertainty and the changing dynamics create an opportunity for the GCC’s forward-leaning economies to position themselves as a global film production hub with five actions. Read the rest here.

Redefining the social contract: Policy options for economic inclusion and fiscal sustainability

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PwC Strategy& Middle East, January 2025

by Chadi N. Moujaes, Sami Zaki, Mitcha Sleiman and Dr. Steffen Hertog

Following the 1970s oil boom, the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC)1 countries developed a generous welfare model offering a wide range of benefits to nationals, including public-sector employment, energy subsidies, a variety of non-means-tested categorical benefits, and free public services such as education and healthcare. Governments now understand that this implicit social contract needs reform, given fiscal constraints and demographic pressures. 

Although GCC governments are responding to this challenge, thus far reforms have been piecemeal. Creating a new social contract requires simultaneous fiscal reform, welfare modernization, and labor policy changes. Moreover, governments need to design and implement the contract components specifically for each country’s needs. 

There are five policy tools that GCC governments can consider as they redesign their social contracts, described below: 

• Permanent income supplements for lower earners can make private-sector employment more attractive to nationals. Such income support ensures that the shift away from public-sector employment does not result in “working poor.” 

• Active labor market policies, including lifelong learning, job services, and training, can support nationals’ integration into the private sector. 

• Universal basic income (UBI) can provide all nationals with income security, while maintaining incentives for private-sector entrepreneurship and work. 

• Means-tested social benefits can support those that need it most, while reducing welfare dependency and fraud. 

• Integration of foreign residents through dedicated welfare tools, such as a modest minimum wage, can attract and ensure a ready workforce of foreigners, while reducing the differential in labor rights and costs that discourages employers from hiring nationals.

A new social contract in GCC countries can provide opportunities to all nationals, guarantee basic welfare for all, incentivize and improve the rewards for private economic activity, ensure fiscal sustainability, and minimize economic distortions. Read the full report here.

Don’t Confuse Ambition With Effective Leadership

Insights by Stanford Business, January 15, 2025

by Theodore Kinni



There’s an old saw — cribbed from Plato and popularized by Douglas Adams — that those people who are most interested in leading others are least suited to the task. That’s not entirely accurate, yet new research has found a grain of truth in this idea: Many leaders have plenty of ambition to lead, but that’s no guarantee others think they’re effective.

“Our society assumes that there is a link between leadership ambition and leadership aptitude,” explains Francis Flynn, a professor of organizational behavior at Stanford Graduate School of Business. People seeking power and success step up to take leadership roles, and how we select leaders rewards that ambitiousness. “We largely rely on opt-in mechanisms to populate our pools of potential leaders — the people who apply to business schools like Stanford or seek a promotion to the next level in their organizations,” Flynn says. “That assumes implicitly that those people who want to lead are the ones who should lead. But is that assumption valid?”

Though it is clear that ambition plays a significant role in who becomes a leader, its link to leadership effectiveness has not been extensively studied. So Flynn, with Shilaan Alzahawi and Emily S. Reitopen in new window, PhD ’22, undertook the first systematic study of that relationship. Read the rest here.

ASX 100 CFOs Unlocked: Identifying the Leadership Advantage that counts

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Spencer Stuart, December 2024

by Jean E. Chiswick and Lucy Smith-Stevens




A senior leadership position, one pivotal to company performance, has undergone a profound shift.

Today’s chief financial officer (CFO) must influence beyond financial issues and offer cross-enterprise leadership on a range of different challenges. The role requires strong communication — someone able to seamlessly switch from internal to external audiences on a range of contemporary industry themes. They have to deftly navigate opportunities and risks, juggle a myriad of stakeholders and be co-pilot to the chief executive, working shoulder to shoulder in many cases, both inside and outside of the company.

No wonder the CFO so often looms large as a strong candidate when a CEO succession is underway.

But it’s not always smooth sailing.

The last two years have been pockmarked by a variety of economic challenges, increased complexity and ambiguity, as well as intense geopolitical disruption. Perhaps unsurprisingly, we have observed a shift in ASX 100 CFOs appointed with more proven CFO track records, classical accounting backgrounds and established credibility in public markets.

Does this mark a return to linear pathways to ASX 100 CFO succession? Well, not necessarily. We have found that 25% of internal CFO promotions have had exposure to P&L or operational leadership positions. This shows that breadth of experience is still important.

With more proven CFOs appointed in ASX 100 CFO positions, coupled with growing CEO succession from CFO roles, one thing is clear: an experienced CFO is the leadership advantage that counts. (Read the rest here.)

GCC economies must plot their way to $1 trillion in non-oil exports

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Gulf News, December 9, 2024

by Rasheed Eltayeb, Chadi Moujaes, Paul Saber, and Sohaib Dar



GCC governments are making progress in reducing their reliance on oil revenues and building an export base of high-value-added goods and services. To accelerate the shift away from oil exports to non-commoditized goods and services, GCC countries can expand their industrial base beyond petrochemicals, support high productivity sectors, and enter competitive markets.

Exports of non-oil goods have grown by a compound annual growth rate of 2% over the past ten years. The World Bank’s latest Gulf Economic Update estimates that GCC non-oil GDP growth reached 3.9% in 2023, while oil-generated revenues contracted by the same percentage.

With the correct measures, we estimate that GCC countries could accelerate this growth and increase total 2022 non-oil exports worth $202 billion to $1 trillion annually by 2030. Our $1 trillion figure comes from: past export growth, GCC countries’ revealed comparative advantage (RCA) in key export sectors (which means they sell abroad significant amounts from that sector), and extrapolating top quartile export growth manifested by global benchmarks.

To capture this prize, GCC policymakers can take three sets of actions. (Read the rest here.)

Exposure to Other Religions Could Help Stem Science Denial

Insights by Stanford Business, September 5, 2024

by Theodore Kinni


Researchers and educators should think about how scientific information will be perceived by people of different religions, says Yu Ding. | iStock/Aleksei Morozov/JakeOlimb/Rinat Khairitdinov

When someone rejects scientific findings that collide with their religion, it may be seen as a sign of their strongly held beliefs. Yet religiosity alone does not explain why some believers are skeptical of science. A multifaceted new study by Yu Ding, an assistant professor of marketing at Stanford Graduate School of Business, finds that there is another strong predictor of science denial: how much exposure religious people have to members of other faiths.

As Ding reviewed studies of religious intensity and science denial, he found several unanswered questions. For instance, why don’t all religious people find their faith incompatible with science? Quakers and Jews often have strong religious convictions yet are well represented in the STEM disciplines. Likewise, why does individual religious intensity not account for geographic variations in levels of science denial? A Pew Research Center study found that 42% of Muslim respondents in Tunisia believe there is a “general conflict” between religion and science versus 16% of Muslim respondents in Morocco.

This led Ding, along with professors Gita Johar and Michael Morris of Columbia Business School, to examine a lack of religious diversity as a pathway to science denial. The trio hypothesized that science denial may arise from religious intolerance — an unwillingness to accept any view that contradicts the accepted dogma — and that intolerance may be the result of a lack of religious diversity within a particular area. Read the rest here.

 

Shopping for growth: How to build an urban retail destination

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PWC Strategy&, August 2024

by Makram Debbas, Ramy Sfeir, Sukalp Tipre, and Matteo Amici




As Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) member states pursue urban transformation and mega projects, they should seize the unrealized opportunity for growth in the retail sectors of their major cities. The region’s annual retail sales are expected to grow to US$300 billion by 2028, a 37 percent increase from 2022. With the right steps, these retail sectors can become global shopping destinations. That would allow retail to make a significant contribution to urban GDP and employment, while improving quality of life for residents and enhancing the offering to tourists.

The prospect of strong domestic retail growth, however, does not guarantee that GCC cities will become global shopping destinations. Indeed, the opposite could occur. Given the ease of foreign travel, rising GCC domestic demand could result in GCC shoppers seeking unique retail experiences outside the region. To prevent that, and to seize the growth opportunity, GCC cities should overcome two categories of challenges: supply issues, such as limited brand and assortment offerings, insufficient talent, and a lack of holistic shopping experiences; and enabling factor issues, such as fragile supply chains, underdeveloped customer and operational technologies, and cumbersome investment regulations.

Cities should create a governance entity that can articulate a compelling and differentiated retail vision and then build the required capabilities through six initiatives... read the rest here.

Open banking is a rich opportunity for GCC incumbent banks

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Finance Middle East, July 28, 2024

by Dr. Antoine Khadige, Nader Haddad, and Marwan Nadda



Banking in the GCC region is undergoing a significant transformation with the growing impact of regulatory-led open banking initiatives. The Central Bank of Bahrain is preparing to enter the second phase of its open banking plan. Saudi Arabia has announced the gradual implementation of open banking use cases. Kuwait is testing open banking products, and the Central Bank of the UAE has initiated an open finance initiative covering banks and insurers.

With open banking regulatory directives, which require the sharing of customer data (with the customer’s consent) with trusted third parties, incumbent banks are entering a new era of competition. New banking entrants such as fintechs and payment providers can access incumbents’ now-exclusive customer relationships and entice customers away with new products and services.

If they articulate the right vision, however, incumbent banks can meet this challenge head-on, adopt the regulatory dictates of open banking and go beyond them. Banks that embrace open banking—which will grow at a global annual rate of 25% to 27%, according to MarkNtel Advisors and Grand View Research—can retain their market share and transform themselves, create new revenue streams, and forge deeper customer relationships. In Saudi Arabia, for example, we project an open banking penetration rate of 20% with retail customers by 2030.

Incumbent banks can take three actions to take advantage of open banking and position themselves in its vanguard. Read the rest here.

Sustainability in the Spotlight: The Balancing Act of ESG

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Diligent Institute/ Spencer Stuart, June 2024





This year, sustainability in the corporate world has been defined by flux. The debate in the U.S. around ESG (environmental, social and governance) remains fierce. The global issues that ESG aims to address — climate change, human rights and equity, among others — are enormous and only becoming more complex. This is because, in its broadest definition, ESG reflects a set of objectives common to all companies — from managing risk to playing a role in addressing societal issues to identifying opportunities for growth and value creation. The corporate will and effort to address these opportunities and challenges seems to be growing, not shrinking.

The third annual global Sustainability in the Spotlight survey, conducted by Spencer Stuart and the Diligent Institute, asked public and private company directors across industries and geographies about their companies’ sustainability strategies and oversight. We also asked respondents to provide their perspectives on and involvement in defining their organization’s ESG vision and strategy, as well as their role in overseeing results. Download the report here.

Time to increase Qatar’s financial literacy

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Qatar Tribune, May, 16, 2024

by Raed Kombargi, Fadi Adra, Swati Chaudhary, and Rasha Salem

As lifestyle aspirations, easy access to digital credit and loans, and the need to finance education and real estate drive up consumer debt levels in Qatar, the case for bolstering financial literacy is becoming urgent. This growing weight of consumer debt, coupled with the ongoing paradigm shift in the social contract, underscores the importance of financial literacy as a tool for managing debt and ensuring financial stability. Research from the Global Financial Literacy Excellence Center finds that countries with higher levels of financial literacy have lower levels of household debt, higher savings rates, and greater resilience during financial downturns than those with lower levels of financial literacy.

Qatari institutions increasingly recognize financial literacy as a critical factor for economic empowerment and financial stability, and have begun to act. Witness, among other efforts, the financial literacy programs launched by the Qatar Central Bank, the Ministry of Education and Higher Education’s decision to add financial literacy as an elective for eleventh and twelfth-grade students, and the Qatar Stock Exchange’s commitment to raising the financial literacy of investors.

While dedicated programs are a good start, meeting increasing financial literacy across the country in a timely manner requires an overarching strategy and a holistic framework that incorporates a multi-dimensional view of life-stages and beneficiary contexts. Read the rest here.

‘I’m Sorry, Dave.’ When AI Writes a CEO’s Apology Letter.

This Week in Leadership, May 8, 2024

by Theodore Kinni




Generative artificial-intelligence programs are already helping professionals write compelling sales presentations, convincing emails, and other difficult business communications. It was only a matter of time before someone tried using it for one of the most sensitive documents of all: an apology from the boss.

Using the widely available GPT-4, researchers at the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST) recently built a model they call “Prompt Engineering for CEO Apology.” The model incorporates a number of variables, including type of event, structure and length of previous apologies, audience, delivery method, and the communication styles of the CEO and the company. The researchers used the model to create apologies for some recent high-profile CEO gaffes, and apparently, AI did pretty well: According to the KAIST study, the notes “conveyed empathy” and “mimicked the same structure and emotional language” of CEO apologies produced by human beings. Read the rest here.

Skills-Based Hiring: Where Did It Go?

This Week in Leadership, March 25, 2024

by Theodore Kinni

If you’ve browsed job postings recently, you’ve probably seen that skills-based hiring is all the rage. Often a bachelor’s degree isn’t even required—only that you have key skills.

But only one word describes how often non-degreed applicants appear to be getting hired: rarely. A new study from the Burning Glass Institute and Harvard Business School’s Managing the Future of Work program uses employment ads to track the progress of skills-based hiring. It found that from 2014 to 2023 the number of roles for which employers dropped degree requirements increased fourfold. But when they studied a sample of 11,300 of these roles, they found that the share of workers hired without a college degree grew by only about 3.5% in 2023. Extrapolating its findings across the hiring universe, the team concludes that “for all its fanfare, the increased opportunity promised by Skills-Based Hiring has borne out in not even 1 in 700 hires last year.” Read the rest here.

Evaluating Your Major Gift Program: Three Strategic Questions for Nonprofit Leaders

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Development Guild DDI, March 25, 2024

by Suzanne Battit




When Dr. Ruth Gottesman, Ed.D. – Professor Emerita in the Department of Pediatrics at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York City – announced that she was donating $1 billion to make the school tuition-free, it seemed like a bolt from the blue. But attracting major gifts — even the rare one of this size —is far more likely to be the result of a rigorous approach than a random event.

The long-term success of a nonprofit’s fundraising is almost always predicated on a strong major gift program, and the ability to identify and cultivate donors like Dr. Gottesman is a hallmark of such a program. Major donors have a strong affinity for the mission and impact of an organization and an unyielding commitment to its success. Indeed, at age 93, Dr. Gottesman – the very wealthy widow of an early business partner and long-time investor with Warren Buffett – has been affiliated with the medical school for 55 years and serves as the chairperson of its board of trustees.

While monumental gifts like Dr. Gottesman’s may be an anomaly in the world of major gifts, every nonprofit can assess their major gift program to be as strong and effective as possible. Here are three strategic questions to assess your program so you can elevate it to the next level and beyond. Read the rest here.

What People Really Think About Search Engine Ads. (You Might Be Surprised.)

Insights by Stanford Business, March 7, 2024

by Theodore Kinni


iStock/Nuthawut Somsuk

Revenues from search ads are expected to exceed $300 billion in 2024 — making search the world’s largest advertising channel online or off. The ads are essential to search companies, but their value to users, who collectively make more than 1.2 trillion queries per year on Google alone, has always been something of a mystery.

Some experts argue that search ads are intrusive and even scammy — a distraction users must tolerate in exchange for free access to search engines. Others see the ads as a convenience, enhancing the search experience by offering users additional information and easy access to products and services related to their interests. “The utility of search advertising has been a controversial question and people have written positive and negative points of view on it in the media for a long time,” says Navdeep Sahni, an associate professor of marketing at Stanford Graduate School of Business. “But it is a question that needs to be answered with data.”

Sahni now has that data. Sahni and Charles Zhang, PhD ’22, then a GSB graduate student focused on quantitative marketing, got it from real users and real ads in a large-scale field experiment on a widely used U.S. search engine. While there has been copious research on the efficacy of search advertising for ad buyers, this experiment was unique for its scale and empirical focus on the value of ads to search users.

Collected over a period of five months in 2017, the data reports on queries submitted to the search engine by nearly 3 million unique users. For two months in the middle of the experiment, half of the users saw search results that included the usual number of ads that appear among the top results and in the middle of the page, known as mainline ads. “Whenever there’s a search query,” Sahni explains, “search engines use a proprietary algorithm that scores every ad that could appear with the results. Only those ads whose quality exceeds a certain preset threshold get placed in the mainline positions.” These ads are the most visible on the page and have the most effective positioning.

During the same two-month period, the search engine tweaked its ad-scoring algorithm so that the other half of the user group saw fewer mainline ads with their results. “The experiment increased the threshold cutoff of that algorithm just enough so that 17% of the ads that would have received mainline positions got pushed to less visible positions on the side of the page,” Sahni explains. Read the rest here.