ChrisBanescu.com

by Michelle Greenwald – How exactly do we define innovation? While it’s probably the most overused term in business today, innovation is not a fad. It’s not even new. What differentiates a smart innovation—and makes it worth writing about—is that it has the capability of moving a business forward in ways that can result in [...]

by Thomas Lockwood – Have you noticed how similar some products are becoming? A Tesla and a Lotus, that’s an easy one. But I’m talking about the similarities between seemingly disparate objects, like an Audi car and Oakley sunglasses, a 3M stapler and an Alessi teapot, or a Starbucks café and your bank lobby. Consumers [...]

by Ryan Ellis – If there’s a common denominator in tax reform and economic growth packages, it’s this: the corporate rate is too high, and needs to come down for the sake of keeping our employers competitive internationally. Even most on the Left have accepted this. The most common tax-rate target is 25%. Because of [...]

By Jim Collins – The author of Good to Great on how to spot the subtle signs that your successful company is actually on course to sputter—and how to reverse the slide before it’s too late. I pondered and puzzled and finally settled upon the question: Is America renewing its greatness, or is America dangerously [...]

by Alice Hansen – How can you make sure your brand inspires trust online? These tips will help your company feel more real—and build real relationships—through transparency and honesty. A client working on her social media strategy asked me a couple of days ago for guidance on gauging the credibility of industry bloggers. She wants [...]

by Greg Pesci – Entrepreneurs, free to pursue their economic dreams, built America! They are, and always have been, its creators of jobs, growth, and wealth. In 1831, Alexis de Tocqueville wrote in Democracy in America:“It may be said that, in the United States, there is no limit to the inventiveness of man to discover [...]

by Steve McCann – Economic despair reigns in America, as stagnation and mounting debt make our future look hopeless. Yet America is uniquely positioned to rebound and recover our economic preeminence. All that is necessary is a political decision to reverse our energy policy and stimulate domestic production of hydrocarbons. From that would flow a [...]

Creativity fosters innovation, but how can you ignite creative sparks within your organization? Inc.com compiled lessons on developing a vibrant research and development strategy. To come up with their best new ideas, most companies turn to an inexpensive and efficient source of innovation: their own employees. How can you unleash the creative spirit lurking in [...]

10/19/2010 – IBD Editorial – Government Motors’ all-electric car isn’t all-electric and doesn’t get near the touted hundreds of miles per gallon. Like “shovel-ready” jobs, maybe there’s no such thing as “plug-ready” cars either. The Chevy Volt, hailed by the Obama administration as the electric savior of the auto industry and the planet, makes its [...]

10/5/2010 – Drew Neisser – How petite Privé Products succeeded where giant P&G couldn’t. Before I could even get in my first question, my hands were already covered with a soft liquid that transformed into a foamy shampoo. An excited Jackie Applebaum, the CEO of, exclaimed that “this is an unbelievable shampoo and never before [...]

9/18/2010 – David Segal – Imagine you are a venture capitalist. One day a man comes to you and says, “I want to build the game layer on top of the world.” You don’t know what “the game layer” is, let alone whether it should be built atop the world. But he has a passionate [...]

6/30/2010 – John Stossel – For all its problems, America is a great place. And one thing that makes America great is its prosperity. Yes, some people have suffered during the recession — but compared to all the other countries in the history of the world, America is rich. Why? One reason is that America [...]

6/1/2010 – Gregory Ferenstein – The funny thing about business books is that for many stories, there are countless counterexamples of management philosophies that are radically different, yet still successful. What is inspiring about Zappos.com, the world’s largest online shoe retailer, is that it is possible for a business to be founded on curiosity, built [...]

4/27/2010 – John Pisciotta – Acton – Americans have less confidence and trust in government today than at any time since the 1950s. This is the conclusion of the Pew Research Center survey released in mid-April. Just 22 percent expressed trust in government to deliver effective policies almost always or most of the time. With [...]

Inc.com | Crispin Porter and Scott Prindle | 4/1/2010 These days, its more crucial than ever to make a good first impression online. If your website is hard to navigate or just boring to look at, you’re probably not going to get many repeat visitors. Crispin Porter + Bogusky’s partner managing director of interactive Winston [...]

Townhall.com | by Cal Thomas | 3/2/2010 When Toyota President Akio Toyoda testified last week before the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, an attitude was exposed that Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-OH) correctly characterized as fostering a “cutthroat corporate” environment that placed costs ahead of quality and safety. Such a priority would have been [...]

Yet another travesty is unfolding before our eyes in these United States of America. While tens of millions of Americans continue to struggle through difficult economic conditions, with hundreds of thousands more losing their jobs every month, tens of thousands more losing their homes and their businesses, and millions more facing salary cuts and pay [...]

Investor’s Business Daily | Feb. 1, 2010 The latest index of economic freedom shows America falling fast, being ranked for the first time as “mostly free.” We’ve fallen behind Canada, and it’s look out below. Our accelerating descent into a command-and-control economy with government pulling the strings is taking its toll. The Heritage Foundation’s 2010 [...]

FT | Review by John Gapper | Jan. 22, 2010 Crash Course: The American Automobile Industry’s Road from Glory to Disaster – by Paul Ingrassia Japanese car companies, which overtook US ones in the early 21st century, leading to the bankruptcy of General Motors and Chrysler last year, used a method of industrial innovation called [...]

Forbes | by Sramana Mitra | Dec. 11, 2009 America is in dire need of some breakthrough innovation that can crack open significant new horizons. Yet, every year, numerous corporate and academic labs spend millions working on projects that have no commercial future, no application, no real justification for their existence. At best, they represent [...]

Entrepreneurs understand the importance of freedom in the workplace. City Journal | by Guy Sorman | October 21, 2009 Brian Carney and Isaac Getz’s Freedom, Inc. is a timely book. It’s also countercyclical and somewhat counterintuitive. After all, most of today’s writing about economics and business is haunted by the current crisis: nearly every author [...]

Inc.com | by Aaron Patzer | October 2009 Aaron Patzer launched Mint.com as a user-friendly alternative to Quicken and other personal-finance software out there. Little did he know that just two years later, Intuit, which makes Quicken, would fork over $170 million for his website. So how’d he do it?

FastCompany | by Kaihan Krippendorff | October 12, 2009 When something works, people grow fixated on it. They stop looking for alternative options. And this fixation creates an opportunity for those willing to reconsider the accepted approach. The company I introduced last week, Rosetta Stone (RST), hasn’t been satisfied with the fact that its products [...]

The Washington Times | by Richard W. Rahn | Aug. 26, 2009 Why does it appear France is bouncing back more quickly from the recession than the United States? France has long been known for having an economy that suffered from too much government interference, too-high taxes and destructive union activity. Yet it grew 1.4 [...]

The Wall Street Journal | by John Mackey | Aug. 11, 2009 With a projected $1.8 trillion deficit for 2009, several trillions more in deficits projected over the next decade, and with both Medicare and Social Security entitlement spending about to ratchet up several notches over the next 15 years as Baby Boomers become eligible [...]