When “Toy Story” premiered to glowing reviews and box office success in 1995, there was one theme among the chorus of praise that made the Pixar team especially proud.

"We took pride in the fact that reviewers talked mainly about the way 'Toy Story' made them feel and not about the computer wizardry that enabled us to get it up on the screen,” Ed Catmull, co-founder of Pixar, recounts in Creativity, Inc. “We believed that this was the direct result of our always keeping story as our guiding light.”

No doubt entrepreneurial success is tough to measure. Many schools tout the “entrepreneurial mindset” they use to train MBAs. That can range from building the next unicorn to creating a business that is beneficial to shareholders and stakeholders alike; or it could mean graduating students equipped to make changes in massive, established businesses through corporate innovation.

Image: The T-Rex coworking space in St. Louis. Courtesy photo

The Global Startup Accelerator is back this year and shifting its focus to building smart cities and partnerships in India.

Image: The University City Science Center is co-hosting the second Global Startup Accelerator. COURTESY UNIVERSITY CITY SCIENCE CENTER

If you occupy the heights of the business world, staying grounded can be a challenge. The longer you reside atop a corporate Mount Olympus, the less connected you may become to the mundane world of work occupied by the rest of us and, perhaps more dangerously, the customers who pay the bills.

I’ve been investigating some whimsical solutions for leaders who need to get their feet back on the ground. One of them is the practice of shinrin-yoku, or forest bathing. Forest bathing, essentially hanging out in nature, sounds like nothing more than a walk in the woods to me. But Dr. Qing Li, a professor at the Nippon Medical School in Tokyo, whose book on the topic was published in April, says it “takes us all the way home to our true selves.” Sounds like a boon for leaders who want to be more authentic — or who just enjoy a good hike.

Anxiety is often a nebulous concept. We know it affects our emotions, but it’s difficult to describe. This is because anxiety feels different for everyone. You might feel uneasy. You might feel light-headed or dizzy. Your heartbeat might escalate. You may experience hot flashes. Regardless of how anxiety affects you, it takes a heavy toll on your performance and stress levels. As a leader, you’re probably no stranger to it.

Around 8.8 million tons of plastic enter the world's oceans each year — the equivalent of a truckload of garbage every minute. Over time, this trash can accumulate in offshore garbage patches and linger there for decades. 

The largest of these vortexes, the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, is located in Pacific Ocean between Hawaii and California. It's estimated to contain more than 1.8 trillion pieces of floating plastic — the equivalent of 250 pieces of debris for every person on Earth.

Image: The Ocean Cleanup's Interceptor tool in the Klang River in Malaysia. The Ocean Cleanup

Ethan Bernstein, associate professor at Harvard Business School, studied how coworkers interacted before and after their company moved to an open office plan. The research shows why open workspaces often fail to foster the collaboration they’re designed for. Workers get good at shutting others out and their interactions can even decline. Bernstein explains how companies can conduct experiments to learn how to achieve the productive interactions they want. With Ben Waber of Humanyze, Bernstein wrote the HBR article “The Truth About Open Offices.”

Venture capitalists face more risk and uncertainty when they invest in companies that are far away compared to startups in their own region or country. Yet, more cross-border VC investment is happening than ever before. New research from Wharton management professor Exequiel (Zeke) Hernandez and Sarath Balachandran, assistant professor of strategy and entrepreneurship at the London Business School, looks at why that is happening. In a paper titled, “Mi Casa Es Tu Casa: Immigrant Entrepreneurs as Pathways to Foreign Venture Capital Investments,” the two authors examine the role immigrants play in facilitating these investments. Hernandez recently spoke with Knowledge@Wharton about their research. (Listen to the podcast at the top of this page.)

Earlier this month, California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed into law amendments to the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA), the most sweeping state data privacy regulations in the country. The law, which takes effect on Jan. 1, regulates how data is collected, managed, shared and sold by companies and entities doing business with or compiling information about California residents. Some observers contend that because no business would want to exclude selling to Californians, the CCPA is de facto a national law on data privacy, absent an overarching federal regulation protecting consumer information.

The Warriors are in transition.

Not only did they overhaul the roster this past summer, but the franchise relocated to San Francisco.

We've heard coach Steve Kerr say that Chase Center is a metaphor for the team's approach to the 2019-20 season, in that it's a "reset" for the organization.

Warriors superstar Steph Curry recently supplied his own metaphor.

"I'd compare it to a venture capitalist running different funds," Curry told ESPN's Ramona Shelburne. "You have your first fund, which you build and hopefully have some success. Then you go back and say, 'We're going to build a second fund, invest in some different things this time.' But it's the same people, the same brain power.

NEW YORK (Reuters) - As a private investor, former U.S. Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Scott Gottlieb is focused on an area where few have found success in recent years: developing new antibiotics.

Since leaving the FDA in April, Gottlieb has revealed little about what types of investments he would make in his new role at New Enterprise Associates, one of the country’s largest venture capital firms where he worked prior to his time in government.

Image: FILE PHOTO: FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb speaks during an interview with Reuters in New York City, U.S., November 26, 2018. REUTERS/Brendan McDermid/File Photo

Illumina Accelerator is currently recruiting for it's eleventh cycle in the San Francisco Bay Area and it's inaugural class in Cambridge, UK.

During the six-month funding cycle, Illumina Accelerator offers genomics-driven startups four key resources – capital and access to capital, sequencing and genomics expertise, coaching, and lab and office space at Illumina’s San Francisco Bay Area Campus and Illumina’s EMEA headquarters in Cambridge.

You’ve left your corporate job, answered some key questions, and decided to make the startup leap. Now it’s time to raise some cash to help fertilize the seeds of your idea. But before you go pitch investors, how should you prepare and what should you be thinking about before the big meeting?

Image: From left to right: Dave Parker, founder of 6 Month Startup; Aviel Ginzburg, general partner at Founders’ Co-op; Elisa La Cava, senior associate at Madrona Venture Group; and Cameron Borumand, principal at Ignition Partners. (GeekWire Photo / Taylor Soper)

The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office is expanding its use of artificial intelligence to tackle steadily growing patent applications, including an influx of AI-related filings.

The patent office last month posted a job opening for a tech expert to guide the use of artificial intelligence and other AI-enabled capabilities across the agency, reporting to its chief information officer, Jamie Holcombe.

Image: U.S. Patent and Trademark Office Director Andrei Iancu. PHOTO: JAY PREMACK/U.S. PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE

Biopharmaceutical executives, especially those who have founded their own companies, never cease to amaze me. Why? Well for starters, the process of starting with nothing but an idea and then pulling together all the necessary resources to build a company capable of developing and delivering a product to patients is an amazing logistical challenge. It requires someone capable of big-picture thinking. Someone confident in being able to recruit top talent to join them on their journey. Getting investors requires a delicate balance. For example, founders need to be able to communicate the idea with sufficient enthusiasm and share complex scientific principles in a way that those lacking a scientific background can not only understand but get behind.

Image: Brad Margus, cofounder and CEO, Cerevance

Employers and entrepreneurs are finding that liberal arts graduates have what it takes to succeed in today’s professions. As new information from Bloomberg shows, forward-looking executives are investing in creativity and adaptability.

Author Andrea Gabor notes, “just as states and school districts add new technology requirements and open STEM-oriented schools, leading technology companies are heading in the opposite direction, forming partnerships with liberal-arts colleges and seeking to hire their graduates.


Image: Denison alumni gather at the ReMix Entrepreneurship Summit - https://denison.edu

BALTIMORE, Oct. 29, 2019 /PRNewswire/ -- Illumina, Inc., a leading developer, manufacturer, and marketer of life science tools and integrated systems, celebrated today the grand opening of its new training facility in the University of Maryland (UM) BioPark.

The 13,000-square-foot Illumina Solutions Center provides training lab capabilities and office space for customers and commercial teams. It is the company's first commercial location on the East Coast and will host hundreds of employees and customers annually.

With the cost of starting an online business today at an all-time low, I can’t imagine why everyone doesn’t have a web site and an LLC to mitigate liability and minimize taxes. You need to have these as backup, in case the gig economy catches up to you, or you need a side hustle for extra income, or being in control of your dream role as an entrepreneur finally becomes a passion.

Two years after launching the first Rise of the Rest Seed Fund, D.C.-based Revolution said Monday that it closed a second $150 million fund to invest in early-stage companies that are based outside Silicon Valley, New York and Boston.

The second fund received investment from business leaders in the region including Monumental Sports and Entertainment CEO Ted Leonsis, Carlyle Group CEO David Rubenstein and Under Armour founder Kevin Plank. The list of big names backing the fund also include Amazon’s Jeff Bezos, Google’s Eric Schmidt and former U.S. CTO Megan Smith.

Image: Steve Case speaks during a Rise of the Rest tour stop in Baltimore. (Photo by Stephen Babcock)

Ask around, and it may seem like everyone is experiencing burnout. A survey from staffing firm Accountemps earlier this year found that 96% of senior managers say their team members are experiencing some degree of burnout. In a separate survey, 91% of workers said they are at least somewhat burned out.

As Kim I. Mills recently wrote for Fast Company, in May 2019 the World Health Organization expanded its definition of burnout in the ICD-11—the 11th revision of its International Classification of Diseases—which moved its definition closer to the way occupational health psychology has defined it.