MIT Sloan Management Review Article on Fostering a Team-Oriented Culture at John Hancock

John Hancock’s chief marketing officer describes how the legacy company is organizing for digital.

Ultimately, customers drive change in companies, and good companies listen to their customers. Today, customers want to have much more control. More than half of people with the means to hire a financial adviser do not and are therefore looking to manage their money on their own. Our company is working to respond and get aligned to what customers are asking for, both in the kinds of products they want and in how they want to interact with the company.

There are several challenges. First, it’s hard to drive change when people feel that the company has been successful doing everything the way it always has. People don’t see the need for change when we still have returns coming in and a stable customer base.

About the Author

Gerald C. (Jerry) Kane is a professor of information systems at the Carroll School of Management at Boston College and the MIT Sloan Management Review guest editor for the Digital Business Initiative. He can be reached at gerald.kane@bc.edu and on Twitter @profkane.

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