HBR Today app helps users stay abreast of business news and trends says Toby Brown, head of digital, Man Bites Dog
Developed by Harvard Business Review
Supporting devices: iPhone, iPad
HBR Today provides a cost-effective window into an ample portion of the deep-thinking content available to full Harvard Business Review magazine subscribers. While much of the content can be accessed directly via HBR.org for just £1.99, the app is well worth it to get rapid and easy access to thought- provoking business ideas. Amid the morass of content I am constantly trying to digest, the app provides a welcome way to cut through to the high-level business issues our clients need to be thinking and talking about today.
Design
Design in not an area where HBR Today stands out. It maintains a demure, ‘boardroom’ feel in-keeping with the overall brand’s serious, C-suite audience persona. A touch of the impact and attention-grabbing imagery like the magazine and website would perhaps tie its content more closely together and deliver a more engaging overall experience.
App navigation is very simple meaning content can be accessed rapidly. The app is segmented into simple menus covering its key content streams: blogs, video, audio, excerpts and more – including stats, tips and article summaries. One slight drawback is the loading speed, which can be slow in some sections, especially video and audio.
Functionality
The central benefit of this app is great content. Harvard Business Review is all about setting the agenda in business thinking, and this app is an excellent extension of that.
Each section is replete with interesting content, from advice on customer service and perspectives on economics, through to business regulatory challenges and innovation. The blogs are particularly eclectic and especially useful for new ideas around company management, building leading teams and overall business competitiveness. The mix of writers including professors, entrepreneurs and business leaders makes for unexpected topics and new perspectives each day that are always interesting and useful.
The app’s video section is similarly eclectic in terms of topics, but not as rich generally, only allowing access to the last 10 videos. This said, the content available is definitely worth a watch.
The app’s audio section is a real demonstration of sharing thought leadership, providing weekly expert-centric podcasts. The podcasts are generally around 15 minutes long, providing an in-depth review of a business topic with an appropriate spokesperson, for example a professor or someone who has recently written a book on the subject in question.
The full back catalogue of almost 300 ‘Idea casts’ is available through the app, giving instant access to a broad range of ideas. The podcasts are produced with the level of insight and quality you’d expect from a professional radio station, so are definitely worth a listen.
While HBR’s ‘Idea casts’ are a great way of catching up on big ideas on-the-go, the app does let itself down functionality-wise slightly. For some reason it uses an in-app media player, meaning when you lock your iPhone to put it in your pocket, it stops playing the audio. Despite this drawback, checking out the audio section is certainly great commuting fodder for the busy executive.
Finally, perhaps one of the most useful sections is the app’s ‘Excerpts’, providing bite-size articles based around book reviews or more in-depth pieces from the magazine. This is a great way of rapidly digesting the ‘need to know’ content and getting a view of the big ideas that will require further consideration.
Overall opinion
While the app doesn’t provide access to all the content in the HBR archive, it certainly gives the busy B2B comms executive all they need to stay on top of the big business ideas of the moment. Its modest design and sometimes-clunky navigation does let it down somewhat, but the wealth of useful ideas and content more than makes up for these bugbears. In a world of increasingly high volumes of low quality content, £1.99 for a wealth or guaranteed high quality, high interest ideas is certainly not to be sniffed at.
