For the fourth year in a row, business interruption risks - including supply chain disruption - rank as a top three global risk, according to the Allianz Risk Barometer.

More organizations are investing in business-to-business electronic integration (B2Bi) to cut costs and increase business flow efficiency, according to a survey of more than 200 organizations by the University of Tennessee's Global Supply Chain Institute and integration provider DiCentral.

Accountability - the ability of people to understand what is expected of them, exercise authority, and take responsibility for delivering results - is an important dimension of organizational health. Of course, some companies are better at fostering it than others.

Last June, Kansas City struck up a nearly $16bn partnership with Cisco Systems and Sprint to help make that city a lot smarter. How so? By tapping into digital technologies to improve such vital city services as energy, water and transportation.

The next thing you try on at the mall might be a virtual reality headset. No longer relegated to video gamers, VR is coming to amusement parks, movie theaters and classrooms. But the technology presents a major opportunity for retailers as they try to lure fickle shoppers into their stores, particularly as consumers shift more of their buying habits online.