Publications

10 Nov 2010
News

Leading a Football Juggernaut

Keywords: Amusement, Gambling, and Recreation Industries; Arts, Entertainment

15 Feb 2011
News

The Yella Fella Rides Again

Keywords: Wood Product Manufacturing; Manufacturing

17 Feb 2011
News

Field Report: Rwanda

Rwandan President Paul Kagame greets HBS students. From left, Jon Porter, Karisimbi Partners intern; Eugene Nyagahene, Tele-10 CEO; Colin Barry, HBS '12; Mariam Dombrovskaja, HBS '12; Dano Jukanovich, Karisimbi Partners, Monne Williams, HBS '12; Carter Crockett, Greg... View Details

Keywords: Julia Hanna; Colleges, Universities, and Professional Schools; Educational Services; Religious, Grantmaking, Civic, Professional, and Similar Organizations; Personal Services

23 Mar 2010
First Look

First Look: March 23

incumbent that faces a low-quality ad-sponsored competitor. In addition to competing through adjustments of tactical variables such as price or the number of ads a product carries, we allow the incumbent to consider changes in its... View Details

Keywords: Martha Lagace

23 Oct 2019
News

Hands-on Simulations Complement the Case Method

students work in small teams to develop a product (beer) and bring it to market. By analyzing data and collaborating on design, pricing, packaging, manufacturing, and marketing, teams compete as they test their ideas and iterate their... View Details

Keywords: Educational Innovation

October 2016
Article

Looking Across and Looking Beyond the Knowledge Frontier: Intellectual Distance and Resource Allocation in Science

By: Kevin J. Boudreau, Eva Guinan, Karim R. Lakhani and Christoph Riedl

Selecting among alternative innovative projects is a core management task in all innovating organizations. In this paper, we focus on the evaluation of frontier scientific research projects. We argue that the "intellectual distance" between the knowledge embodied in... View Details

Keywords: Knowledge; Innovation; Novelty; Evaluation; Resource Allocation; Decision Choices and Conditions; Innovation and Management; Science-Based Business; Experience and Expertise

SSRN

November 2012 (Revised July 2014)
Case

Doing Deals and Leading Teams at XAF Partners

By: Boris Groysberg and Kerry Herman

Private equity firm XAF Partners, created out of the 2003 merger of Shanghai-based Xuan Partners and AF Group, a spin out of the Shanghai-based, emerging market-focused private equity arm of a large European bank, had grown steadily over the last decade, establishing... View Details

Keywords: Professional Service Firms; Leading Teams; Producing Managers; Delegation; Giving And Receiving Feedback; Managing Performance; Leadership; Work-Life Balance; Managerial Roles; Talent and Talent Management; Service Operations; Time Management; Performance; Financial Services Industry; Asia

Educators

Purchase

2011
Working Paper

Top Executive Background and Financial Reporting Choice

By: Francois Brochet and Kyle Travis Welch

We study the role of executive functional background in explaining management discretion in financial reporting. Taking goodwill impairment as our reporting setting, we focus on top executives (CEOs and CFOs) whose employment history includes experience in investment... View Details

Keywords: Financial Reporting; Goodwill Accounting; Experience and Expertise; Decision Choices and Conditions; Managerial Roles; Agency Theory

2010
Chapter

Utilizing Team Member Expertise Under Pressure

By: Heidi K. Gardner and Erin McFee

Pressure intensifies on a strategy consulting team as they deliver a critical project, and the team manager faces a dilemma about her changing role on the team. Although she had been the key decision-maker in the early weeks of the project, Julia Narino now finds that... View Details

Keywords: Experience and Expertise; Managerial Roles; Organizational Culture; Projects; Groups and Teams; Behavior; Customization and Personalization; Consulting Industry

April 2010
Article

Performance Persistence in Entrepreneurship and Venture Capital

By: Paul A. Gompers, Josh Lerner, David Scharfstein and Anna Kovner

This paper presents evidence of performance persistence in entrepreneurship. We show that entrepreneurs with a track record of success are much more likely to succeed than first-time entrepreneurs and those who have previously failed. In particular, they exhibit... View Details

Keywords: Performance; Entrepreneurship; Venture Capital; Private Equity; Market Timing; Competency and Skills; Success; Business Startups

August 2007 (Revised September 2008)
Case

Baker & McKenzie (A): A New Framework for Talent Management

By: Boris Groysberg and Eliot Sherman

Describes the process by which the largest law firm in the world developed a unique framework for personnel management. In 2004, John Conroy is about to take the reigns as the leader of Baker and McKenzie, the largest law firm in the world by employees, with offices in... View Details

Keywords: Talent and Talent Management; Framework; Cross-Cultural and Cross-Border Issues; Retention; Management Analysis, Tools, and Techniques; Adoption; Legal Services Industry

Educators

Purchase

2009
Working Paper

Virtual Team Learning: Reflecting and Acting, Alone or With Others

By: Deborah L. Soule and Lynda M. Applegate

This paper examines virtual team learning in new product development situations. New product development activities manifest novelty, uncertainty and complexity, presenting an extreme need for learning in the course of the work. We present data from an exploratory... View Details

Keywords: Competency and Skills; Learning; Knowledge Acquisition; Knowledge Use and Leverage; Product Development; Groups and Teams; Behavior

01 Dec 2016
News

Cast of Characters

Illustration by Brian Stauffer THE PROFESSOR: Asaf Ali Khan For his first book, James Glenn (MBA 1965) was going to write about his own experiences in India during the Green Revolution of the 1970s. Worried it might not be exciting enough, he turned his attention to... View Details

Keywords: April White

01 Dec 2013
News

Alumni News | Bookshelf: A Manager's Responsibility in the 21st Century

individual action, against which individual biases can be lessened and competing interests balanced. At BP, the overriding concern was economic efficiency. What was not considered, argue the authors, were external costs: the potentially... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne; oil spill; Publishing Industries (except Internet); Information

05 Feb 2009
What Do You Think?

Why Can’t We Figure Out How to Select Leaders?

Summing Up How do we close the gap between theory and results in selecting leaders? In discussing why our achievements in selecting leaders are less than stellar, contributors offered a rich set of ideas. Given their number, I've tried to categorize them into several... View Details

Keywords: by Jim Heskett

April 2018
Article

Scope versus Speed: Team Diversity, Leader Experience, and Patenting Outcomes for Firms

By: Prithwiraj Choudhury and Martine R. Haas

How does the organization of patenting activity affect a firm’s patenting outcomes? We investigate how the composition of patenting teams relates to both the scope of their patent applications and the speed of their patent approvals by examining the main effects of... View Details

Keywords: Leader Experience; Micro-foundations Of Innovation; Scope; Speed; Team Diversity; Within-firm Data; Groups and Teams; Diversity; Patents; Leadership; Experience and Expertise; Outcome or Result

January 2015
Article

Are Incentives Without Expertise Sufficient? Evidence from Fortune 500 Firms

By: Emilie R. Feldman and Cynthia A. Montgomery

Agency theory predicts that incentives will align agents' interests with those of principals. However, the resource-based view suggests that to be effective, the incentive to deliver must be paired with the ability to deliver. Using Fortune 500 boards as an... View Details

Keywords: Board Of Directors; Corporate Governance; Incentives; Expertise; Motivation and Incentives; Governing and Advisory Boards; Experience and Expertise; Agency Theory

2012
Working Paper

Learning by Supplying

By: Juan Alcacer and Joanne Oxley

Learning processes lie at the heart of our understanding of how firms build capabilities to generate and sustain competitive advantage: learning by doing, learning by exporting, learning from competitors, users, and alliance partners. In this paper we focus attention... View Details

Keywords: Learning; Supply Chain; Competitive Advantage; Mobile and Wireless Technology; Competency and Skills; Relationships; Telecommunications Industry

June 2009 (Revised March 2011)
Module Note

The Creative Industries: Managing and Marketing Talent

By: Anita Elberse

This module note examines issues concerning the management and marketing of talent in the creative industries. It describes the characteristics of the market for creative talent, discusses how individual talent creates and captures value, and explores how professional... View Details

Keywords: Talent and Talent Management; Entertainment; Innovation and Management; Marketing; Creativity; Value