Publications

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December 2007 (Revised October 2008)
Case

The American National Red Cross (A)

By: Jay W. Lorsch, Eliot Sherman and David Chen

Describes the governance issues facing the Board of Governors of the American Red Cross. After a series of issues--FDA consent decree on its blood operations; the response to 9/11 and Hurricane Katrina--the Red Cross board was under pressure to fix its governance from... View Details

Keywords: Corporate Governance; Governing and Advisory Boards; Management Practices and Processes; Service Operations; Business Processes; Non-Governmental Organizations; Service Industry

February 2010 (Revised August 2010)
Case

Digital Media Group: The Shanghai Bid

By: G. Felda Hardymon and Ann Leamon

In December 2008, Thomas G. Tsao, acting CEO of Digital Media Group (DMG), a venture-backed provider of technology and media used primarily in subways, must decide how to structure the company's bid for the advertising concession in Shanghai's 13 existing and planned... View Details

Keywords: Advertising; Entrepreneurship; Venture Capital; Corporate Accountability; Business or Company Management; Bids and Bidding; Business and Stakeholder Relations; Competitive Strategy; Advertising Industry; Technology Industry; Shanghai

June 2023
Case

Barton Malow: Building From the Top-Down

By: Hise O. Gibson and Alicia Dadlani

In 2023, Detroit-based Barton Malow completed the first high-rise building in the U.S. built from the top-down using LIFTbuild, a patented methodology that aimed to make construction safer and more efficient. By completing building work at ground level and then... View Details

Keywords: Growth and Development Strategy; Innovation and Invention; Construction Industry

April 1998
Case

Citibank Hong Kong--Capital Arbitrage in the Emerging Markets

Describes how a credit derivative may be used to structure a profitable transaction between a bank and its client. Design and risk management issues are discussed in the context of this new class of derivative security. View Details

Keywords: Credit Derivatives and Swaps; Investment Banking; Financial Services Industry; Hong Kong

2016
Working Paper

Managing Reputation: Evidence from Biographies of Corporate Directors

By: Ian D. Gow, Aida Sijamic Wahid and Gwen Yu

We examine how corporate directors manage reputation through disclosure choices in biographies in proxy statements filed with the SEC. Directors are more likely to withhold information about directorships at firms that experienced adverse events. Withholding such... View Details

Keywords: Director Monitoring; Strategic Disclosure; Management; Corporate Disclosure; Reputation

SSRN

September 1993 (Revised December 1993)
Case

Cott Corp.: Private Label in the 1990s

By: Ray A. Goldberg and Robert S. Kaplan

Private label cola, Cott, gets 30% of the market in Canada. How does it move into the U.S. market? How do retailers evaluate its benefit costs? Does Cott use an existing structure or build new ones? Does Cott diversify from drink to snack foods? View Details

Keywords: Private Sector; Cost Management; Labels; Growth and Development Strategy; Market Entry and Exit; Industry Structures; Diversification; Food and Beverage Industry

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December 2011
Article

Manager-Specific Effects on Earnings Guidance: An Analysis of Top Executive Turnovers

By: Francois Brochet, Lucile Faurel and Sarah McVay

We investigate how managers contribute to the provision of earnings guidance by examining the association between top executive turnovers and guidance. Although firm and industry characteristics are important determinants of guidance, we conclude that CEOs participate... View Details

Keywords: Management Analysis, Tools, and Techniques; Management Teams; Policy; Decisions; Change; Risk and Uncertainty; Leadership

SSRN

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July 1998 (Revised December 1998)
Background Note

A User's Guide to the General Management Course

By: Ashish Nanda

Offered at the beginning of a twenty-five session course on general management, this note presents a structure and an outline intended to serve as a reference and provide orientation to the students as the course progresses. View Details

Keywords: Management

24 Jun 2010
News

Interview with Professor Geoffrey Jones, author of Beauty Imagined

February 2001 (Revised February 2002)
Background Note

Leader's (Dis)Advantage, The

Provides a rigorous description of the economic dynamics that may produce inherent advantages for large and/or first-mover firms within an industry, as well as those factors that may result in disadvantages for such leading firms. The leader advantages discussed... View Details

Keywords: Competitive Advantage; Semiconductor Industry

Web

The Gift - A Concrete Symbol: The Building of Harvard Business School 1908-1927 – Baker Library | Bloomberg Center, Historical Collections

School’s higher mission, as set out by President Charles Eliot and HBS Deans Gay and Donham. 11 “The methods of the Harvard Business School fell in with the results View Details

January 2021 (Revised May 2021)
Case

Delta Air Lines: Navigating the COVID-19 Storm

By: Ted Berk and Ryan Flamerich

This case examines Delta Air Lines’ response as demand for its services plummeted in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic, with a focus on the company’s funding needs and capital structure. Following a series of initial actions, the company’s cash “burn” had reduced from... View Details

Keywords: COVID-19; Health Pandemics; Financial Condition; Capital Structure; Crisis Management; Risk Management; Business and Stakeholder Relations; Air Transportation Industry

July 2025
Background Note

Ecosystem Disruption: A Multi-Stakeholder View of Disruptive Innovations

By: E. Ofek, Michael Haenlein, Eitan Muller and Roman Welden

The purpose of this note is to offer a more expansive view of how innovations disrupt markets than has been portrayed thus far in the extant literature by taking an ecosystem perspective. This broader outlook allows examining not only the product strategies of the... View Details

2017
Book

HBR Guide to Buying a Small Business: Think Big, Buy Small, Own Your Own Company

By: Richard S. Ruback and Royce Yudkoff

Find, acquire, and run your own business. Are you looking for an alternative to a career path at a big firm? Does founding your own start-up seem too risky? There is a radical third path open to you: you can buy a small business and run it as CEO. Purchasing a small... View Details

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07 Oct 2014
HBS Seminar

Dylan Minor, Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University

Journal of Economics & Management Strategy (JEMS)

Together with Prof. Daniel F. Spulber (Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University), I edit the Journal of Economics & Management Strategy (JEMS), the leading academic journal on the economics of strategy. JEMS is based at Harvard Business... View Details

06 Apr 2021
Working Paper Summaries

The World Management Survey at 18: Lessons and the Way Forward

Keywords: by Daniela Scur, Raffaella Sadun, John Van Reenen, Renata Lemos, and Nicholas Bloom

Lazy Prices - Follow the Filings

Using the complete history of regular quarterly and annual filings by U.S. corporations from 1995-2014, Professor Lauren Cohen shows that when firms make an active change in their reporting practices, this conveys an important signal about future firm operations. View Details

2020
Working Paper

Determinants of Early-Stage Startup Performance: Survey Results

By: Thomas R. Eisenmann

To explore determinants of new venture performance, the CEOs of 470 early-stage startups were surveyed regarding a broad range of factors related to their venture’s customer value proposition, product management, marketing, technology and operations, financial... View Details

Keywords: Startups; Survey Research; Performance Analysis; Entrepreneurship; Performance; Analysis; Business Startups; Failure; Surveys