Publications

2017
Working Paper

Economic Uncertainty and Earnings Management

By: Luke C.D. Stein and Charles C.Y. Wang

In the presence of managerial short-termism and asymmetric information about skill and effort provision, firms may opportunistically shift earnings from uncertain to more certain times. We document empirically that when financial markets are less certain about a firm's... View Details

Keywords: Discretionary Accruals; Uncertainty; Implied Volatility; Earnings Response Coefficient; Risk and Uncertainty; Earnings Management; Financial Markets

SSRN

2015
Chapter

Managerial Responsibility and the Purpose of Business: Doing One's Job Well

By: Nien-he Hsieh

Business managers routinely make decisions that significantly affect the lives of others in both positive and negative ways. In the light of these wide-ranging effects, much scholarship has been devoted to specifying the responsibilities of managers of for-profit... View Details

Keywords: Business or Company Management; Goals and Objectives

June 2015
Case

1996 Welfare Reform in the United States

By: Matthew Weinzierl, Katrina Flanagan and Alastair Su

On August 22, 1996, U.S. President Bill Clinton signed into law the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act (PRWORA)—a dramatic reform of the American system of economic assistance for the poor that, as its title suggested, attempted to... View Details

Keywords: Welfare State; Public Goods; Moral Hazard; Median Voter Theorem; Poverty; Welfare; Public Administration Industry; United States

Educators

Article

Seeking the Roots of Entrepreneurship: Insights from Behavioral Economics

By: Thomas Astebro, Holger Herz, Ramana Nanda and Roberto A. Weber

There is a growing body of evidence that many entrepreneurs seem to enter and persist in entrepreneurship despite earning low risk-adjusted returns. This has lead to attempts to provide explanations—using both standard economic theory and behavioral economics—for why... View Details

Keywords: Entrepreneurship; Personal Characteristics; Attitudes; Behavior

May 2014
Case

Cycle for Survival (A)

By: Das Narayandas, Kerry Herman and Noah Fisher

Katie Kotkins, director of Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center's (MSKCC) Cycle for Survival fundraising event, had to determine the best avenue for continuing the event's success and momentum after its founder, Jennifer (Jen) Goodman Linn (HBS '99) passed away... View Details

Keywords: Not For Profit; Cancer; Partnerships; United States; Fundraising; Nonprofit Organizations; United States

Educators

2014
Working Paper

Opting Out of Good Governance

By: C. Fritz Foley, Paul Goldsmith-Pinkham, Jonathan Greenstein and Eric Zwick

Cross-listing on a U.S. exchange does not bond foreign firms to follow the corporate governance rules of that exchange. Hand-collected data show that 80% of cross-listed firms opt out of at least one exchange governance rule, instead committing to observe the rules of... View Details

Keywords: Financial Markets; Globalization; Corporate Governance

2009
Working Paper

Corporate Misgovernance at the World Bank

By: Ashwin Kaja and Eric D. Werker

We test for evidence of corporate misgovernance at the World Bank. Most major decisions at the World Bank are made by its Board of Executive Directors. However, in any given year the majority of the Bank's member countries do not get a chance to serve on this powerful... View Details

Keywords: Developing Countries and Economies; Banks and Banking; Financing and Loans; International Finance; Corporate Governance; Governing and Advisory Boards

July 2000 (Revised August 2005)
Case

Deaconess-Glover Hospital (A)

Chronicles the initial efforts to teach a health care organization to manage itself according to the principles of the Toyota Production System (TPS). Describes the decision and dilemmas that arose from the implementation experiment. Builds on Bowen and Spear's earlier... View Details

Keywords: Management; Service Delivery; Health Care and Treatment; Health Industry; Massachusetts

Educators

28 Nov 2005
Research & Ideas

Unilever: Transformation and Tradition

demonstrated that Unilever could make a hostile acquisition, while the acquisition of Chesebrough-Pond's two years later showed that Unilever could move quickly and decisively if it wished. Effective procedures were put in place to absorb... View Details

Keywords: by Geoffrey Jones; Consumer Products

2022
Working Paper

Stories, Statistics and Memory

By: Thomas Graeber, Christopher Roth and Florian Zimmermann

For most decisions, we rely on information encountered over the course of days, months or years. We consume this information in various forms, including abstract summaries of multiple data points – statistics – and contextualized anecdotes about individual instances... View Details

Keywords: Decision Choices and Conditions; Information Types; Media; Cognition and Thinking

29 Nov 2021
Research & Ideas

How Bonuses Get Employees to Choose Work Over Family

When your boss asks you to meet with clients for last-minute drinks, are you tempted to clear your calendar, even if it means missing your child’s piano recital? If so, you’re among the many professionals who tend to prioritize professional relationships over personal... View Details

Keywords: by Rachel Kim Raczka

20 Oct 2008
Research & Ideas

The Seven Things That Surprise New CEOs

reporting on results and management's decisions. Surprise Six: Pleasing Shareholders Is Not The Goal Warning signs: Executives and board members judge actions by their effect on stock price. Analysts who don't understand the business push for View Details

Keywords: by Michael E. Porter, Jay W. Lorsch & Nitin Nohria

Web

Impact Stories - Impact Stories

Impact Stories Impact Stories The Godmother of Consumer-Driven Health Care Regina E. Herzlinger Each New Class Brings Opportunity Robert S. Huckman Play Making better decisions when it comes to your health Leslie John Going Beyond the... View Details

1998
Book

Cost and Effect: Using Integrated Cost Systems to Drive Profitability and Performance

By: Robert S. Kaplan and Robin Cooper

Keywords: Cost vs Benefits