Publications

December 2002 (Revised October 2006)
Case

Tesco Plc.

By: David E. Bell

Tesco, a supermarket chain, has been transformed from a third-rate retailer to a global leader in the past ten years. This case describes how that was accomplished. Interviews with Tesco employees explain the company's approach to understanding customers, motivating... View Details

Keywords: History; Motivation and Incentives; Leadership; Internet and the Web; Supply Chain Management; Global Strategy; Globalization; Customer Focus and Relationships; Business Strategy; Retail Industry

August 2021
Supplement

Aligning Mission and Margin at Southern Bancorp

By: Brian Trelstad

Video Supplement for HBS Case No. 321-099. In October 2020, after spending almost a decade to turnaround Southern Bancorp, an Arkansan bank founded with the mission to provide financial services to rural, underserved communities, CEO Darrin Williams is wondering how... View Details

Keywords: Racial Wealth Gap; Banks and Banking; Growth and Development; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Mission and Purpose; Going Public; Investment Return; Social Issues; Wealth and Poverty; Banking Industry; Financial Services Industry; United States; Arkansas

07 Jan 2020
Cold Call Podcast

Can Capitalism Be Fixed by Making Companies More Just?

Keywords: Re: Ethan C. Rouen & Charles C.Y. Wang; Financial Services

18 Oct 2016
First Look

October 18, 2016

2016 New York: HarperBusiness Competing Against Luck: The Story of Innovation and Customer Choice By: Christensen, Clayton M., Taddy Hall, Karen Dillon, and David S. Duncan Abstract—The foremost authority on innovation and growth presents... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

17 Jan 2007
Op-Ed

Learning from Private-Equity Boards

compensation is an absolute minimum. Third, public companies need a different degree of directors' wealth at risk. According to a recent poll by the Investor Responsibility Research Center, the average... View Details

Keywords: by Malcolm Salter; Financial Services

July 1998 (Revised March 2000)
Case

Champion International

By: Michael Beer and James Weber

Richard Olson, a long-tenured employee, was named CEO of Champion in 1996. Champion had been conducting an organizational transformation since the early 1980s that could be considered successful on most operational and social measures. However, due to industry... View Details

Keywords: Change Management; Transformation; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Organizational Design

Find at Harvard

2020
Case

The Ellen MacArthur Foundation: Accelerating a Circular Economy for Plastic Packaging

By: Andrew J. Hoffman

Plastic has become essential to global day-to-day activities, yet it is also causing extreme environmental degradation. Many leaders in the plastics industry are starting to question its sustainability. This case presents insights into the future of the plastic... View Details

Keywords: Plastic Waste; Environmental Sustainability; Cooperation; Supply Chain Management; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Consumer Products Industry

January 1993 (Revised November 1993)
Case

FCB and Publicis (B): Managing Client and Country Diversity

By: Rosabeth M. Kanter

Discusses FCB and Publicis, partners in a global advertising agency alliance, working together with their clients to provide excellent service. May be used with FCB and Publicis (A): Forming the Alliance and (C): The German-Led Network. View Details

Keywords: Customer Relationship Management; Alliances; Cooperation; Globalized Firms and Management; Partners and Partnerships; Marketing Strategy; Advertising; Diversity; Advertising Industry; France; Germany; United States

23 Aug 2019
Sharpening Your Skills

Has the Corporate Mission Just Been Disrupted?

their “agency” at every level will be in the best position to create change. Corporate social responsibility in action Activist CEOs Are Rising Up—and Their Customers Are... View Details

Keywords: by Sean Silverthorne; Green Technology

23 Dec 2014
First Look

First Look: December 23

Internal Problems By: Sebenius, James K. Abstract—Many negotiators have constituencies that must formally or informally approve an agreement. Traditionally, it is the responsibility of each negotiator to... View Details

Keywords: Carmen Nobel

December 2004 (Revised December 2005)
Case

Nectar: Making Loyalty Pay

By: John A. Deighton

Loyalty Management UK (LMUK) manages British supermarket chain Sainsbury's frequent-shopper card program, called Nectar. LMUK uses Sainsbury's sponsorship as the magnet to attract other retailers into a profitable, multisponsor loyalty network. Examines the economics... View Details

Keywords: Customer Focus and Relationships; Business or Company Management; Supply Chain Management; Marketing Strategy; Networks; Marketing Channels; Advertising Campaigns; Outcome or Result; Growth and Development; Retail Industry; Great Britain

10 Sep 2014
Research & Ideas

Become a Value Creator

information like gold, believing that guarding certain company know-how gives them more power. Rather than sharing customer lists that might give another department a hand in making sales, for instance, they squirrel those names away.... View Details

Keywords: by Dina Gerdeman

14 Sep 2010
First Look

First Look: September 14, 2010

activity. We examine the responses of U.S.-based MNEs and domestic industrial production to a set of IPR reforms in the 1980s and 1990s. Following reform, MNEs expand the scale of their activities. MNEs that... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

05 Apr 2010
Research & Ideas

HBS Cases: iPads, Kindles, and the Close of a Chapter in Book Publishing

bookstores—the whole physical distribution system—is on the cusp of changing fundamentally." Olson has a particularly informed view of the issue. Before arriving at HBS in 2008, he was CEO of Random House. In a recent unpublished case study, "The Random House... View Details

Keywords: by Julia Hanna; Information; Publishing; Entertainment & Recreation

21 Jun 2010
Research & Ideas

Strategy and Execution for Emerging Markets

producers and customers in an efficient manner. Q: How can intermediaries grow as businesses in their own right? Khanna: Emerging markets can't mandate intermediaries into existence. Entrepreneurs must first recognize an institutional... View Details

Keywords: by Martha Lagace

2023
Working Paper

Flow-Driven ESG Returns

By: Philippe van der Beck

I show that the recent returns to ESG investing are strongly driven by price impact from flows towards ESG funds. Using data on institutional trades, I estimate the market’s ability to accommodate the demand of ESG funds, which is given by the elasticity of... View Details

Keywords: Investment Funds; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Financial Markets; Investment Return