Publications

March 2008
Article

What Have We Learned from Market Design?

By: Alvin E. Roth

This essay discusses some things we have learned about markets, in the process of designing marketplaces to fix market failures. To work well, marketplaces have to provide thickness, i.e. they need to attract a large enough proportion of the potential participants in... View Details

Keywords: Risk Management; Market Design; Market Participation; Market Transactions; Failure; Safety

04 Mar 2021
News

It Would Be a Major Blunder to Raise Taxes Right Now

04 Dec 2019
News

Prudential’s long position on skills: fostering careers while embracing automation

Web

Great American Business Leaders of the 20th Century - Leadership

CENTURY ZEITGEIST Six contextual factors deeply influenced the opportunities available to 20th century business leaders: Demographics Technology Social Mores Government Labor Global the 20 th Century Zeitgeist Demographics Demographics... View Details

August 2008
Article

Ethnic Scientific Communities and International Technology Diffusion

By: William R. Kerr

This study explores the importance of knowledge transfer for international technology diffusion by examining ethnic scientific and entrepreneurial communities in the US and their ties to their home countries. US ethnic research communities are quantified by applying an... View Details

Keywords: Information Technology; Ethnicity; Production; Integration; Knowledge Sharing; Patents; Employment; Performance Productivity; Entrepreneurship; Change; Developing Countries and Economies; Immigration; China; United States

03 Sep 2014
Working Paper Summaries

Supply Chain Screening Without Certification: The Critical Role of Stakeholder Pressure

Keywords: by Susan A. Kayser, John W. Maxwell & Michael W. Toffel

01 Jul 2014
Working Paper Summaries

Creating Reciprocal Value Through Operational Transparency

Keywords: by Ryan W. Buell, Tami Kim & Chia-Jung Tsay

June 2017 (Revised August 2018)
Case

Goodbye IMF Conditions, Hello Chinese Capital: Zambia's Copper Industry and Africa's Break with Its Colonial Past

By: Rafael Di Tella, Vincent Pons, Sarah Mehta and David Lane

Over the past several decades, rapid growth in Chinese investment and trade has created for Africa a new development partner. China represents an alternative to U.S. and European nations whose past imperialism, resource avarice, and economic dictates—through the... View Details

Keywords: Copper; Imperialism; IMF; World Bank; ODA; Debt Relief; Growth and Development; Business and Stakeholder Relations; Labor and Management Relations; History; Development Economics; China; Zambia; Africa

27 Mar 2019
HBS Seminar

Caitlin Rosenthal, UC Berkeley, Department of History

November 2016 (Revised February 2017)
Case

BrightStar Care: The Evolution of a Leadership Team

By: Boris Groysberg, Colleen Ammerman and John D. Vaughan

BrightStar Care was a rapidly growing franchise of home health care agencies. Founded by husband and wife team JD and Shelly Sun as a single agency near Chicago in 2002, BrightStar had opened nearly 300 franchises across the United States by 2016, generating over $300... View Details

Keywords: Health Care Services; Entrepreneurs; Board Of Directors; Boards Of Directors; Health Care Industry; Growth Strategy; Organizational Change; Brand Positioning; Entrepreneurial Organizations; Entrepreneurial Management; Franchising; Family-owned Business; Home Health Care; Managing Growth; Management Styles; Organizational Development; Talent Management; Women Executives; Women And Leadership; Business Startups; Family Business; Small Business; Talent and Talent Management; Governing and Advisory Boards; Health Care and Treatment; Human Capital; Leadership Development; Leadership Style; Business or Company Management; Growth and Development Strategy; Management Analysis, Tools, and Techniques; Management Skills; Management Style; Management Succession; Management Systems; Management Teams; Brands and Branding; Marketing Strategy; Strategy

June 2002 (Revised June 2014)
Case

The Netherlands: Is the Polder Model Sinking?

By: Huw Pill, Marie-Laure Y Goepfer, Mathijs Robbens and Ingrid Vogel

The Netherlands suffered economic crisis in the late 1970s and early 1980s, despite (or perhaps because of) its access to North Sea gas. In response to mounting inflation and unemployment, a tripartite agreement between employers, unions, and government was reached in... View Details

Keywords: Macroeconomics; Labor Unions; Netherlands

April 2024
Case

Cyrus: Turning a Traditional Business Model on Its Head (A)

By: James Heskett

The loss of the lease at their Michelin-starred Cyrus 1.0 in Sonoma County, California gives the partners an opportunity to shut down and rework a “broken” business model, one with labor intensive experiences six or seven nights a week, high burnout, high... View Details

Keywords: Business Model; Retention; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Leasing; Work-Life Balance; Strategic Planning; Loss; Profit; Working Conditions; California

Article

The Baby Benefits Club

By: Debora L. Spar

This past summer several prominent firms seemed to be competing for the title of America's most family-friendly company. In August, Netflix announced plans to offer new mothers and fathers "unlimited leave". Microsoft countered quickly, promising to increase its own... View Details

Keywords: Parental Leave; Maternity Leave; Employees; Compensation and Benefits; Policy; Gender; Equality and Inequality

May–June 2019
Article

Your Workforce Is More Adaptable Than You Think

By: Joseph B. Fuller, Manjari Raman, Judith K. Wallenstein and Alice de Chalendar

In 2018 the Project on Managing the Future of Work at HBS teamed up with the BCG Henderson Institute to survey 6,500 business leaders and 11,000 workers about the various forces reshaping the nature of work. The responses revealed a surprising gap: While the executives... View Details

Keywords: Management; Employees; Attitudes; Organizational Culture; Organizational Change and Adaptation

2016
Working Paper

Food Stamp Entrepreneurs

By: Gareth Olds

This paper explores how eligibility for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP, formerly known as the Food Stamps Program) affects firm formation. Using a variety of identification strategies, I show that expanded SNAP eligibility in the mid-2000s... View Details

Keywords: Entrepreneurship; Welfare or Wellbeing

Forthcoming
Chapter

Oil, Macroeconomic Volatility and Crime in the Determination of Beliefs in Venezuela

By: Rafael Di Tella, Javier Donna and Robert MacCulloch

Book Abstract: At the beginning of the twentieth century Venezuela had one of the poorest economies in Latin America, but by 1970 it had become the richest country in the region and one of the twenty richest countries in the world, ahead of countries such as Greece,... View Details

Keywords: Macroeconomics; Volatility; Crime and Corruption; Values and Beliefs; Non-Renewable Energy; Energy Industry; Venezuela

April 2019 (Revised March 2020)
Case

Handy: The Future of Work? (A)

By: Nien-hê Hsieh and Kieron Stopforth

Witnessing numerous lawsuits alleging that online platform companies misclassified workers as contractors when they were actually employees, Handy’s founders faced a series of decisions. Handy was an online platform business that enabled customers to book appointments... View Details

Keywords: Employment; Working Conditions; Entrepreneurship; Compensation and Benefits; Internet and the Web; Ethics; Fairness; Service Industry; United States

November–December 2018
Article

Slack Time and Innovation

By: Ajay Agrawal, Christian Catalini, Avi Goldfarb and Hong Luo

Traditional innovation models assume that new ideas are developed up to the point where the benefit of the marginal project is just equal to the cost. Because labor is a key input to innovation when the opportunity cost of time is lower, such as during school breaks or... View Details

Keywords: Crowdfunding; Slack Time; Innovation and Invention; Labor; Projects; Complexity; Value

Winter 2024
Article

Is Pay Transparency Good?

By: Zoë B. Cullen

Countries around the world are enacting pay transparency policies to combat pay discrimination. Since 2000, 71 percent of OECD countries have done so. Most are enacting transparency horizontally, revealing pay between coworkers doing similar work within a firm. While... View Details

Keywords: Policy; Wages; Knowledge Sharing; Job Design and Levels; Negotiation; Performance Productivity; Compensation and Benefits; Motivation and Incentives