Publications
Publications
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- All HBS Web
(1,035)
- Faculty Publications (102)
- 2009
- Working Paper
Operational Failures and Problem Solving: An Empirical Study of Incident Reporting
By: Julia Rose Adler-Milstein, Sara J. Singer and Michael W. Toffel
Operational failures occur in all industries with consequences that range from minor inconveniences to major catastrophes. Many organizations have implemented incident reporting systems to highlight actual and potential operational failures in order to encourage... View Details
- March 2009
- Article
Applicant and Examiner Citations in U.S. Patents: An Overview and Analysis
By: Juan Alcacer, Michelle Gittelman and Bhaven Sampat
Prior art patent citations have become a popular measure of patent quality and knowledge flow between firms. Interpreting these measurements is complicated, in some cases, because prior art citations are added by patent examiners as well as by patent applicants. The... View Details
- 2008
- Working Paper
Applicant and Examiner Citations in U.S. Patents: An Overview and Analysis
By: Juan Alcacer, Michelle Gittelman and Bhaven Sampat
Researchers studying innovation increasingly use indicators based on patent citations. However, it is well known that not all citations originate from applicants—patent examiners contribute to citations listed in issued patents—and that this could complicate... View Details
- May 2008
- Article
Real and Accrual-Based Earnings Management in the Pre- and Post-Sarbanes Oxley Periods
By: Daniel Cohen, Aiyesha Dey and Thomas Lys
We document that accrual‐based earnings management increased steadily from 1987 until the passage of the Sarbanes‐Oxley Act (SOX) in 2002, followed by a significant decline after the passage of SOX. Conversely, the level of real earnings management activities declined... View Details
- February 2008
- Article
Attracting Skeptical Buyers: Negotiating for Intellectual Property Rights
By: James J. Anton and Dennis A. Yao
Expropriable disclosures of knowledge to prospective buyers may be necessary to facilitate the sale of intellectual property (IP). In principle, confidentiality agreements can protect disclosures by granting the seller rights to sue for unauthorized use. In practice,... View Details
- 2008
- Chapter
Life-Cycle Funds
By: Luis M. Viceira
The U.S. retirement system has experienced a substantial transformation in recent years. It has evolved from a system in which employees relied mainly on Social Security and professionally managed defined benefit (DB) pension plans sponsored by their employers to... View Details
- January 2008 (Revised October 2010)
- Case
Sara Campbell Ltd. (A)
By: Romana Autrey, V.G. Narayanan and Julia Rozovsky
Describes a situation in which Sara Campbell, the CEO of a women's apparel company, must decide how to resolve the tense relationship with her Financial Controller and ex-brother-in-law, Stephen Holt. Holt was employed by Campbell for 10 years, took on the majority of... View Details
- January 2008 (Revised October 2010)
- Supplement
Sara Campbell Ltd. (B)
By: Romana Autrey, V.G. Narayanan and Julia Rozovsky
Supplements the Sara Campbell Ltd. (A) case by introducing additional concerns with Holt. In January of 1999, Campbell received a certified letter written by Holt. The letter described Holt's own frustration in working for Campbell. Students are given context to... View Details
- January 2008 (Revised December 2011)
- Case
Inner Mongolia Yili Group: China's Pioneering Dairy Brand
By: Regina M. Abrami, William C. Kirby, F. Warren McFarlan and Tracy Yuen Manty
Setting up the goal to become one of the top 20 enterprises in the world dairy industry by 2010, the Inner Mongolia Yili Group had ambitious plans. As one of China's biggest national dairy companies, its main challenge was competing as a local company against... View Details
- 2008
- Working Paper
The Ethnic Composition of U.S. Inventors
By: William R. Kerr
The ethnic composition of US scientists and engineers is undergoing a significant transformation. This study applies an ethnic-name database to individual patent records granted by the United States Patent and Trademark Office to document these trends with greater... View Details
- Article
Why Schumpeter Was Right: Innovation, Market Power and Creative Destruction in 1920s America
By: Tom Nicholas
Are firms with strong market positions powerful engines of technological progress? Joseph Schumpeter thought so, but his hypothesis has proved difficult to verify empirically. This article highlights Schumpeterian market-power and creative-destruction effects in a... View Details
- April 2002
- Case
Sally Jameson: Valuing Stock Options in a Compensation Package (Abridged)
By: Peter Tufano
Details a thinly disguised situation facing a recent Harvard MBA graduate who was forced by a prospective employer to place a dollar value on a grant of stock options. There are two objectives: 1) Serves as an introduction to option valuation, in which students have an... View Details
- May 2001 (Revised January 2003)
- Case
Calpine Corporation: The Evolution from Project to Corporate Finance
By: Benjamin C. Esty and Michael Kane
In early 1999, Calpine Corp.'s CEO Pete Cartwright adopted an aggressive growth strategy with the goal of increasing the company's aggregate generating capacity from approximately 3,000 to 15,000 megawatts (MW) by 2004. He believed there was a fleeting opportunity to... View Details
- 1999
- Other Unpublished Work
Executive Ownership and Control in Newly Public Firms: The Role of Venture Capitalists
By: Malcolm Baker and Paul Gompers
We study the implications of CEO equity ownership for incentives and control in a sample of 1,011 newly public firms. Before an initial public offering, equity investments by venture capitalists reduce CEO ownership by about half, from an average of 35 percent to 19... View Details
- August 1998 (Revised October 2002)
- Case
Harbus Foundation, The
By: James E. Austin and Linda Carrigan
Describes the challenges faced by a group of HBS students as they create a foundation. Given surplus funds generated by the student-run newspaper, The Harbus leadership decides to find a meaningful use for the excess cash. Profiles both the entrepreneurial process used... View Details
- October 1997 (Revised January 1998)
- Case
Oxfam America
By: James E. Austin and James Kondo
Oxfam America, a nongovernmental organization providing grant assistance to organizations fighting hunger, poverty, and their causes, was engaged in a new strategy formulation process, led by its new president. View Details
- January 1993 (Revised August 2003)
- Case
Sally Jameson: Valuing Stock Options in a Compensation Package
By: Peter Tufano
Details a thinly disguised situation faced by a recent Harvard MBA graduate who was forced by a prospective employer to place a dollar value on a grant of stock options. There are two objectives: 1) Serves as an introduction to option valuation, in which students have... View Details
- Article
Enfranchisement of Service Workers
By: Leonard A. Schlesinger and James Heskett
Enfranchisement is achieved through an integration of empowerment with methods of pay for performance. Evidence from Ito Yokado Group in Japan and Nordstrom in the US demonstrates the positive effects of enfranchisement. Successful efforts to enfranchise employees: 1.... View Details
- Teaching Interest
Contemporary Developing Countries: Entrepreneurial Solutions to Intractable Problems
By: Tarun Khanna
What problems do developing countries face, and how can individuals contribute to solutions rather than awaiting the largesse of the state or other actors? Intractable problems – such as lack of access to education and healthcare, forced reliance on contaminated... View Details
- Research Summary
Management Control Systems in Multiunit Companies
By: Tatiana Sandino
Professor Sandino conducts research on early-stage multiunit companies that introduce management control systems to help maintain operations, as well as company culture, as they grow, but also to enable adaptation to the different markets that they serve. Building... View Details