Publications

August 2007
Case

Codelco Copper Mines

Codelco was a Chilean copper-mining company, widely considered to be one of the most professionally managed firms in South America in spite of the fact that it was 100% government-owned. A $10.5 billion company in 2005, Codelco faced the challenge of incorporating... View Details

Keywords: Mining; Geographic Location; Leading Change; Business Processes; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Information Technology; Mining Industry; Chile

November 2023
Case

The Commons Project in Rwanda—Building Digital Infrastructure for the Global Public Good

By: Álvaro Rodríguez Arregui and Tom Quinn

In September 2022, The Commons Project Foundation (TCP) CEO Zhenya Lindgardt and her team met on a Zoom call to discuss building tools to help Rwandans manage their health data. They believed that helping Africa build digital infrastructure would improve much-needed... View Details

Keywords: Developing Countries and Economies; Capital; Cross-Cultural and Cross-Border Issues; Health Care and Treatment; Information Management; Adaptation; Information Infrastructure; Information Technology Industry; Rwanda; United States

September 2023 (Revised December 2023)
Case

TetraScience: Noise and Signal

By: Thomas R. Eisenmann and Tom Quinn

In 2019, TetraScience CEO “Spin” Wang needed advice. Five years earlier, he had cofounded a startup that saw early success with a hardware product designed to help laboratory scientists in the biotechnology and pharmaceutical spaces more easily collect data from... View Details

Keywords: Entrepreneurship; Business Growth and Maturation; Business Organization; Restructuring; Forecasting and Prediction; Digital Platforms; Analytics and Data Science; AI and Machine Learning; Organizational Structure; Network Effects; Competitive Strategy; Biotechnology Industry; Pharmaceutical Industry; United States; Boston

March 2003 (Revised January 2004)
Case

CDC Capital Partners: December 2002

By: G. Felda Hardymon, Josh Lerner and Ann Leamon

Paul Fletcher, CEO of CDC Capital Partners, a private equity group investing in the world's poorest countries, is wrestling with questions raised by the imminent reorganization of the firm. Previously an arm of the United Kingdom's international aid agency, CDC is... View Details

Keywords: Private Equity; Investment Portfolio; Privatization; Venture Capital; Business and Government Relations; Emerging Markets; Infrastructure; Financial Services Industry; Banking Industry; United Kingdom

September 2001 (Revised January 2002)
Case

The American Medical Association-Sunbeam Deal (C): Denouement

By: Ashish Nanda and Kimberly A. Haddad

On September 5, 1997, the American Medical Association(AMA) withdrew from a contract with Sunbeam Corporation, the maker of small home appliances. Sunbeam sued the AMA to pay for the damages or to comply with the contract. The fracas led to the dismissal of three top... View Details

Keywords: Medical Services; Appliances; Lawsuit; Litigation; Professionalism; Contracts; Corporate Accountability; Organizations; Lawsuits and Litigation; Consumer Products Industry; Health Industry; United States

March 2009
Article

The Impact of Shareholder Activism on Financial Reporting and Compensation: The Case of Employee Stock Options Expensing

By: F. Ferri and Tatiana Sandino

We examine the economic consequences of more than 150 shareholder proposals to expense employee stock options (ESO) submitted during the proxy seasons of 2003 and 2004, the first case in which the SEC allowed a shareholder vote on an accounting matter. Our results... View Details

Keywords: Shareholder Activism; Shareholder Votes; Stock Option Expensing; Executive Compensation; Financial Reporting; Employee Stock Ownership Plan; Corporate Governance; Business and Shareholder Relations; Investment Activism

SSRN

Find at Harvard

June 2007 (Revised August 2007)
Case

Dressen (Abridged) (A)

By: Thomas R. Piper

John Lynch, CEO of the Dressen Division of Westinghouse, was elated by the proposed leveraged buyout by the private equity firm, Warburg Pincus Ventures. The buyout would rid the division of a 'bad' parent and place the division's destiny in its own hands. A recently... View Details

Keywords: Leveraged Buyouts; Restructuring; Forecasting and Prediction; Private Equity; Bids and Bidding; Valuation

March 2019
Supplement

KITEA (B): Getting Ready to Face IKEA

By: Ramon Casadesus-Masanell and Gamze Yucaoglu

The case opens in September 2015, when IKEA is about to open its first store in Morocco. It then chronicles the efforts of KITEA CEO Amine Benkirane and his son Othman between 2013 and 2015 to prepare KITEA for IKEA’s entry. After incurring losses for the first time in... View Details

01 Aug 2018
News

Inside the Emerging Economy With Millions of High-Paying Jobs

January 2018
Case

John Rogers, Jr.—Ariel Investments Co.

By: Steven Rogers and Greg White

John Rogers Jr., the founder and CEO of Ariel Investments, an enormously successful finance firm with $12 billion of invested capital, is one of the few African Americans in the asset management industry. As one of the high profile leaders in the black business... View Details

Keywords: Advocacy; Diversity; Investment Management; Affirmative Action; Disruption; Cost vs Benefits; Corporate Entrepreneurship; Fairness; Moral Sensibility; Values and Beliefs; Corporate Accountability; Leading Change; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Problems and Challenges; Financial Services Industry; Chicago

Person Page

A. Harbus Articles 2009-2010

EiR Interview - Jim Sharpe
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October 2004 (Revised October 2005)
Case

ORIX KK: Incentives in Japan

In the context of Japan's struggling economy of the 1990s, ORIX, a leading Japanese financial services company, implemented a new performance evaluation and compensation system. At the time, many higher-paying western firms were entering the Japanese market and... View Details

Keywords: Performance Evaluation; Cross-Cultural and Cross-Border Issues; Compensation and Benefits; Financial Services Industry; Japan

16 Oct 2023
HBS Case

Advancing Black Talent: From the Flight Ramp to 'Family-Sustaining' Careers at Delta

At the end of 2020—seven months after COVID-19 had sent the airline industry into a tailspin and five months after George Floyd’s murder by Minneapolis police provoked nationwide protests for racial justice—Delta Air Lines CEO Ed Bastian... View Details

Keywords: by Lane Lambert; Air Transportation

04 Jan 2022
What Do You Think?

Firing McDonald’s Easterbrook: What Could the Board Have Done Differently?

a board member, I’ve unfortunately had to confront these issues. The McDonald’s board faced these issues in October 2019. The company’s CEO at the time, Steve Easterbrook, was found to have “engaged in a consensual relationship with an... View Details

Keywords: by James Heskett

March 2023
Case

Ransomware Attack at Colonial Pipeline Company

By: Suraj Srinivasan and Li-Kuan Ni

On the morning of May 7, 2021, Colonial Pipeline Company became aware that the company had been the victim of a malicious ransomware attack that had stolen and locked up company data. The extortionists demanded 75 bitcoins (worth about $4.4 million at the time) in... View Details