Publications

20 Dec 2006
Working Paper Summaries

The Demise of Cost and Profit Centers

Keywords: by Robert S. Kaplan

December 2012
Article

Reflected Knowledge and Trust in Global Collaboration

By: Mark Mortensen and Tsedal Neeley

Scholars argue that direct knowledge about distant colleagues is crucial for fostering trust in global collaboration. However, their arguments focus mainly on how trust accrues from knowledge about distant collaborators' personal characteristics, relationships, and... View Details

Keywords: Global Work; Organizational Studies; Knowledge; Trust; Cooperation; Global Range; Relationships; Behavior; Personal Characteristics

04 Nov 2012
News

Assume the Position: Posing Your Way to Personal Power And Excellence

29 Nov 2011
Working Paper Summaries

Local Industrial Structures and Female Entrepreneurship in India

Keywords: by Ejaz Ghani, William R. Kerr & Stephen O'Connell

December 2001 (Revised July 2005)
Case

E.I. du Pont de Nemours and Company: The Conoco Split-off (A)

By: Stuart C. Gilson and Perry Fagan

After taking 30% of its Conoco oil and gas subsidiary public in the largest domestic initial public offering (IPO) in U.S. history, management of E.I. du Pont de Nemours and Co. (DuPont) is considering divesting its remaining interest in Conoco. This goal is to be... View Details

Keywords: Business Conglomerates; Business Subsidiaries; Restructuring; Non-Renewable Energy; Chemicals; Assets; Initial Public Offering; Business and Shareholder Relations; Diversification; Value; Chemical Industry; United States

Article

Collaboration Networks, Structural Holes, and Innovation: A Longitudinal Study

By: Gautam Ahuja

To assess the effects of a firm's network of relations on innovation, this paper elaborates a theoretical framework that relates three aspects of a firm's ego network-direct ties, indirect ties, and structural holes (disconnections between a firm's partners)—to the... View Details

Keywords: Strategy; Social and Collaborative Networks; Innovation and Invention; Chemical Industry

March 2000
Article

The Duality of Collaboration: Inducements and Opportunities in the Formation of Interfirm Linkages

By: Gautam Ahuja

I argue that the linkage-formation propensity of firms is explained by simultaneously examining both inducement and opportunity factors. Drawing upon resource-based and social network theory literatures I identify three forms of accumulated... View Details

Keywords: Collaboration; Innovation; Networks; Strategy; Alliances; Social and Collaborative Networks; Innovation and Invention; Chemical Industry

Research Summary

Team, Individual, and Organizational Learning From Experience in Two High-Hazard Industries

High-hazard industries such as nuclear power and chemical process plants must learn and improve without sole reliance on trial-and-error. Considerable attention and resources are placed on learning from operating experience, including exchange of best practices, peer... View Details

11 Oct 2021
Blog Post

Crafting a Nontraditional Path to Venture Capital and Private Equity with Morgan Sheil (MBA 2021)

years at HBS, allowed her to pick up experiences, skills, and knowledge that would help her carve a path from chemical engineering and supply chain to climate operations... View Details

March 2001
Article

Technological Acquisitions and the Innovation Performance of Acquiring Firms: A Longitudinal Study

By: Gautam Ahuja and Riitta Katila

This paper examines the impact of acquisitions on the subsequent innovation performance of acquiring firms in the chemicals industry. We distinguish between technological acquisitions, acquisitions in which technology is a component of the acquired firm's assets, and... View Details

Keywords: Innovation; Acquisitions; Knowledge; Strategy; Knowledge Acquisition; Acquisition; Innovation and Invention; Chemical Industry

2009
Working Paper

Firsthand Experience and the Subsequent Role of Reflected Knowledge in Cultivating Trust in Global Collaboration

By: Mark Mortensen and T. B. Neeley

While scholars contend that firsthand experience—time spent onsite observing the people, places, and norms of a distant locale—is crucial in globally distributed collaboration, how such experience actually affects interpersonal dynamics is poorly understood. Based on... View Details

Keywords: Interpersonal Communication; Experience and Expertise; Globalized Firms and Management; Knowledge Acquisition; Knowledge Use and Leverage; Trust

Read Now

June 2008 (Revised May 2017)
Case

Cook Composites and Polymers Co.

By: Deishin Lee, Michael W. Toffel and Rachel Gordon

This case describes how a company improves resource efficiency and process quality in its manufacturing process by developing a waste by-product into a new product. The case describes how CCP cleans production equipment between batches using styrene, which becomes a... View Details

Keywords: Innovation and Invention; Product Development; Business Processes; Performance Efficiency; Natural Environment; Wastes and Waste Processing; Pollutants; Environmental Sustainability; Chemical Industry; Manufacturing Industry

July 2020
Case

Amanda and Kristen: Mented Cosmetics

By: Steven Rogers, Jeffrey J. Bussgang and Alterrell Mills

The co-founders (Black HBS alumnae) of an e-commerce beauty startup explore the unmet needs within the beauty industry. This case study examines the entrepreneurial opportunities that come from identifying an underserved market, specifically within the Black community... View Details

21 Feb 2019
Blog Post

Machine Learning and Behavioral Economics

This is a repost from the recruiting blog. For John Bracaglia, his academic and professional careers have been driven by two themes: “machine learning and behavioral economics,” he says. “The two work... View Details

2009
Article

Synthesis by Microbes or Chemists? Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturing in the Antibiotic Era

By: Arthur A. Daemmrich

This article presents a case study of the rise of Pfizer as a leading pharmaceutical company, with a focus on changing relationships between manufacturing technology and R&D between the mid-1940s and the mid-1960s. Pfizer first moved into pharmaceuticals through... View Details

Keywords: Research and Development; Production; Technology; Transformation; Relationships; Success; Organizations; Programs; Chemicals; Alignment; Pharmaceutical Industry; United States

04 Sep 2019
News

Clicks and Mortar

glasses and take pictures of yourself. What’s brilliant about this is that it gives you this theatrical experience but with some operational benefits: If you want to receive the picture, you have to give... View Details

Keywords: Jen McFarland Flint; Miscellaneous Store Retailers; Retail Trade

February 2020 (Revised February 2022)
Case

Sustainable Product Management at Solvay

By: George Serafeim, Vincent Dessain and Mette Fuglsang Hjortshoej

In November 2019, Ilham Kadri, CEO of Solvay, a Belgian specialty chemicals and advanced materials group, with annual revenues of more than €10 billion in 2018, announced the group’s mid-term strategy, eight months after she took the helm as Solvay’s 11th CEO. The case... View Details

Keywords: Sustainability; Sustainable Business And Innovation; Sustainability Management; Sustainable Development; Management Accounting; Innovation; Carbon Emissions; Sustainability Reporting; Sustainability Targets; Target-setting; Product; Management; Transformation; Growth and Development Strategy; Climate Change; Environmental Sustainability; Chemical Industry; Europe; Belgium

1966
Book

Aromatics and Derivatives

By: Robert B. Stobaugh

Keywords: Chemical Industry; Chemical Industry