Publications
Publications
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- All HBS Web
(1,372)
- Faculty Publications (296)
- February 2017 (Revised August 2018)
- Case
Sarah Powers at Automated Precision Products
By: Jeffrey T. Polzer, Michael Norris, Julia Kelley and Kristina Tobio
In 2017, Sarah Powers, VP of Sales at an automation hardware firm, is trying to understand why some members of her sales team have been underperforming. She is tasked with analyzing her firm’s email and calendar data to try to find relationships between communications... View Details
- February 2017
- Case
Yemeksepeti: Growing and Expanding the Business Model through Data
By: William R. Kerr, Gamze Yucaoglu and Eren Kuzucu
In October 2016, Nevzat Aydin, co-founder and CEO of Yemeksepeti, the Turkish online food-ordering company, was looking over the company's quarterly results and projections for the upcoming year with his management team. It had been almost a year and a half since Aydin... View Details
Keywords: Entrepreneurial Management; Entrepreneurial Ventures; Turkey; Big Data; Customer Focused Organization; Service Management; Continuous Improvement; Data Analysis; Internet; Growth Strategy; Technological Change; Information Systems; Entrepreneurship; Corporate Strategy; Analytics and Data Science; Analysis; Customer Focus and Relationships; Emerging Markets; Service Operations; Competitive Advantage; Performance Improvement; Internet and the Web; Growth and Development Strategy; Information Technology; Value Creation; Food and Beverage Industry; Turkey
- November 2016 (Revised April 2017)
- Case
Basecamp: Pricing
By: Frank Cespedes and Robb Fitzsimmons
A data analyst at Basecamp is evaluating the results of pricing research and its potential implications for the venture’s latest version of its project management software product. View Details
Keywords: Pricing; Entrepreneurial Management; Data Analysis; Marketing; Customer Acquisition; Customer Retention; Value Proposition; Sales Management; Product Management; Market Research; Life Time Value; Testing; Entrepreneurship; Analytics and Data Science; Customers; Value; Sales; Product Marketing; United States
- October 2016 (Revised February 2019)
- Module Note
Strategy Execution Module 5: Building a Profit Plan
By: Robert Simons
This module reading describes how to build a profit plan to reflect the strategy of a business in economic terms. After introducing the profit wheel, cash wheel, and ROE wheel, the module illustrates how to use a profit plan to assess the viability of different... View Details
Keywords: Management Control Systems; Implementing Strategy; Execution; Profit Planning; Cash Flow Analysis; Asset Utilization; Return On Equity; Business Planning; Testing Strategy; Analyzing Strategic Alternative; Strategy; Asset Management; Cash Flow; Investment Return; Management Systems; Profit
- September 2016
- Case
Hotel Vertu: Financing the Venture in the Boutique Hotel Industry
By: Howard H. Stevenson and Michael J. Roberts
Two recent MBA graduates are considering a business opportunity in the boutique hotel industry. Having found a seemingly attractive property in Savannah, Georgia, Yvonne D'Arcy and Elisabeth Whiting face questions about financing, deal structure, and unequal power... View Details
- September 2016 (Revised May 2018)
- Case
Zurich Insurance: Global Job Structure and Data Analysis
By: Boris Groysberg and Katherine Connolly
Zurich Insurance was undergoing organizational change after implementing five new people practices focused on manager development, diversity and inclusion, job model and data analytics, recruitment, and talent pipeline. The case “Zurich Insurance: Fostering Key People... View Details
- Article
ESG Integration in Investment Management: Myths and Realities
By: Sakis Kotsantonis, Christopher Pinney and George Serafeim
The authors’ aim in this article is to set the record straight on the financial performance of sustainable investing while also correcting a number of other widespread misconceptions about this rapidly growing set of principles and methods.
Myth Number 1:... View Details
- 2016
- Book
Managing in the Gray: Five Timeless Questions for Resolving Your Toughest Problems at Work
Part of a manager's job is making tough calls, and the hardest challenge can be resolving "gray area” problems—situations in which analysis of the numbers, facts, and data fails to provide a clear answer. Gray areas test not only managers’ skills but also their... View Details
- September 2016 (Revised March 2017)
- Module Note
Strategy Execution Module 3: Using Information for Performance Measurement and Control
By: Robert Simons
This module reading explains how managers use information to control critical business processes and outcomes. The analysis begins by illustrating how managers use information to communicate goals and track performance. Then the focus turns to the choices that managers... View Details
- August 2016 (Revised November 2019)
- Supplement
eSig: Growth Analysis
By: Mark N. Roberge and Thomas R. Eisenmann
eSig, an early-stage startup, offers an electronic signature application as a "freemium" product, i.e., users can upgrade from a free basic version to a premium version by paying a subscription fee. Using 9 months of data from 50,000 user activations, available as a... View Details
- August 2016 (Revised November 2019)
- Case
eSig: Growth Analysis
By: Mark Roberge and Tom Eisenmann
eSig, an early-stage startup, offers an electronic signature application as a "freemium" product, i.e., users can upgrade from a free basic version to a premium version by paying a subscription fee. Using 9 months of data from 50,000 user activations (available as a... View Details
- 2019
- Working Paper
The Customer May Not Always Be Right: Customer Compatibility and Service Performance
This paper investigates the impact of customer compatibility – the degree of fit between the needs of customers and the capabilities of the operations serving them – on customer experiences and firm performance. We use a variance decomposition analysis to quantify the... View Details
- February 2016
- Article
Unearned Status Gain: Evidence from a Global Language Mandate
By: Tsedal Neeley and Tracy Dumas
Theories of status rarely address unearned status gain—an unexpected and unsolicited increase in relative standing, prestige, or worth, attained not through individual effort or achievement, but from a shift in organizationally valued characteristics. We build theory... View Details
- January 2016 (Revised April 2017)
- Case
The Galaxy Dividend Income Growth Fund's Option Investment Strategies
By: W. Carl Kester
This case is designed to provide an elementary introduction to options and option pricing for beginning finance students. Analysis of the case requires students to compare the prices of put and call options with various exercise prices and maturity dates on two... View Details
- December 2015
- Article
Harnessing Productive Tensions in Hybrid Organizations: The Case of Work Integration Social Enterprises
By: Julie Battilana, Metin Sengul, Anne-Claire Pache and Jacob Model
We examine the factors that influence the social performance of hybrid organizations that pursue a social mission, and sustain their operations through commercial activities, by studying work integration social enterprises (WISEs). We argue that social imprinting and... View Details
- October 2015 (Revised October 2016)
- Case
Building Watson: Not So Elementary, My Dear! (Abridged)
By: Willy C. Shih
This case is set inside IBM Research's efforts to build a computer that can successfully take on human challengers playing the game show Jeopardy! It opens with the machine named Watson offering the incorrect answer "Toronto" to a seemingly simple question during the... View Details
- Article
Pricing and Production Flexibility: An Empirical Analysis of the U.S. Automotive Industry
By: Antonio Moreno and Christian Terwiesch
We use a detailed data set from the U.S. auto industry spanning from 2002 to 2009 and a variety of econometric methods to characterize the relationship between the availability of production mix flexibility and firms’ use of responsive pricing. We find that production... View Details
- August 2015 (Revised May 2017)
- Case
TSG Hoffenheim: Football in the Age of Analytics
By: Feng Zhu, Karim R. Lakhani, Sascha L. Schmidt and Kerry Herman
In 2015, Dietmar Hopp, owner of Germany's Bundesliga football team TSG Hoffenheim and co-founder of the global enterprise software company SAP, was considering how to ensure long-term sustainability and competitiveness for TSG Hoffenheim. While historically a small... View Details
- August 2015
- Article
Poultry in Motion: A Study of International Trade Finance Practices
By: Pol Antràs and C. Fritz Foley
This paper analyzes the financing terms that support international trade and sheds light on how these terms shape the impact of economic shocks on trade. Analysis of transaction-level data from a U.S.-based exporter of frozen and refrigerated food products, primarily... View Details
- 2015
- Article
Testing Strategy with Multiple Performance Measures: Evidence from a Balanced Scorecard at Store24
We analyze balanced scorecard data from a convenience store chain, Store24, during the implementation of an innovative, but ultimately unsuccessful, strategy. Quarterly strategic reviews, based in part on the firm's balanced scorecard, led executives at Store24 to... View Details