Publications

05 Feb 2024
Research & Ideas

The Middle Manager of the Future: More Coaching, Less Commanding

says Letian Zhang, the study’s author and an assistant professor of business administration at HBS. “Organizations are adopting a more bottom-up approach, so they’re trying to unleash the potential, the creativity, and the motivation of... View Details

Keywords: by Ben Rand

December 2007 (Revised July 2008)
Case

Montague Corporation: Unfolding the Future in Cycling

Montague has developed a major innovation that creates a new sub-category in the bicycle industry: a full-sized, high-quality bicycle that folds. In contrast to existing small-wheeled folding bicycles that are portable, but with inferior performance characteristics,... View Details

Keywords: Entrepreneurship; Innovation and Invention; Product Positioning; Demand and Consumers; Adoption; Bicycle Industry

January 1994
Case

Evolving Finance Function: Judy C. Lewent at Merck & Co., Inc.

By: Timothy A. Luehrman

This case examines the career path of Merck's CFO, Judy C. Lewent, as a way of tracing changes over time in Merck's finance function. It describes the adoption of innovative quantitative analytical models, changes in job definitions and in the organization of the... View Details

Keywords: Finance; Mathematical Methods; Personal Development and Career; Organizational Design; Innovation and Invention; Pharmaceutical Industry

09 May 2024
Research & Ideas

Called Back to the Office? How You Benefit from Ideas You Didn't Know You Were Missing

Leaders have fretted since COVID-19 lockdowns that collaboration and innovation might suffer when teammates interact less. New research points to an emerging concern four years on, as organizations settle into remote, hybrid, and... View Details

Keywords: by Ben Rand

Research Summary

Professor Hiatt’s research is aimed at discovering how institutional factors can affect sector growth and technology development and adoption by mediating and moderating uncertainty. His work encompasses two related research questions:

1) How can... View Details

2007
Other Unpublished Work

Implementing Technology

By: Diego Comin and Bart Hobijn

We introduce a tractable model of endogenous growth in which the returns to innovation are determined by the technology adoption decisions of the users of new technologies. Technology adoption involves an implementation investment that determines the initial... View Details

Keywords: Learning; Investment; Investment Return; Innovation and Invention; Growth and Development Strategy; Performance Productivity; Technology Adoption

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November 2012
Article

The Organization of Firms Across Countries

By: Nicholas Bloom, Raffaella Sadun and John Van Reenen

We argue that social capital as proxied by trust increases aggregate productivity by affecting the organization of firms. To do this we collect new data on the decentralization of investment, hiring, production, and sales decisions from Corporate Headquarters to local... View Details

Keywords: Decentralization; Social Capital; Theory Of The Firm; Firm Objectives, Organization, And Behavior; Business Economics; Management Of Technological Innovation And R＆D; Technological Change: Choices And Consequences; Diffusion Processes; Organizational Structure; Performance Productivity; Trust; Technology Adoption; Multinational Firms and Management

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October 2002 (Revised March 2013)
Case

Intermountain Health Care

By: Richard M.J. Bohmer, Amy C. Edmondson and Laura Feldman

Intermountain Health Care (IHC), an integrated delivery system based in Utah, has adopted a new strategy for managing health care delivery. The approach focuses management attention not only on the facilities where care takes place but also on physician decision making... View Details

Keywords: Ethnicity; Innovation Strategy; Cost Management; Information Technology; Organizational Structure; Technology Adoption; Performance Improvement; Problems and Challenges; Adoption; Change Management; Cost vs Benefits; Health Care and Treatment; Health Industry; Utah

2025
Working Paper

How to Choose Among Technologies with Learning Curves: Making Better Investment Decisions

By: Christian Kaps and Arielle Anderer

Learning curves, the fact that technologies improve as a function of cumulative experience or investment, are desirable-think inexpensive solar panels or higher performing semiconductors. But, for firms that need to pick one technology among several candidates, such as... View Details

Keywords: Learning Curve; Technology; Innovation; Batteries; Energy Storage; Sequential Decision Making; TELCO; Exploration; Exploitation; Problems and Challenges; Cost vs Benefits; Technology Adoption; Battery Industry

SSRN

2011
Casebook

Cases about Redefining Global Strategy

By: Pankaj Ghemawat and Jordan I. Siegel

In "Cases about Redefining Global Strategy," Pankaj Ghemawat and Jordan Siegel have assembled 26 full-length case studies as a resource for active learning about the nature of cross-border differences and strategies. As technology innovation globalizes markets and... View Details

Keywords: Global Strategy; International Business; Cases; Strategy; Globalization

March 2000
Case

Heartport, Inc.

By: Gary P. Pisano and Shoshana Dobrow

Heartport, an entrepreneurial medical device maker, has introduced several innovative systems for conducting less-invasive cardiac surgery. Despite initially high expectations, the company has struggled to get its technology adopted by cardiac surgeons. The company's... View Details

Keywords: History; Product Positioning; Knowledge Acquisition; Corporate Entrepreneurship; Technology Adoption; Health Care and Treatment

22 Apr 2008
Working Paper Summaries

An Exploration of Technology Diffusion

Keywords: by Diego A. Comin & Bart Hobijn

04 Jun 2007
Research & Ideas

Is Health Care Making You Better—or Dead?

the needs of human beings, not around the needs of the status quo, didn't happen. Consumer-Driven Health Care was another book that I wrote to help change the demand for health care, to get innovation in the insurance industry. That was... View Details

Keywords: by Sean Silverthorne; Health

22 Feb 2018
Book

The New History of American Capitalism

questions with the tools generated by the innovation of past decades, including the relationship between money and power, commerce and politics, exchange and social status. Its effort is to find new ways of exploring how institutions,... View Details

Keywords: Manufacturing

January–February 2017
Article

The Truth about Blockchain

By: Marco Iansiti and Karim R. Lakhani

Contracts, transactions, and records of them provide critical structure in our economic system, but they haven’t kept up with the world’s digital transformation. They’re like rush-hour gridlock trapping a Formula 1 race car. Blockchain promises to solve this problem.... View Details

Keywords: Technological Innovation; Technology Adoption; Information Management; Information Technology Industry

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October 2017 (Revised August 2018)
Case

HTC and Virtual Reality

By: David B. Yoffie, Andy Wu and Allison M. Ciechanover

In fall 2017, HTC CEO and Chairperson Cher Wang was driving the company to focus on virtual reality (VR). HTC's first VR product, VIVE, released in spring 2016, was applauded for its superior immersive room-scale capabilities. However, early adoption of VR beyond... View Details

Keywords: Virtual Reality; Strategy; Competition; Information Technology; Innovation and Management; Consumer Behavior; Customer Relationship Management; Technology Industry

August 2000 (Revised February 2002)
Case

Arepa

By: Jay O. Light and Daniel J. Green

This case illustrates the importance of structuring negotiations with large companies and investors that are critical to a start-up's success. It depicts a firm with innovative technology that contracts with giant companies in order to survive. It also demonstrates how... View Details

Keywords: Negotiation; Organizational Structure; Entrepreneurship; Technological Innovation; Business or Company Management; Business Model; Partners and Partnerships; Business Startups

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March 2010 (Revised April 2014)
Case

American Well: The Doctor Will E-See You Now

By: Elie Ofek and Ron Laufer

What is next for healthcare IT provider American Well, whose innovative Online Care technology allows physicians to deliver care to patients online in real time? Using American Well's platform, patients with non-emergency health concerns can communicate with physicians... View Details

Keywords: Entrepreneurship; Health Care and Treatment; Technological Innovation; Growth and Development Strategy; Market Entry and Exit; Service Delivery; Online Technology; Health Industry