Publications

September 2013
Case

Management Levels at Staples (A): Company and Organization (Abridged)

By: David A. Garvin

Abridged version of one of six cases that describe the roles and responsibilities of managers at each of the hierarchical levels of management within the U.S. Stores business unit of Staples, the world's largest office supply company. Together, the cases form a... View Details

Keywords: Strategy; Managerial Roles; Organizational Design; Management Practices and Processes; Job Design and Levels; Business Processes; Consumer Products Industry; United States

Program

Launching New Ventures

managerial skills needed to make sound investment decisions, manage rapid change, and ensure the success of your new enterprise throughout its lifecycle. Details Conceive, launch, and grow a successful new venture Analyze, prioritize, and... View Details

15 Jul 2008
First Look

First Look: July 15, 2008

open up within them, giving companies a powerful mechanism for arbitrage across national financial markets. Managing these internal markets to build an advantage requires that CFOs must balance new financial opportunities with the View Details

Keywords: Martha Lagace

2009
Chapter

Do Private Equity-owned Firms Have Better Management Practices?

By: Nicholas Bloom, Raffaella Sadun and John Van Reenen

We use an innovative survey tool to collect management practice data from over 4,000 medium sized manufacturing firms across Asia, Europe and the US. These measures of managerial practice are strongly associated with firm-level performance (e.g. productivity,... View Details

Keywords: Private Equity; Management Practices and Processes; Production; Private Ownership; Performance Improvement; Performance Productivity

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13 Feb 2024
Research & Ideas

Breaking Through the Self-Doubt That Keeps Talented Women from Leading

short-term positions that put an emphasis on managerial or analytical acumen. The ads called for expertise in these stereotypically male domains that struggle with female underrepresentation and lack of advancement , Coffman explains. The... View Details

Keywords: by Kara Baskin

19 Feb 2019
First Look

New Research and Ideas, February 19, 2019

https://www.hbs.edu/faculty/Pages/item.aspx?num=55632 forthcoming Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes Active Choice, Implicit Defaults, and the Incentive to Choose By: Beshears, John, James J. Choi, David Laibson, and... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

November 1992
Case

PPG: Developing a Self-Directed Work Force (A)

By: David A. Garvin and Norman Klein

PPG has built a state-of-the-art glass plant in Berea, Kentucky. The plant is pursuing the goal of a "self-directed workforce." The case describes the progress to date and the unresolved issues faced by management. These include questions about shift rotation,... View Details

Keywords: Employees; Employee Relationship Management; Organizational Culture; Managerial Roles; Management Style

March 2004 (Revised February 2006)
Case

Salt Lake Organizing Committee, The: 2002 Olympics

By: H. Kent Bowen, Bryce LaPierre and Courtney Purrington

After two and a half years of effort, Fraser Bullock, COO of the 2002 Winter Olympics, faced projected deficits and post-9/11 security requirements only five months before the opening ceremony. Summarizes the organizational structure and processes put in place by... View Details

Keywords: Framework; Knowledge Dissemination; Business or Company Management; Managerial Roles; Organizational Design; Organizational Structure; Planning; Practice; Risk and Uncertainty; Safety; Sports; System

October 2008
Article

Evaluating the CEO

By: Stephen P. Kaufman

This article includes a one-page preview that quickly summarizes the key ideas and provides an overview of how the concepts work in practice along with suggestions for further reading. After Kaufman became a CEO, he was struck by how perfunctory the board was in its... View Details

Keywords: Decision Choices and Conditions; Governing and Advisory Boards; Leadership; Managerial Roles; Performance Evaluation; Motivation and Incentives

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2008
Working Paper

Exploring the Duality between Product and Organizational Architectures: A Test of the Mirroring Hypothesis

By: Alan D. MacCormack, John Rusnak and Carliss Y. Baldwin

A variety of academic studies argue that a relationship exists between the structure of an organization and the design of the products that this organization produces. Specifically, products tend to "mirror" the architectures of the organizations in which they are... View Details

Keywords: Open Source Distribution; Product Design; Organizational Design; Organizational Structure; Performance Effectiveness; Information Technology Industry

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25 Jun 2024
Research & Ideas

Rapport: The Hidden Advantage That Women Managers Bring to Teams

managerial practices necessitate a good rapport with workers, and some managerial styles and approaches only work if you have that good rapport. [Lack of rapport could] lead to increased turnover and low... View Details

Keywords: by Kara Baskin; Food & Beverage

Political Standards

The University of Chicago Press November 2015.

Prudent, verifiable, and timely corporate accounting is a bedrock of our modern capitalist system. In recent years, however, the rules that govern corporate accounting have been subtly changed in... View Details

December 1994 (Revised May 1999)
Case

3M Optical Systems: Managing Corporate Entrepreneurship

By: Christopher A. Bartlett and Afroze A Mohammed

A middle-level division manager must decide whether he should support an investment request for a third attempt at launching a new product developed by a struggling business unit. Describes the long, difficult process by which the unit has developed the product--a... View Details

Keywords: Managerial Roles; Decision Choices and Conditions; Corporate Entrepreneurship; Product Launch; Problems and Challenges; Product Development; Consumer Products Industry

2017
Working Paper

Management as a Technology?

By: Nicholas Bloom, Raffaella Sadun and John Van Reenen

Are some management practices akin to a technology that can explain firm and national productivity, or do they simply reflect contingent management styles? We collect data on core management practices from over 11,000 firms in 34 countries. We find large cross-country... View Details

Keywords: Management Practices; Productivity; Competition; Management Practices and Processes; Performance Productivity

SSRN

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Article

How to Bounce Back from Adversity

By: Joshua D. Margolis and Paul G. Stoltz

The article focuses on how companies can be managed to overcome adversity with resilience. The characteristics of resilient managers who provide leadership for their teams and can build resilience in their employees are discussed. The manager's ability to shift... View Details

Keywords: Competency and Skills; Leadership; Crisis Management; Managerial Roles; Behavior; Cognition and Thinking

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26 Apr 2023
In Practice

Is AI Coming for Your Job?

irrelevant construct when considering how to harness generative AI’s capabilities. Processes ranging from negotiating contracts with vendors to developing marketing messages will be redesigned from the ground up in order to exploit the... View Details

Keywords: by Kristen Senz; Technology

14 Apr 2014
Working Paper Summaries

Facts and Figuring: An Experimental Investigation of Network Structure and Performance in Information and Solution Spaces

Keywords: by Jesse Shore, Ethan Bernstein & David Lazer

26 Jan 2010
First Look

First Look: Jan. 26

Analysis of the Reduction Mammaplasty Learning Curve: A Statistical Process Model for Approaching Surgical Performance Improvement Authors:Matthew Carty, Rodney Chan, Robert S. Huckman, Daniel C. Snow, and Dennis Orgill... View Details

Keywords: Martha Lagace

November 2005 (Revised June 2006)
Case

Strategic Planning at United Parcel Service

By: David A. Garvin and Lynne Levesque

In March 2005, CEO Michael Eskew has asked the Corporate Strategy Group to recommend changes to the strategic process to ensure it allows United Parcel Service (UPS) to continue to transform itself over the next several years. Describes the evolution of UPS's strategic... View Details

Keywords: Change; Decisions; Globalization; Growth and Development Strategy; Managerial Roles; Strategic Planning; Creativity; Corporate Strategy