Publications

May 2003 (Revised March 2006)
Case

Carol Fishman Cohen: Professional Career Reentry (B)

By: Myra M. Hart, Robin J. Ely and Susan Wojewoda

Supplements the (A) case. View Details

Keywords: Work-Life Balance; Family and Family Relationships

September 2012
Case

Getting Back to Your Roots: Rose Carpenter's Story

By: John A. Davis, Janet Kraus and Lisa Strope

Rose Carpenter is a successful entrepreneur who is considering the personal implications of leaving the business she created to pursue her own interests. View Details

Keywords: Career Planning; Entrepreneurs; Life Planning; Work-Life Balance; Entrepreneurship; Decisions

2023
Working Paper

Trading Off Business and Family Investments: Evidence from U.S. Entrepreneurial Households

By: Olivia S Kim

Keywords: Downsizing; Small Business; Work-Life Balance; Household

08 Mar 2004
Research & Ideas

Secret to Success: Go for “Just Enough”

"Success has always been an American preoccupation, but the definition of success takes on a new urgency today, when every conventional measure of success seems to have a faster burn rate than ever before," say Laura Nash and Howard Stevenson. The HBS faculty... View Details

Keywords: by Laura Nash & Howard Stevenson

November 2018 (Revised March 2019)
Case

Mellody Hobson at Ariel Investments

By: Francesca Gino and Lakshmi Ramarajan

In 2018, Mellody Hobson, President of Ariel Investments, the largest minority-owned investment firm in the United States, was considering how best to divide her time and use her position and personal characteristics to push for positive change at her firm and in... View Details

Keywords: Female Protagonist; African-American Protagonist; Investment Management; Leadership; Personal Development and Career; Work-Life Balance; Financial Services Industry; Chicago

01 Jun 2004
News

Charlie Rose Interviews Goldman CEO Paulson

audience, which included several previous Goldman employees. One former Goldman analyst asked how work-life balance — which Paulson urged his audience to seek — can be achieved when a job demands more than... View Details

Keywords: Goldman Sachs; Finance

July–August 2020
Article

Make the Most of Your Relocation

By: Prithwiraj Choudhury

Although the COVID-19 crisis has halted travel in recent months, geographic mobility has become critical for managers and knowledge workers hoping to advance in today’s globalized economy, and that trend is unlikely to reverse. Geographic mobility can pay off... View Details

Keywords: Relocation; Mobility; Personal Development and Career; Geographic Location; Work-Life Balance

Find at Harvard

Read Now

September 2003 (Revised March 2004)
Compilation

Time Distribution and Interaction Patterns for PEARL Project Team: Work Patterns at Ditto (D)

By: Leslie A. Perlow

Provides data to enable students to analyze how software engineers spend their time. A rewritten version of an earlier case. View Details

Keywords: Product Development; Time Management; Work-Life Balance; Information Technology Industry

February 2014
Article

Toward a Model of Work Redesign for Better Work and Better Life

By: Leslie A. Perlow and Erin L. Kelly

Flexible work accommodations provided by employers purport to help individuals struggling to manage work and family demands. The underlying model for change is accommodation—helping individuals accommodate their work demands with no changes in the structure of work or... View Details

Keywords: Organizational Change and Adaptation; Work-Life Balance

Find at Harvard

May 2003 (Revised March 2006)
Case

Carol Fishman Cohen: Professional Career Reentry (A)

By: Myra M. Hart, Robin J. Ely and Susan Wojewoda

Explores the career challenges facing highly successful women who leave the full-time workforce for several years to manage family commitments. Carol Cohen is a 1985 Harvard MBA who has professional line experience in a manufacturing environment, followed by a... View Details

Keywords: Work-Life Balance; Family and Family Relationships

03 Jan 2018
News

Finding Faith in an NFL Locker Room

of family members, taking care of bills, managing personal relationships, balancing work-life with family. You've got a lot of players who are married, that have children. And spend a lot of time away from... View Details

22 Nov 2016
Working Paper Summaries

Explaining the Persistence of Gender Inequality: The Work-Family Narrative as a Social Defense against the 24/7 Work Culture

Keywords: by Irene Padavic, Robin J. Ely, and Erin M. Reid

24 Apr 2013
Research & Ideas

Who Sets Your Benchmarks?

Editor's note:When it comes to improving your leadership abilities, Professor Robert Steven Kaplan is a big believer in starting with a look in the mirror. In fact, he wrote a book on that subject: What To Ask The Person In The Mirror: Critical Questions For Becoming A... View Details

January–February 2024
Article

The Challenge of Maintaining Passion for Work over Time: A Daily Perspective on Passion and Emotional Exhaustion

By: Joy Bredehorst, Kai Krautter, Jirs Meuris and Jon M. Jachimowicz

Passion for work is highly coveted, but many employees report struggling to maintain their passion over time. In the current research, we explain the challenge of pursuing passion by conceptualizing passion as an attribute with temporal variation. Viewed through a... View Details

Keywords: Passion; Work-Life Balance; Employees; Emotions

Find at Harvard

August 11, 2023
Article

How CEOs Can Navigate the Emotional Labor of Leadership

By: Nitin Nohria

Although the CEO role comes with power, pay, and privilege, it also involves emotional labor, as leaders feel the toll of making divisive and unpopular decisions. This aspect of the job has become more challenging the last few years. This article offers leaders four... View Details

Keywords: Leadership Style; Work-Life Balance; Emotions