Publications

August 2021 (Revised November 2023)
Supplement

Coats: Supply Chain Challenges

By: Willy C. Shih

Coats, the largest thread maker in the world, transformed its business to digital colour measurement so that it could respond better to customer demand in the garment industry for rapid product cycles and more fragmented colour choices. Its embrace of digital colour... View Details

Keywords: Inventory Management; Supply Chain; Inventory; Supply Chain Management; Operations; Apparel and Accessories Industry; Asia

December 2012
Article

Bolstering and Restoring Feelings of Competence via the IKEA Effect

By: Daniel Mochon, Michael I. Norton and Dan Ariely

We examine the underlying process behind the IKEA effect, which is defined as consumers' willingness to pay more for self-created products than for identical products made by others, and explore the factors that influence both consumers' willingness to engage in... View Details

Keywords: Value; Consumer Behavior; Attitudes

Read Now

August 2005 (Revised April 2006)
Case

Kemps LLC: Introducing Time-Driven ABC

By: Robert S. Kaplan

Kemps is making a strategy shift: from being focused on fulfilling customer requests to becoming the best cost dairy producer in the industry. Its existing manufacturing cost system, however, fails to capture the costs associated with handling special flavors, small... View Details

Keywords: Activity Based Costing and Management; Customer Relationship Management; Cost Accounting; Managerial Roles; Cost Management; Earnings Management; Business Strategy; Time Management; Growth and Development Strategy; Management Teams; Decisions; Food and Beverage Industry

April 1998
Case

Compaq, 1998

By: Steven C. Wheelwright and Matt Verlinden

In 1997, Compaq Computer Corp. had become a $25 billion powerhouse. It had accomplished its revenue growth projections, successfully made a number of strategic acquisitions, and increased its gross margins, principally by moving up market into servers, workstations,... View Details

Keywords: Mergers and Acquisitions; Transformation; Customer Relationship Management; Profit; Revenue; Growth and Development Strategy; Brands and Branding; Distribution Channels; Alliances; Customization and Personalization; Computer Industry

15 Feb 2017
News

You Should Consider Buying a Small Business. But When?

20 Jan 2015
First Look

First Look: January 20

https://cb.hbsp.harvard.edu/cbmp/product/415032-PDF-ENG Harvard Business School Case 115-001 Quiet Logistics (A) This two-part case focuses on how to identify and manage strategic uncertainties in an innovative, entrepreneurial start-up company. In the (A) case,... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

October 2020
Case

LifeBank Nigeria

By: Brian Trelstad, Pippa Tubman Armerding and Wale Lawal

The aspiration of addressing maternal deaths in Nigeria, which were mostly caused by blood shortages, led Temie Giwa-Tubosun to found LifeBank in 2015. LifeBank developed an online platform that enabled hospitals to connect and purchase blood from local blood banks and... View Details

Keywords: Systems Design; Social Business; Business At The Base Of The Pyramid; Health Care; Blood; Social Enterprise; Health Care and Treatment; Growth and Development Strategy; Finance; Health Industry; Transportation Industry; Africa; Nigeria

Research Summary

Mobile web advertising: maximum entropy banner allocation

The worldwide mobile advertising market, currently $3 billion in size, is expected to grow to $20 billion by 2011. Online and mobile advertising employs two main pricing models: pay-per-click (CPC) and pay-per-impression (CPM). To date, most of the... View Details

April 2021
Case

Glass-Shattering Leaders: Ana Paula Pessoa

By: Boris Groysberg and Colleen Ammerman

Ana Paula Pessoa built a career at the largest media conglomerate in Latin America, combining a passion for digital transformation with a commitment to doing work that had a positive impact on society. Having grown up during a dictatorial military regime in Brazil, the... View Details

Keywords: Glass Ceiling; Leadership; Gender; Power and Influence

2023
Working Paper

Point Four and the Politics of Foreign Direct Investment in the United States during the Early Cold War

By: Melanie Sheehan

This article traces business influence in the formulation of the Point Four technical assistance program, the first US Cold War-era international development program. It focuses specifically on business interest associations’ efforts to secure federal incentives to... View Details

Keywords: Point Four Program; Business Interest Association; International Development; Cold War; Foreign Direct Investment; Business History; Business and Government Relations

Read Now

This article explores the significant transition of retirement and offers insights into creating a satisfying postcareer life. It highlights the contrasting experiences of Irene and Lawrence, two retirees who navigated this change differently. Irene embraced... View Details

20 Mar 2007
First Look

First Look: March 20, 2007

Working PapersIncorporating Price and Inventory Endogeneity in Firm-Level Sales Forecasting Authors:Saravanan Kesavan, Vishal Gaur, and Ananth Raman Abstract As numerous papers have argued, sales, inventory, and gross margin for a retailer are interrelated. We... View Details

Keywords: Martha Lagace

May–June 2025
Article

Sustainability as a Business-Model Transformation

By: Ivanka Visnjic, Felipe Monteiro and Michael L. Tushman

Many global companies have made public commitments to sustainability targets. Fulfilling these commitments will require firms to transform their business models and organizational architectures. A few pioneers are leading the way, demonstrating that companies can make... View Details

Keywords: Environmental Sustainability; Business Model

February 2003 (Revised March 2003)
Case

The Nature Conservancy

By: Allen S. Grossman and Jane Wei-Skillern

Almost immediately upon being appointed CEO of The Nature Conservancy (TNC), Steve McCormick undertakes a radical reorganization of this global institution. TNC is the largest and, by most measures, the most successful environment organization in the world, with... View Details

Keywords: Globalization; Leading Change; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Strategic Planning; Natural Environment; Nonprofit Organizations; United States

June 2022
Teaching Plan

Lifebank Nigeria

By: Brian Trelstad, Pippa Tubman Armerding and Wale Lawal

The aspiration of addressing maternal deaths in Nigeria, which were mostly caused by blood shortages, led Temie Giwa-Tubosun to found LifeBank in 2015. LifeBank developed an online platform that enabled hospitals to connect and purchase blood from local blood banks and... View Details

Keywords: Systems Design; Social Business; Business At The Base Of The Pyramid; Health Care; Blood; Social Enterprise; Health Care and Treatment; Growth and Development Strategy; Finance; Health Industry; Transportation Industry; Africa; Nigeria

Program

The Women's Leadership Forum

valuable for women who are at an inflection point in their careers. While the program is designed for women executives (and will be most beneficial to those who identify as such), the program is open to all executives who otherwise View Details

March 2020
Article

A Revolution in Economics? It's Just Getting Started...

By: Shawn A. Cole, William Pariente and Anja Sautmann

We have each experienced thrills and pain while supporting the mission of the Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab, which facilitated many of the experiments described in the 2019 Nobel Prize citation. J-PAL in many ways seeks to fulfill what Angrist and Pischke... View Details

Keywords: Randomized Control Trials; Economics; Research; Innovation and Invention

November–December 2024
Article

Retire Without Regrets

By: Teresa M. Amabile, Lotte Bailyn, Marcy Crary, Douglas T. "Tim" Hall and Kathy E. Kram

This article explores the significant transition of retirement and offers insights into creating a satisfying postcareer life. It highlights the contrasting experiences of Irene and Lawrence, two retirees who navigated this change differently. Irene embraced retirement... View Details

Keywords: Retirement; Satisfaction; Transition; Identity

Article

Creating Value in the Age of Distributed Capitalism

By: Shoshana Zuboff

Capitalism is a book of many chapters—and we are beginning a new one. Every century or so, fundamental changes in the nature of consumption create new demand patterns that existing enterprises can't meet. When a majority of people want things that remain priced at a... View Details

Keywords: Value Creation; Economic Systems; Transformation