Hard Power - Publications - Faculty & Research

08 Mar 2012
Research & Ideas

Unplugged: What Happened to the Smart Grid?

have been talking about the market for 10 years, but it's not yet where it's supposed to be." Henderson's best guess is that the utility and power integrators, like Siemens AG and GE, may have the best shot at making money off of the... View Details

Keywords: by Dina Gerdeman; Energy; Utilities

19 Jan 2021
In Practice

Leadership Advice for Biden: Restore a Sense of Calm

attention and energies on maximizing profit and financial value. This exclusive focus on profit and shareholder value maximization has led to environmental destruction and the concentration of wealth and power within the hands of a few.... View Details

Keywords: by Dina Gerdeman

09 Oct 2001
Research & Ideas

Five Questions for Paul Lawrence and Nitin Nohria

product. In four-drive terms, we would argue that brands would be stronger to the extent they come to represent an implicit promise to the customer that can be trusted, a promise that to some extent addresses all four primary drives. Take Coca-Cola, for example. What... View Details

Keywords: by Sean Silverthorne

12 Sep 2011
Research & Ideas

The Untold Story of ‘Green’ Entrepreneurs

In the 1920s, on pitch black nights in rural eastern Montana, the farmhouse owned by the parents of brothers Marcellus and Joe Jacobs stood out for one reason: it had light, although located far from power lines and gasoline supplies. It... View Details

Keywords: by Sean Silverthorne

15 Feb 2017
Op-Ed

What Africa Can Teach the United States About Funding Infrastructure Projects

bridges, water, power and more? It’s not because they don’t aspire to. It’s because they lack the money and the expertise (in African cities) or because they can’t get to political consensus (in the United States)—or because there are... View Details

Keywords: by John Macomber; Construction

21 Jan 2013
Research & Ideas

Altruistic Capital: Harnessing Your Employees’ Intrinsic Goodwill

economic theory with field experiments. "Field experiments give you scientific rigor while being close to practice," says. "Unless you really have a bulletproof argument that you can't poke holes in, it's hard to change prior beliefs."... View Details

Keywords: by Carmen Nobel

18 Jul 2005
Research & Ideas

Identify Emerging Market Opportunities

hard for multinationals to figure out the value of South African companies and affects their assessments of potential partners. Executives would do well to identify a country's power centers and figure out... View Details

Keywords: by Tarun Khanna, Krishna G. Palepu & Jayant Sinha

27 Feb 2006
Research & Ideas

Corporate Values and Employee Cynicism

as breaching those values. Obviously, greater agreement about the values' meanings would have helped to prevent their reactions. At the same time, we believe that leaders should not clamp down hard on how employees interpret corporate... View Details

Keywords: by Martha Lagace

08 Sep 2009
Research & Ideas

The Height Tax, and Other New Ways to Think about Taxation

rich topic of study and an immensely powerful policy tool.” "The problem is this: The government can't tell whether it is easy or hard for a given person to earn income, because it can't measure... View Details

Keywords: by Martha Lagace

26 Apr 2011
Op-Ed

HBS Faculty Comment on Environmental Issues for Earth Day

computing, deep sensing, simulation, analytics and application services with the fabric of buildings and infrastructure. The hope is that a smarter building process results in smarter buildings, and smarter buildings result in smarter cities. Many innovators today are... View Details

Keywords: by Staff; Energy; Utilities

20 Jan 2003
Research & Ideas

Fixing Corporate Governance: A Roundtable Discussion at Harvard Business School

railroad, the telegraph, and a host of other innovations related to them—along with the rise of powerful business figures, such as John D. Rockefeller—gave many observers pause. The reaction was increased oversight and anti--big-business... View Details

Keywords: by Garry Emmons

12 Sep 2006
First Look

First Look: September 12, 2006

potential areas of conflict. Then, to gain the upper hand, companies can use a variety of tools that fall into two main categories: hard power (inducements or coercion to get what you want) and soft View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

07 Oct 2002
Research & Ideas

What Leaders Need to Do To Restore Investor Confidence

is all this misconduct occurring now? A: I think it's the confluence of several factors: the use of powerful incentive packages, an exuberance that pushed equity prices to heights that were hard to justify... View Details

Keywords: by Harvard Management Update

31 Dec 2012
Research & Ideas

Most Popular Stories of 2012

Power of Conversational Leadership Published: July 23, 2012 Communication is always a challenge, especially in multinational corporations. Boris Groysberg and Michael Slind discuss why it makes sense to adopt the principles of... View Details

Keywords: by Staff

10 Sep 2014
Research & Ideas

Become a Value Creator

to copy certain colleagues on pertinent emails. "People want to increase their power by keeping that information confidential," Hall says. "But you have to make sure you cc the right people. It's important to keep in mind... View Details

Keywords: by Dina Gerdeman

19 Aug 2015
Research & Ideas

Codeacademy’s Delicate Work of Adding Monetization Without Crushing Mission

help families save money for college. That experience convinced me of the power of for-profit, mission-driven companies as a force for change. Because they are for-profit, they can attract amazing talent and command huge resources.... View Details

Keywords: Re: Jeffrey J. Bussgang; Technology

30 Jun 2020
What Do You Think?

Is a Business School-Industry Collaboration Needed to Attract Black Talent to Campus?

diverse talent to business school, we must demonstrate in both deed and word that business on a wide scale is a powerful change agent and that the avenue to being part of that change is through a business school education.” The following... View Details

Keywords: by James Heskett; Education

05 Aug 2002
What Do You Think?

Is Platform Leadership Old Hat or the Wave of the Future?

entrepreneurs can exploit through the development of products and services specifically for inclusion in platforms, whether they are technological or marketing in nature? And do increasingly powerful platforms represent opportunities or... View Details

Keywords: by James Heskett

11 Aug 2014
HBS Case

The Business of Behavioral Economics

people's thinking: loss aversion. Research has shown that people are much more averse to losing something they have than they are inclined toward gaining something they don't. So by putting up their own money toward their goal, they try extra View Details

Keywords: by Michael Blanding; Food & Beverage; Health

27 Jul 2019
Op-Ed

Does Facebook's Business Model Threaten Our Elections?

regulation, history is likely to repeat itself. “Without a push by Facebook’s customers or more fundamental federal government regulation, history is likely to repeat itself.” After all, the ability of advertisers to get hold of personal data from Facebook users is not... View Details

Keywords: by George Riedel

Publications