employee training - Publications - Faculty & Research

16 Jul 2020
Research & Ideas

Restaurant Revolution: How the Industry Is Fighting to Stay Alive

and 8 million employees out of work—three times the job losses seen by any other industry. While some restaurants began reopening in May and June, most featured only takeout, delivery, or outdoor dining options due to local restrictions.... View Details

Keywords: by Michael S. Kaufman, Lena G. Goldberg, and Jill Avery; Food & Beverage

04 Apr 2023
What Do You Think?

How Does Remote Work Affect Innovation?

employers. Some couldn’t do what they’re doing without the opportunity. Employers appear to be less enthusiastic about remote work. Many feel that they have to offer it in order to access talent that would not otherwise be approachable. Although View Details

Keywords: by James Heskett

12 Aug 2014
First Look

First Look: August 12

provider" offering financing solutions including debt and equity, investment banking, brokerage, and asset management services to clients in the infrastructure sector. With nearly 50% of its employees joining through acquisitions,... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

08 Sep 2015
Research & Ideas

Knowledge Transfer: You Can't Learn Surgery By Watching

are you won’t ever learn how to pull off a triple bypass. And yet, in business, companies routinely expect employees to pick up new job knowledge through vicarious learning—through reading descriptions of tasks in knowledge-management... View Details

Keywords: by Michael Blanding; Health

01 Nov 2019
What Do You Think?

Should Non-Compete Clauses Be Abolished?

organizations to make investments in employees in the form of training and education. What may surprise you is how far down into the organization NCCs can legally extend. Some states only disallow them for... View Details

Keywords: by James Heskett

27 Apr 2016
Research & Ideas

How the FBI Reinvented Itself After 9/11

organizational units, one for law enforcement and one for domestic intelligence, seeking what scholars call “structural ambidexterity.” Two, the FBI could have pursued “contextual ambidexterity” wherein senior management establishes simultaneous structures and... View Details

Keywords: by Carmen Nobel

26 Oct 2021
Research & Ideas

What Companies Want Most in a CEO: A Good Listener

studied searches primarily conducted on behalf of companies with 1,500 to 55,000 employees in a variety of industries, including manufacturing, finance, insurance, real estate, retail, and information technology. United States companies... View Details

Keywords: by Jay Fitzgerald

28 Jun 2021
Research & Ideas

Keep or Cut Workers? How Companies Reacted to the COVID-19 Crisis

commitments to their employees, as they tried to keep them." The study also showed that layoffs and furloughs were less frequent for firms with “sticky costs”—those that are unable to reduce their expenses quickly when revenues decline, often because of sunk... View Details

Keywords: by Lane Lambert

20 Jan 2014
Research & Ideas

Language Wars Divide Global Companies

As global companies increasingly adopt a dominant language, usually English, which all employees must use to simplify communications and increase collaboration, many are dismayed to find an unexpected outcome. Results are exactly opposite... View Details

Keywords: by Kim Girard

29 Apr 2014
First Look

First Look: April 29

transformed into a truly global enterprise with 127,000 employees of 153 nationalities in 140 countries generating $56.7 billion in 2012 revenues and $9.6 billion in net income, making the firm one of the world's largest and most... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

09 Jun 2022
HBS Case

From Truck Driver to Manager: US Foods’ Novel Approach to Staff Shortages

back and shifted its staff, furloughing some employees and placing others in temporary jobs in other industries until the company needed them back. For example, the company had created a role that it calls “restaurant operations... View Details

Keywords: by Pamela Reynolds

16 Oct 2017
Research & Ideas

The Most Successful Startups Have Hands-On Founders

Source: iPhoto Startup founders with a hands-on management style are more likely to retain employees and see their firms thrive, new research shows. The results are particularly applicable to knowledge-intensive technology firms, where... View Details

Keywords: by Dina Gerdeman

01 Nov 1999
Research & Ideas

John H. Patterson and the Sales Strategy of the National Cash Register Company, 1884 to 1922

John H. Patterson created an intricate system of management to monitor and train company salesman. He gave them scripts to memorize and assigned them territory to cover. He held conventions and thematic sales contests, and pressured... View Details

Keywords: by Walter A. Friedman

12 Dec 2005
Research & Ideas

Using the Law to Strategic Advantage

in-house training on those issues of particular sensitivity in their industry. Exhorting employees to be ethical is not enough. As one manager convicted of price-fixing put it: "I thought I had morals.... View Details

Keywords: by Sean Silverthorne; Legal Services

22 Apr 2002
Research & Ideas

Does Spirituality Drive Success?

to his house instead of work, Sharpe cut off relations with that company. And when he took over the business, he promoted existing employees to management roles rather than bring in trained managers.... View Details

Keywords: by Martha Lagace, Sean Silverthorne & Wendy Guild

17 Jun 2011
HBS Case

KFC’s Explosive Growth in China

skipping class. If you decide to skip work—please call in and let us know, so we can make sure your job is covered.'" Trained labor, it turns out, is a very valuable asset even in a land of 1.3 billion-plus people. "Chu's... View Details

Keywords: by Maggie Starvish; Food & Beverage

October 2016
Supplement

24 Hour Fitness (B): Ownership Changes, 2005–2016

By: John R. Wells and Gabriel Ellsworth

In 2016, 24 Hour Fitness was the number-two fitness chain in the United States, generating revenues of $1.4 billion from 441 clubs serving 3.8 million members. Based in San Ramon, California, 24 Hour Fitness operated clubs in 13 states. Having grown rapidly to become... View Details

Keywords: Advertising; Advertising Campaigns; Buildings and Facilities; Acquisition; Business Growth and Maturation; Business Model; Business Organization; For-Profit Firms; Customers; Customer Focus and Relationships; Customer Satisfaction; Age; Training; Private Equity; Financing and Loans; Price; Profit; Revenue; Geographic Location; Geographic Scope; Health; Nutrition; Business History; Human Resources; Employees; Employee Relationship Management; Recruitment; Selection and Staffing; Journals and Magazines; Human Capital; Business or Company Management; Goals and Objectives; Growth and Development Strategy; Management Teams; Marketing; Brands and Branding; Marketing Channels; Marketing Communications; Marketing Strategy; Social Marketing; Demand and Consumers; Market Entry and Exit; Media; Organizational Design; Private Ownership; Problems and Challenges; Groups and Teams; Sales; Salesforce Management; Situation or Environment; Welfare or Wellbeing; Sports; Strategy; Business Strategy; Competition; Competitive Strategy; Competitive Advantage; Corporate Strategy; Expansion; Segmentation; Information Technology; Internet; Mobile Technology; Online Technology; Software; Web Sites; Value; Valuation; Health Industry; Media and Broadcasting Industry; United States; California; San Francisco

Citation

Purchase

16 Feb 2010
Research & Ideas

The Outside-In Approach to Customer Service

between awareness and action. Much to my surprise, even if an organization and its employees became consummate listeners and tried to make sense of what they were hearing, they were often immobilized to do much with their insights. Why?... View Details

Keywords: by Sarah Jane Gilbert; Consumer Products

20 Dec 2017
Lessons from the Classroom

How to Design a Better Customer Experience

to spend money on creating “moments of delight” for customers—and in 2013, staff logged more than 30,000 such moments for the chain’s hotel guests. Apple store employees are trained to handle upset... View Details

Keywords: by Dina Gerdeman; Health; Entertainment & Recreation

21 Sep 2020
Research & Ideas

Are You Sabotaging Your Own Company?

leaders who create arcane and tedious processes can kill employee morale and cripple company performance just as quickly as an adversary who pours sand into the gas tank of a company vehicle, Thomke writes in the MIT Sloan Management... View Details