Publications

01 Nov 2020
News

Good Leadership Is an Act of Kindness

April 2013 (Revised October 2013)
Case

National Instruments

By: Lynda M. Applegate, Keri Pearlson and Natalie Kindred

This case explores the use of social media to support product design, customer support, marketing and HR activities at National Instruments (NI). Based in Austin, Texas, with over $1 billion in 2011 sales, NI designs, produces, and sells software and hardware platforms... View Details

Keywords: Organizational Structure; Applications and Software; Organizational Culture; Technological Innovation; Digital Platforms; Innovation and Management; Media; Management Systems; Social and Collaborative Networks; Information Technology Industry; Service Industry; Texas

June 2022 (Revised November 2023)
Case

Platinum Capital

By: Jo Tango and Alys Ferragamo

How should a venture capital firm divide compensation and decision rights between its founders and its next-generation partners? Platinum Capital faced this decision in July 2020. Platinum’s younger partners had just requested a piece of the firm’s highly lucrative... View Details

Keywords: Decision Rights; Business and Stakeholder Relations; Compensation and Benefits; Governance; Retention; Negotiation; Partners and Partnerships

January 2019 (Revised February 2019)
Supplement

The a2 Milk Company

By: Benjamin C. Esty, Daniel Fisher and Greg Saldutte

The a2 Milk Company (a2MC) became the most valuable company listed on the New Zealand stock exchange in 2018 by capitalizing on a biochemical discovery related to the protein composition of cow's milk. Because many people find the A1 protein difficult to digest, and... View Details

18 Aug 2022
Op-Ed

Your Best Employees Are Burning Out: A Framework for Retaining Talent

While gains were focused at the executive and investor levels, these cuts fostered a transactional relationship between businesses and their workers. So, it should be a shock to no one that in recent years, the power dynamic has switched... View Details

Keywords: by Hise Gibson and MaShon Wilson

28 Mar 2016
Research & Ideas

What's a Boss Worth?

We all have our boss horror stories. The underminer. The bad communicator. The credit hog. The snake. Then again, if we’re lucky, we’ve all had those amazing bosses as well—the supervisor who encourages all employees to take their work up to the next level; the View Details

Keywords: by Michael Blanding; Service

September 26, 2022
Article

Is Your Family Office Built for the Future?

By: Josh Baron and Rob Lachenauer

Family offices can provide a number of benefits, including privacy, customization, and having your own team to handle a wide range of services, such as guiding family philanthropy, managing shared properties, or even managing household help. Successful principals in... View Details

Keywords: Business Offices; Family and Family Relationships

Register to Read

January 1982 (Revised July 2007)
Case

Dan Stewart (A)

A subordinate who Dan Stewart has recently placed on warning for unsatisfactory performance is suddenly appointed Dan's boss. Involves such issues as the management of disappointment, understanding organizational irrationality, lateral transfer within the same company,... View Details

Keywords: Rank and Position; Emotions

01 Dec 2023
News

Leadership Transition for External Relations

MESSAGE FROM ANGELA CRISPI AND DEAN SRIKANT DATAR To: HBS Faculty and Staff From: Angela Crispi and Srikant Datar Re: Leadership Transition – Janet Cahill, External Relations We write to let you know that Janet Cahill (AMP 189) has decided to step down from her... View Details

09 Sep 2015
HBS Seminar

Judith A. Chevalier, Yale University

May 2012 (Revised August 2014)
Case

McKesson

By: Regina E. Herzlinger and Natalie Kindred

McKesson, a large, diversified drug distribution and health care IT company, is considering development of new business offerings to help private practice physicians remain independent. The company, with $122 billion in 2010 revenues, just made its first foray into... View Details

Keywords: Health Care Industry; Health Care Policy; Organizational Transformations; Health Services; Health Care and Treatment; Business Model; Service Operations; Change Management; Corporate Strategy; Information Technology; Policy; Pharmaceutical Industry; Health Industry; United States

2018
Book

Food Citizenship: Food System Advocates in an Era of Distrust

By: Ray A. Goldberg

The global food system is the largest segment of the world's economy. As agribusiness-studies pioneer Ray Goldberg suggests, it is also the largest health system on the planet. And it is changing fast. Its size and importance to human, environmental, and economic... View Details

Keywords: Food; System; Global Range; Health; Environmental Sustainability; Development Economics; Partners and Partnerships; Public Opinion; Agriculture and Agribusiness Industry; Food and Beverage Industry

Find at Harvard

March 1993 (Revised June 1998)
Case

Commercial Fixtures, Inc.

Two equal partners arrange a sealed bid auction to decide which one buys out the other's interest in a lighting fixture company started by their fathers. After 25 years together, they had developed irreconcilable differences over how to manage the company. A rewritten... View Details

Keywords: Family Business; Business or Company Management; Auctions; Partners and Partnerships

Web

Human Behavior & Decision-Making - Faculty & Research

attractive person whom they thought of spontaneously than deliberately in Study 4, and reported their commitment to a current romantic relationship would be more affected by the spontaneous than deliberate recollection of a good or bad... View Details

October 1997 (Revised July 1998)
Case

Cultivating Capabilities to Innovate: Booz.Allen & Hamilton

By: Clayton M. Christensen and Bret J. Baird

Describes the efforts of the president of Booz.Allen, a major consulting firm, to understand and improve the way that products, services, and processes are developed and deployed throughout the firm. Proactive management of these processes proves very difficult because... View Details

Keywords: Change Management; Innovation and Management; Management Teams; Service Operations; Organizational Culture; Customer Focus and Relationships; Decision Making; Consulting Industry

December 2016
Case

HBS in 2016

By: Thomas R. Eisenmann and Kerry Herman

The case explores opportunities and challenges confronting the Harvard Business School as it seeks to maintain its differentiated strategic positioning in the face of a rapidly evolving management education landscape. View Details

Keywords: Business Education; Engineering; Strategy; Partners and Partnerships; Change Management; Education Industry; United States

Program

OPM Renew

Summary Whether you attended the Owner/President Management (OPM) program at Harvard Business School last year or many years ago, the excitement of learning and growing at HBS—and collaborating and networking with other entrepreneurial... View Details

April 2006 (Revised April 2020)
Case

"The Case of Leadership Inertia"

By: Rosabeth Moss Kanter

The CEO of an international bank has raised the bank's performance by emphasizing a new culture of leadership that empowers people at all levels. Managers are rated both on their business results and their leadership—how they model new behaviors—but 12 senior managers... View Details

Keywords: Organizational Culture; Leadership Style; Leading Change; Performance Evaluation; Employee Relationship Management