Publications

May 2024
Article

Design of Off-Grid Lighting Business Models to Serve the Poor: Field Experiments and Structural Analysis

By: Bhavani Shanker Uppari, Serguei Netessine, Ioanna Popescu and Rowan P. Clarke

A significant proportion of the world's population has no access to grid-based electricity and so relies on off-grid lighting solutions. Rechargeable lamp technology is gaining popularity as an alternative off-grid lighting model in developing countries. In this paper,... View Details

Keywords: Technological Innovation; Developing Countries and Economies; Consumer Behavior; Poverty; Logistics; Business Model; Utilities Industry

January 2002 (Revised July 2004)
Case

Renationalization of Railtrack?

Railtrack faces bankruptcy five years after its privatization. Railtrack's performance deteriorated since its privatization in 1996, exhibited by its weakening financial health, unsatisfactory services, poor safety record, and mismanaged investment program. In October... View Details

Keywords: Rail Transportation; Privatization; Insolvency and Bankruptcy; State Ownership; Rail Industry; United Kingdom

March 2006
Background Note

Business, Law, and Society: The Systems Approach to Law and Management

Presents the systems approach to law and management, a construct for understanding how public law affects the competitive environment and a firm's resources. Describes how the legally astute manager can use legal tools to assess opportunities, develop the firm's value... View Details

Keywords: Business or Company Management; Law; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact

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HBS Working Knowledge – Harvard Business School Faculty Research

three working Americans with criminal records from the economy? In a case study, Paul Gompers explores the challenges a social justice startup encounters in helping the formerly incarcerated, as well as lessons for other entrepreneurs. 12... View Details

29 Nov 2022
Cold Call Podcast

How Will Gamers and Investors Respond to Microsoft’s Acquisition of Activision Blizzard?

Keywords: Re: Joseph Pacelli; Technology; Media & Broadcasting

June 2013
Article

What Is Privacy Worth?

By: Alessandro Acquisti, Leslie K. John and George Loewenstein

Understanding the value that individuals assign to the protection of their personal data is of great importance for business, law, and public policy. We use a field experiment informed by behavioral economics and decision research to investigate individual privacy... View Details

Keywords: Safety; Rights; Valuation; Ethics; Identity

2022
Article

Which Explanation Should I Choose? A Function Approximation Perspective to Characterizing Post hoc Explanations

By: Tessa Han, Suraj Srinivas and Himabindu Lakkaraju

A critical problem in the field of post hoc explainability is the lack of a common foundational goal among methods. For example, some methods are motivated by function approximation, some by game theoretic notions, and some by obtaining clean visualizations. This... View Details

Keywords: Mathematical Methods; Decision Choices and Conditions; Analytics and Data Science

In the late 1980s, law professors Ian Ayres and Peter Siegelman set out to learn whether blacks and women got the same deals as white men when buying a new car. They trained 38 people—some white and some black, some male and some female—to negotiate a purchase using a... View Details

May 2013
Case

Altius Golf and the Fighter Brand

By: Robert J. Dolan and Sunru Yong

Altius Golf is the clear leader in the golf ball market despite a long-term decline in the number of golfers and a drop in sales following the financial crisis. The firm has maintained its position by introducing generations of advanced, super-premium golf balls that... View Details

Keywords: Governing and Advisory Boards; Competitive Advantage; Decision Choices and Conditions; Distribution Channels; Sports; Financial Crisis; Brands and Branding; Segmentation; Sports Industry; Entertainment and Recreation Industry

Educators

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Publications - Faculty & Research

Performance Across Three CEOs." Harvard Business School Case 125-112, July 2025. July 2025 Teaching Note Designed for Purpose: “Never a Failure. Always a Lesson” By: James Riley and Andrea Dorbu In 2017,... View Details

13 Sep 2011
First Look

First Look: September 13

2011 Abstract The contribution of culture to organizational performance is both substantial and quantifiable. This book presents the results of field research that demonstrates how an effective culture can account View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

May 2008 (Revised June 2008)
Case

Kenny Kahn at Muzak (A)

By: Linda A. Hill and Emily Stecker

Founded in 1934, Muzak pioneered the industry of background music. Equipped with propriety technology and a vast music library, over the ensuing decades the Muzak franchise organization expanded geographically. Despite a history of innovation, by the late 1990s Muzak... View Details

Keywords: Change Management; Design; Management Analysis, Tools, and Techniques; Brands and Branding; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Organizational Culture; Franchise Ownership; Music Industry

2016
Working Paper

The Microstructure of Work: How Unexpected Breaks Let You Rest, but Not Lose Focus

By: Pradeep Pendem, Paul Green, Bradley R. Staats and Francesca Gino

How best to structure the work day is an important operational question for organizations. A key structural consideration is the effective use of breaks from work. Breaks serve the critical purpose of allowing employees to recharge, but in the short term, translate to... View Details

Keywords: Breaks; Productivity; Attention; Workload; Harvesting; Working Conditions; Behavior; Performance Productivity; Organizations

SSRN

2006
Article

Capital Budgeting: The Role of Cost Allocations

By: Ian D. Gow and Stefan Reichelstein

A common issue for firms is how to allocate capital resources to various investment alternatives. An extensive and long-standing literature in finance has examined various aspects of capital budgeting, including capital constraints, the determination of discount rates,... View Details

Keywords: Capital Budgeting; Resource Allocation; Performance Evaluation; Cost Management; Research; Investment; Cash Flow; Risk Management; Performance Capacity

Purchase

25 Jan 2024
Research & Ideas

Being a Team Player: Why College Athletes Succeed in Business

Members of these colleges’ sports teams secure higher-level jobs and better pay after graduation than their non-athlete peers, finds the analysis of more than 400,000 Ivy Leaguers over the past half-century. Ivy jocks tend to earn some... View Details

Keywords: by Rachel Layne

14 Nov 2023
Research & Ideas

The Network Effect: Why Companies Should Care About Employees’ LinkedIn Connections

in driving a company’s performance and competitive success. One of the more surprising findings was that middle- and lower-level employees, more than senior executives, provide the backbone for the... View Details

Keywords: by Ben Rand

27 May 2017
News

The Dumb Politics of Elite Condescension

Article

Know Your Customers' 'Jobs to Be Done'

By: Clayton M. Christensen, Taddy Hall, Karen Dillon and David S. Duncan

Firms have never known more about their customers, but their innovation processes remain hit-or-miss. Why? According to Christensen and his coauthors, product developers focus too much on building customer profiles and looking for correlations in data. To create... View Details

Keywords: Customer Relationship Management