Publications

18 Feb 2014
First Look

First Look: February 18

Abstract—Innovation has traditionally taken place within an organization's boundaries and/or with selected partners. This Chandlerian approach to innovation has been rooted in transaction costs, organizational boundaries, and information... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

12 Oct 1999
Research & Ideas

Value Judgments: Business Ethics Across Borders

organizational values and business ethics, Paine focused on U.S. companies engaged in business principally at home. But faced with an increasing number of questions from international students about whether U.S. standards and values... View Details

Keywords: by Judith A. Ross

06 May 2013
Research & Ideas

How Local Events Shake Up Corporate Philanthropy

philanthropy because even global companies tend to focus corporate giving on local nonprofits. Charitable behavior is a key area of interest for Marquis, whose research and teaching focuses on businesses' social strategies and activities.... View Details

Keywords: by Carmen Nobel

20 Nov 2018
First Look

New Research and Ideas, November 20, 2018

incremental to the effects of other forms of organizational structure, namely business and geographic diversification. I also find that the level of debt at subsidiaries affects the parent company's borrowing costs. However, the... View Details

Keywords: Dina Gerdeman

January 1985 (Revised June 1993)
Case

Turner Construction Co.

By: Frank V. Cespedes

In June, 1984, a vice president at Turner Construction Co. must decide whether to approve a construction project being considered by one of Turner's territorial offices and how to manage that territory general manager's apparent reluctance to pursue another account... View Details

Keywords: Organizational Structure; Projects; Market Entry and Exit; Integration; Contracts; Marketing Strategy; Sales; Business or Company Management; Business Offices; Geographic Location; Construction Industry

December 1978 (Revised January 1986)
Case

Pepsi-Cola (A)

By: Walter J. Salmon and Steven R. Palesy

Combining aspects of a functionally organized marketing management system, with a franchised channel of distribution network. Focuses on extending an innovative promotional program to a market where competitive conditions differ. View Details

Keywords: Innovation Strategy; Management; Marketing; Marketing Reference Programs; Network Effects; Distribution; Organizational Design; Franchise Ownership; Competition; Food and Beverage Industry

Find at Harvard

October 2013 (Revised December 2013)
Case

Intuit QuickBooks: From Product to Platform

By: Andrei Hagiu and Elizabeth J. Altman

This case focuses on the challenges and opportunities faced by a successful incumbent organization attempting to transform a large portion of its business from a traditionally product-centric operating mode to a platform-based one that leverages network effects to... View Details

Keywords: Business Model; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Digital Platforms; Competitive Advantage; Network Effects; Consumer Products Industry

November 2005 (Revised December 2006)
Case

Jeanette Clough at Mount Auburn Hospital

Jeanette Clough, the CEO of Mt. Auburn Hospital, successfully leads a turnaround for the struggling local hospital. When she assumed leadership of Mt. Auburn in 1998, the hospital had recently suffered a $10 million loss. During her first six months, several members of... View Details

Keywords: Organizational Change and Adaptation; Change Management; Leading Change; Expansion; Health Care and Treatment; Business and Community Relations; Health Industry; Cambridge

January 2024 (Revised June 2024)
Case

School of Rock: Tuning into Structured Empowerment (A)

By: Tatiana Sandino, Jeffrey Rayport, Samuel Grad and Stacy Straaberg

In summer 2021, School of Rock was a youth-oriented music education company with 291 franchise- and company-owned schools globally. Before CEO Rob Price’s hire in 2017, School of Rock’s nonconformist rock ‘n’ roll culture led to variability in teaching styles,... View Details

01 Apr 1999
News

Spirit at Work

School's Cahners-Rabb Professor of Business Administration and an expert on organizational behavior. "Quite simply, without a sense of purpose, we become alienated from our work and find it harder to motivate ourselves." Senior Lecturer... View Details

Keywords: Marguerite Rigoglioso

15 Sep 2011
Research & Ideas

High Ambition Leadership

and physical assets, not creating social value." Higher-ambition leaders, as the authors call them, also make decisions about long-term relationships with all their stakeholders in mind. "Consider United Stationers' strategy of 'enabling... View Details

Keywords: by Martha Lagace

December 2010 (Revised March 2012)
Teaching Note

Alibaba Group

By: Julie M. Wulf

Teaching Note for 710436. View Details

Keywords: Business Startups; Business Subsidiaries; Competition; Motivation and Incentives; Internet and the Web; Growth and Development; Corporate Strategy; Organizational Structure; Retail Industry; China

25 Sep 2007
First Look

First Look: September 25, 2007

been priorities in national initiatives. Conclusions. Our study suggests an underutilized strategy for improving patient safety and staff efficiency: leveraging frontline staff experiences with work systems to identify and remove... View Details

Keywords: Martha Lagace

13 Apr 2010
First Look

First Look: April 13

trade reasonably close to their intrinsic value. In place of earnings forecasts, management should provide information about the company's strategic goals and main value drivers. They should also discuss the risks associated with the View Details

Keywords: Martha Lagace

02 Aug 2004
Research & Ideas

Health Care Research and Prospects

The problems and challenges this creates, just from a business point of view. Lots of the organizational and institutional arrangements we have for doing business don't work very well if you start to graft them onto a context like... View Details

Keywords: by Wendy Guild Swearingen; Health

2010
Working Paper

Does Product Market Competition Lead Firms To Decentralize?

By: Nicholas Bloom, Raffaella Sadun and John Van Reenen

There is a widespread sense that over the last two decades firms have been decentralizing decisions to employees further down the managerial hierarchy. Economists have developed a range of theories to account for delegation, but there is less empirical evidence,... View Details

Keywords: Decision Making; Employees; Managerial Roles; Organizational Structure; Competitive Strategy; Asia; Europe; North America