Publications

08 Apr 2013
Research & Ideas

How to Demotivate Your Best Employees

motivated to work harder over the long term. But new research suggests that some awards may actually have the opposite effect, according to a recent paper called The Dirty Laundry of Employee Award Programs: Evidence from the Field, written by Harvard View Details

Keywords: by Dina Gerdeman; Service

December 2019 (Revised January 2020)
Case

Boll & Branch

By: Leonard A. Schlesinger and Mel Martin

Boll & Branch is a direct-to-consumer (DTC) business launched in 2015. It was the first Fair-Trade Certified manufacturer of linens. The case provides background on the company, its start, business model, and evolution through 2019. View Details

Keywords: Direct-to-consumer; Channels; Disruption; Business Model; Brands and Branding; Internet and the Web; Strategy; Retail Industry; United States; Canada

March 2016 (Revised May 2018)
Case

Reinventing Best Buy

By: John R. Wells and Gabriel Ellsworth

On March 1, 2017, Best Buy Company, Inc., North America’s largest retailer of consumer electronics and appliances, announced a third year of comparable-store sales increases and a 20.8% increase in domestic comparable online sales. These results were in marked contrast... View Details

Keywords: Best Buy; Hubert Joly; Renew Blue; Showrooming; Webrooming; E-commerce; E-Commerce Strategy; Online Retail; Multichannel Retailing; Omnichannel; Marketplaces; Turnaround; Consumer Electronics; Consumer Electronics Accessories; Appliances; Stores-within-stores; Store Experience; Store Size; Store Pickup; Store Management; Delivery; Delivery Models; Amazon; Amazon.com; Pricing Strategy; Business Subsidiaries; Business Units; Business Growth and Maturation; Business Model; For-Profit Firms; Customer Focus and Relationships; Customer Satisfaction; Entertainment; Film Entertainment; Games, Gaming, and Gambling; Music Entertainment; Television Entertainment; Theater Entertainment; Price; Profit; Revenue; Geographic Scope; Multinational Firms and Management; Business History; Cost; Selection and Staffing; Reports; Technological Innovation; Job Cuts and Outsourcing; Human Capital; Leading Change; Business or Company Management; Goals and Objectives; Growth and Development; Growth and Development Strategy; Management Teams; Brands and Branding; Product Marketing; Consumer Behavior; Demand and Consumers; Media; Distribution; Order Taking and Fulfillment; Distribution Channels; Infrastructure; Product; Service Delivery; Service Operations; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Public Ownership; Problems and Challenges; Programs; Groups and Teams; Sales; Salesforce Management; Strategy; Adaptation; Business Strategy; Competition; Competitive Advantage; Competitive Strategy; Corporate Strategy; Expansion; Information Technology; Information Infrastructure; Information Technology; Internet and the Web; Mobile and Wireless Technology; Internet and the Web; Applications and Software; Internet and the Web; Mobile and Wireless Technology; Resource Allocation; Computer Industry; Electronics Industry; Entertainment and Recreation Industry; Information Technology Industry; Retail Industry; Service Industry; Technology Industry; Telecommunications Industry; Video Game Industry; United States; Minnesota; Minneapolis; Saint Paul; St. Paul

Profile

Yaoxin Ding

sick from the city’s endemic air pollution. “That really inspired me to create cleaner cars,” Yaoxin says. “Tailpipe emissions are a major cause of pollution; I wanted to be part of developing a better solution.” Yaoxin came to the United... View Details

February 2008 (Revised August 2014)
Case

MedVal Ventures

By: Regina E. Herzlinger

Is medical travel a viable business opportunity? A group of MBA students consider the pros and cons of starting a business that would send people from the U.S. to India for elective non-emergency surgeries. View Details

Keywords: Business Startups; Cost Management; Globalized Markets and Industries; Health Care and Treatment; Health Industry; Travel Industry; India; United States

09 Sep 2013
Lessons from the Classroom

Teaching Climate Change to Skeptics

A few years ago, Joseph B. Lassiter traveled to San Francisco, Houston, and New York to hold discussions with Harvard alumni on the topic of business and the environment. Each time, he surveyed the audience about the touchy subject of climate change and how society... View Details

Keywords: by Carmen Nobel

September 2002 (Revised May 2003)
Case

X-IT and Kidde (A)

By: Constance E. Bagley and David Lane

Involves a start-up, X-IT Products LLC, whose founders had designed an innovative, lightweight, and easy-to-use--yet strong--escape ladder. After X-IT had filed a patent application for the ladder in the United States, X-IT was approached by Kidde PLC, one of the... View Details

Keywords: Patents; Negotiation Process; Agreements and Arrangements; Ethics; Lawsuits and Litigation; Business Startups; Consumer Products Industry

July 2021 (Revised February 2022)
Case

Mary Kay Inc.: Enriching Women's Lives while Embracing Change

By: Elie Ofek, K. Shelette Stewart and Julia Kelley

In December 2020, Mary Kay Inc. Chief Marketing Officer Sheryl Adkins-Green considered several strategic dilemmas. Founded in 1963 by Mary Kay Ash, Mary Kay was a direct sales company whose Independent Beauty Consultants purchased its beauty and cosmetics products at... View Details

To all who declare that American democracy is broken—riven by partisanship, undermined by extremism, and corrupted by wealth—history offers hope. In nearly every generation since the nation’s founding, critics have made similar declarations, and yet the nation is... View Details

December 2017 (Revised November 2018)
Case

Tesla Motors (B): Merging with SolarCity

By: Stuart C. Gilson and Sarah L. Abbott

In 2016, electric car manufacturer Tesla announced that it was making an offer to acquire solar panel manufacturer SolarCity in an all-stock offer worth $2.6 billion in Tesla stock. Tesla’s co-founder and CEO, Elon Musk, believed that the merger would generate... View Details

Keywords: M＆A; M＆A Valuation; Investing; Equities; Equity; Valuation; Mergers and Acquisitions; Auto Industry; Energy Industry; United States

02 Mar 2016
News

David Moss is Rewriting History

first case Moss, who came to HBS with a background and degrees in both history and economics, wrote in 1994: “Constructing a Nation: The United States and Their Constitution, 1763–1792.” His experience teaching that case suggested that... View Details

Keywords: April White

March 2021 (Revised December 2023)
Case

Capitalism and the Party-State: The People's Republic of China at 70

By: Meg Rithmire and Courtney Han

In 2019, the People’s Republic of China (PRC) turned seventy-years-old and became the longest active authoritarian regime in recent history. By then, China was the world’s second largest economy by GDP (after the United States), and a high-technology industrial... View Details

Keywords: Party-state; Economic Systems; Business and Government Relations; Economy; Society; International Relations; China

October 2012 (Revised July 2014)
Background Note

The Role of the Government in the Early Development of American Venture Capital

By: Josh Lerner and Tom Nicholas

Whether the government or markets, or a mixture of both, can provide efficient and effective incentives for encouraging entrepreneurial activity and new venture financing is an age-old question. Public promotion efforts are controversial and in most cases they tend to... View Details

Keywords: Venture Capital; Business and Government Relations; United States

September 2014
Case

Victors & Spoils: 'Born Open'

By: Karim R. Lakhani and Michael L. Tushman

Victors & Spoils (V&S), located in Boulder, Colorado, was the first advertising agency built on open innovation and crowdsourcing principles from the ground-up. V&S was co-founded in 2009 by John Winsor, Claudia Batten and Evan Fry, all former members of the... View Details

Keywords: Advertising Agency; Marketing; Crowdsourcing; Open Innovation; Growth; Acquisitions; Advertising; Advertising Campaigns; Digital Marketing; Acquisition; Innovation and Invention; Advertising Industry; United States

08 Apr 2011
Research & Ideas

Will the Japan Disaster Remake the Landscape for Green Energy in Asia?

Even before the recent earthquake, tsunami, and nuclear meltdown in Japan, many parts of Asia had already begun investing in "green" energy. But the disaster has certainly upped the urgency of the discussions. “It's driven a lot of people to have a bit of a... View Details

Keywords: by Dennis Fisher; Energy; Utilities

22 Feb 2018
Book

The New History of American Capitalism

represents a distinctive departure. First—and most basically—the history of American capitalism, along with the essays gathered here, reinstalls political economy as a category for analysis. Economic life, all the authors agree, is crucial to understanding the history... View Details

Keywords: Manufacturing

March 1983 (Revised March 2008)
Case

Benjamin Franklin and the Definition of American Values

By: Richard S. Tedlow

Discusses the value systems and their relationship to the conduct of business in 18th Century America. Also focuses on Benjamin Franklin, the preeminent colonial American, to examine how business was conducted in his era. Based on an earlier case by B.E. Supple. View Details

Keywords: Business Ventures; Values and Beliefs; Business History; Business and Government Relations; United States