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Article

Organizational Innovation in the Multinational Enterprise: Internalization Theory and Business History

By: Teresa da Silva Lopes, Mark Casson and Geoffrey Jones

This article engages in a methodological experiment by using historical evidence to challenge a common misperception about internalization theory. The theory has often been criticized for maintaining that it assumes a hierarchically organized MNE based on knowledge... View Details

Keywords: Internalization; Multinational Strategy; Business History; Organization And Management Theory; Globalization; Entrepreneurship; Governance; History; Organizations; Theory; Africa; Asia; Europe; Latin America; North and Central America

06 Oct 2020
Sharpening Your Skills

18 Tips Managers Can Use to Lead Through COVID's Rising Waters

Since March, Harvard Business School Working Knowledge has posted more than 80 stories and research papers on the topic of COVID-19, most targeted at managers and the new... View Details

Keywords: by Sean Silverthorne

12 Mar 2024
HBS Case

How Used Products Can Unlock New Markets: Lessons from Apple's Refurbished iPhones

Some of Apple’s most loyal customers think nothing of upgrading to the latest iPhone every time one comes out. But what about consumers who can’t splurge on a $1,000 iPhone 15 Pro? And what about the electronic waste that would accrue if people threw away functional... View Details

Keywords: by Rachel Layne; Electronics; Information Technology

Web

Using Personal Devices for HBS Business | Information Technology

Using Personal Devices for HBS Business Leveraging our own devices is something that is very common for all of us. Whether you're simply leveraging your mobile device to check... View Details

2023
Working Paper

Mapping Organizational-Level Networks Using Individual-Level Connections: Evidence from Online Professional Networks

By: Shelley Xin Li, Frank Nagle and Aner Zhou

Organization-level networks facilitate the flow of information and business activities in the economy. Prior research relies solely on high-level connections to measure these networks. Therefore, to understand the role of employee connections at all job levels in... View Details

Keywords: Networks; Value; Social and Collaborative Networks; Innovation and Invention; Knowledge Sharing; Employees; Social Media

SSRN

Article

The Perils of Proactive Churn Prevention Using Plan Recommendations: Evidence from a Field Experiment

By: Eva Ascarza, Raghuram Iyengar and Martin Schleicher

Facing the issue of increasing customer churn, many service firms have begun recommending pricing plans to their customers. One reason behind this type of retention campaign is that customers who subscribe to a plan suitable for them should be less likely to churn... View Details

Keywords: Churn/retention; Field Experiment; Pricing; Tariff/plan Choice; Targeting; Customer Relationship Management; Price; Performance Effectiveness

Web

1.21 Use of Course Work & Materials | MBA

1.21 Use of Course Work & Materials 1.0 Academic Information & Policies HBS has specific rules that govern the ways in which students may share their knowledge and work... View Details

09 Jun 2022
HBS Case

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

In 2021, US Foods faced a problem that has become all too familiar: As thousands of Americans re-evaluated their work lives in the middle of the pandemic, the company—one of the largest food service distributors in the United... View Details

Keywords: by Pamela Reynolds

November 2021
Article

Corporate Strategy and the Theory of the Firm in the Digital Age

By: Markus Menz, Sven Kunisch, Julian Birkinshaw, David J. Collis, Nicolai J. Foss, Robert E. Hoskisson and John Prescott

The purpose of this article is to reinvigorate research in the intersection of corporate strategy and the theory of the firm in light of the rapid advancement of digital technologies. Using the theory of the firm as an interpretive lens, we focus our analysis on the... View Details

Keywords: Digitalization; Multi-business Firm; Scale And Scope; Theory Of The Firm; Corporate Strategy; Technological Innovation; Competitive Advantage; Organizational Design; Theory; Research; Digital Transformation

2023
Working Paper

Organizational Responses to Product Cycles

By: Achyuta Adhvaryu, Vittorio Bassi, Anant Nyshadham, Jorge Tamayo and Nicolas Torres

We use daily administrative data from a leading automobile manufacturer to study the organizational impacts of introducing new models to the auto assembly line. We first show that costly defects per vehicle spike when new models are introduced. As a response, the firm... View Details

Keywords: Product Quality Upgrading; Product Cycles; Organizational Behavior; Knowledge Hierarchies; Worker Skills; Auto Manufacturing; Training; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Knowledge Management; Production; Product; Organizational Structure; Auto Industry; Argentina

10 Sep 2020
Research & Ideas

The COVID Two-Step for Leaders: Protect and Pivot

top executive. Because of the COVID-19 outbreak, we are all taking in vast amounts of new information every day and adjusting to an entirely new set of behavioral habits. In addition, most of us are dealing... View Details

Keywords: by Boris Groysberg and Katherine Connolly Baden

October 2013 (Revised November 2013)
Case

Blackstone and the Sale of Citigroup's Loan Portfolio

By: Victoria Ivashina and David Scharfstein

The credit boom that preceded the 2007-2009 financial crisis led to several lending practices that exposed banks to large risks. In particular, when the financial crisis unraveled, there were several billion dollars' worth of leveraged buyout (LBO) loans that were... View Details

Keywords: Restructuring; Private Equity; Insolvency and Bankruptcy; Credit Derivatives and Swaps; Financial Markets; Investment; Banking Industry; Financial Services Industry

Educators

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25 Jun 2001
Lessons from the Classroom

Machiavelli, Morals, and You

of one of the keys to leadership: the notion of accountability. Badaracco, the school's John Shad Professor of Business Ethics, uses the novel as part of his course called The Moral Leader, an unusual course for MBA students in which... View Details

Keywords: by Martha Lagace

August 2008
Article

Ethnic Scientific Communities and International Technology Diffusion

By: William R. Kerr

This study explores the importance of knowledge transfer for international technology diffusion by examining ethnic scientific and entrepreneurial communities in the US and their ties to their home countries. US ethnic research communities are quantified by applying an... View Details

Keywords: Information Technology; Ethnicity; Production; Integration; Knowledge Sharing; Patents; Employment; Performance Productivity; Entrepreneurship; Change; Developing Countries and Economies; Immigration; China; United States

January 2007
Article

Acquisitions and Firm Growth: Creating Unilever's Ice Cream and Tea Business

By: G. Jones and Peter Miskell

This article provides a longitudinal case study of the use of acquisitions by the Anglo-Dutch multinational Unilever to build the world's largest ice cream and tea businesses. The study supports recent resource-based theory which argues that complementary rather than... View Details

Keywords: Mergers and Acquisitions; Integration; Value; Knowledge Use and Leverage; Business and Shareholder Relations; Interests; Business Ventures; Employees; Food and Beverage Industry

This work leverages the strengths of expert human assessments of randomized controlled trials (RCTs) included in Cochrane reviews with data science techniques to build a comprehensive database on biomedical research quality. The data links the full-text and... View Details

Research Summary

Retail and the Internet

By: Rajiv Lal

The emergence of new technology, increasing number of new retail formats and the emphasis on store brands are contributing factors to enormous changes taking place in retailing. Rajiv Lal's work on the use of the Internet by retailers calls into question the... View Details

October 2011 (Revised December 2013)
Case

Lehman Brothers and Repo 105

By: Anette Mikes, Gwen Yu and Dominique Hamel

The collapse of Lehman Brothers in 2008 was the largest bankruptcy in US history. The case examines the economics of the off-balance sheet transactions Lehman undertook prior to the collapse, and highlights the corporate governance challenges in situations where firms... View Details

Keywords: Accounting; Policy; Accounting Audits; Corporate Governance; Financial Instruments; Risk Management; Financial Services Industry

Educators

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2010
Working Paper

Local R&D Strategies and Multi-location Firms: The Role of Internal Linkages

By: Juan Alcacer and Minyuan Zhao

This study looks at the role of firms' internal linkages in highly competitive technology clusters, where much of the world's R&D takes place. The leading players in these clusters are multi-location firms that organize and integrate knowledge across sites worldwide.... View Details

Keywords: Geographic Location; Collaborative Innovation and Invention; Technological Innovation; Knowledge Use and Leverage; Industry Clusters; Research and Development; Competitive Advantage; Semiconductor Industry