by Paul Gompers - Publications - Faculty & Research

06 Sep 2004
What Do You Think?

How Do We Prepare for a World Without Cheap Oil?

Summing Up Is the end of cheap oil a challenge to the world? Yes. Will it affect our standard of living adversely? Not likely. At least that is the verdict of most of the large number of respondents to this month's column who rely on assumed human ingenuity combined... View Details

Keywords: by James Heskett

01 Aug 2005
What Do You Think?

Is There an “Efficient Market” in CEO Compensation?

Summing Up Paul Jackson sums up the thinking of most respondents to this month's column with the comment, " . . . nothing about CEO compensation seems to be 'efficient.'" Brad Millet adds, "The CEO market for... View Details

Keywords: by James Heskett

05 Dec 2012
What Do You Think?

Should Managers Bother Listening to Predictions?

that we have invested in significantly to understand deeply I'll trust our predictions. And I'll trust the prediction more if it's (from) someone who has an unbiased 3rd party interest in the outcome." Paul Lepley added that... View Details

Keywords: by James Heskett

01 May 2009
What Do You Think?

Do Innovation and Entrepreneurship Have to Be Incompatible with Organization Size?

energy to priority areas for innovation." Amy Sauers added findings that suggest that large firms succeed that "attempted to 'get small' (through the vehicle of) 'lean, mean, heavyweight teams.'" Another ingredient suggested View Details

Keywords: by Jim Heskett

16 Jun 2020
Research & Ideas

Your Customers Have Changed. Here's How to Engage Them Again.

environment has resulted in volatility in purchases and productivity across idiosyncratic product categories, resulting in a net economic crisis of a type that has not been witnessed by anyone alive today. Government-imposed quarantines,... View Details

Keywords: by Rohit Deshpandé, Ofer Mintz, and Imran S. Currim; Retail; Service

17 Nov 2015
Lessons from the Classroom

How Activist Investors Became Respectable

buyout raiders of the 1980s eventually morphed into the legitimate private equity business, greenmailers of a generation ago are now taken seriously as hard-nosed change agents who may be doing the right thing when they take on management View Details

Keywords: by Joseph Fuller; Financial Services; Banking

17 Jul 2017
Op-Ed

Op-Ed: As America Recedes from Global Leadership, Its CEOs are Stepping Up

to the reality that race issues in major metropolitan cities had to be addressed. The third instance came in the 1990s when global opportunities arose for US-based companies to lead their respective industries through a sustained period of growth. This latest... View Details

Keywords: by Bill George

03 Dec 2012
HBS Case

HBS Cases: Against the Grain

Rospil.info, coauthored with HBS professor Paul M. Healy and research associate Matthew Shaffer, focuses on the Russian anticorruption blogger Alexey Navalny, who advocates tech-savvy ways to expose and encourage prosecution of unethical... View Details

Keywords: by Martha Lagace; Food & Beverage

06 Jul 2010
Research & Ideas

Renewable Energy: Winds at Our Back?

When American energy entrepreneur Jim Gordon envisioned the first offshore wind farm lining the horizon a few miles off the coast of the eastern United States, he perhaps did not factor in blowback from almost every angle. Gordon's nearly 10-year battle to gain... View Details

Keywords: by Sarah Jane Gilbert; Energy; Utilities

06 Sep 2011
Research & Ideas

The Power of Leadership Groups for Staying on Track

Today's most successful leaders are focusing on sustaining superior performance by aligning people around mission and values and empowering leaders at all levels, while serving customers and collaborating throughout the organization. Over... View Details

Keywords: by Bill George

07 Feb 2007
Research & Ideas

Dividends from Schumpeter’s Noble Failure

Business Cycles was Joseph Schumpeter's least successful book when measured by its professed aims and several other yardsticks. Yet the book contains two vital aspects that have largely been overlooked. First, the prodigious research that... View Details

Keywords: by Thomas K. McCraw

19 Oct 2011
Research & Ideas

Designing Cities for a Sustainable Future

On a June day in Manhattan with temperatures heading into the 90s, a straphanger named Mike is taking his customary subway ride to work. People are grumbling about the heat, but hey, it's summer, it's supposed to be hot, and besides, "Whaddya gonna do?" New Yorkers... View Details

Keywords: by Garry Emmons; Construction; Real Estate

02 Apr 2014
What Do You Think?

Has the Post-Capitalist Economy Finally Arrived?

'leadership'." Today's leadership heroes, however, stimulated debate about just what constitutes leadership. It is an important discussion, as several pointed out. Paul Stavrand put it this way: " we need to be concerned about... View Details

Keywords: by James Heskett; Service

30 Jun 2020
Book

Capitalism Is More at Risk Than Ever

The book Capitalism at Risk first appeared in 2011. The problems it identified with social inequality, global trade strife, and environmental degradation have only accelerated by 2020. The new edition of Capitalism at Risk, subtitled How Business Can Lead, is expanded... View Details

Keywords: by Martha Lagace

22 Jun 2009
Research & Ideas

“Too Big To Fail”: Reining In Large Financial Firms

on specific proposals begin the week of June 22.] Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner's proposals for fixing the broken financial system closely resemble those found in Moss's own playbook. In this instance, the book is a Special Report on Regulatory Reform,... View Details

Keywords: by Roger Thompson; Banking; Financial Services

The Venture Capital Cycle

In The Venture Capital Cycle, Paul Gompers and Josh Lerner correct widespread misperceptions about the nature and role of the venture capitalist and provide an accessible and comprehensive overview of the venture capital industry. Bringing together fifteen... View Details

2020
Working Paper

Private Equity and COVID-19

By: Paul A. Gompers, Steven N. Kaplan and Vladimir Mukharlyamov

We survey more than 200 private equity (PE) managers from firms with $1.9 trillion of assets under management (AUM) about their portfolio performance, decisionmaking and activities during the Covid-19 pandemic. Given that PE managers have significant incentives to... View Details

Keywords: Health Pandemics; Private Equity; Management; Investment Portfolio; Performance; Decision Making; Value Creation

Citation

Read Now

September 2001 (Revised June 2005)
Case

Stevenson Industries (A)

By: John A. Davis and Kacie LaChapelle

Simon Carlson, chairman of the board of his family's fourth-generation industrial company, must decide how to deal with his conflict with the company's nonfamily CEO. Hired by the board just 15 months earlier to pursue growth more aggressively, CEO Paul Steel has upset... View Details

Keywords: Family Business; Management Succession; Management Style; Governing and Advisory Boards; Management Teams; Rank and Position; Organizational Culture; Decision Making; Manufacturing Industry

Citation

Educators

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06 May 2022
News

Professor David Moss: Strengthen

October 2016
Case

The Quiet Ascension of LA Fitness

By: John R. Wells and Gabriel Ellsworth

In 2016, LA Fitness was the largest chain of non-franchised fitness clubs in North America, operating 676 clubs, serving 4.9 million members, and generating revenues of over $1.9 billion. Founded by Chinyol Yi, Louis Welch, and Paul Norris in 1984, the privately held... View Details