Publications

2010
Working Paper

The Many Faces of Nonprofit Accountability

By: Alnoor Ebrahim

What does it mean for a nonprofit organization to be accountable? Nonprofit leaders tend to pay attention to accountability once a problem of trust arises—a scandal in the sector or in their own organization, questions from citizens or donors who want to know if their... View Details

Keywords: Corporate Accountability; Corporate Disclosure; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Leadership; Mission and Purpose; Performance Evaluation; Nonprofit Organizations; Business Strategy

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Article

How B2B Companies Can Win Back Customers They've Lost

By: Frank V. Cespedes and León Poblete

Most research and training in sales focus on acquiring new customers. But winning back previous customers is increasingly important: mergers, choice in supply chains, and uncertainty about trade wars mean that B2B customers are constantly re-evaluating relationships... View Details

Keywords: B2B; Customer Reacquisition; Customer Relationship Management

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February 2003
Background Note

Leading Teams

By: Jeffrey T. Polzer

This note which describes the architecture and processes that characterize effective teams, begins by detailing the steps involved in designing a team, from diagnosing the complexity, interdependence, and objectives of the task to harnessing the key resources teams... View Details

Keywords: Communication; Decision Making; Leadership; Managerial Roles; Performance Effectiveness; Groups and Teams

August 1991
Background Note

Industrial Market Research: Beta Test Site Management

By: Robert J. Dolan

Describes the role of BETA tests in the new product development process and presents guidelines for effective test program development. View Details

Keywords: Product Development; Mathematical Methods; Marketing

Program

Program for Leadership Development

exclusive access to our vast global alumni network and an array of resources that facilitate lifelong learning, growth, and success. Admissions Criteria and View Details

January 2018
Supplement

BeiGene Supplemental PowerPoint

By: Willy C. Shih and Jimmy Zhang

BeiGene was a biopharmaceutical company founded on exploiting a temporal regulatory policy discontinuity. Because of regulatory challenges in China, most innovative new drugs launched there four to six years after their initial U.S. launches. This gave BeiGene a window... View Details

Keywords: Biotechnology; Pharmaceutical Company; Pharmaceuticals; China; Regulatory Environment; Business Strategy; Innovation Strategy; Situation or Environment; Pharmaceutical Industry; Biotechnology Industry; China

April 2023 (Revised September 2023)
Case

Levels: The Remote, Asynchronous, Deep Work Management System

By: Joseph B. Fuller and George Gonzalez

Levels is a highly innovative startup in the health care space. They intend to revolutionize health by linking behavior—eating, exercise, sleeping, etc.—to changes in metabolism. They believe metabolic health can be managed through careful monitoring of changes in... View Details

Keywords: Applications and Software; Business Startups; Organizational Culture; Management Style; Technology Industry; United States

George A. Riedel is the Henry B. Arthur Fellow and Senior Lecturer in the General Management Unit, where he currently teaches TEM (The Entrepreneurial Manager) and acts as a Section Chair in the Required Curriculum (RC). He has also taught TOM (Technology and... View Details

2016
Working Paper

Market Design for Altruistic Supply: Evidence from the Lab

By: Robert Slonim and Carmen Wang

Volunteer supply is widespread. Yet without a price, inefficiencies occur due to suppliers’ inability to coordinate with each other and with demand. In these contexts, we propose a market clearinghouse mechanism that improves efficiency if supply is altruistically... View Details

Keywords: Laboratory Experiments; Volunteering; Public Goods Provision; Market Design; Philanthropy and Charitable Giving; Economics

SSRN

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2021
Working Paper

The Demand for Executive Skills

By: Stephen Hansen, Tejas Ramdas, Raffaella Sadun and Joseph B. Fuller

We use a unique corpus of job descriptions for C-suite positions to document skills requirements in top managerial occupations across a large sample of firms. A novel algorithm maps the text of each executive search into six separate skill clusters reflecting... View Details

Keywords: Executives; Management Skills; Competency and Skills

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05 May 2003
Research & Ideas

How Bank of America Turned Branches into Service-Development Laboratories

research. Every potential experiment was entered into an "idea portfolio," a spreadsheet that described the experiment, the process or problem it addressed, the customer segments it targeted, and... View Details

Keywords: by Stefan Thomke; Banking; Financial Services

July–August 2021
Article

Case Study: Will a Bank's New Technology Help or Hurt Morale?

By: Leonard A. Schlesinger

A case study is presented on the effort to introduce new information technology into a community bank and what impact that process may have on bank employees. View Details

Keywords: Employee Morale; Community Banks; Information Technology; Banks and Banking; Employees; Technology Adoption

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June 2016
Case

Augustine Heard & Co.: Building a Family Business in the China Trade (B)

By: William C. Kirby and Joycelyn W. Eby

In 1861, the Heard brothers faced a decision: should they continue their family firm's business model that had made them a successful commission house in China, or was it time to make fundamental adjustments to their work? This case reveals that the brothers decided to... View Details

Keywords: China; Mercantilism; Family Business; China

07 Oct 2020
Blog Post

7 Coming Out Stories from the HBS PRIDE Club

their LGBTQ+ status private. We accept everyone in any stage of their coming out process and hope that you will be inspired by the stories of these students as they continue to grapple with a world that is... View Details

February 2012 (Revised October 2013)
Case

OpenIDEO

By: Karim R. Lakhani, Anne-Laure Fayard, Natalia Levina and Stephanie Healy Pokrywa

The case describes OpenIDEO, an online offshoot of IDEO, one of the world's leading product design firms. OpenIDEO leverages IDEO's innovative design process and an online community to create solutions for social issues. Emphasis is placed on comparing the IDEO and... View Details

Keywords: Social Issues; Product Design; Social and Collaborative Networks; Collaborative Innovation and Invention; Ghana; New Zealand

Career Coach

Jamie Woodard

Jamie wants to help students navigate the career switch process for those interested in venture capital. Having pivoted from a non-investing background into two VC internships, Jamie can provide insight on how to break into venture... View Details

December 2020
Case

Urban Company

By: Krishna G. Palepu

Urban Company is an India-based market platform that helps customers book home services and at home beauty services. The company differentiated itself by investing heavily in building customer trust. Rather than merely positioning itself as a lead generating... View Details

Keywords: COVID-19 Pandemic; Entrepreneurship; Digital Platforms; Emerging Markets; Strategy; Service Delivery; Trust; Technology Industry; Service Industry; India

January 1983 (Revised January 1998)
Background Note

Note on Analyzing BGIE Data

Introduces students to the process of data analysis in Business, Government, and the International Economy (BGIE) cases. Uses examples from Selected U.S. Statistics: Part I. View Details

Keywords: Data and Data Sets; Analysis