Publications

10 Mar 2015
First Look

First Look: March 10

education in local communities? To switch to renewable power? All of these actions might improve social welfare, and some of them might improve profitability, but they are very different, and the business case for each of them is... View Details

Keywords: Carmen Nobel

16 Jul 2013
First Look

First Look: July 16

that may be to do. In this article, the authors look at research from behavioral economics, social psychology, and other disciplines and offer practical tactics for leaders hoping to project a healthy amount of both qualities. Publisher's... View Details

Keywords: Anna Secino

23 Aug 2016
First Look

August 23, 2016

We find that location fundamentals including market access and comparative advantage and agglomeration economies including capital-good market externality and technology diffusion play a particularly... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

25 Nov 2014
First Look

First Look: November 25

ratios. Conversely, peer firms identified by Google and Yahoo Finance, as well as product market competitors gleaned from 10-K disclosures, turned in consistently worse performances. We contextualize these results in a simple model that... View Details

Keywords: Carmen Nobel

February 2022 (Revised October 2022)
Case

P.T. Barnum: Changing the World

By: Robert Simons and Shirley Sun

This case describes the life of P.T. Barnum, widely considered to the be the father of modern advertising and marketing. Barnum showed his genius for business early, selling lottery tickets and confections from his father’s store. He went on to found a famous museum of... View Details

Keywords: Entertainment; Entrepreneurship; Personal Characteristics; Marketing; Success; Values and Beliefs; Mission and Purpose; Entertainment and Recreation Industry; United States; Europe

19 May 2016
Research Event

Crowdsourcing, Patent Trolls, and Other Research Insights Highlighted at Harvard Business School Symposium

markets, if a trader wants to purchase a bundle of shares, the market should tell the trader how much to pay. “We should think about how we can design interactions to achieve system-wide goals in social... View Details

Keywords: by Dina Gerdeman & Carmen Nobel

09 Apr 2008
Research & Ideas

The Matchmaker of the Modern Economy

Warren Motley, was also a counsel to the National Association of Investment Companies who helped write the 1940 Investment Company Act, a key piece of legislation that aimed to restore the public trust after the 1929 stock market crash.... View Details

Keywords: by Spencer E. Ante

January 2023
Case

Natura: Weathering the Pandemic at Brazil's Cosmetic Giant

By: Brian Trelstad, Pedro Levindo and Carla Larangeira

Brazil's Natura, a multi-brand cosmetics group, has taken several measures to safeguard the livelihoods of its thousands of employees and millions of sales representatives during the COVID-19 health and economic crisis. The company has also made strides in its efforts... View Details

October 2019
Case

GRIT Fitness

By: Lynda M. Applegate and Olivia Hull

In December 2018, GRIT Fitness was a growing chain of boutique fitness studios offering a variety of workout classes, including weightlifting, high intensity interval training, and cardio dance. With 400 members and three Dallas studios, CEO Brittani Rettig believed... View Details

04 Oct 2011
First Look

First Look: October 4

knowing "who we are" might depend in part on repeatedly remembering to forget "who we were not." The Enabling Role of Social Position in Diverging from the Institutional Status Quo: Evidence from the U.K. National... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

October 2003 (Revised January 2016)
Exercise

The BCPC Internet Strategy Team: An Exercise

By: Amy C. Edmondson and Laura Feldman

This short fictional case forms the basis of a team decision-making exercise. The case, inspired by a real decision facing a major telecommunications company, describes a cross-functional management team convened by the CEO for the purpose of developing a... View Details

Keywords: Groups and Teams; Decision Making; Risk and Uncertainty; Information Management; Perspective; Product Launch; Internet and the Web; Knowledge Sharing; Telecommunications Industry

15 May 2019
Research Event

The Unconventional Capitalism That Shapes Business History

impact of global capitalism has focused on the West. The capitalism which is now under so much criticism is American capitalism, or more specifically a form of American capitalism which became dominant from the 1980s. The School’s extensive Creating Emerging View Details

Keywords: by Geoffrey G. Jones; Education

February 2018 (Revised March 2018)
Case

Kickstarting Tomato Jos in Nigeria

By: Sophus A. Reinert and Risa Kavalercik

In the spring of 2016, Mira Mehta (HBS 2014), faced a difficult decision. Following a successful Kickstarter campaign and winning the second place in the HBS New Venture Competition—Social Enterprise Track, she had moved to Northern Nigeria, where she founded the... View Details

Keywords: Nigeria; Entrepreneurs; Import Substitution; China In Africa; Killer Tomato Paste; Mira Mehta; Tomato Jos; Developing Countries and Economies; Social Entrepreneurship; Cross-Cultural and Cross-Border Issues; Government Legislation; Business History; Emerging Markets; Business and Government Relations; Agriculture and Agribusiness Industry; Nigeria

March 2011
Article

Cheaper Patents

By: Tom Nicholas

The 1883 Patents Act in Britain provides perspective for modern patent policy reforms because it radically changed incentives for inventors by reducing filing fees by 84 percent. Patents increased 2.5 fold after the reform, which was evenly distributed across the... View Details

Keywords: Patents; Global Range; Distribution; Demand and Consumers; Organizational Structure; Business Processes; Innovation and Invention; Innovation and Management; Policy; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Fluctuation; Motivation and Incentives; Distribution Industry; United States; Great Britain

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2008
Working Paper

The Internalization of Advertising Services: An Inter-Industry Analysis

By: Sharon Horsky, Steven C. Michael and Alvin J. Silk

The common perception appears to be that vertical integration of advertising services is more the exception than the rule in the U.S. advertising industry. This study investigates the extent of such outsourcing and examines inter-industry variation in the use of... View Details

Keywords: Advertising; Cost; Analytics and Data Science; Management Analysis, Tools, and Techniques; Service Operations; Creativity; Perception; Vertical Integration; Information Technology; Advertising Industry; United States