Publications

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2008
Working Paper

The Artful Dodger: Answering the Wrong Question the Right Way

By: Todd Rogers and Michael I. Norton

What happens when people try to "dodge" a question they would rather not answer by answering a different question? In four online studies using paid participants, we show that listeners can fail to detect dodges when speakers answer similar—but objectively... View Details

Keywords: Communication Strategy; Interpersonal Communication; Judgments; Perception

July – August 2010
Article

Are You Ignoring Trends That Could Shake Up Your Business?

By: Elie Ofek and Luc Wathieu

Virtually all managers in consumer businesses recognize major social, economic, and technological trends. But many do not consider the profound ways in which trends--especially those that seem unrelated to their core markets--influence consumers' aspirations,... View Details

Keywords: Trends; Innovation and Invention; Knowledge Use and Leverage; Marketing Strategy; Consumer Behavior; Product Development

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2009
Working Paper

Prices or Knowledge? What Drives Demand for Financial Services in Emerging Markets?

By: Shawn A. Cole, Thomas Sampson and Bilal Zia

Financial development is critical for growth, but its micro-determinants are not well understood. We test leading theories of low demand for financial services in emerging markets, combining novel survey evidence from Indonesia and India with a field experiment. We... View Details

Keywords: Banks and Banking; Saving; Knowledge Acquisition; Emerging Markets; Motivation and Incentives; Financial Services Industry; India; Indonesia

20 Sep 2004
Research & Ideas

How Consumers Value Global Brands

that people associate with global brands. Then we surveyed 1,800 people in twelve nations to measure the relative importance of those dimensions when consumers buy products. A detailed analysis revealed that consumers all over the world... View Details

Keywords: by Douglas B. Holt, John A. Quelch & Earl L. Taylor

21 Jul 2006
Op-Ed

Enron Jury Sent the Right Message

Enron case should not be taken as a one-off judgment by a business school professor. Many years ago, at the dedication of the Harvard Business School campus on June 24, 1927, Owen Young—a lawyer, visionary... View Details

Keywords: by Malcolm S. Salter

December 2023
Background Note

Organizational Learning

By: Willy Shih

This is a background note that surveys part of the extensive literature on organizational learning. The focus is on learning from experiences, how those learnings get translated into organizational routines and processes, and how that can also lead to getting stuck in... View Details

Keywords: Learning; Knowledge; Business Processes; Manufacturing Industry; Service Industry

Educators

2009
Working Paper

Industry Equilibrium with Open Source and Proprietary Firms

By: Gaston Llanes and Ramiro de Elejalde

We present a model of industry equilibrium to study the coexistence of Open Source (OS) and Proprietary (P) firms. Two novel aspects of the model are: (1) participation in OS arises as the optimal decision of profit-maximizing firms, and (2) OS and P firms may (or may... View Details

Keywords: Investment; Technological Innovation; Knowledge Sharing; Industry Structures; Open Source Distribution; Research and Development

November 2000 (Revised November 2002)
Case

Activity-Based Management at W.S. Industries (A)

By: V.G. Narayanan and Sanjay Pothen

W.S. Industries undertakes the design and implementation of an activity based costing (ABC) system, and the ABC information empowers workers to make process improvement decisions. Workers' incentive pay is tied to cost savings from process improvements. View Details

Keywords: Activity Based Costing and Management; Motivation and Incentives; Performance Evaluation; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Knowledge Management; Energy Industry; India

Educators

12 Jul 2017
Working Paper Summaries

Task Selection and Workload: A Focus on Completing Easy Tasks Hurts Long-Term Performance

Keywords: by Diwas S. KC, Bradley R. Staats, Maryam Kouchaki, and Francesca Gino; Health

2011
Working Paper

Collaborating across Cultures: Cultural Metacognition & Affect-Based Trust in Creative Collaboration

By: Roy Y.J. Chua, Michael W. Morris and Shira Mor

We propose that managers' awareness of their own and others' cultural assumptions (cultural metacognition) enables them to develop affect-based trust with associates from different cultures, promoting creative collaboration. Study 1, a multi-rater assessment of... View Details

Keywords: Cross-Cultural and Cross-Border Issues; Knowledge Sharing; Managerial Roles; Creativity; Prejudice and Bias; Social and Collaborative Networks; Trust; Cooperation

January 2015
Article

Competing with Privacy

By: Ramon Casadesus-Masanell and Andres Hervas-Drane

We analyze the implications of consumer privacy for competition in the marketplace. We consider a market where firms set prices and disclosure levels for consumer information, and consumers observe both before deciding which firm to patronize and how much information... View Details

Keywords: Information Acquisition; Information Disclosure; Online Privacy; Privacy Regulation; Information; Rights; Internet and the Web; Competition; Internet and the Web; Corporate Disclosure; Ethics; Knowledge Acquisition

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January 2025
Supplement

A Winning Strategy (B): Innovation in Olympic Speed Skating

By: Rebecca Karp, Maria Roche, Maisie Wiltshire-Gordon and Tom Quinn

This case describes the aftermath of decisions made by two innovators in the Olympic sport of speed skating: the U.S. Men’s team, which devised a new approach to the team pursuit event; and Nils van der Poel, a Swedish skater who created a new training plan that defied... View Details

Keywords: Sports; Disruptive Innovation; Innovation Strategy; Competitive Strategy; Competitive Advantage; Knowledge Sharing; Performance Improvement; Sports Industry; United States; Sweden; Netherlands; Norway

April 2009 (Revised January 2011)
Case

Gucci Group: Freedom within the Framework

By: Francisco de Asis Martinez-Jerez, Elena Corsi and Vincent Marie Dessain

Gucci Group's CEO had to decide if his decentralized management style was the most effective philosophy in an economic downturn. The sharing of customer information across units and its use in the creative process are key initiatives analyzed in the case. CEO Robert... View Details

Keywords: Customer Relationship Management; Decision Choices and Conditions; Globalized Firms and Management; Knowledge Sharing; Leadership; Management Style; Management Systems; Brands and Branding; Apparel and Accessories Industry

Educators

September 2018
Article

Rumors and Refugees: How Government-Created Information Vacuums Undermine Effective Crisis Management

By: Melissa Carlson, Laura Jakli and Katerina Linos

Although more than 800,000 displaced people arrived in Greece by sea in 2015, fewer than 5 percent applied for asylum in this first country of arrival. Instead, they either traveled northward informally or remained in Greece in legal limbo. The resultant chaotic... View Details

Keywords: Refugees; Governance Compliance; Knowledge Dissemination; Policy; Crisis Management; Communication; Greece

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

25 Jul 2017
First Look

First Look at New Research and Ideas: July 25, 2017

principles can be valuable to a welfarist facing this limitation if they act as informational proxies, carrying accumulated knowledge about the effects of policy that otherwise cannot be considered. This... View Details

Keywords: Carmen Nobel

2010
Working Paper

Conveniently Upset: Avoiding Altruism by Distorting Beliefs about Others

By: Rafael Di Tella and Ricardo Perez-Truglia

In this paper we present the results from a "corruption game" (a dictator game modified so that the second player can accept a side payment that reduces the overall size of the pie). Dictators (silently) treated to have the possibility of taking a larger proportion of... View Details

Keywords: Decision Choices and Conditions; Judgments; Fairness; Values and Beliefs; Game Theory; Personal Characteristics