Publications

July 2004 (Revised September 2004)
Case

China and the WTO: Doing the Right Thing? (Abridged)

In late 2001, the People's Republic of China joined the World Trade Organization (WTO). Sets the terms of China's accession agreement against its compliance record some two years later. Discusses why key actors, such as business, organized labor, and other governments,... View Details

Keywords: History; International Relations; Judgments; Trade; Business and Government Relations; Development Economics; Governance Compliance; Emerging Markets; Economic Growth; Global Strategy; China

April 2004 (Revised September 2005)
Case

China and the WTO: Doing the Right Thing?

In late 2001, the People's Republic of China joined the World Trade Organization (WTO). Sets the terms of China's accession agreement against its compliance record some two years later. Discusses why key actors, such as business, organized labor, and other governments,... View Details

Keywords: Management; History; International Relations; Judgments; Trade; Business and Government Relations; Development Economics; Governance Compliance; Emerging Markets; Global Strategy; China

March 2024
Supplement

Negotiating the Gift of Life (B)

By: Alex Chan

Describes a negotiation where lives are truly at stake, where key lessons on persuasion and the role that identity might play in a negotiation are on display through an effort by a frontline negotiator from OneLegacy, the US's largest organ procurement organization. As... View Details

Keywords: Economics; Negotiation; Communication; Diversity; Nonprofit Organizations; Emotions; Mission and Purpose; Health Industry

April 2018 (Revised July 2018)
Case

Maersk: Betting on Blockchain

By: Rajiv Lal and Scott Johnson

In March 2018, international shipping giant Maersk is getting ready to debut a trade digitization platform. Maersk hopes the platform will help streamline global trade since shipping goods internationally is an extraordinarily complicated and inefficient process.... View Details

Keywords: Maersk; IBM; Blockchain; Shipping; Shipping Line; Trade; Bitcoin; Digitization; Container Shipping; Joint Ventures; Ship Transportation; Transportation Networks; Digital Platforms; Information Technology; Technology Adoption; Applications and Software; Shipping Industry; Technology Industry

28 Aug 2023
Research & Ideas

How Workplace Wellness Programs Can Give Employees the Energy Boost They Need

Dilan Gomih, founder and CEO of Dilagence, a company that works with organizations to create physical and mental well-being events. At a time when workers continue to quietly quit and many companies are struggling to fill openings, it’s... View Details

Keywords: by Hise Gibson

04 May 2015
Research & Ideas

Need to Solve a Problem? Take a Break From Collaborating

Got a problem? Throw some collaboration software at it. It's a common strategy among today's managers: Organizations spend a lot of money on technology that enables employees to tackle problems collectively. Hence, the market is rife with... View Details

Keywords: by Carmen Nobel; Video Game; Web Services

August 1994 (Revised June 1995)
Background Note

Managerial Effectiveness and Diversity: Organizational Choices

Defines "diversity" in organizational terms and provides a descriptive framework for understanding the ways organizations identify and respond to its challenges and opportunities. The four components or lenses of the framework are: motivators, mindset, methods,... View Details

Keywords: Customers; Organizations; Labor; Diversity Characteristics

January 1990 (Revised June 1995)
Case

Colliers International Property Consultants

By: Nitin Nohria

Describes the origins, organizational structure, management practices, and use of information technology (IT) in Colliers, a real estate network. Colliers provides local firms with a way to maintain local autonomy while gaining national and international coverage.... View Details

Keywords: Property; Organizational Structure; Information Technology; Management Practices and Processes; Partners and Partnerships; Business Model; Mission and Purpose; Business Growth and Maturation; Conflict and Resolution; Quality; Real Estate Industry

January 2005 (Revised February 2018)
Background Note

Negotiation Advice: A Synopsis

By: Michael Wheeler

Distills the negotiation advice of more than a dozen general books on negotiation. Compares and contrasts specific prescriptions and organizes the books into five loose categories: win-win or mutual gains negotiation, negotiation analysis, relational negotiation,... View Details

Keywords: Negotiation; Research

February 2020
Article

Using Charity Performance Metrics as an Excuse Not to Give

By: Christine L. Exley

There is an increasing pressure to give more wisely and effectively. There is, relatedly, an increasing focus on charity performance metrics. Via a series of experiments, this paper provides a caution to such a focus. While information on charity performance metrics... View Details

Keywords: Charitable Giving; Prosocial Behavior; Altruism; Excuses; Self-serving Biases; Philanthropy and Charitable Giving; Performance; Measurement and Metrics; Behavior

Read Now

September 2001
Background Note

Assessing Your Organization's Crisis Response Plans

Organizations inevitably face crises, but few are well prepared to deal with them. This note summarizes the findings of research and experience about what it takes to respond effectively in crisis situations. Provides principles to guide crisis response planning,... View Details

Keywords: Organizations; Crisis Management

18 Mar 2021
News

With More People Working from Home, Valuable Connections Lost

Blog

Understanding the Benefits of Our Virtual Programs

in-person classroom experience. The program was very well organized and managed. Kristine Schmidt (KS): While I have done both the in-person class and now the virtual class, both have their tremendous benefits including developing... View Details

27 Sep 2017
Blog Post

Meet the Latino Student Association

The Latino Student Organization (LASO) at the Harvard Business School is dedicated to fostering a collaborative community of aspiring Latino business leaders who wish to pursue a career in the United States. We View Details

Keywords: All Industries

Article

Dynamic Silos: Modularity in Intra-organizational Communication Networks during the Covid-19 Pandemic

By: Jonathan Larson, Tiona Zuzul, Emily Cox Pahnke, Neha Parikh Shah, Patrick Bourke, Nicholas Caurvina, Fereshteh Amini, Youngser Park, Joshua Vogelstein, Jeffrey Weston, Christopher White and Carey E. Priebe

Workplace communications around the world were drastically altered by Covid-19, work-from-home orders, and the rise of remote work. We analyze aggregated, anonymized metadata from over 360 billion emails within over 4000 organizations worldwide to examine changes in... View Details

Keywords: COVID-19; Remote Work; Organizational Silos; Health Pandemics; Organizations; Communication; Networks

Read Now

April 1995 (Revised November 1995)
Case

Human Resources at Hewlett-Packard (A)

By: Michael Beer and Gregory C. Rogers

Provides an overview of the human resource policies and practices applied by Hewlett-Packard (HP). Discusses HP's reactions as an organization to changes in its business environment. As such, it is an opportunity to analyze HP's practices, and how they have been... View Details

Keywords: Human Resources; Change; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Policy; Computer Industry

03 May 2024
Research & Ideas

How Much Does Proximity Influence Startup Innovation? 20 Meters' Worth to Be Exact

unlikely to speak to people who are very different from us unless there is some sort of mechanism that brings us together.” The work provides a deeper understanding of the importance of physical proximity as View Details

Keywords: by Ben Rand

February 2009 (Revised June 2019)
Case

Cleveland Clinic: Transformation and Growth 2015

By: Michael E. Porter and Elizabeth O. Teisberg

The Cleveland Clinic's health care services are internationally renowned for quality. In 2008, The Clinic began to restructure the organization into teams defined around patient needs, rather than traditional medical specialties. "Patients First!" takes shape as the... View Details

Keywords: Health; Health Care Operations; Health Care Quality; Health Care; Strategy And Leadership; Strategy Development; Health Care and Treatment; Leading Change; Goals and Objectives; Growth and Development Strategy; Measurement and Metrics; Service Delivery; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Outcome or Result; Health Industry; Cleveland

2008
Book

Ownership Quotient: Putting the Service Profit Chain to Work for Unbeatable Competitive Advantage

By: James L. Heskett, W. Earl Sasser Jr. and Joe Wheeler

Hundreds of large organizations worldwide have used the groundbreaking Service Profit Chain to improve business performance. Now The Ownership Quotient reveals the next generation of the chain: customer and employee "owners" of your business. Employee-owners exhibit... View Details

Keywords: Customer Satisfaction; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Customer Ownership; Employee Ownership; Competitive Advantage; Value Creation