Publications

November 2003 (Revised March 2006)
Case

Dow Chemical's Bid for the Privatization of PBB in Argentina

By: Mihir A. Desai and Alexandra de Royere

What price should Dow Chemical bid for PBB, a petrochemical complex that is being privatized by the Argentine government? To answer this question, students are forced to consider the role of country risk, the underlying currency exposure of the business, and how to... View Details

Keywords: Bids and Bidding; Privatization; Credit Derivatives and Swaps; Cash Flow; Emerging Markets; Valuation; Business and Government Relations; Multinational Firms and Management; Risk and Uncertainty; Energy Industry; Argentina

June 1997
Background Note

The Normative Foundations of Business

What is the appropriate role for business to play in a capitalist society? In analyzing responses to this question, this note distinguishes two separate dimensions. The first involves the distinctive objective of business as a social institution, considers the pros and... View Details

Keywords: Business or Company Management; Economic Systems

17 Oct 2009
News

Understanding Users of Social Networks

Keywords: Professor Mikolaj Piskorski; News, Library, Internet, and Other Services; Information

August 2002 (Revised August 2002)
Case

Raiser Senior Services--The Stratford (A)

By: H. Kent Bowen and Alison Berkley Wagonfeld

Focuses on modifying operations to increase profitability at an upscale senior care facility in California. Jennifer Raiser, president of Raiser Senior Services, opened the Stratford in 1992 as a high-end, continuing-care retirement community. Ten years later, the... View Details

Keywords: Cost Management; Profit; Saving; Health Care and Treatment; Age; Management Teams; Problems and Challenges; Ethics; Legal Liability; Business Growth and Maturation; Service Industry; Service Industry; California

Paige Tsai is PhD candidate in the Technology and Operations Management Unit at Harvard Business School. Her research broadly examines the effects of job design on employees. Her current projects explore the financial and well-being effects of holding multiple jobs,... View Details

Keywords: service industry; service industry; service industry; service industry

05 Jul 2006
Working Paper Summaries

Why IT Matters in Midsized Firms

Keywords: by Marco Iansiti, George Favaloro, James Utzschneider & Greg Richards; Technology; Computer

December 2024 (Revised March 2025)
Case

The Shouldice Hospital Today

By: James Heskett and Roger Hallowell

The leadership and staff of Shouldice Hospital in Toronto, Canada have, for 75 years, sought to do one thing better than any other hospital in the world, repair inguinal hernias. For some years, a possible second hospital in another market has been under consideration.... View Details

Keywords: Joint Ventures; Health Care and Treatment; Growth and Development Strategy; Organizational Culture; Expansion; Health Industry; Toronto; Canada; United States

February 2022
Supplement

Agora (B)

By: Lindsay N. Hyde, Thomas R. Eisenmann and Tom Quinn

This is the conclusion to Agora (A), where founder Elsa Sze decides if she wants to continue investing energy in her civic technology startup.
Agora was a civic technology (civic tech) startup founded by Elsa Sze, who wanted to enhance the connection between... View Details

Keywords: Civic Technology; Government Administration; Conferences; Business Startups; Business Strategy

Article

Affording to Wait: Medicare Initiation and the Use of Health Care

By: Guy David, Philip Saynisch, Victoria Acevado-Perez and Mark D. Neuman

Delays in receipt of necessary diagnostic and therapeutic medical procedures related to the timing of Medicare initiation at age 65 years have potentially broad welfare implications. We use 2005–2007 data from Florida and North Carolina to estimate the effect of... View Details

Keywords: Medicare; Behavior; Insurance; Health Care and Treatment; Insurance Industry; Public Administration Industry; Health Industry; North Carolina; Florida

Find at Harvard

December 2007 (Revised July 2008)
Case

MINI USA: Finding a New Advertising Agency (A)

Selling an intangible like advertising services is a difficult task. The first step is to understand how brands buy these services. What are they looking for? What do they need to learn? How do they go about assessing things like creativity, trust, and loyalty? This... View Details

Keywords: Strategy; Advertising; Sales; Advertising Industry

March 2005
Case

Henkel Iberica (A)

By: Francisco de Asis Martinez-Jerez, V.G. Narayanan and Lisa Brem

In 2002, Esteban Garriga, customer service director at Henkel Iberica, questions whether Collaborative Planning, Forecasting, and Replenishment (CPFR) would help manage retail promotions and limit their impact on the stock-outs and obsolete inventory. Describes the... View Details

Keywords: Business Subsidiaries; Forecasting and Prediction; Price; Distribution Channels; Strategic Planning; Commercialization; Valuation; Rail Industry; Germany; Spain

June 1998 (Revised December 2006)
Case

Clear Communications Ltd. vs. Telecom Corporation of New Zealand Ltd. (A)

By: Willis M. Emmons III and Martin Calles

Features the challenges facing an entrant in the New Zealand telecommunications market during the period 1989-1994. Clear Communications Ltd. (CCL), a joint venture owned by Bell Canada, MCI, New Zealand Television Corp., and Todd Companies, begins offering long... View Details

Keywords: Market Entry and Exit; Competition; Emerging Markets; Privatization; Monopoly; Mobile and Wireless Technology; Corporate Strategy; Business or Company Management; Expansion; Law; Telecommunications Industry; New Zealand

13 Nov 2014
News

Going Against the Flow: Michelle Zatlyn, Cofounder of CloudFlare

26 Jun 2015
Video

Into the FIELD

Web

Business & Environment - Faculty & Research

Faculty Research This research studies business alliances that seek to address climate change, offering empirical evidence to address claims advanced by alliance supporters and critics. We study eleven major alliance mostly focused on financial View Details

December 2007 (Revised December 2021)
Case

The South Sea Company (A)

By: David A. Moss, Eugene Kintgen, Agnieszka Rafalska and Kimberly Hagan

In early 1720, the South Sea Company and the Bank of England were cometing for the right to issue new shares and to exchange those shares for government bons that were then in the hands of the public. The British government had already executed two such debt conversion... View Details

Keywords: Borrowing and Debt; Debt Securities; Stock Shares; Financial Strategy; Bids and Bidding; Business and Government Relations; Financial Services Industry; Financial Services Industry; Great Britain

2010
Working Paper

The Job Market for New Economists: A Market Design Perspective

By: Peter A. Coles, John Cawley, Phillip B. Levine, Muriel Niederle, Alvin E. Roth and John J. Siegfried

This paper provides an overview of the market for new Ph.D. economists. It describes the role of the American Economic Association (AEA) in the market and focuses in particular on two mechanisms adopted in recent years at the suggestion of our committee. First, job... View Details

Keywords: Cost Management; Information; Surveys; Jobs and Positions; Job Interviews; Job Search; Emerging Markets; Digital Platforms; Service Operations; Internet and the Web