the Women's Initiative - Publications - Faculty & Research

30 Jun 2020
Book

Capitalism Is More at Risk Than Ever

undermine those foundations. Since 2007 when we carried out our initial research, we have experienced a global financial collapse that destroyed the economic position of the... View Details

Keywords: by Martha Lagace

19 Apr 2004
Research & Ideas

Ground-Floor Opportunities for Retail in India

opportunity for goods and services that offer new consumer concepts or new product qualities, but most Indians believe brands are more expensive—even when they're not. It can be difficult for a new product to get over that initial hump... View Details

Keywords: by Julia Hanna; Consumer Products; Retail

03 Dec 2008
What Do You Think?

Can Housing and Credit be “Nudged” Back to Health?

one might conclude that efforts to influence human decisions through "nudging" might be effective. However, respondents were far from unanimous in drawing this conclusion. Adnan Younis Lodhi initiated View Details

Keywords: by Jim Heskett

12 Mar 2006
Research & Ideas

Global Poverty Needs a Global Answer

funded initiatives by Land O' Lakes in some twenty-three poor countries. In Albania, for example, Land O' Lakes has organized 8,000 women into cooperatives for the production of dairy products, providing... View Details

Keywords: by Cynthia Churchwell

31 Mar 2002
Research & Ideas

You’re Wasting Your Employees! What You Can Do About It

departments, simplification of strategic-planning and capital budgeting processes, and massive overhauls of corporate structures and processes—all in an effort both to shift initiative to those deep in the... View Details

Keywords: by Christopher A. Bartlett & Sumantra Ghoshal

16 Sep 2015
Research & Ideas

Can Applied Economics Save Homeless Puppies?

Wagaroo. The initial iteration of Wagaroo was based entirely on trying to develop an effective matching algorithm. Prospective owners filled out surveys, indicating preferences about factors such as size,... View Details

Keywords: by Carmen Nobel; Retail

09 Jul 2024
Research & Ideas

Are Management Consulting Firms Failing to Manage Themselves?

before and during the COVID-19 pandemic, strategy firms initiated a growth-driven hiring spree. However, as economies slowed, these firms faced a significant imbalance between their staffing “supply” and... View Details

Keywords: by David Fubini; Consulting

07 Nov 2005
What Do You Think?

Is Less Becoming More?

consumers will determine which are successful and which are not." But just how is "less" achieved? As Martin Reveli points out, "To artificially restrict choice eliminates some elements of competition. . . . Long live View Details

Keywords: by James Heskett; Consumer Products

28 Jul 2016
Op-Ed

Where is TripAdvisor for Doctors?

by other patients? Would I want to write a review of my psychiatrist that, to be thorough, might have to reveal my weaknesses? Wouldn't I benefit more from just paying for an initial visit to see if the... View Details

Keywords: by John A. Quelch; Health

09 May 2005
Research & Ideas

Hold or Fold? Sizing Up Business Risk

column, "want other things." When you put these three dimensions together, you get a simple matrix that looks like this. We've included a line for you to add your rationale or thinking for the View Details

Keywords: by Eileen C. Shapiro & Howard H. Stevenson

01 May 2000
What Do You Think?

Can You Hard-Wire Performance?

incentive—given other management initiatives already in place—will, if it works, insure that GE's organization in the future will deliver the greatest value (best results at... View Details

Keywords: by James Heskett

31 Oct 2004
Research & Ideas

Bypass Marketing: Are Docs Influenced?

The question of whether advertising 'informs' or 'persuades' consumers is the subject of a long and ongoing stream of debate and research.— Alvin Silk Initially there was... View Details

Keywords: by Manda Salls

24 Nov 2014
Research & Ideas

Corrupting Silence: Companies Must Speak Up Against Bribes

offering more ways of tracing and communicating such activities," says Healy. (He wrote an article article on such initiatives in the Harvard Business Review with HBS Associate Professor Karthik Ramanna.) If... View Details

Keywords: by Michael Blanding

24 Oct 2005
Research & Ideas

IPR: Protecting Your Technology Transfers

question. There has indeed been a general trend towards stronger IPR over the last twenty years, but the overall consequences of reform remain hotly debated. While our initial... View Details

Keywords: by Cynthia Churchwell

09 Feb 2004
Research & Ideas

Got a New Strategy? Now Make it Happen

species' survival by triggering learning and adaptation; it can have the same effect on organizations. Businesses and the people inside them don't learn to change unless they have View Details

Keywords: by Michael Beer & Russell A. Eisenstat

13 Jul 2015
Research & Ideas

‘Humblebragging’ is a Bad Strategy, Especially in a Job Interview

lessons learned from the initial research—namely, admitting fallibility rather than couching it. "I think people have a tendency not to say something negative about themselves because that makes them... View Details

Keywords: by Carmen Nobel

18 Sep 2013
Research & Ideas

Unspoken Cues: Encouraging Morals Without Mandates

hears whispers of a more distant collective guidance. In the initial draft of my ethnography of HBS, I noted the School's relative silence on the... View Details

Keywords: by Sean Silverthorne; Education

23 Jul 2014
Lessons from the Classroom

Innovation Is Magic. Really

The initial idea was tested in a course called Leading Product Innovation in the executive education program and refined over the years. At this... View Details

Keywords: by Dina Gerdeman; Consumer Products

24 Apr 2006
Research & Ideas

Managing Alignment as a Process

help their organizational unit implement it. Enterprises must have active policies to communicate, educate, motivate, and align employees with the strategy. They must also align their ongoing management processes—for resource allocation,... View Details

Keywords: by Robert S. Kaplan & David P. Norton; Apparel & Accessories; Fashion; Consumer Products; Retail

03 Jan 2019
Research & Ideas

Everyone Knows Innovation is Essential to Business Success—Except Board Directors

Open the Wall Street Journal on any given day, and you are likely to find at least one story about how technology is disrupting yet another industry, and the pressures companies face to innovate. And yet,... View Details