Publications

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10 Dec 2015
News

Leveraging Curiosity to Broaden the Impact

family and my community.” Giving back to the community has always been important to the Los Angeles native, who used to mentor high schoolers from minority families in South LA, helping them prepare for... View Details

01 Dec 2017
News

Turning Point: The Dark Season

I’m unemployed.” Yet every day I was leading a prayer conference call for hundreds of people from across the country. The feedback was that my words were extremely encouraging and helpful. So there’s a sense... View Details

Keywords: Jonathan Wilkins (MBA 2007, MDiv 2009)

April 1995 (Revised May 1995)
Case

Kraft General Foods: The Merger (B)

By: David J. Collis and Elizabeth Wynne Johnson

Discusses the recent decision to blend the previously separate Kraft and General Foods units into one operating company with a focus on the creation of a single massive sales force. View Details

Keywords: Mergers and Acquisitions; Salesforce Management; Corporate Strategy; Consumer Products Industry; Food and Beverage Industry

December 2021 (Revised May 2025)
Case

Bed Bath & Beyond: The New Strategy to Drive Shareholder Value

By: Benjamin C. Esty and Daniel W. Fisher

At one time, Bed Bath & Beyond was one of the most successful specialty retailers in the United States—its growth and profit margins far exceeded both peer retailers in the home goods market as well as many other discount retailers. But in 2014, its stock price peaked,... View Details

Keywords: Competitive Strategy; Competitive Advantage; Value Creation; Diversification; Corporate Governance; Leading Change; Performance Evaluation; Valuation; Investment Activism; Retail Industry; Consumer Products Industry; United States

April 2018
Case

The Bayer - Monsanto Merger: GMOs and 'Science for a Better Life'

By: Martha J. Crawford and James Barnett

This case allows students to explore the economic, ethical and legal challenges faced by agri-business companies, after several decades of promoting and selling Genetically Modified (GM) crops. Starting in the 1980s, the widespread introduction of GM crops was... View Details

Keywords: Merger; Acquisition; GMO; Genetically Modified Crops; Neonics; Pesticides; Crop Seeds; EU; Mergers and Acquisitions; Agribusiness; Genetics; Natural Environment; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Consolidation; Agriculture and Agribusiness Industry; Europe; United States

01 Oct 2001
News

Peter W. Olson: By the Book

the book business fascinated me," says Olson, who joined the German media corporation Bertelsmann in 1988 and worked his way up to chairman of its North American book group.... View Details

Keywords: Hanna, Julia; Publishing Industries (except Internet); Information

American Fair Trade: Proprietary Capitalism, Corporatism, and the 'New Competition,' 1890-1940

American Fair Trade explores the contested political and legal meanings of the term fair trade from the late nineteenth century through the New Deal era. This history of American capitalism argues that business associations partnered with... View Details

June 2023
Article

The Effect of Firms' Information Exposure on Safeguarding Employee Health: Evidence from COVID-19

By: Lisa Yao Liu and Shirley Lu

We show that information exposure through international business networks enables firms to take proactive measures that benefit employees and potentially the local community. Specifically, in the early days of COVID-19, firms that have business networks with China and... View Details

Keywords: COVID-19 Pandemic; Networks; Knowledge Use and Leverage; Health Pandemics; Decision Choices and Conditions; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact

26 Sep 2019
Research & Ideas

What Can the World’s Largest Refugee Camp Teach Us About the Meaning of Work?

Two years have passed since more than 700,000 Rohingya people fled a bloody ethnic cleansing campaign in Myanmar and created the world’s largest refugee camp in Bangladesh. But not much has changed since then. At View Details

Keywords: by Danielle Kost

10 Sep 2020
Research & Ideas

The COVID Two-Step for Leaders: Protect and Pivot

challenge. For example, LVHM, a French multinational corporation and conglomerate specializing in luxury goods, announced it will cease the production of perfumes in some of its factories in order to make... View Details

Keywords: by Boris Groysberg and Katherine Connolly Baden

2011
Chapter

Accelerating the Adoption of Integrated Reporting

By: Robert G. Eccles and George Serafeim

This chapter describes the concept of integrated reporting, provides a brief history of its development, reviews the current state of practice, presents a strategy for institutional change that will accelerate the adoption of integrated reporting in order to meet the... View Details

Keywords: Integrated Corporate Reporting; Business History; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Practice; Adoption

SSRN

February 2018 (Revised October 2019)
Case

Steinhoff International and the Stock Exchange

By: Siko Sikochi and Austin Lim

Nicky Newton-King, the Chief Executive Officer of the Johannesburg Stock Exchange (JSE), was put in a difficult position. A scandal had broken out at Steinhoff, a JSE-listed company, under her watch and there were calls to suspend listing of the company securities from... View Details

Keywords: Accounting; Financial Reporting; Mergers and Acquisitions; Financial Markets; Corporate Governance; Retail Industry; Manufacturing Industry; Distribution Industry; Africa; South Africa

February 2017
Case

Clear Channel (A): The Rise, 1972–2003

By: John R. Wells and Gabriel Ellsworth

At the end of 2003, Clear Channel Communications, Inc., a diversified media group with revenues of $8.9 billion, could claim leadership positions in all three of its main businesses. Clear Channel Broadcasting was the largest radio-station operator in the world, with... View Details

Keywords: Clear Channel; Clear Channel Outdoor; Radio; Outdoor Advertising; Concert Industry; Lowry Mays; Federal Communications Commission; Regulation; Regulations; Regulatory Environment; JCDecaux; Media; Growth Management; Consolidation; Competitive Strategy; Fair Value Accounting; Advertising; Acquisition; Mergers and Acquisitions; Business Growth and Maturation; For-Profit Firms; Entertainment; Music Entertainment; Television Entertainment; Public Equity; Profit; Revenue; Geographic Scope; Multinational Firms and Management; Government Legislation; Business History; Laws and Statutes; Business or Company Management; Growth and Development Strategy; Marketing Channels; Industry Structures; Public Ownership; Problems and Challenges; Sales; Opportunities; Strategy; Adaptation; Business Strategy; Commercialization; Competition; Competitive Advantage; Corporate Strategy; Diversification; Expansion; Wireless Technology; Valuation; Media and Broadcasting Industry; Entertainment and Recreation Industry; Advertising Industry; Music Industry; United States; Texas

January–February 2022
Article

Algorithm-Augmented Work and Domain Experience: The Countervailing Forces of Ability and Aversion

By: Ryan Allen and Prithwiraj Choudhury

How does a knowledge worker’s level of domain experience affect their algorithm-augmented work performance? We propose and test theoretical predictions that domain experience has countervailing effects on algorithm-augmented performance: on one hand, domain experience... View Details

Keywords: Automation; Domain Experience; Algorithmic Aversion; Experts; Algorithms; Machine Learning; Future Of Work; Employees; Experience and Expertise; Decision Making; Performance

Find at Harvard

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16 Apr 2001
Research & Ideas

Making the Most of Government Upheaval

largest cement company in Spain, it was evident that a once nationally focused enterprise was ready to go head-to-head with leading corporations in Europe and the rest of the... View Details

Keywords: by Nancy O. Perry

December 2010
Teaching Note

VeeV on the Rocks? (TN)

By: Christopher Marquis, Joshua D. Margolis and Bobbi Thomason

Teaching Note for 410006. View Details

Keywords: Quality; Ownership Stake; Growth and Development; Problems and Challenges; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Brands and Branding; Food and Beverage Industry

September 2013 (Revised June 2014)
Supplement

Rana Plaza: Workplace Safety in Bangladesh (B)

By: John A. Quelch and Margaret L. Rodriguez

In the aftermath of the Rana Plaza building collapse, a group of international retailers and labor unions partnered to create a proposal for more stringent inspections and enforcement of safety standards in Bangladesh garment factories. The proposal was met by... View Details

Keywords: Retail Trade; Corporate Social Responsibility; Apparel; Bangladesh; Worker Safety; Government And Business; International Business; Apparel and Accessories Industry; Bangladesh

March 2009 (Revised April 2011)
Course Overview Note

Growing, Financing, and Managing Family and Closely Held Firms: Overview of the Course

By: Belen Villalonga

Most companies around the world are controlled by their founding families, including more than half of all public corporations in the U.S. and Europe and more than two thirds of those in Asia. These companies are the subject of the Financial Management of Family and... View Details

Keywords: Family Business; Financial Management; Corporate Governance; Governing and Advisory Boards; Family Ownership; Business and Stakeholder Relations; Valuation

2023
Working Paper

The Politics of Philanthropy in China

By: Geoffrey Jones and Yuhai Wu

This working paper looks historically at business philanthropy in China. In the West, the literature has distinguished between entrepreneurial and customary philanthropy, while the phenomenon of spiritual philanthropy has been identified in many emerging markets. This... View Details

Keywords: China; Philanthropy; Ethics; Philanthropy and Charitable Giving; Moral Sensibility; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Economic Systems; Economic Sectors; China