Publications

Research Summary

Consumer's Relationships with Technologies

Susan M. Fournier is involved with two lines of research investigating consumers' relationships with technological products. The first project (with Professor David Mick of the University of Wisconsin) concerns 'everyday technologies' such as... View Details

22 Sep 2003
Research & Ideas

When Protestors Knock at Your Door

may serve as a clever way to differentiate a brand or product and capture market share. Q: What can managers learn from past experiences of targeted companies? Spar: I think the broadest lesson is not to... View Details

Keywords: by Cynthia Churchwell

14 Oct 2014
First Look

First Look: October 14

offshore clusters of multinationals are not a simple reflection of domestic industrial clusters. Agglomeration economies including capital-good market externality and technology diffusion play a more important role in the offshore... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

July 1982 (Revised July 2004)
Case

Esmark, Inc. (B)

By: William E. Fruhan Jr.

Esmark's management sells its most valuable business and its most unattractive business in an effort to reposition itself and maximize shareholder value. View Details

Keywords: Business Exit or Shutdown; Product Positioning; Business and Shareholder Relations; Reputation; Value

December 2010 (Revised October 2021)
Case

Silver Lake

By: David J. Collis and Elizabeth A. Kind

Dave Roux, co-founder and chairman of Silver Lake, a private equity (PE) firm specializing in technology investments, was meeting with the firm's investment committee via video conference to discuss options for Silver Lake's future growth. While the private equity... View Details

Keywords: Growth and Development Strategy; Competitive Strategy; Private Equity; Expansion; Global Range; Financial Services Industry

17 Feb 2020
Sharpening Your Skills

How Entrepreneurs Can Find the Right Problem to Solve

Entrepreneurial Management Unit at the Harvard Business School. [Image by: iStock Photo ] Other stories by Julia Austin Making the Right Technical Hire How Scale Changes a Manager's Responsibilities Startup or Established Company? Which... View Details

Keywords: by Julia Austin

March 1996
Case

Ernst & Young United Kingdom (A) (Abridged)

By: John J. Gabarro and Samantha Graff

Intended to be a robust example of the challenges encountered during the early stages of a large-scale organizational transformation effort in a professional service firm. Describes a massive change program initiated and led by the new managing partner along with a... View Details

Keywords: Change Management; Leading Change; Management Teams; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Restructuring; Problems and Challenges; United Kingdom; London

Find at Harvard

11 Feb 2021
Blog Post

Good Leadership Is an Act of Kindness

managers are in perpetual crisis management mode, struggling with layoffs, remote work technology, market woes, and a range of other frustrating disruptions. While confronting... View Details

Keywords: All Industries

October 2016 (Revised February 2019)
Case

PTC: A Transformation to IoT

By: Rajiv Lal and Sarah McAra

In the 2010s, PTC, a leading provider of software for discrete manufacturers, faced maturing markets and changing customer needs as smart, connected products took hold—the rise of the Internet of Things (IoT). PTC saw a first mover advantage in entering the IoT space... View Details

Keywords: Internet Of Things; IoT; Smart; Connected Products; Business Organization; Transformation; Customer Relationship Management; Innovation Strategy; Technological Innovation; Leading Change; Marketing; Product Development; Service Operations; Strategy; Competition; Technology Industry

February 2011 (Revised May 2011)
Case

Utilis: Designing, Producing, and Selling Rapid Deployment Shelters for a Troubled World

By: Herman B. Leonard, Daniela Beyersdorfer and Simon Harrow

How can a company that supplies disaster response and humanitarian agencies best handle the intrinsically unpredictable and highly volatile demand for its products? Utilis is a French supplier of rapid-deploy high-end tent solutions for civilian and military uses (such... View Details

Keywords: Business Model; Growth and Development Strategy; Demand and Consumers; Strategic Planning; Natural Disasters; Competitive Strategy; Consumer Products Industry; Industrial Products Industry; France

04 Mar 2002
Research & Ideas

Don’t Lose Money With Customers

series of articles and HBS Working Papers, he explores the process of how firms in business-to-business markets manage customer relationships. As a frame of reference, Narayandas explains that modern View Details

Keywords: by Peter K. Jacobs

Web

Asia Pacific - Global

leveling the playing field between retail investors and institutional investors. In addition, he also explored the implications of misinformation for managers and discussed ways in which managers could play... View Details

26 Jul 2024
Research & Ideas

Why Great Ideas Get Stuck in Universities

Roche and Boudou considered several explanations for their findings: whether the technology driving the startup was too new or not good enough, and whether the founders took too central a role in controlling or managing the company.... View Details

Keywords: by Ben Rand; Biotechnology; Health

March 2009
Case

Putting Sparkle Into Soda-Club's European Partnerships

Daniel Birnbaum, new CEO of Soda-Club, has taken charge of a company with significant market penetration, brand equity, and revenues in certain European markets. The company is also plagued with hostile relationships with major distributors. He needs to decide how to... View Details

Keywords: Globalized Firms and Management; Partners and Partnerships; Distribution; Entrepreneurship; Crisis Management; Distribution Industry; Europe

January 1998 (Revised September 1998)
Case

Staples (A)

By: Myra M. Hart, Marco Iansiti and Barbara Feinberg

Chronicles development of a new business concept. Starts with Stemberg's search for a new employment opportunity, then provides details of his decision to launch a new venture concept through careful matching of personal capabilities and experience against a variety of... View Details

Keywords: Marketing; Personal Development and Career; Entrepreneurship; Management Skills; Retail Industry

November 1995 (Revised March 2000)
Case

Jurassic Park

By: John A. Quelch

Managers at MCA/Universal Merchandising are reviewing worldwide merchandising and licensing arrangements for the movie Jurassic Park. View Details

Keywords: Commercialization; Globalization; Film Entertainment; Brands and Branding; Entertainment and Recreation Industry

March 2017 (Revised February 2018)
Case

VMware and the Public Cloud

By: Raffaella Sadun and Christine Snively

In 2015, VMware, a pioneer in server and network virtualization and a member of parent company EMC’s “federation” of companies, had set its sights on becoming a leading public cloud provider. Two years prior, VMware first entered the public cloud market with its vCloud... View Details

Keywords: Information Technology; Information Infrastructure; Applications and Software; Growth and Development Strategy; Internet and the Web; Computer Industry; Technology Industry; Information Technology Industry