Decision-making, Business Model - Publications - Faculty & Research

21 Mar 2011
Research & Ideas

Are We Thinking Too Little, or Too Much?

The most captivating item in Michael Norton's office is a Star Wars The Force Trainer, a toy that allows would-be Jedi warriors to levitate a Ping-Pong ball within a tube using only the power of focused thinking. Norton, a marketing professor at Harvard View Details

Keywords: by Carmen Nobel

14 Sep 2016
Research & Ideas

Web Surfers Have a Schedule and Stick to It

Harvard Business School; and Jeffrey Prince, Indiana University. The study notes, for example: We devote a more or less fixed amount of time online each week. We don’t allocate more time when something new comes along; instead, we shift... View Details

Keywords: by Julia Hanna; Retail; Web Services

07 Aug 2006
Research & Ideas

Whatever Happened to Caveat Emptor?

Its early milestones—comparative product tests launched by Consumer Reports in 1936, the Kennedy administration's Consumer Bill of Rights in 1960, Ralph Nader's critique of the U.S. automobile industry in Unsafe at Any Speed in 1965—became View Details

Keywords: by Sean Silverthorne; Retail

31 Oct 2016
Research & Ideas

Quantitative Easing Didn’t Ease the Housing Crisis for the Neediest

virtual roller coaster of the financial markets. The findings are detailed in the paper How Quantitative Easing Works: Evidence on the Refinancing Channel, co-authored by Marco Di Maggio, an assistant professor in the Finance Unit at Harvard View Details

Keywords: by Carmen Nobel

November 2004 (Revised September 2019)
Background Note

The U.S. Health Club Industry in 2004

By: John R. Wells, Gabriel Ellsworth and Benjamin Weinstock

In 2004, the $16.8 billion U.S. health club industry continued its strong record of growth. There were almost 27,000 health clubs in the United States, up from 6,700 two decades earlier, and these clubs claimed 41 million members, over 14% of the U.S. population.... View Details

Keywords: Health Clubs; Fitness; Gyms; Chain; Weight Loss; Obesity; Exercise; Personal Training; Bally Total Fitness; 24 Hour Fitness; YMCA; Gold's Gym; Curves; Franchise; Franchising; Subscription; Promotional Sales; Promotions; Fixed Costs; Body; Accrual Accounting; Revenue Recognition; Buildings and Facilities; Business Growth and Maturation; Business Model; For-Profit Firms; Trends; Customers; Demographics; Age; Income; Private Equity; Financing and Loans; Profit; Revenue; Geographic Scope; Multinational Firms and Management; Health; Nutrition; Business History; Employees; Retention; Human Capital; Working Conditions; Contracts; Business or Company Management; Goals and Objectives; Growth and Development Strategy; Markets; Demand and Consumers; Supply and Industry; Industry Growth; Industry Structures; Operations; Service Operations; Franchise Ownership; Private Ownership; Public Ownership; Problems and Challenges; Sales; Salesforce Management; Situation or Environment; Opportunities; Nonprofit Organizations; Welfare; Sports; Strategy; Business Strategy; Competition; Competitive Strategy; Consolidation; Corporate Strategy; Customization and Personalization; Expansion; Segmentation; Hardware; Health Industry; United States

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14 Aug 2012
First Look

First Look: August 14

of leading globally distributed operations. Purchase this case:http://hbr.org/search/612078-PDF-ENG Aman Resorts (Abridged) Eugene Soltes and Aldo SesiaHarvard Business School Case 112-100 This case describes the operating View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

12 Jan 2018
Cold Call Podcast

Leadership Lessons from a Young Martin Luther King, Jr.

writes about extensively, including numerous books, articles, and business cases. He's also the former chairman and chief executive officer of Medtronic, and he's the author of this really wonderful case that we're going to discuss today.... View Details

12 Jul 2010
Research & Ideas

Rocket Science Retailing: A Practical Guide

fail to make changes to their processes and business model that would be needed to use the technology optimally. That is akin to replacing your car with a helicopter but not making any changes to your... View Details

Keywords: by Martha Lagace; Retail; Auto

15 Sep 2003
Research & Ideas

The Lessons of New-Market Disruption

rewarded with a new line of business that created revenues in excess of $200 million over the next several years. HP backed out of its efforts after two years with multimillion-dollar losses and a considerable amount of bad press. How did... View Details

Keywords: by Clark Gilbert; Technology

12 Oct 1999
Research & Ideas

Building Bridges: New Dimensions in Negotiation

MBA course in negotiation as well as advanced dealmaking electives and Executive Education programs), has developed a model with former HBS faculty member David A. Lax called "three-dimensional negotiation." In a course note... View Details

Keywords: by Anita M. Harris

13 Jun 2017
Research & Ideas

Why Global Investments Are Still a Good Bet

sense to be diversified than it used to in the past, since, at the end of the day, all markets are moving together,” says Luis Viceira, George E. Bates Professor and Senior Associate Dean for International Development at Harvard Business... View Details

Keywords: by Michael Blanding; Financial Services

07 Apr 2009
First Look

First Look: April 7, 2009

evidence, while consistent with agency theory, does not confirm the private information hypothesis. Download the working paper from SSRN ($5): http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1134943 Cases & Course MaterialsAddleshaw Goddard LLP Harvard View Details

Keywords: Martha Lagace

04 Apr 2019
Cold Call Podcast

Can Mark Zuckerberg Rebuild Trust in Facebook?

Professor Bill George about his case entitled, Facebook Confronts a Crisis of Trust. I'm your host, Brian Kenny, and you're listening to Cold Call. Bill George is an expert on leadership, a topic that he teaches and writes about extensively, including numerous books,... View Details

Keywords: Re: Andi Wang

15 Jun 2010
First Look

First Look: June 15

institutional logics in unprecedented ways) can develop and maintain their hybrid nature in the absence of a "ready-to-wear" model for handling the tensions between the logics they combine. The results of our comparative study... View Details

Keywords: Martha Lagace

06 Feb 2006
Research & Ideas

Sorting Out the Patent Craze

users out of luck. Harvard Business School professor Josh Lerner and his colleagues are studying how SSOs balance the interests of users against the interest of sponsors to gain widespread acceptance of new technologies. Their paper,... View Details

Keywords: by Sara Grant; Technology

06 Jun 2005
Research & Ideas

Don’t Listen to “Yes”

If people smile, nod, and say "yes" at your company, maybe it's time to start an argument. According to HBS professor Michael Roberto, the lack of good conflict—constructive conflict—within an organization makes it that much harder to accurately evaluate... View Details

Keywords: by Martha Lagace

16 Jan 2019
Research & Ideas

What Football Firings Teach Managers About Staying Relevant

idea with Harvard Business School Dean Nitin Nohria. Nohria remembered that he and his HBS colleague, Rakesh Khurana, had noticed a similar effect in CEO data—that some chief executives had two distinct halves to their careers, a... View Details

Keywords: by Boris Groysberg, Evan M.S. Hecht, and Abhijit Naik; Sports

09 Apr 2012
Research & Ideas

Who Sways the USDA on GMO Approvals?

Many corporations have gotten good at pulling the levers of government to tilt the odds in their favor, weakening regulations or securing perks, justified or not, to further their business interests. Economists use the term... View Details

Keywords: by Michael Blanding; Food & Beverage; Biotechnology; Agriculture & Agribusiness

19 Jul 2011
First Look

First Look: July 19

jobs and dignified salaries. As of March 2010, La Fageda has opened up a new production facility to make ice cream in an urban area outside of its well-known agricultural farm. Students are faced with understanding La Fageda's business... View Details