Publications

21 Aug 2000
Research & Ideas

Inside the OR: Disrupted Routines and New Technologies

Why did a group of Harvard Business School professors become interested in an innovative new heart surgery technique? It turns out that a hospital's operating room provides an excellent controlled arena from which to explore the role that... View Details

Keywords: by Hilah Geer

2009
Article

Placing the Normative Logics of Accountability in 'Thick' Perspective

By: Alnoor Ebrahim

This article provides a critical reflection on the heavily normative nature of current accountability debates. In particular, it explores three streams of normative discourse on nonprofit accountability: improving board governance, improving performance-based... View Details

Keywords: Fair Value Accounting; Accounting; Governance; Performance Evaluation; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Goals and Objectives; Management Practices and Processes; Power and Influence; Social and Collaborative Networks; Organizational Structure; Relationships; Accounting Industry

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Article

Why Hospitals Don't Learn from Failures: Organizational and Psychological Dynamics That Inhibit System Change

By: A. Tucker and A. Edmondson

The importance of hospitals learning from their failures hardly needs to be stated. Not only are matters of life and death at stake on a daily basis, but also an increasing number of U.S. hospitals are operating in the red. This article reports on in-depth qualitative... View Details

Keywords: Health Care and Treatment; Health Industry

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August 2014
Case

Rent the Runway (Abridged)

By: Thomas R. Eisenmann, Brent Goldfarb and David A. Kirsch

Two months after a successful launch In November 2009, the cofounders of Rent the Runway (RTR), a website that rented designer dresses, are debating whether to grow their startup at a measured pace and focus on improving operational effectiveness, or raise a new round... View Details

Keywords: Lean Startup; Electronic Commerce; Fashion; Expansion; Business Startups; Growth and Development Strategy; E-commerce; Fashion Industry

Professor Toffel is the Senator John Heinz Professor of Environmental Management. His research examines how companies are addressing climate change (especially decarbonization) and other environmental and working condition issues in their operations and supply... View Details

May 2017
Case

Pho Hoa Dorchester

By: Leonard A. Schlesinger, Michael Raiche and Roger Zhu

Pho Hoa is a traditional, family-owned Vietnamese restaurant in Dorchester, Massachusetts that opened in 1992. As he approached retirement in recent years, the founder/owner has scaled down his involvement in the day-to-day operations, leading to a number of... View Details

February 2016 (Revised February 2017)
Case

Greening Walmart: Progress and Controversy

By: Rebecca Henderson and James Weber

In 2005, Walmart, the world’s largest retailer, launched a sustainability initiative aimed at reducing waste and making the company more environmentally and socially conscious. By 2015, the company had made progress on multiple dimensions: energy efficiency in its... View Details

Keywords: Sustainability; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Business or Company Management; Motivation and Incentives; Reputation; Environmental Sustainability; Retail Industry; United States

Jenny Shan Wang is a doctoral student in the Technology and Operations Management program at Harvard Business School (HBS). She is broadly interested in interpretable machine learning (ML), identity and inequality, and improving existing methods... View Details

January 2024 (Revised January 2025)
Case

Huawei: Resilience amid Autarky and Adversity

By: William C. Kirby and Daniel Fu

In September 2023, Huawei made a dramatic return to the global smartphone space with the launch of its Mate 60 Pro smartphone, equipped with an indigenously designed, 7nm chip. This came despite a myriad of export controls and restrictions imposed against the company... View Details

October 2017 (Revised October 2022)
Case

JetBlue: Relevant Sustainability Leadership

By: George Serafeim

In 2017, JetBlue, the airline founded on the mission to “bring humanity back to air travel,” was considering becoming one of the first companies to report its sustainability performance according to the Sustainability Accounting Standards Board (SASB) standards. SASB... View Details

January 2007 (Revised January 2008)
Case

Amanco: Developing the Sustainability Scorecard

By: Robert S. Kaplan and Ricardo Reisen de Pinho

Describes the challenges of using the Balanced Scorecard to implement a triple-bottom-line strategy for delivering excellent economic, environmental, and social performance. The owners and senior executive team of Amanco, a producer of plastic pipe and complete water... View Details

Keywords: Balanced Scorecard; Measurement and Metrics; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Environmental Sustainability; Social Issues; Strategy; Construction Industry; Industrial Products Industry; Latin America; Brazil

June 2014 (Revised April 2015)
Supplement

OrthoChoice: Bundled Payments in the County of Stockholm (B)

By: Michael E. Porter, Clifford M. Marks and Zachary C. Landman

By the end of 2008, all major hospitals (one of which was private) and three private specialized orthopedic centers signed OrthoChoice contracts. In 2009, hip and knee replacements in the County of Stockholm for relatively healthy patients began being reimbursed. By... View Details

Keywords: Hip Replacement; Bundled Payment; Knee Replacement; Value Agenda; Strategy; Health Care Industry; Health; Health Care and Treatment; Health Disorders; Health Industry; Sweden

May 2023
Case

CMA CGM: Reducing the Carbon Footprint of Container Shipping

By: Willy C. Shih and Emilie Billaud

Marine transport is the most cost-effective way to move large volumes over long distances, and container shipping is the backbone of international trade in goods. Yet shipping contributed 3% of worldwide greenhouse gas emissions, and the deep-sea segment, which... View Details

Keywords: Container Shipping; Logistic Regression; Trade Links; Decarbonization; Environmental Strategies; Environmental Impact; Globalization; Trade; Environmental Regulation; Logistics; Supply Chain; Governance Compliance; Shipping Industry; European Union; Asia; North America

29 Aug 2018
What Do You Think?

What Should Harley-Davidson’s Management Do?

company executives, who “biked” there on their own machines. Executives and employees alike shared a devotion to motorcycle culture. Its outlook was improved by the 2017 tax cut that would have reduced its tax bill by $80 to $90 million.... View Details

Keywords: by James Heskett; Auto

June 2024
Case

Building Innovation at VINCI

By: Dennis Campbell, Aluna Wang and Carlota Moniz

This case study explores how the VINCI Group, a French multinational operating in concessions, energy, and construction, bolstered awareness and adoption rates of new technologies within the organization. Through its separate innovation hub, Leonard, VINCI aimed to... View Details

February 2023 (Revised February 2025)
Case

Doing Business in Nairobi, Kenya

By: Archie L. Jones, Leonard A. Schlesinger, Pippa Tubman Armerding and Kuria Kamau

This case examines the challenges and opportunities of doing business in Nairobi, Kenya. It highlights Kenya's economic transformation in the decades leading up to 2024 in the context of its history, culture, and politics. The case gives an overview of some of the main... View Details

Keywords: Business History; Business and Government Relations; Technological Innovation; Foreign Direct Investment; Economic Growth; Financial Crisis; Apparel and Accessories Industry; Consumer Products Industry; Fashion Industry; Manufacturing Industry; Retail Industry; Kenya; Nairobi; Africa

September 2013
Case

Boeing 787: More Electric Architecture

By: Willy Shih

The "more electric architecture" of the Boeing 787 Dreamliner represented a significant shift in the design of secondary power systems for commercial aircraft, compared to traditional designs that employed a mix of hydraulic, pneumatic, and electrical power. While the... View Details

Keywords: Boeing; 787; Airbus; A350XWB; Architectural Innovation; Technological Substitution; Technological Innovation; Vertical Integration; Air Transportation; Aerospace Industry; United States