Publications

April 2024 (Revised November 2024)
Case

Moderna: Pioneering a People Platform to Accelerate Science Innovation

By: Tatiana Sandino, Emil Dy and Samuel Grad

Moderna was founded in 2010 to explore how messenger ribonucleic acid (mRNA) could be used to create breakthrough medicines by encoding instructions for the body to create antibodies. When Stéphane Bancel (HBS 2000) took over in 2011, he bet on the potential of this... View Details

Keywords: Disruptive Innovation; Talent and Talent Management; Selection and Staffing; AI and Machine Learning; Digital Strategy; Innovation and Management; Leadership Development; Management Practices and Processes; Management Systems; Organizational Culture; Performance Evaluation; Alignment; Employee Relationship Management; Science-Based Business; Expansion; Pharmaceutical Industry; Biotechnology Industry; United States

August 2023
Article

Explaining Machine Learning Models with Interactive Natural Language Conversations Using TalkToModel

By: Dylan Slack, Satyapriya Krishna, Himabindu Lakkaraju and Sameer Singh

Practitioners increasingly use machine learning (ML) models, yet models have become more complex and harder to understand. To understand complex models, researchers have proposed techniques to explain model predictions. However, practitioners struggle to use... View Details

Keywords: AI and Machine Learning; Technological Innovation; Technology Adoption

Article

Agility Hacks

By: Amy C. Edmondson and Ranjay Gulati

In the past 20 years, the agile approach to improving products, services, and processes has swept the business world. Rooted in software development, agile has spread to many other functions, and some companies have turned much of their organization, including the... View Details

Keywords: Agile Practices; Agile Project Management; Projects; Management Practices and Processes; Groups and Teams; Innovation Strategy

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February 28, 2020
Article

How Tesla Sets Itself Apart

By: Lou Shipley

Tesla and its flamboyant, and sometimes erratic, innovator Elon Musk have turned the more than a century old industry upside down in a mere 16 years. Traditional automakers are ill prepared to compete in today’s software-centered world. Unlike nimble Tesla, they are... View Details

Keywords: Strategy; Information Technology; Transportation; Business Model; Technological Innovation; Disruption; Auto Industry

February 2020
Teaching Note

Ariadne Labs: Building Impactful Partnerships

By: Ariel D. Stern and Sarah Mehta

Teaching Note for HBS No. 619-017. View Details

Keywords: Health; Health Care and Treatment; Innovation and Invention; Social Enterprise; Nonprofit Organizations; Health Industry; Boston

September 2013 (Revised June 2017)
Case

IBM and the Reinvention of High School (A): Proving the P-TECH Concept

By: Rosabeth Moss Kanter and Ai-Ling Jamila Malone

IBM's Corporate Citizenship office created a social and organizational innovation in public education through a business-school partnership. IBM's Stanley Litow was the key architect in designing Pathways in Technology Early College High School, known as P-TECH. The... View Details

Keywords: Innovation; Partnerships; Leadership; Partners and Partnerships; Education; Business and Community Relations; Change; Innovation and Invention; Education Industry

Winter 2012
Article

South Sudan: The Birth of an Economy

By: Eric D. Werker, Kelly Wyett and Shannon Ding

We discuss the birth of a new economy in a society that has only recently emerged from a 22-year-long civil war. The pace of growth so far has been fast but uneven. We find that aid and oil money are flowing rapidly into certain sectors, while other... View Details

Keywords: Sudan; Developing Markets; Foreign Aid; Conflict; Oil Prices; Private Sector Development; Emerging Markets; Policy; Developing Countries and Economies; Innovation and Invention; South Sudan

June 2011
Teaching Note

Zespri (TN)

By: Jose B. Alvarez and Mary Shelman

Teaching Note for 511001. View Details

Keywords: Competition; Brands and Branding; Innovation and Invention; Corporate Strategy; Patents; Food and Beverage Industry; Australia; New Zealand

June 2010
Teaching Note

Design Thinking and Innovation at Apple (TN)

By: Stefan H. Thomke

Teaching Note for 609066. View Details

Keywords: Product Development; Strategy; Product Design; Innovation and Management; Computer Industry; Electronics Industry

December 2010
Article

An Exploration of Technology Diffusion

By: Diego Comin and Bart Hobijn

We develop a model that, at the aggregate level, is similar to the one sector neoclassical growth model, while, at the disaggregate level, has implications for the path of observable measures of technology adoption. We estimate our model using data on the diffusion of... View Details

Keywords: Business Model; Income; Technology Adoption; Macroeconomics; Innovation and Invention

January 2001 (Revised February 2002)
Case

Rambus, Inc.: Commercializing the Billion Dollar Idea

Rambus, Inc. was founded to develop a new type of high-speed memory chip technology to enable DRAMs to keep up with ever-faster microprocessors. After developing the technology, Rambus chose an unusual licensing approach to commercialize it. This case focuses on the... View Details

Keywords: Technological Innovation; Competition; Commercialization; Information Infrastructure; Cooperation; Technology Industry

July 2000 (Revised April 2011)
Case

Greeley Hard Copy, Portable Scanner Initiative (A)

By: Michael L. Tushman and Daniel Radov

Hewlett-Packard's Greeley Hard Copy Division is the market leader in the production of desktop flatbed scanners for personal computers. The division has been working to develop a portable scanner product for the past five years with mixed results. The new general... View Details

Keywords: Technological Innovation; Leading Change; Product Development; Organizational Structure; Hardware; Technology Industry

February 1997 (Revised April 1998)
Case

first direct (A)

By: Jeffrey F. Rayport

Describes the operations and strategy of the world's largest, fastest growing branchless bank. Using a person-to-person interface over conventional phone lines, First Direct provides standard banking and related financial products to nearly 700,000 customers throughout... View Details

Keywords: Service Delivery; Customer Satisfaction; Banks and Banking; Innovation and Invention; Banking Industry; United Kingdom

September 1995 (Revised December 2018)
Case

Managing Innovation at Nypro, Inc. (A)

By: Clayton M. Christensen and Rebecca Voorheis

Nypro is the world's leading injection molder of precision plastic parts, operating a global network of 21 plants. Nypro's strategy is for each plant to offer identical capabilities, because its customers are global companies with worldwide sourcing needs. The case... View Details

Keywords: Globalized Firms and Management; Innovation and Management; Operations; Performance Consistency; Manufacturing Industry

September 1998 (Revised September 2001)
Case

IBM's Reinventing Education (A)

By: Rosabeth M. Kanter

Describes IBM's national innovation strategy to transform K-12 public education through new solutions developed by IBM engineers and consultants using information technology. Examples are: data warehousing in Broward County, FL schools, tracking software for the... View Details

Keywords: Social Enterprise; Innovation Strategy; Information Technology; Education; Business and Community Relations; Information Technology Industry; Education Industry; San Jose; Philadelphia; Ohio; Florida

August 2002
Article

Creativity Under the Gun

By: Teresa Amabile, Constance N. Hadley and Steven J. Kramer

If you're like most managers, you've worked with people who swear they do their most creative work under tight deadlines. You may use pressure as a management technique, believing it will spur people on to great leaps of insight. You may even manage yourself this way.... View Details

Keywords: Creativity; Innovation and Invention; Time Management; Working Conditions; Performance Evaluation