Publications
Publications
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- Faculty Publications (712)
- 2017
- Supplement
Uncommon Schools (B): Seeking Excellence at Scale through Standardized Practice
By: John J-H Kim and Sarah McAra
The (B) case provides an update to the (A) case by illustrating how charter school management organization Uncommon Schools responded to the disparity in its students’ 2013 standardized test results. In 2015, CEO Brett Peiser and his management team decided to align... View Details
Keywords: Charter Schools; Nonprofit Organizations; Strategy; Teaching; Talent And Talent Management; Innovation; Education; Early Childhood Education; Middle School Education; Organizational Structure; Performance Consistency; Growth and Development Strategy; Innovation and Invention; Education Industry
- February 2017 (Revised April 2018)
- Case
Kameda Seika: Cracking the U.S. Market
By: Elie Ofek, Nobuo Sato and Akiko Kanno
In spring 2016, Kameda’s CEO, Michiyasu Tanaka, is facing difficult questions from board members over the lackluster performance of the company’s U.S. subsidiary. Kameda was the leading player in the Japanese rice cracker market and was looking to expand overseas to... View Details
- December 2016 (Revised May 2018)
- Module Note
Strategy Execution Module 15: Using the Levers of Control to Implement Strategy
By: Robert Simons
This module reading pulls together key concepts and techniques from the Strategy Execution series into an integrated model—the levers of control. The four levers are: (1) belief systems, (2) boundary systems, (3) diagnostic control systems, and (4) interactive control... View Details
Keywords: Management Control Systems; Implementing Strategy; Execution; Levers Of Control; Balancing Innovation And Control; Managing Growing Businesses; Turn Around Management; Human Behavior; Organizational Life Cycle; Strategy; Management Systems; Performance; Measurement and Metrics; Management Analysis, Tools, and Techniques; Behavior
- December 2016
- Article
Industry Window Dressing
By: Huaizhi Chen, Lauren Cohen and Dong Lou
We explore a new mechanism by which investors take correlated shortcuts and present evidence that managers undertake actions—in the form of sales management—to take advantage of these shortcuts. Specifically, we exploit a regulatory provision wherein a firm’s primary... View Details
- November 2016 (Revised February 2017)
- Case
BrightStar Care: The Evolution of a Leadership Team
By: Boris Groysberg, Colleen Ammerman and John D. Vaughan
BrightStar Care was a rapidly growing franchise of home health care agencies. Founded by husband and wife team JD and Shelly Sun as a single agency near Chicago in 2002, BrightStar had opened nearly 300 franchises across the United States by 2016, generating over $300... View Details
Keywords: Health Care Services; Entrepreneurs; Board Of Directors; Boards Of Directors; Health Care Industry; Growth Strategy; Organizational Change; Brand Positioning; Entrepreneurial Organizations; Entrepreneurial Management; Franchising; Family-owned Business; Home Health Care; Managing Growth; Management Styles; Organizational Development; Talent Management; Women Executives; Women And Leadership; Business Startups; Family Business; Small Business; Talent and Talent Management; Governing and Advisory Boards; Health Care and Treatment; Human Capital; Leadership Development; Leadership Style; Business or Company Management; Growth and Development Strategy; Management Analysis, Tools, and Techniques; Management Skills; Management Style; Management Succession; Management Systems; Management Teams; Brands and Branding; Marketing Strategy; Strategy
- November 2016 (Revised December 2016)
- Module Note
Strategy Execution Module 12: Aligning Performance Goals and Incentives
By: Robert Simons
This module reading explains how managers use performance goals and incentives to ensure that employee actions align with the overall business strategy of the organization. The module begins by discussing how managers use goals to communicate business strategy, the... View Details
- November 2016
- Case
QuintilesIMS: Biosimilar Marketing in England
By: John A. Quelch and Emily C. Boudreau
QuintilesIMS was a leading healthcare consulting firm best known for its data and information offerings as well as its market research and management consulting services for life science companies. By 2015, the company was expanding beyond the biopharmaceutical... View Details
- October 2016
- Case
Supercell
By: William R. Kerr, Benjamin F. Jones and Alexis Brownell
Supercell is a young Finnish smartphone game company with an unusual team structure and company philosophy. It is already one of Finland’s most valuable companies, and despite being only six years old, it has put up some impressive numbers: as of 2016, it has released... View Details
- October 2016 (Revised January 2018)
- Case
BlackRock (A): Selling the Systems?
By: Ranjay Gulati, Jan W. Rivkin and Kelly McNamara
As the case opens in 1999, several key leaders at BlackRock, Inc., then a relatively small asset management firm, are trying to convince CEO Larry Fink and others that the firm should begin to offer Aladdin—its proprietary analytics and trading platform—to other asset... View Details
- October 2016 (Revised February 2019)
- Module Note
Strategy Execution Module 5: Building a Profit Plan
By: Robert Simons
This module reading describes how to build a profit plan to reflect the strategy of a business in economic terms. After introducing the profit wheel, cash wheel, and ROE wheel, the module illustrates how to use a profit plan to assess the viability of different... View Details
Keywords: Management Control Systems; Implementing Strategy; Execution; Profit Planning; Cash Flow Analysis; Asset Utilization; Return On Equity; Business Planning; Testing Strategy; Analyzing Strategic Alternative; Strategy; Asset Management; Cash Flow; Investment Return; Management Systems; Profit
- October 2016 (Revised July 2017)
- Case
The Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra: Cultural Entrepreneurship
By: Rohit Deshpande and Annelena Lobb
The Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra (LA Phil), under the leadership of Deborah Borda, had enjoyed great successes in the 2000s and 2010s, even as other U.S. orchestras faltered. The architecturally acclaimed Walt Disney Concert Hall had opened its doors. The... View Details
- September 2016 (Revised May 2018)
- Case
Zurich Insurance: Diversity and Inclusion
By: Boris Groysberg and Katherine Connolly
Zurich Insurance was undergoing organizational change after implementing five new people practices focused on manager development, diversity and inclusion, job model and data analytics, recruitment, and talent pipeline. The case “Zurich Insurance: Fostering Key People... View Details
- September 2016
- Case
Hewlett Packard Enterprise: The Dandelion Program
By: Gary P. Pisano and Robert D. Austin
This case describes Hewlett Packard Enterprise’s “Dandelion Program," which has developed a new service offering for the company’s clients by drawing on the special talents of people with autism. The company has deployed “pods” organized around 8 or 9 employees with... View Details
- September 2016 (Revised February 2017)
- Case
Angie's List: Ratings Pioneer Turns 20
By: Robert J. Dolan and Ayelet Israeli
In 1995, before people “googled” or “yelped,” Angela Hicks (HBS, 2000) was establishing her Angie’s List as a pioneer in the accumulation and dissemination of consumer rating information. Hicks focused on the home repair and maintenance market and, as she put it,... View Details
Keywords: Pricing; Pricing Strategy; Services; Product Line Management; Growth; Conjoint Analysis; Market Research; Freemium; Growth Strategy; Two Sided Markets; Ecommerce; Platform; Platform Business; Platform Businesses; Platform Strategy; Platforms; Platforms And Ecosystems; Business Model; Internet and the Web; Business Growth and Maturation; Growth and Development Strategy; Price; Strategy; Digital Platforms; E-commerce; Service Industry; United States
- September 2016 (Revised March 2017)
- Module Note
Strategy Execution Module 3: Using Information for Performance Measurement and Control
By: Robert Simons
This module reading explains how managers use information to control critical business processes and outcomes. The analysis begins by illustrating how managers use information to communicate goals and track performance. Then the focus turns to the choices that managers... View Details
- August 2016
- Supplement
CEO Succession at Cisco (B): Announcement Strategy
By: Boris Groysberg, J. Yo-Jud Cheng and Annelena Lobb
Supplements the (A) case (417-031).
This case supplement describes Cisco’s communications strategy around the CEO announcement, which focused on controlling the narrative and avoiding leaks. The strategy included both internal and external processes aimed at... View Details
- August 2016
- Case
CSI Ingenieros
By: Jay Lorsch and Emily McTague
CSI's business unit managers gathered around the downstairs conference room for the company's weekly meeting to discuss project bids. Cristina WaldAshley Hartman, who was in charge of finding projects for the engineering firm to work on, read through several she had... View Details
Keywords: Corporate Governance; Board; Board Committees; Board Dynamics; Organization; Organization Alignment; Dynamic Capabilities; Organization Design; Organizational Prototyping; Organizational Silence; Organizational Learning; Organization Behavior; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Organizational Culture; Manufacturing Industry; South America; Uruguay
- August 2016
- Case
Building Smart Neighborhoods at Bouygues
By: Amy C. Edmondson, Bertrand Moingeon, Guo Bai and Jean-François Harvey
Can a consortium of 16 organizations, including multinational corporations, local government agencies, and startups, turn a rundown Paris suburb into a “smart” (ecologically viable, high-tech, livable) neighborhood? This case explores how Bouygues Immobilier led such a... View Details
Keywords: Collaboration; Teaming; Cross-industry Collaboration; Interorganizatonal Relationships; Innovation; Nascent Industries; Smart Cities; Governance; Collaborative Innovation and Invention; Innovation and Management; Innovation Strategy; Technological Innovation; Information Technology Industry; Construction Industry; Paris; France
- August 2016
- Article
Independent Directors' Dissent on Boards: Evidence from Listed Companies in China
By: Juan Ma and Tarun Khanna
In this paper, we examine the circumstances under which so-called "independent" directors voice their independent views on public boards in a sample of Chinese firms. First, we ask why independent directors dissent, i.e. how they justify such dissent to public... View Details
- July 2016 (Revised October 2016)
- Case
Entrepreneurial Sales and Marketing Vignettes
By: Mark Roberge and Frank Cespedes
Which sales candidate is a startup’s ideal first hire? What marketing channels are best to invest in? How aggressively should an executive team align sales with customer success? Early stage founders, sales leaders, and marketing executives often face one, and... View Details