Publications

31 Aug 2021
Book

Feeling Powerless at Work? Time to Agitate, Innovate, and Orchestrate

positions of power. “If the balance of power is out of whack, it can lead to heightened tension and problems,” Battilana says. “It can become a crisis of inequities and can lead to political and social confrontation.” What’s the key to View Details

Keywords: by Jay Fitzgerald

01 Feb 2022
Book

Innovation Isn’t Just for Startups: How Big Companies Can Succeed

successful is first, you need enough structural separation. You do need the CEO and senior team connected, but you also need an individual leader who is able to be a change leader. You are not given the... View Details

Keywords: by Lane Lambert

April 2020 (Revised October 2020)
Case

Unilever's Response to the Future of Work

By: William R. Kerr, Emilie Billaud and Mette Fuglsang Hjortshoej

In February 2020, Nick Dalton, executive vice president HR business transformation at Unilever, reflected on the changing nature of work marked by rapid advances in artificial intelligence, machine learning, and automation. Launched in 2016, Unilever’s Future of Work... View Details

Keywords: Change Management; Human Capital; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Mission and Purpose; Organizational Structure; Transformation; Human Resources; Consumer Products Industry; Europe

12 Jan 2011
Working Paper Summaries

Modularity for Value Appropriation--How to Draw the Boundaries of Intellectual Property

Keywords: by Carliss Y. Baldwin & Joachim Henkel

March 1999
Case

City of Charlotte (B)

By: Robert S. Kaplan

This case shows how two operating departments-transportation and police-translate the high-level corporate scorecard for the city into departmental balanced scorecards. The transportation department follows a highly structured approach designed to link initiatives... View Details

Keywords: Crime and Corruption; Global Strategy; National Security; Balanced Scorecard; Organizational Design; Technology Adoption; Public Administration Industry; Transportation Industry

Article

Culture Is Not the Culprit: When Organizations Are in Crisis, It's Usually Because the Business Is Broken

By: Jay W. Lorsch and Emily McTague

When organizations get into big trouble, fixing the culture is usually the prescription. That's what most everyone said GM needed to do after its recall crisis in 2014—and ever since, CEO Mary Barra has been focusing on creating "the right environment" to promote... View Details

Keywords: Culture; Cultural Reform; Organizational Culture; Crisis Management; Business Processes

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2006
Working Paper

Future Lock-In: Future Implementation Increases Selection of 'Should' Choices

By: Todd Rogers and Max H. Bazerman

People often experience tension over certain choices (e.g., they should reduce their gas consumption or increase their savings, but they do not want to). Some posit that this tension arises from the competing interests of a deliberative "should" self and... View Details

Keywords: Decision Choices and Conditions; Attitudes; Conflict and Resolution; Cognition and Thinking

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March 2011
Case

Semiconductor Manufacturing International Company in 2011

By: Willy Shih and Jia Cheng

When David Wang took over as the CEO of SMIC, he knew that if he was to capitalize on the company's strategic location in the China market, he would have to transform the company mindset and its operating structure from its roots in the manufacturing of DRAMs to the... View Details

Keywords: Growth and Development Strategy; Resource Allocation; Market Entry and Exit; Business Processes; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Organizational Culture; Customization and Personalization; Semiconductor Industry; China

April 2023 (Revised September 2023)
Case

Levels: The Remote, Asynchronous, Deep Work Management System

By: Joseph B. Fuller and George Gonzalez

Levels is a highly innovative startup in the health care space. They intend to revolutionize health by linking behavior—eating, exercise, sleeping, etc.—to changes in metabolism. They believe metabolic health can be managed through careful monitoring of changes in... View Details

Keywords: Applications and Software; Business Startups; Organizational Culture; Management Style; Technology Industry; United States

1998
Case

Nucor Corporation (A)

By: Vijay Govindarajan

Under the leadership of CEO Ken Iverson, Nucor thrived. Nucor's structure was decentralized, with only four management layers. Only 22 employees worked at the corporate headquarters; plants were located in rural areas across the U.S. and the general manager of each... View Details

Keywords: Organizational Change and Adaptation; Organizational Structure; Business Strategy

May 2008
Journal Article

Future Lock-in: Future Implementation Increases Selection of 'Should' Choices

By: Todd Rogers and Max Bazerman

People often experience tension over certain choices (e.g., they should reduce their gas consumption or increase their savings, but they do not want to). Some posit that this tension arises from the competing interests of a deliberative “should” self and an affective... View Details

Keywords: Decision Choices and Conditions; Research; Behavior; Conflict of Interests

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December 2024
Article

Are Bankruptcy Professional Fees Excessively High?

By: Samuel Antill

Chapter 7 is the most popular bankruptcy system for U.S. firms and individuals. Chapter 7 professional fees are substantial. Theoretically, high fees might be an unavoidable cost of incentivizing professionals. I test this empirically. I study trustees, the most... View Details

Keywords: Insolvency and Bankruptcy; Motivation and Incentives; Policy

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

July 2020
Case

Driving Transformation at the Majid Al Futtaim Group

By: Suraj Srinivasan and Esel Çekin

The case opens with Alain Bejjani, CEO of Majid Al Futtaim (MAF) Holding, anticipating on the Group’s next phase in the multi-year transformation journey and reflecting on the initiatives he implemented to create the Group’s growth-oriented culture. Founded in 1995,... View Details

Keywords: Transformation; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Organizational Culture; Growth and Development Strategy; Retail Industry; United Arab Emirates; Middle East; Dubai

Research Summary

Game Theory for Business Strategy

Game theory--the mathematical study of strategic interactions--came of age, in a sense, when three of the field's pioneers were awarded the Nobel Prize in Economics in 1994. Yet despite the development of the theory and the widespread use of game-theoretic jargon in... View Details

2018
Working Paper

Corporate Refinancing, Covenants, and the Agency Cost of Debt

By: Daniel Green

How valuable are restrictive debt covenants in reducing the agency costs of debt? I exploit the revealed preference decision to refinance fixed-coupon bonds, which weighs observable interest rate savings against the unobservable costs of a change in restrictive... View Details

Keywords: Covenants; Refinancing; Corporate Bonds; Agency Costs; Debt Policy; Borrowing and Debt; Bonds; Interest Rates