Publications

SSRN

January 2013 (Revised June 2018)
Case

Amazon, Apple, Facebook, and Google 2018

By: John Deighton and Leora Kornfeld

Four businesses had, by 2012, grown to dominate the infrastructure that all firms rely on to reach online customers. Will the balance of power among the four persist, will one take command at the expense of the other three, or are all four more vulnerable than they... View Details

Keywords: Internet and the Web; Competitive Advantage; Infrastructure; Mobile and Wireless Technology; Growth and Development; Service Industry; Retail Industry; United States

December 2022 (Revised June 2023)
Case

Hacking the U.S. Election: Russia's Misinformation Campaign

By: Shikhar Ghosh

The case discusses the relatively low technology approach used by Russia to influence the U.S. Presidential Election in 2016. Although political parties manipulating the media was not a new phenomenon, the Russians ran a broad, well-financed, and sophisticated social... View Details

Keywords: Political Elections; International Relations; Social Media; Power and Influence; Information; Russia; United States

29 Oct 2020
Blog Post

Delving Deeper into Development with the MBA/MPA-ID Program – a Q+A with Zainab Raji (MBA/MPA-ID 2022)

attend college at Emory University in Atlanta, GA, and I enjoyed the mix of the liberal arts, inquiry-based learning, and specialized accounting & information systems instruction. What were you doing before grad school and what led... View Details

April 2022
Case

Mastercard: Creating a World Beyond Cash

By: Sunil Gupta, Linda A. Hill, Julia Kelley and Emily Tedards

In late 2021, Mastercard CEO Michael Miebach and Chairman and former CEO Ajaypal “Ajay” Banga considered how Mastercard could best position itself for continued success in the years to come. Since Mastercard’s initial public offering in 2006, the company had grown and... View Details

01 Oct 2021
News

Fostering Diversity

believe is crucial to society. “You need to invest in the pipeline in order for things to change,” says Victoria, an independent consultant focused on health care and technology. “We believe that we need more diversity—race, gender,... View Details

03 Dec 2020
Research & Ideas

Cut Payroll Costs with Transparency, Fairness, and Compassion

the 2018-19 shutdown) organizations. Some firms with seasonal business, such as landscaping companies, use furloughs regularly. Furloughed workers generally keep their benefits, such as health insurance, but are still eligible to file for... View Details

Keywords: by Boris Groysberg and Sarah Abbott

Summer 2024
Article

The Business Revolution: Economy-Wide Impacts of Artificial Intelligence and Digital Platforms

By: Hanna Halaburda, Jeffrey Prince, D. Daniel Sokol and Feng Zhu

In this essay, we identify several themes of the digital business transformation, with a particular focus on the economy-wide impacts of artificial intelligence and digital platforms. In doing so, we highlight specific industries, beyond just the high-profile “Big... View Details

Keywords: Digital Transformation; Digital Platforms; AI and Machine Learning

Read Now

10 Jan 2022
Research & Ideas

How to Get Companies to Make Investments That Benefit Everyone

learning more advanced coding. Build shared platforms like the United Nations Development Programme’s Accelerator Labs. This network of small teams exchange information to combat a range of problems, from food shortages in Zimbabwe to... View Details

Keywords: by Lane Lambert

March 2023 (Revised March 2024)
Case

Accelerating AI Adoption in the U.S. Air Force

By: Maria P. Roche and Alexander Farrow

In August 2022, the Pentagon tasked U.S. Air Force Captain Victor Lopez to launch a new office for AFWERX, an Air Force innovation unit that leveraged commercial developers and military talent to acquire advanced technologies. This task was particularly arduous because... View Details

Keywords: Technological Innovation; Organizational Design; AI and Machine Learning; Adoption; Technology Adoption; United States

September 2023 (Revised July 2024)
Case

Honest Jobs: A Path to Redemption

By: Paul A. Gompers and Jeffrey Barkas

Founded by a formerly incarcerated job seeker, Honest Jobs' mission is to be the hub where people with criminal records come to build careers and employers come to find great talent. Honest Jobs faced early challenges as a two-sided platform for justice-involved job... View Details

Keywords: Business Startups; Venture Capital; Recruitment; Entrepreneurial Finance; Selection and Staffing; Digital Platforms; Job Search; Mission and Purpose; Expansion; Employment Industry; United States; Colorado; Ohio; Texas

28 Mar 2012
What Do You Think?

Are Factory Jobs Important to the Economy?

Summing Up: What Next, If Manufacturing Proves Not To Be A Creator Of Those Good "factory Jobs" Of The Past? Manufacturing is essential to the health of an economy. It both fuels and results from innovation. It is natural in the course of... View Details

Keywords: by James Heskett; Manufacturing

24 May 2017
News

Ilene H. Lang, MBA 1973

valued not just because of how they are alike but of how they are different.” During her 10 years leading Catalyst, Lang pushed the organization to expand globally, fortified its endowment, invested in information View Details

Keywords: Susan Young

30 May 2023
News

Finding PRIDE

Edited by Jen McFarland Flint; Illustrations by Anthony Gerace In the late 1970s, a dozen or so gay men found one another at HBS and decided to band together, calling themselves the Alternative Executive Lifestyles group. They posted notices around campus, discreetly... View Details

Keywords: Colleges, Universities, and Professional Schools; Educational Services

1988
Book

In the Age of the Smart Machine: The Future of Work and Power

By: S. Zuboff

Keywords: Power and Influence; Information Technology

Find at Harvard

August 2023
Case

Reimagining Hindustan Unilever (A)

By: Sunil Gupta and Rachna Tahilyani

In the fall of 2019, the CEO and MD of Hindustan Unilever (HUL), India’s largest fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) firm, is wondering what to do about their experiments to digitize distribution. Despite three years of intense efforts, their apps to empower retailers... View Details

Keywords: Experimentation; Digital Transformation; Digital Strategy; Leading Change; Distribution; Decisions; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Consumer Behavior; E-commerce; Competition; Performance; Business Strategy; Marketing; Transformation; Consumer Products Industry; Asia; India