Publications

January 2017 (Revised March 2017)
Case

IBM Transforming, 2012–2016: Ginni Rometty Steers Watson

By: Rosabeth Moss Kanter and Jonathan Cohen

To transform IBM for the next technology wave, Ginni Rometty, who became CEO in 2012, led divestment of declining businesses, made acquisitions in digital innovation and cloud computing, formed partnerships with former competitors such as Apple and tech startups, and... View Details

Keywords: Digital; Technological Change; Artificial Intelligence; Data; IBM; Watson; Internet Of Things; Innovation and Invention; Management; Sales; Information Technology; Technological Innovation; Transformation; AI and Machine Learning

December 1999 (Revised May 2002)
Case

CNBC (A): NBC and Its Startup Friends

By: Rosabeth M. Kanter

NBC expands further on to the Internet with CNBC.com. NBC's Internet strategy, supported by corporate parent General Electric, involves numerous investments as well as new ventures like CNBC.com. Soon after CNBC.com is launched in 1999, NBC brings in a new CEO, Pamela... View Details

Keywords: Business Startups; Change Management; Management Teams; Corporate Strategy; Leadership Development; Internet and the Web; Expansion; Media; Media and Broadcasting Industry; Telecommunications Industry

Find at Harvard

September 1989 (Revised April 1990)
Case

Banc One Corp.--1989

By: Rosabeth M. Kanter

Banc One Corp., an innovative and financially successful super-regional bank holding company, has a track record of upgrading performance of acquisitions while retaining previous management--doing better with the same people. In June 1989 Banc One made its first... View Details

Keywords: Business Growth and Maturation; Banks and Banking; Private Ownership; Human Resources; Mergers and Acquisitions; Performance Evaluation; Management Teams; Banking Industry; United States

2011
Working Paper

The Institutional Logic of Great Global Firms

By: Rosabeth Moss Kanter

Theories of the firm have been dominated by a legacy of ideas from early industrialization that pose zero-sum opposition between capital and labor (or capital and nearly everything else), differentiating the economy from society and often posing irreconcilable... View Details

Keywords: Economy; Capital; Globalized Firms and Management; Labor; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Practice; Conflict of Interests; Social Issues; Theory

Read Now

November 2012 (Revised June 2013)
Case

The Levees Repaired, a System Still Broken: Post Katrina Turnaround at the Orleans Public Defenders (A)

By: Rosabeth M. Kanter and Olivia Leskinen

Law Professor Ronald Sullivan was asked to lead a turnaround of the Orleans Public Defenders as a one-year assignment following Hurricane Katrina in 2005. The office was underfunded and had perverse incentives embedded throughout the system. Sullivan's new vision to... View Details

Keywords: Innovation; Management; New Orleans

01 Oct 1997
News

Theory & Practice

the ways in which game theory can help explain actual patterns of interaction. Rosabeth Moss Kanter on the Frontiers of Management by View Details

01 Feb 2001
News

Books

Evolve! Succeeding in the Digital Culture of Tomorrow by Rosabeth Moss Kanter (Harvard Business School Press) In her new book Evolve!: Succeeding... View Details

Keywords: books; research; Publishing Industries (except Internet); Information

January 1996 (Revised December 2005)
Case

First Community Bank (A)

By: Rosabeth M. Kanter

First Community Bank, a bank-within-a-bank at Bank of Boston, was established in 1990 as a unique venture to serve urban communities. By 1995 it has achieved profitability but must manage relationships with the mainstream at Bank of Boston, serve as a change agent and... View Details

Keywords: Banks and Banking; Business Ventures; Business and Community Relations; Agency Theory; Change Management; Leadership; Balanced Scorecard; Mission and Purpose; Organizational Structure; Problems and Challenges; Banking Industry; Boston

September 2013 (Revised June 2017)
Supplement

IBM and the Reinvention of High School (B): Replicating & Scaling P-TECH and Partners

By: Rosabeth Moss Kanter and Ai-Ling Jamila Malone

IBM's Corporate Citizenship office created an innovation in public education through a business-school partnership for widespread replication and diffusion. In 2012, while P-TECH (Pathways in Technology Early College High School) was still in its first year operating,... View Details

Keywords: Social Enterprise; Partnerships; Innovation; Entrepreneurship; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Leadership; Partners and Partnerships; Social Entrepreneurship; Education; Business and Community Relations; Innovation and Invention; Growth Management; Chicago; Idaho

December 2011 (Revised January 2012)
Supplement

Pierre Frankel in Moscow (B): Plowing Ahead

By: Rosabeth Moss Kanter and Matthew Bird

After several months into his turnaround of a global technology company's Russia subsidiary, a young and upcoming French executive reflected on how to institutionalize the subsidiary's transformation by further driving cultural change and breaking down internal silos.... View Details

Keywords: Organizational Change and Adaptation; Organizational Culture; Organizational Structure; Business Subsidiaries; Leadership; Manufacturing Industry; Russia

May 2025
Teaching Note

Bridj and the Business of Urban Mobility (B): A New Model in Kansas City

By: Rosabeth Moss Kanter and Jonathan Cohen

This Teaching Note helps instructors teach students the HBS Case, Bridj and the Business of Urban Mobility (B): A New Model in Kansas City. In late 2016, Bridj was expanding its digital platform to help address urban mobility problems faced by cities across the country... View Details

Keywords: App Development; Innovation; Stakeholder Engagement; Collaboration; Ride-sharing; Entrenchment; Digital; Transportation; Urban Development; Disruption; Business Startups; Digital Platforms; Growth and Development Strategy; Business and Stakeholder Relations; Partners and Partnerships; Expansion

Web

Research - Health Care

and Management Regina E. Herzlinger General Management Leslie K. John Negotiation, Organizations & Markets Rosabeth M. Kanter General Management Robert S. Kaplan Tarun Khanna Strategy Karim R. Lakhani... View Details

01 Jun 2014
News

Roads to Recovery

Professor Rosabeth Moss Kanter organized a two-day conference titled "America on the Move: Transportation and Infrastructure for the 21st Century," held at HBS in February. To... View Details

Keywords: Garry Emmons; Transportation; Heavy and Civil Engineering Construction; Construction; Administration of Housing Programs, Urban Planning, and Community Development; Government

03 Nov 2009
First Look

First Look: Nov. 3

http://cb.hbsp.harvard.edu/cb/product/109079-PDF-ENG IBM in the 21st Century: The Coming of the Globally Integrated Enterprise Rosabeth Moss KanterHarvard Business School Case 308-105 Members of IBM's fifth... View Details

Keywords: Martha Lagace

Web

Social Enterprise - Faculty & Research

Norway ; Europe Citation Educators Purchase Related Kaps, Christian, and Michael W. Toffel. "Hurtigruten: Sea Zero." Harvard Business School Case 625-100, March 2025. More Publications Faculty V. Kasturi Rangan George Serafeim Michael W. Toffel View Details

October 1998
Background Note

Welfare-to-Work Information and Statistics

By: Rosabeth M. Kanter and Ellen Pruyne

Summarizes information on the national issue of hiring people from the welfare roles. Organized by topics relevant to business, this note reviews research findings and statistics and poses questions to assist business decision-makers in assessing a company's current or... View Details

Keywords: Decision Choices and Conditions; Recruitment; Risk Management; Planning; Programs; Research; Welfare

24 Jun 2008
First Look

First Look: June 24, 2008

into asset prices. Position and Emotion: The Significance of Georg Simmel's Structural Theories for Leadership and Organizational Behavior Authors: Rosabeth Moss Kanter and... View Details

Keywords: Martha Lagace

12 Jun 2012
First Look

First Look: June 12

largest shocks in the history of the U.S. banking system. Download the paper: http://www.hbs.edu/research/pdf/12-106.pdf Cases & Course MaterialsPiramal e-Swasthya: Attempting Big Changes for Small Places-in India and Beyond View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

November 2000 (Revised December 2001)
Case

iSteelAsia (A)

By: Rosabeth M. Kanter and Pamela A. Yatsko

The chairman of a Hong Kong-based steel distributor starts an online Asian steel trading portal and contemplates different paths to profitability and growth. Barriers include industrial culture, weakened markets in the spring of 2000, and vulnerability to takeover by... View Details

Keywords: Commercialization; Distribution Channels; Business Growth and Maturation; Horizontal Integration; Transformation; Corporate Strategy; Business Strategy; Mergers and Acquisitions; Steel Industry; Hong Kong