Publications

March 1991 (Revised July 1993)
Case

Kyocera Corp.

By: John P. Kotter

Examines the three factors critical to this company's remarkable success in the high tech field. The first factor is the founder, Dr. Inamori's powerful leadership. The second is the strong corporate culture or philosophy of the firm. The third element in Kyocera's... View Details

Keywords: Customer Relationship Management; Information Infrastructure; Leadership Style; Management Systems; Management Style; Organizational Culture; Practice; Profit; Planning; Technology Industry; Electronics Industry

01 Feb 2001
News

HBSi Combines HBS Content with State-of-the-Art Technology

Building on its commitment to delivering innovative custom education programs to corporations around the world, last November the School launched HBS Interactive (HBSi). The wholly owned nonprofit organization will pursue an expanded... View Details

Keywords: HBSi; HBS Interactive; e-learning; Colleges, Universities, and Professional Schools; Educational Services

May 1995
Case

Hannaford Brothers: Leading the Grocery Channel Transformation

The merchandising manager of a supermarket chain leads an effort to reorganize the process of buying and delivering products from manufacturers to their warehouse for further distribution to stores. The company is an early mover in implementing efficient consumer... View Details

Keywords: Competition; Supply Chain Management; Distribution Channels; Customer Focus and Relationships; Retail Industry; Food and Beverage Industry

September 2015
Article

Design and Implementation of a Privacy Preserving Electronic Health Record Linkage Tool in Chicago

By: Abel Kho, John Cashy, Kathryn Jackson, Adam Pah, Satyender Goel, Jorn Boehnke, John Eric Humphries, Scott Duke Kominers and et al.

Objective
To design and implement a tool that creates a secure, privacy preserving linkage of electronic health record (EHR) data across multiple sites in a large metropolitan area in the United States (Chicago, IL), for use in clinical... View Details

Keywords: Information; Customers; Safety; Rights; Ethics; Entrepreneurship; Health Care and Treatment; Health Industry; Chicago

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September 2018
Case

Sealed Air Corporation: Deciding the Fate of VTID (Abridged)

By: Elie Ofek

In mid-2010 the Sealed Air Corporation has to decide on next steps for its novel video tracking technology (called VTID) after unsuccessful attempts to market it in three different industry settings. The company must determine whether its most recent target market, the... View Details

Keywords: Budgets and Budgeting; Customer Focus and Relationships; Decision Choices and Conditions; Technological Innovation; Marketing Strategy; Problems and Challenges; Commercialization; Service Industry

01 Dec 2014
News

Dressing by Number

More Retail Revolutions Manufacturing Makeup on Demand Although it isn’t available yet, Mink, a 3D home printer that produces custom makeup, has already made serial inventor Grace Choi (MBA 2013) a cosmetics celebrity. Katrina Lake knew... View Details

Keywords: Christine Lejeune; fashion; cosmetics; Clothing and Clothing Accessories Stores; Retail Trade

17 Nov 2020
In Practice

How Retailers Can Thrive in a Shopping Season Like No Other

season and what it will take to win over anxious customers. Here's what they said. Jill J. Avery: Mind the details and focus on customer service Persistent unemployment plagues many families, and people are saving more and spending less... View Details

Keywords: by Danielle Kost; Retail

11 Apr 2007
Research & Ideas

Adding Time to Activity-Based Costing

McKinsey to found Acorn Systems where he developed software to incorporate time equations into ABC. The software modeled how, for example, the time to process a customer order would vary depending on whether it was a standard or a View Details

Keywords: by Sarah Jane Gilbert

August 1991 (Revised September 1994)
Background Note

What Is Industrial Marketing?

By: V. Kasturi Rangan

Discusses the key distinguishing aspects of industrial as compared to consumer marketing. These differences are highlighted for organizational as well as marketing mix aspects. View Details

Keywords: Customer Relationship Management; Innovation Strategy; Growth and Development Strategy; Marketing Channels; Marketing Strategy; Marketplace Matching; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Core Relationships; Industrial Products Industry; Manufacturing Industry

16 Sep 2015
News

Rethink pricing to create shared—and expanded—value

John T. Gourville, the Albert J. Weatherhead Jr. Professor of Business Administration, advocates that value be shared by a firm and its customers. “Without a willing customer, there is no value,” he says. “When companies view customers as... View Details

May 2007
Case

Westin Hotels and Resorts: Operations of a Lifestyle Experience

By: Frances X. Frei, Chekitan S. Dev and Laure Mougeot Stroock

Westin Hotels and Resorts adopted a new "lifestyle" brand strategy which provided guests with a new service experience. The dilemma Westin faced was how to operationally build a brand that delivered consistent service on intangible values. View Details

Keywords: Customer Relationship Management; Decision Choices and Conditions; Growth Management; Brands and Branding; Service Operations; Value Creation; Tourism Industry

11 Oct 2004
Research & Ideas

Four Ways to Create Lasting Change

generations of a customer-satisfaction program at a large American retailer, dubbed "Alpha Corporation" for the sake of confidentiality. The first of Alpha's customer satisfaction programs, launched in the early 1990s, fell... View Details

Keywords: by Martha Lagace

Article

Determining Segmentation in Sales Response Across Consumer Purchase Behaviors

By: Randolph E. Bucklin, Sunil Gupta and S. Siddarth

Keywords: Segmentation; Sales; Customers; Behavior

Find at Harvard

2004
Working Paper

The Accidental Entrepreneur: The Emergent and Collective Process of User Entrepreneurship

We develop a process model of how users, an understudied source of entrepreneurship, create, evaluate, share, and commercialize their ideas. We compare and contrast our model to the classic model of the entrepreneurial process, highlighting the emergent and collective... View Details

Keywords: Customers; Commercialization; Entrepreneurship; Innovation and Invention

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July 1994
Background Note

Note on Retail Organizations

By: David E. Bell

Describes a typical organizational structure for retailers and discusses duties of various individuals such as buyer, category manager, etc. View Details

Keywords: Customers; Managerial Roles; Organizational Structure; Retail Industry

01 Jun 2008
News

Understanding the Digital Frontier

Web 2.0 opportunities for your firm are endless. Managers can engage with customers via blogs (caution: they take much more time than you think). Victoria’s Secret and thousands of other firms have highly successful exposure on Facebook... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne; Management

Forthcoming
Article

Vertical Integration and Cream Skimming of Profitable Referrals: The Case of Hospital-Owned Skilled Nursing Facilities

By: David M. Cutler, Leemore Dafny, David C. Grabowski, Steven Lee and Christopher Ody

We examine whether vertical integration of hospitals and skilled nursing facilities (SNFs) could lessen competition by foreclosing rival SNFs’ access to lucrative referrals. We find that it could: among integrated providers, a one percent increase in SNF reimbursement... View Details

Keywords: Antitrust; Competition; Monopoly; Vertical Integration; Customer Value and Value Chain; Health Industry; United States

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2013
Chapter

Gender Bender Brand Hijacks and Consumer Revolt: The Porsche Cayenne Story

By: Jill Avery

Throughout history, marketers have created gendered brands, creating their brands and the stories they crafted about them in their advertising to appeal either to men or to women. Gendered brands deliver value to consumers, and therefore, deliver value to marketers.... View Details

Keywords: Consumer Behavior; Brands; Brand Positioning; Brand Equity; Brand Management; Advertising Campaigns; Customer Focus and Relationships; Marketing; Brands and Branding; Marketing Strategy; Auto Industry; Consumer Products Industry