Publications
Publications
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- All HBS Web
(2,362)
- Faculty Publications (256)
- January 2023 (Revised April 2025)
- Case
Peloton Interactive (A)
By: Suraj Srinivasan, Lynn S. Paine and David Lane
Early in February 2022, the board of Peloton Interactive faced some knotty challenges. Immense pandemic demand for its stationary exercise bicycles and treadmills had prompted the firm to scale up production rapidly. But as gyms reopened and the virulence of the virus... View Details
- 2023
- Working Paper
The Subjective Expected Utility Approach and a Framework for Defining Project Risk in Terms of Novelty and Feasibility—A Response to Franzoni and Stephan (2023), ‘Uncertainty and Risk-Taking in Science’
In their Discussion Paper, Franzoni and Stephan (F&S, 2023) discuss the shortcomings of existing peer review models in shaping the funding of risky science. Their discussion offers a conceptual framework for incorporating risk into peer review models of research... View Details
- December 2022
- Article
Cost Standard Set Program: Moving Forward to Standardization of Cost Assessment Based on Clinical Condition
By: Anna Paula Beck da Silva Etges, Richard D. Urman, Anne Geubelle, Robert Kaplan and Carisi Anne Polanczyk
This communication announces the International Cost Standard Set Program. Its goal is to establish global standardized frameworks for measuring the costs of treating specific clinical conditions. A scientific committee, including 16 international healthcare cost... View Details
- June 2022
- Article
A New Initiative to Track HIV Resource Allocation and Costs
By: Ryan McBain, AK Nandakumar, Michael Ruffner, Carlyn Mann, Mai Hijazi, Susanna Baker, Linden Morrison, Kalipso Chalkidou, Shufang Zhang, Iris Semini, Fern Terris-Prestholt, Steven Forsythe, Sarah Byakika, Joshua Musinguzi and Robert S. Kaplan
In early 2020, several global health institutions – including the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria; Joint United Nations Program on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS); United States Agency for International Development; and Office of the Global AIDS Coordinator at... View Details
- October 2022
- Article
It’s Not Just the Prices: Time-Driven Activity-Based Costing for Initiation of Veno-Venous Extracorporeal Membrane Oxygenation at Three International Sites—A Case Review
By: Michael Nurok, Vin Pellegrino, Marc Pineton de Chambrun, Jonathan Warsh, Meredith Young, Erik Dong, Neil Parrish, Syed Shehab, Alain Combes and Robert S. Kaplan
The United States spends more for intensive care units (ICUs) than do other high-income countries. We used time-driven activity-based costing (TDABC) to analyze ICU costs for initiation of extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO) for respiratory failure to estimate... View Details
- September 2022
- Article
Cost of Cardiac Stereotactic Body Radioablation Therapy versus Catheter Ablation for Treatment of Ventricular Tachycardia
By: Chen Wei, Michelle Boeck, Pierre C. Qian, Todd Vivenzio, Zoe Elizee, Jeremy S. Bredfeldt, Robert S. Kaplan, Usha Tedrow, Raymond Mak and Paul C. Zei
Cardiac SBRT is a novel way of treating refractory ventricular tachycardia (VT) that may be less costly than catheter ablation, owing to its noninvasive, outpatient nature. We applied time-driven activity-based costing to both procedures. The direct and total... View Details
- July 2022 (Revised February 2025)
- Case
A Soul and a Service: North Carolina Mutual Life Insurance
By: Tom Nicholas and John Masko
The North Carolina Mutual and Provident Association (the Mutual) was founded in 1898 as a for-profit entity selling life insurance catering to the Black community. The Mutual was entering a field crowded with established White-owned competitors that largely refused to... View Details
- May 2022
- Article
Variance Analysis: New Insights from Health Care Applications
By: Robert S. Kaplan and Susanna Gallani
We use a health care application to illustrate how variance analysis can be used to benchmark costs across similar service delivery sites. Variances for personnel costs, typically the largest cost component in service organizations, are calculated for price, quantity,... View Details
- Article
We Need Better Carbon Accounting. Here's How to Get There.
By: Robert S. Kaplan and Karthik Ramanna
Any effective system of greenhouse gas (GHG) accounting needs to measure each company’s supply-chain carbon impacts accurately. Such information would provide visibility and incentives for the company to make more climate-friendly product-specification and purchasing... View Details
- February 8, 2022
- Article
Time-Driven Activity-Based Cost Comparison of Treating Five Acute, Low-Severity Conditions
By: Alan Yang, Andy Hung-Yi Lee, Joseph W. Kopp, Katherine D. Rose, Adam M. Licurse, Philip D. Anderson and Robert S. Kaplan
In 2017, patients made 145 million visits to emergency departments (EDs), generating $76.3 billion in charges. About a third of ED visits, however, were for conditions that were treatable in lower-resourced settings. We used time-driven activity-based costing (TDABC)... View Details
- November–December 2021
- Article
Successfully Implementing TDABC in Health-Care Provider Organizations
By: Susanna Gallani and Gregory Sabin
This article describes some of the common obstacles that challenge the success of TDABC implementation in health-care provider organizations and suggests potential remedies and preventive measures. View Details
- November 2021
- Article
Determining Variable Costs in the Acute Urolithiasis Cycle of Care Through Time-driven Activity-based Costing
By: Tyler R. McClintock, David F. Friedlander, Aiden Y. Feng, Mahek A. Shah, Daniel J. Pallin, Steven L. Chang, Angela M. Bader, Thomas W. Feeley, Robert S. Kaplan and George E. Haleblian
Objective. To characterize full cycle of care costs for managing an acute ureteral stone using time-driven activity-based costing.
Methods. We defined all phases of care for patients presenting with an acute ureteral stone and built an... View Details
Methods. We defined all phases of care for patients presenting with an acute ureteral stone and built an... View Details
- October 2021 (Revised May 2023)
- Case
Project Maji: Pricing Water in Sub-Saharan Africa
By: Elie Ofek, Marco Bertini, Dilyana Karadzhova Botha and Esel Çekin
In July 2021, Sunil Lalvani, founder and CEO of Project Maji, a non-profit social enterprise headquartered in Dubai that had already provided sustainable, clean water solutions to 80,000 people living in rural communities across Ghana and Kenya, was facing an important... View Details
- August 2021
- Case
Yummy: Delivering Value to Venezuela
By: Ayelet Israeli, Jenyfeer Martinez Buitrago and Carla Larangeira
By June 2021, Yummy had become Venezuela’s first and largest food delivery app and last-mile logistics company. In Caracas, the nation’s capital, Yummy held a 55% market share, while operations in other cities had already started to take place, including in three of... View Details
- 2021
- Working Paper
How to Fix ESG Reporting
By: Robert S. Kaplan and Karthik Ramanna
Investors, advocacy groups, academics, and the 200 CEOs of the US Business Roundtable have asked corporations to take on an added purpose beyond a narrow pursuit of shareholder value. In response, many companies now issue ESG (Environmental, Societal, and Governance)... View Details
Keywords: ESG Reporting; Sustainability; Corporate Purpose; Greenhouse Gas; Activity-Based Costing; Environmental Sustainability; Environmental Management; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Measurement and Metrics; Goals and Objectives; Agreements and Arrangements; Corporate Accountability
- July 2021 (Revised July 2022)
- Case
Brigham & Women's Hospital: Using Patient Reported Outcomes to Improve Breast Cancer Care
By: Robert S. Kaplan, Navraj S. Nagra and Syed S. Shehab
Dr. Andrea Pusic, breast cancer reconstruction surgeon, wants to extend outcomes measurement beyond traditional surgical metrics of infections, complications, and survival rates. The case describes her development of a new mobile phone app, which collects patients’... View Details
- June 2021
- Case
Modern Endowment Management: Paula Volent and the Bowdoin Endowment
By: Luis M. Viceira, Emily R. McComb and Dean Xu
This case examines modern endowment investment management through the lens of a leadership transition between Chief Investment Officers (CIOs). In March 2021, Paula Volent is about to step down as the CIO of the endowment of Bowdoin College after twenty-one years, and... View Details
- Article
A Feasibility Study Using Time-driven Activity-based Costing as a Management Tool for Provider Cost Estimation: Lessons from the National TB Control Program in Zimbabwe in 2018
By: J. Chirenda, B. Nhlema Simwaka, C. Sandy, K. Bodnar, S. Corbin, P. Desai, T. Mapako, S. Shamu, C. Timire, E. Antonio, A. Makone, A. Birikorang, T. Mapuranga, M. Ngwenya, T. Masunda, M. Dube, E. Wandwalo, L. Morrison and R. S. Kaplan
Background: This study used process maps and time-driven activity-based costing to document TB service delivery processes. The analysis identified the resources required to sustain TB services in Zimbabwe, as well as several opportunities for more effective and... View Details
- January 2021 (Revised June 2021)
- Supplement
Eaton Corporation: Portfolio Transformation and The Cost of Capital (Abridged)
By: Benjamin C. Esty, E. Scott Mayfield and Daniel Fisher
In 2000, Eaton Corporation was a broadly diversified industrial conglomerate. But its strategy was evolving and its focus was narrowing around “power management” and more recently on “intelligent power,” the use of digitally enabled products and services designed to... View Details
- January 2021 (Revised June 2021)
- Case
Eaton Corporation: Portfolio Transformation and the Cost of Capital (Abridged)
By: Benjamin C. Esty, E. Scott Mayfield and Daniel Fisher
In 2000, Eaton Corporation was a broadly diversified industrial conglomerate. But its strategy was evolving and its focus was narrowing around “power management” and more recently on “intelligent power,” the use of digitally enabled products and services designed to... View Details