Publications

April 8, 2025
Article

Creating Workplaces Free of Forever Chemicals

By: Joseph G. Allen, Heather A. Henrikson and Michael W. Toffel

Forever chemicals are toxic and widely used in buildings and yet they remain on the rise globally with little regulation to control them. In the United States, for example, Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) regulations currently cover only forever chemicals in... View Details

Keywords: Occupational Health; Safety Regulations; Regulation; Working Conditions; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Safety; Health

March 2016 (Revised March 2022)
Teaching Note

Evive Health and Workplace Influenza Vaccinations

By: John Beshears

Evive Health is a company that manages communication campaigns on behalf of health insurance plans and large employers. Using big data techniques and insights from behavioral economics, Evive deploys targeted and effective messages that improve individuals' health... View Details

2008
Contribution

Freedom in the Workplace

By: Nien-he Hsieh

2021
Article

Reflections: Voice and Silence in Workplace Conversations

By: Amy C. Edmondson and Tijs Besieux

We highlight conversations at work as an arena of change. Drawing on and extending the psychological safety literature, we offer a new framework to distinguish between productive and unproductive forms of both voice and silence. The framework’s four... View Details

Keywords: Conversation; Silence; Voice; Psychological Safety; Interpersonal Communication; Quality; Management Practices and Processes; Organizational Change and Adaptation

09 Dec 2013
Research & Ideas

Cultural Disharmony Undermines Workplace Creativity

intercultural disharmony, says Chua. "It is inevitable to have conflict when you bring people from different cultural backgrounds together," he says. "It's about how you manage the conflict. A lot of times managers try to put together a multicultural View Details

Keywords: by Michael Blanding

2008
Working Paper

Workplace Peers and Entrepreneurship

By: Ramana Nanda and Jesper B. Sorensen

We examine whether the likelihood of entrepreneurial activity is related to the prior career experiences of an individual's co-workers, using a unique matched employer-employee panel dataset. We argue that coworkers can increase the likelihood that an individual... View Details

Keywords: Experience and Expertise; Entrepreneurship; Personal Development and Career; Power and Influence

July 2010
Article

Workplace Peers and Entrepreneurship

By: Ramana Nanda and Jesper B. Sorensen

We examine whether the likelihood of entrepreneurial activity is related to the prior career experiences of an individual's co-workers, using a unique matched employer-employee panel dataset. We argue that coworkers can increase the likelihood that an individual will... View Details

Keywords: Entrepreneurship; Personal Development and Career; Perception; Opportunities; Motivation and Incentives; Power and Influence

15 Mar 2022
Research & Ideas

This Workplace Certification Made Already Safe Companies Even Safer

according to the working paper Do Management System Standards Indicate Superior Performance? Evidence from the OHSAS 18001 Occupational Health and Safety Standard. To earn the voluntary certification, workplaces need to demonstrate that... View Details

Keywords: by Rachel Layne

September 1999 (Revised May 2003)
Case

Deloitte & Touche (B): Changing the Workplace

By: Rosabeth M. Kanter and Jane Roessner

Deloitte & Touche women's initiative changed the workplace culture at the firm, solved retention problems, and brought external benefits. Now a new CEO must decide how to take this a step further as competition for talent was even stronger, young people had different... View Details

Keywords: Strategic Planning; Organizational Culture; Accounting; Gender; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Loss; Change Management; Jobs and Positions; Resignation and Termination; Accounting Industry; United States

Research Summary

The Unexpected Effects of Workplace Transparency

By: Ethan S. Bernstein

Workplace transparency provides a foundation for learning and control, and therefore for satisfaction and productivity. Yet my research shows that an obsession with transparency-enhancing tools and structures can backfire, producing the unintended consequences of... View Details

Keywords: Transparency; Privacy; Productivity; Field Experiments; Organizational Design; Organizational Structure; Behavior; Social and Collaborative Networks; Human Resources; Leadership; United States; Europe; China; Japan

August 2021 (Revised November 2024)
Case

Intenseye: Powering Workplace Health and Safety with AI (A)

By: Michael W. Toffel and Youssef Abdel Aal

Intenseye was a Turkey-based technology startup that deployed machine learning algorithms to workplace camera feeds in order to identify unsafe worker actions and unsafe working conditions, in order to help improve worker safety. The case describes how Intenseye’s... View Details

Keywords: Privacy; Product Development; Operations; Technological Innovation; Value Creation; Production; Distribution; Safety; Risk and Uncertainty; Technology Industry; Manufacturing Industry; Distribution Industry; Turkey; Middle East; United States

Forthcoming
Article

It Takes Two to Untangle: Illuminating How and Why Some Workplace Relationships Adapt While Others Deteriorate After a Workplace Microaggression

By: Summer R. Jackson and Basima A. Tewfik

Although scholars largely assume that workplace microaggressions negatively impact the work relationship between the target and the perpetrator, relational deterioration is not the only observable relational outcome. Indeed, there are instances of relational... View Details

Keywords: Employees; Interpersonal Communication; Motivation and Incentives; Relationships; Conflict and Resolution

16 Feb 2024
Research & Ideas

Is Your Workplace Biased Against Introverts?

Managers almost universally say they want to see passion in their employees. Yet sometimes, they can’t spot it when it’s right in front of them. Extroverted employees are more likely to be considered passionate compared to more introverted colleagues—even if it’s not... View Details

Keywords: by Ben Rand

2005
Article

Rawlsian Justice and Workplace Republicanism

By: Nien-he Hsieh

Keywords: Theory

Article

Use Purpose to Transform Your Workplace

By: Leena Nair, Nick Dalton, Patrick Hull and William Kerr

Is keeping pace with the future of work incompatible with using purpose to guide the organization? Unilever is stretching its well-known commitment to purpose for a new and daunting challenge—the transformation of its workforce of more than 149,000 employees. Its... View Details

Keywords: Future Of Work; Purpose; Unilever; Organizations; Mission and Purpose; Talent and Talent Management; Transition; Decision Making; Transformation

Register to Read

November 2014 (Revised March 2016)
Background Note

Mental Health and the American Workplace

By: John A. Quelch and Carin-Isabel Knoop

Mental illness has been described as an epidemic affecting nearly a quarter of all Americans in their lifetimes, often during their most productive working years. Managers who can design organizations that maximize mental health can minimize these risks and boost... View Details

Keywords: Public Health; Productivity; Competitiveness; Stress Management; Depression; Absenteeism; Presenteeism; Work Culture; Business or Company Management; Work-Life Balance; Performance Productivity; Organizational Culture; Medical Specialties; Health Care and Treatment; Health Industry; United States

January 1995 (Revised June 1995)
Case

Managing Conflict in a Diverse Workplace

Consists of several vignettes and discussion points around issues of conflict in the workplace. Issues presented are differences of race, gender, nationality, culture, religion; access to power, training, advancement; tolerance of style of management, language,... View Details

Keywords: Conflict Management; Working Conditions; Diversity Characteristics