Publications
Publications
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- All HBS Web
(1,251)
- Faculty Publications (181)
- September 2022 (Revised January 2023)
- Case
DBS: Purpose-Driven Transformation
By: Ranjay Gulati, Adina Wong, Dawn H. Lau and Joseph Mesfin
Singapore-based bank DBS went through three waves of purpose-driven transformation, overhauling the bank’s systems, upgrading employee skills, and re-centering its customer focus, with the bank’s purpose growing bolder with each key milestone achieved. Find out how the... View Details
- August 2022
- Case
Southwick Social Ventures
By: Henry McGee, Mel Martin and Amy Klopfenstein
In 2021, the HBS Impact Investment Fund student team had found a promising potential investment in Southwick Social Ventures (SSV), a worker and management-owned trouser manufacturer. With a 100% immigrant workforce, the co-operative was focused on reviving... View Details
- August 13, 2022
- Article
A Historic Opportunity for Universal Health Coverage in India
By: Vikram Patel, Shubhangi Bhadada, Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw, Arnab Mukherji, Tarun Khanna and Gagandeep Kang
The milestone of India's 75th anniversary of independence on Aug 15, 2022, offers an opportunity to reassert the country's commitment to realising universal health coverage (UHC). The first such effort predates independence, with the 1946 Bhore Committee report.... View Details
- August 2022
- Supplement
NOW PT (B): Should We Invest?
By: George A. Riedel, Amy Klopfenstein and Mel Martin
This (B) case examines the results of the HBS Impact Investment Fund student team’s diligence on Neurologic Optimal Wellness Physical Therapy (NOW PT). After examining Springfield’s demographics, anticipated PT demand, local competition, and NOW PT’s financial... View Details
- 2022
- Working Paper
Confidence, Self-Selection and Bias in the Aggregate
By: Benjamin Enke, Thomas Graeber and Ryan Oprea
The influence of behavioral biases on aggregate outcomes like prices and allocations depends in part on self-selection: whether rational people opt more strongly into aggregate interactions than biased individuals. We conduct a series of betting market, auction and... View Details
- May 2022
- Case
TikTok and National Security: Investment in an Age of Data Sovereignty?
By: Jeremy Friedman, Sarah Bauerle Danzman and David Lane
This case covers TikTok’s purchase of Musical.ly and the reaction of the United States government, including the review of the purchase by the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS) and the reaction of the presidential administration of Donald... View Details
- May 2022
- Case
The NFL’s $110-Billion Media Rights Deals
By: Anita Elberse and Elizabeth Warner
On March 18, 2021, Brian Rolapp, chief media and business officer at the National Football League (NFL) presented the results of a months-long effort to renegotiate rights deals with the NFL’s current partners in television—the media conglomerates behind the networks... View Details
- March 2022 (Revised October 2022)
- Case
Transforming Kimball International, Inc. (A)
By: Lynn S. Paine and Will Hurwitz
Kimball International, Inc. (KII), led by CEO Kristie Juster, and its board of directors, chaired by Kim Ryan, faced critical questions about KII’s future in the spring of 2021. Two years earlier, the board had appointed Juster as the new CEO of KII, a publicly traded,... View Details
Keywords: Board Of Directors; Board Committees; Board Decisions; Board Dynamics; CEO Compensation; CEO Succession; Compensation Committee; Compensation Consultants; Compensation Design; Compensation Mix; Corporate Purpose; COVID-19; ESG; Furniture; Furniture Industry; Manufacturing; Midwest; Pandemic; Purpose; Spin Off; Strategic Change; Strategic Decisions; Strategic Evolution; Target-setting; Executive Compensation; Family Ownership; Governance; Restructuring; Strategy; Transformation; Manufacturing Industry; United States
- March 2022
- Supplement
Transforming Kimball International, Inc. (B)
By: Lynn S. Paine and Will Hurwitz
Supplements the (A) case. View Details
Keywords: Board Of Directors; Board Committees; Board Decisions; Board Dynamics; CEO Compensation; CEO Succession; Compensation Committee; Compensation Consultants; Compensation Design; Compensation Mix; Corporate Purpose; COVID-19; ESG; Furniture; Furniture Industry; Manufacturing; Midwest; Pandemic; Purpose; Spin-off; Strategic Change; Strategic Decisions; Strategic Evolution; Target-setting; Executive Compensation; Family Ownership; Governance; Restructuring; Strategy; Transformation; Manufacturing Industry; United States
- October 2021
- Case
Financial Reporting at Mattel
By: Aiyesha Dey, Trung Nguyen, Marshal Herrmann and Julia Kelley
In September 2020, Diana Ferguson was nearing her first Audit Committee meeting as the newly appointed Audit Committee chair of Mattel, Inc. Mattel was just recovering from an accounting scandal which had revealed the company’s poor internal controls and weak board... View Details
Keywords: Accounting; Accounting Audits; Financial Reporting; Financial Statements; Governance; Corporate Accountability; Corporate Disclosure; Corporate Governance; Governance Compliance; Governance Controls; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Governing and Advisory Boards; Lawsuits and Litigation; Business and Shareholder Relations; Consumer Products Industry; Entertainment and Recreation Industry; Financial Services Industry; North and Central America; United States; California
- October 2021
- Article
Board Design and Governance Failures at Peer Firms
By: Shelby Gai, J. Yo-Jud Cheng and Andy Wu
Our study introduces board committees as a crucial determinant of board actions. We examine how directors who structurally link different board committees—referred to as multi-committee directors (MCDs)—explain why some board actions are merely symbolic while others... View Details
- June 2021
- Case
uBiome
By: Thomas R. Eisenmann and Olivia Graham
uBiome provided clinical tests that sequenced the DNA of human microbiome samples, providing data on health conditions directly to consumers or to prescribing physicians. Founded in 2012, the San Francisco-based startup raised $105 million from top-tier venture capital... View Details
- May 2021 (Revised September 2021)
- Case
CPE and SUS Environmental: You've Got to Know When to Hold 'Em (A)
By: Josh Lerner and Franko Jira
In July 2016, Di Yang and Grace Guo of the leading Chinese private equity group CPE faced a dilemma—a happy dilemma, but a challenge nonetheless. CPE’s investment in the waste-to-energy firm SUS Environment had proved to be exceedingly successful. This success had... View Details
- April 2021 (Revised June 2021)
- Case
Balancing Act: Deborah Lovich (A)
By: David G. Fubini and Patrick Sanguineti
Deborah Lovich, Partner at the Boston Consulting Group (BCG), has been given the opportunity of a lifetime: to join the firm's Executive Committee as its youngest member and only current woman, as well as just the second woman in its history. Encouraged by her mentors,... View Details
- April 2021
- Case
Glass-Shattering Leaders: Michele Hooper
By: Boris Groysberg and Colleen Ammerman
Michele Hooper joined the board of the Dayton-Hudson Corporation when she was in her late thirties, becoming the company’s youngest director as well as the only woman and the only person of color in the boardroom. Such “firsts” were not unusual for Hooper, who had been... View Details
- April 2021 (Revised July 2021)
- Case
Public Equities Impact Investing at BlackRock
By: Shawn A. Cole, Vikram S. Gandhi, Michael Norris and John Masko
In early 2021, BlackRock—the world’s largest asset manager with $9 trillion in assets under management (AUM)—sought to become a leader in promoting environmental and social sustainability. Over the previous ten years, CEO Larry Fink had written an annual open letter to... View Details
Keywords: Impact Investing; Renewable Energy; Climate Change; Environmental Sustainability; Equity; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Financial Management; Investment Funds; Investment Return; Mission and Purpose; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Financial Services Industry; United States
- January–February 2021
- Article
Cross‐firm Return Predictability and Accounting Quality
By: Wen Chen, Mozaffar Khan, Leonid Kogan and George Serafeim
We test the hypothesis that if poor accounting quality (AQ) is associated with poor investor understanding of firms’ revenue and cost structures, then poor AQ stocks likely respond more slowly than good AQ stocks to new non‐idiosyncratic information that affects both... View Details
- January 2021 (Revised October 2024)
- Case
Aptiv PLC Board of Directors (A)
By: Lynn S. Paine and Will Hurwitz
Aptiv’s board must decide whether a joint venture with an auto maker is the right next step in the company’s efforts to develop and commercialize a production-ready autonomous driving system. While many commentators believed that Aptiv’s self-driving technologies had... View Details
Keywords: Automotive Industry; Bankruptcy Reorganization; Board Of Directors; Board Committees; Board Decisions; Board Dynamics; Corporate Boards; Innovation And Strategy; Legal Aspects Of Business; Spin Off; Strategic Alliances; Strategic Change; Strategic Evolution; Supplier Relationships; Technological Change; Corporate Governance; Governing and Advisory Boards; Innovation Strategy; Going Public; Joint Ventures; Leadership; Restructuring; Technological Innovation; Transformation; Auto Industry; Europe; United States
- December 2020 (Revised September 2023)
- Case
PG&E and the First Climate Change Bankruptcy
By: Stuart C. Gilson and Sarah L. Abbott
In early 2020, the California-based utility PG&E filed a second amended plan of reorganization. PG&E had filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in the face of more than $30 billion of legal claims brought against it for its alleged role in causing California wildfires. The... View Details
- October 2020 (Revised July 2023)
- Case
UCK Partners: Gong Cha
By: Victoria Ivashina and Sangyun Lee
In the Spring of 2017, Soomin Kim, Founding Partner of UCK Partners, and his team were debating the potential exit of UCK Partner’s investment in Gong Cha Korea, the sole local franchisor of the premium milk tea brand that they proprietarily sourced three years ago.... View Details