Publications

September 2019 (Revised May 2021)
Case

pymetrics: Early Days

By: John R. Wells and Benjamin Weinstock

In 2013, CEO Frida Polli was contemplating the next steps for her start-up business, pymetrics. After receiving her PhD in neuropsychology and MBA from HBS, she was determined to put her scientific and academic knowledge to work to build a business solving real world... View Details

Educators

26 Jul 2016
First Look

July 26, 2016

Decision Processes Managing Perceptions of Distress at Work: Reframing Emotion as Passion By: Wolf, Elizabeth Baily, Jooa Julia Lee, Sunita Sah, and Alison Wood Brooks Abstract—Expressing distress at work can have negative consequences... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

May 2008
Article

When Winning Is Everything

By: Deepak Malhotra, Gillian Ku and J. Keith Murnighan

In the heat of competition, executives can easily become obsessed with beating their rivals. This adrenaline-fueled emotional state, which the authors call competitive arousal, often leads to bad decisions. Managers can minimize the potential for competitive arousal... View Details

Keywords: Decision Choices and Conditions; Auctions; Bids and Bidding; Behavior; Emotions; Personal Characteristics; Competitive Strategy; Competitive Advantage

With rising CEO turnover, companies are increasingly looking outside for qualified candidates. Sure, externally recruited CEOs bring fresh perspectives and connections. But they lack the in-depth knowledge of the company s culture and history that they need to succeed.... View Details

Teresa M. Amabile

Teresa Amabile is the Edsel Bryant Ford Professor, Emerita, at Harvard Business School. Originally educated and employed as a chemist, Teresa received her Ph.D. in psychology from Stanford University. Her current research investigates how people approach and... View Details

Deepak Malhotra

Deepak Malhotra's teaching, research and advisory work is focused on negotiation, deal-making and conflict resolution. In 2020, Deepak was named MBA Professor of the Year by Poets & Quants. He has won... View Details

August 2020
Article

Does Spending Money on Others Promote Happiness? A Registered Replication Report

By: Lara B. Aknin, Elizabeth W. Dunn, Jason Proulx, Iris Lok and Michael I. Norton

Research indicates that spending money on others—prosocial spending—leads to greater happiness than spending money on oneself (e.g., Dunn, Aknin, & Norton, 2008, 2014). These findings have received widespread attention because they offer insight into why people engage... View Details

Keywords: Prosocial Spending; Generosity; Well-being; Replication; Happiness; Behavior; Spending

Read Now

03 Jun 2014
First Look

First Look: June 3

revolutionary, rather than evolutionary, innovation. This note outlines a process for studying extreme consumers-consumers who fall in both tails of a normal distribution of customers-with needs, behaviors, attitudes, and emotions... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

26 Apr 2023
In Practice

Is AI Coming for Your Job?

Automating these tasks will enable knowledge workers to concentrate on value-adding activities where human expertise is indispensable, such as interpreting context and nuance, exercising emotional intelligence, addressing moral and... View Details

Keywords: by Kristen Senz; Technology

Joshua D. Margolis

Joshua Margolis is James Dinan and Elizabeth Miller Professor of Business Administration and the Unit Head for the Organizational Behavior unit. He is also Faculty Chair of the Program for Leadership Development. His research and teaching revolve around leadership... View Details

Keywords: furniture; health care; insurance industry; nonprofit industry; pharmaceuticals

08 Oct 2020
Research & Ideas

Keep Your Weary Workers Engaged and Motivated

motivated, to find meaning at work during this crisis. Research by Harvard Business School Dean Nitin Nohria and colleagues suggests that people are guided by four basic emotional needs, or drives, that are the product of our common... View Details

Keywords: by Boris Groysberg and Robin Abrahams

16 Jan 2006
Research & Ideas

What Customers Want from Your Products

get done, and design products and brands that fill that need. In this excerpt, the authors look at designing products that do a job rather than fill a product segment. With few exceptions, every job people need or want to do has a social, a functional, and an View Details

Keywords: by Clayton M. Christensen, Scott Cook & Taddy Hall; Consumer Products

25 Jun 2024
Research & Ideas

Rapport: The Hidden Advantage That Women Managers Bring to Teams

course, the next question is: Can we train one type of manager to act like the other when it would be performance-enhancing to do so?” Why rapport makes a difference Scheduling workers is a logistical puzzle, but it’s also an emotional... View Details

Keywords: by Kara Baskin; Food & Beverage

2025
Book

Talk: The Science of Conversation and the Art of Being Ourselves

By: Alison Wood Brooks

We all struggle with difficult conversations, but we're often not very good at easy ones either. Though we do it all the time, conversation is one of the most complex, demanding, and delicate of all human tasks, rife with possibilities for misinterpretation and... View Details

Keywords: Interpersonal Communication