Publications

2022
Working Paper

Can a Website Bring Unemployment Down? Experimental Evidence from France

By: Aïcha Ben Dhia, Bruno Crépon, Esther Mbih, Louise Paul-Delvaux, Bertille Picard and Vincent Pons

We evaluate the impact of an online platform giving job seekers tips to improve their search and recommendations of new occupations and locations to target, based on their personal data and labor market data. Our experiment used an encouragement design and was... View Details

Keywords: Online Platform; Digital Platform; Unemployment; Encouragement Design; Job Search; Jobs and Positions; Internet and the Web; Well-being; Outcome or Result; Digital Platforms; France

Register to Read

06 Feb 2013
What Do You Think?

Is ‘Conscious Capitalism’ an Antidote to Income Inequality?

with a new name The ideas are feel good and to be desired but will fail in the market place which gives capital the primary (and therefore only) stake in the outcome of social human enterprise." Jan Fersubg said, "Whole Foods (an example... View Details

Keywords: by James Heskett

April 2001 (Revised March 2003)
Case

XUMA

By: Andrew P. McAfee and Kerry Herman

XUMA is a Silicon Valley start-up that builds customized eBusiness software suites for its corporate clients. This market is crowded with large players, including the major consulting and systems integration companies. To date, building these suites has been a very... View Details

Keywords: Production; Software; Business Startups; Innovation and Invention; Information Technology Industry; California

2015
Working Paper

Strategy-Proofness, Investment Efficiency, and Marginal Returns: An Equivalence

By: John William Hatfield, Fuhito Kojima and Scott Duke Kominers

We show that a mechanism induces an agent to make efficient ex ante investment choices if and only if it rewards that agent with his marginal surplus; additionally, for an ex post efficient mechanism, these properties are equivalent to strategy-proofness for the agent.... View Details

Keywords: Strategy-proofness; Investment Efficiency; Providing Marginal Rewards; Vickrey-Clarke-Groves Mechanisms; Mechanism Design; Market Design; Human Capital

SSRN

January 1998 (Revised April 1998)
Case

Lincoln Electric: Venturing Abroad

By: Christopher A. Bartlett and Jamie O'Connell

Lincoln Electric, a 100-year-old manufacturer of welding equipment and consumables based in Cleveland, Ohio, motivates its U.S. employees through a culture of cooperation between management and labor and an unusual compensation system based on piecework and a large... View Details

Keywords: Acquisition; Restructuring; Transformation; Construction; Compensation and Benefits; Management; Market Entry and Exit; Labor and Management Relations; Competitive Advantage; Expansion; Manufacturing Industry; Ohio

February 2010 (Revised August 2010)
Case

Sheikh Mohammed and the Making of 'Dubai, Inc.'

By: Anthony Mayo, Nitin Nohria, Umaimah Mendhro and Johnathan Cromwell

Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum has converted Dubai from a sleepy little coastal village into a world-class city, famous for its ambition, drive, and economic promise. He is the founder, part-owner, and visionary behind companies such as Emirates Airlines, a... View Details

Keywords: Development Economics; Leadership Style; Emerging Markets; Personal Development and Career; Business and Community Relations; Business and Government Relations; Dubai

October 2017
Case

Shift Technologies, Inc.

By: Thomas Eisenmann and Nicole Tempest Keller

In 2017, management at Shift, an online marketplace that uses a “high touch,” concierge approach to buy and sell used cars, was formulating plans for the San Francisco–based startup’s next phase of expansion. One option was to preserve Shift’s current business model... View Details

Keywords: Entrepreneurship; Market Design; Multi-Sided Platforms; Marketplace Matching; Growth and Development Strategy; Decision Choices and Conditions; Auto Industry; Retail Industry; United States

2025
Working Paper

Productivity Beliefs and Efficiency in Science

By: Fabio Bertolotti, Kyle R. Myers and Wei Yang Tham

We develop a method to estimate producers’ productivity beliefs in settings where output quantities and input prices are unobservable, and we use it to evaluate allocative efficiency in the market for science. Our model of researchers’ labor supply shows that their... View Details

Keywords: Performance Productivity; Perception; Research

August 2022
Case

Air Wars: Deregulating the U.S. Airline Industry

By: Tom Nicholas and James Weber

In the early decades of the twentieth century, the U.S. government assisted in the development of an airline industry by subsidizing the delivery of mail and allowing mail carriers to also fly passengers. Because the government awarded mail routes to the lowest... View Details

22 Nov 2016
First Look

November 22, 2016

Publisher's link: https://www.hbs.edu/faculty/Pages/item.aspx?num=50794 September 2016 Administrative Science Quarterly Whitened Résumés: Race and Self-Presentation in the Labor Market By: Kang, Sonia K.,... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

02 Jul 2009
Working Paper Summaries

Technology Innovation and Diffusion as Sources of Output and Asset Price Fluctuations

Keywords: by Diego A. Comin, Mark Gertler & Ana Maria Santacreu; Technology

Article

Recent Advances in the Empirics of Organizational Economics

By: Nicholas Bloom, Raffaella Sadun and John Van Reenen

We present a survey of recent contributions in empirical organizational economics, focusing on management practices and decentralization. Productivity dispersion between firms and countries has motivated the improved measurement of firm organization across industries... View Details

Keywords: Economics; Management Practices and Processes; Performance Productivity; Geographic Location; Motivation and Incentives; Factories, Labs, and Plants; Competition; Human Capital; Markets; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Multinational Firms and Management; India; Brazil; United States

02 Sep 2015
Research & Ideas

Explaining China's Crash

After more than a decade of nearly can’t-miss growth, China’s stock market began a precipitous summer slide that has spooked investors worldwide. In July, the Shanghai composite index dropped 15 percent from June, prompting the People’s... View Details

Keywords: by Christina Pazzanese; Financial Services

Web

Publications - Faculty & Research

settings where output quantities and input prices are unobservable, and we use it to evaluate allocative efficiency in the market for science. Our model of researchers’ labor supply shows that their... View... View Details

2010
Working Paper

Agglomerative Forces and Cluster Shapes

By: William R. Kerr and Scott Duke Kominers

We model spatial clusters of similar firms. Our model highlights how agglomerative forces lead to localized, individual connections among firms, while interaction costs generate a defined distance over which attraction forces operate. Overlapping firm interactions... View Details

Keywords: Entrepreneurship; Geographic Location; Patents; Labor; Industry Clusters; Industry Structures; Relationships; Competitive Advantage; Technology Industry; California

2002
Book

Searching for a Corporate Savior: The Irrational Quest for Charismatic CEOs

By: Rakesh Khurana

Corporate CEOs are headline news. Stock prices rise and fall at word of their hiring and firing. Business media debate their merits and defects as if individual leaders determined the health of the economy. Yet we know surprisingly little about how CEOs are selected... View Details

Keywords: Managerial Roles; Selection and Staffing; Personal Characteristics; Experience and Expertise; Investment Activism; Corporate Strategy

February 2022 (Revised January 2023)
Case

Huazhu: A Chinese Hotel Giant's Journey of Digital Transformation

By: Feng Zhu, Yulin Fang, Bonnie Yining Cao and Duan Yang

Based in Shanghai, China, Huazhu Group, the world’s third-largest hotel operator, was known for its standardized IT system. It helped the company boost efficiency during the COVID-19 pandemic. Chief Digital Officer Xinxin Liu also faced some longer-term challenges:... View Details

Keywords: Hotel Industry; COVID-19 Pandemic; Labor; Business or Company Management; Emerging Markets; Information Technology; Operations; Strategy; Digital Transformation; Accommodations Industry; China; United States; Singapore; Germany; Hong Kong

2014
Book

Empire of Cotton: A Global History

By: Sven Beckert

The epic story of the rise and fall of the empire of cotton, its centrality to the world economy, and its making and remaking of global capitalism. Cotton is so ubiquitous as to be almost invisible, yet understanding its history is key to understanding the origins... View Details

Keywords: Economic Systems; Plant-Based Agribusiness; Globalized Markets and Industries; Society; Manufacturing Industry; Agriculture and Agribusiness Industry