Publications
Publications
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- All HBS Web
(2,345)
- Faculty Publications (541)
- July 2007 (Revised January 2008)
- Case
Turnaround at the Veterans Health Administration (A)
By: Amy C. Edmondson, Brian R. Golden and Gary J. Young
Investigates the challenges that Dr. Kenneth W. Kizer confronted in seeking to create organizational change at the largest integrated health care system in North America, the Veterans Health Administration (VHA). Kizer was appointed as the Under Secretary of Health, to... View Details
- June 2007
- Article
Does Employment Protection Reduce Productivity? Evidence from U.S. States
By: David H Autor, William R. Kerr and Adriana D. Kugler
Theory predicts that mandated employment protections may reduce productivity by distorting production choices. Firms facing (non-Coasean) worker dismissal costs will curtail hiring below efficient levels and retain unproductive workers, both of which should affect... View Details
Keywords: Theory; Production; Selection and Staffing; Cost; Employment; Capital; Performance Productivity; United States
- June 2007
- Article
Efficient Kidney Exchange: Coincidence of Wants in a Structured Market
By: A. E. Roth, Tayfun Sonmez and M. Utku Unver
Patients needing kidney transplants may have donors who cannot donate to them because of blood or tissue incompatibility. Incompatible patient-donor pairs can exchange donor kidneys with other pairs only when there is a "double coincidence of wants." Developing... View Details
- 2007
- Working Paper
Bandwidth Allocation in Peer-to-Peer Filesharing Networks
By: Albert Creus-Mir, Ramon Casadesus-Masanell and Andres Hervas-Drane
We present a model of bandwidth allocation in a stylized peer-to-peer file sharing network with s peers (sharers) who share files and download from each other and f peers (freeriders) who download from sharers but do not contribute files. Assuming that upload bandwidth... View Details
- 2007
- Working Paper
Strategy-proofness versus Efficiency in Matching with Indifferences: Redesigning the NYC High School Match
By: Atila Abdulkadiroglu and Alvin E. Roth
- January 2007 (Revised December 2008)
- Case
Mercy Corps: Positioning the Organization to Reach New Heights
By: Allen S. Grossman and Caroline Joan King
Mercy Corps, the world's 5th largest international relief and development agency, is at a turning point. The nonprofit's opportunities to grow and serve a larger number of beneficiaries are unprecedented. By looking at the unique relationship between headquarters and... View Details
- January 2007
- Article
Introducing the First Management Control Systems: Evidence from the Retail Sector
By: Tatiana Sandino
Focusing on a sample of US retailers, I study the management control systems (MCS) that firms introduce when they first invest in controls, and identify four categories of initial MCS, which are defined in terms of the purposes these MCS fulfill. The first category,... View Details
- December 2006 (Revised January 2008)
- Case
ViaGen: Revolutionizing the Livestock Industry
By: David E. Bell, Reed Martin and Mary L. Shelman
ViaGen has invested heavily to develop cloning technology for the livestock industry. Cloning has the potential to significantly improve the genetics of livestock, leading to higher quality meat, healthier animals, and more efficient production. Since 2003, the firm... View Details
- November 2006
- Article
Breaking the Trade-Off Between Efficiency and Service
By: Frances X. Frei
Keywords: Performance Efficiency
- August 2006 (Revised March 2007)
- Background Note
Developing an Effective Living Group in the General Management Program
By: Michael Beer and John J. Gabarro
Discusses the importance of living room groups (eight participants who share a living room) at Harvard Business School's Advanced Management Program developing into effective learning groups. The diversity of the groups is a strength, but only a conscious and concerted... View Details
Keywords: Groups and Teams
- August 2006
- Article
A Market for Time: Fairness and Efficiency in Waiting Lines
- August 2006
- Article
Confidence Intervals for Probabilities of Default
By: Samuel G. Hanson and Til Schuermann
In this paper we conduct a systematic comparison of confidence intervals around estimated probabilities of default (PD) using several analytical approaches as well as parametric and nonparametric bootstrap methods. We do so for two different PD estimation... View Details
- July 2006
- Case
Boeing's e-Enabled Advantage
By: Lynda M. Applegate, Joseph S. Valacich, Mara Vatz and Christoph Schneider
Examines Boeing's new strategy of offering services to regain market dominance and help its struggling airline customers improve efficiency and profitability. View Details
- March 2006 (Revised April 2008)
- Module Note
Conceptualizing the Customer Operating Role
By: Frances X. Frei
The module introduces students to the concept and implications of a customer operating role. Building on the first year operations curriculum in which only employees' and machines' operating roles are considered, it provides the additional perspectives needed to bring... View Details
- March 2006
- Background Note
Customer-Introduced Variability in Service Operations
By: Frances X. Frei
Presents a typology of customer-introduced variability and offers guidance on how to manage each type. Central to the ideas developed is how to mitigate the effects of the apparent trade-off between reducing variability and diminishing the service experience or... View Details
- January 2006 (Revised March 2010)
- Case
Peer-to-Peer File Sharing and the Market for Digital Information Goods
By: Ramon Casadesus-Masanell, Andres Hervas and Jordan Mitchell
We study competitive interaction between two alternative models of digital content distribution over the Internet: peer-to-peer (p2p) file sharing and centralized client-server distribution. We present microfoundations for a stylized model of p2p file sharing where all... View Details
Keywords: Price; Profit; Distribution; Competition; Internet and the Web; Information Infrastructure
- 5 Nov 2005 - 8 Nov 2005
- Conference Presentation
New Perspectives on the Business Value of IT
By: David James Brunner, Bradley R. Staats and Marco Iansiti
We sought to unravel the link between IT investment and firm performance by examining deployed IT functionality (ITF). First, ITF appears to be an important link in the IT spend to business value chain. Second, ITF does not seem to be a commodity and has... View Details
- November 2005 (Revised May 2007)
- Case
Leading Change at Simmons (A)
By: Tiziana E. Casciaro, Amy C. Edmondson, Stacy McManus and Kate Roloff
Explores the challenge of managing large-scale organizational change at Simmons, an old and established company that manufactures and distributes mattresses. The new CEO, Charlie Eitel, hired to turn the organization's performance around, considers whether to implement... View Details
- November 2005
- Case
Playgrounds and Performance: Results Management at KaBOOM! (A)
By: Herman B. Leonard, Marc J. Epstein and Laura Winig
KaBOOM!, a successful playground-building social enterprise funded through corporate partnerships, wants to develop a performance measurement system that will enable the organization to expand its impact substantially. The board of directors and management are trying... View Details