Publications

February 2011 (Revised August 2012)
Teaching Note

Emotiv Systems Inc.: It's the Thoughts that Count (TN)

By: Elie Ofek and Natalie Kindred

Teaching Note for 510050. View Details

Keywords: Product Launch; Technological Innovation; Applications and Software; Decision Choices and Conditions; Games, Gaming, and Gambling; Marketing Channels; Price

1973
Book

Curriculum Recommendations for Graduate Professional Programs in Information Systems

By: F. W. McFarlan, R. L. Nolan and D. P. Norton

Keywords: Higher Education; Information Technology

September 2013
Teaching Note

Gary Hirshberg and Stonyfield Farm

By: Nancy F. Koehn and Nora N. Khan

Gary Hirshberg and Stonyfield Farm is the story of one entrepreneur's vision and journey to create a market-leading, environmentally responsible business founded on the principles of product quality, organizational alignment and sustainability. A former... View Details

Keywords: Development Stage Enterprises; Entrepreneurs; Experimentation; Management By Objective; Technology; Values; Leadership; Entrepreneurship; Agriculture and Agribusiness Industry; United States

October 2009 (Revised April 2021)
Case

Ingrid Johnson and Nedbank Business Banking

By: Michael Tushman and David Kiron

This case discusses the issue of leading change at the business banking division of Nedbank, a prominent South African bank, between 2005 and 2009. (This timeframe, beginning just 11 years after Apartheid's end, covers Ingrid Johnson's leadership of this division... View Details

Keywords: Leadership And Change Management; Leadership; Leading Change; Banks and Banking; Organizational Culture; Organizational Structure; Change Management; Leadership Style; Banking Industry; South Africa

February 2019
Technical Note

Can Multiunit Organizations Remain Agile as They Grow?

By: Tatiana Sandino

This note discusses how multiunit organizations incorporate flexibility into their management control systems, some by authorizing all or a select number of their dispersed units to make input and process decisions, some by investing in data-analytic technologies to... View Details

Keywords: Management Control Systems; Flexibility; Management Systems; Business Units; Decision Making

2020
Working Paper

Design Rules, Volume 2: How Technology Shapes Organizations: Chapter 2 Transactions in a Task Network

By: Carliss Y. Baldwin

From the 1930s through today, many economists have conceived of large technical systems for the production of goods and services as a series of transactions. This point of view has led eminent economists to assert that transactions are the fundamental unit of analysis... View Details

Keywords: Modularity; Information Technology; Organizations

SSRN

2022
Book

Deep Purpose: The Heart and Soul of High-Performance Companies

By: Ranjay Gulati

This book offers a compelling reassessment and defense of purpose as a management ethos, documenting the vast performance gains and social benefits that become possible when firms manage to get purpose right. Few business topics have aroused more skepticism in recent... View Details

Keywords: Purpose; Business And Society; Organizations; Mission and Purpose; Performance Effectiveness; Organizational Culture

Find at Harvard

22 Sep 2021
Blog Post

Student Spotlight: Jesse Lou (MBA 2022) – Working to Change the Food System

microbes to produce foods is nothing new -- however, using microbes to replace commodity crops and serve as a pillar in our food production system is fairly uncharted waters. My partner Max is a View Details

2019
Working Paper

Design Rules, Volume 2: How Technology Shapes Organizations: Chapter 10 Variations on the Theme of Flow Production

By: Carliss Y. Baldwin

The purpose of this chapter is to explore how technologies and organizations engaged in flow production evolve over time. To allow for an apples-to-apples comparison, I examine organizations using essentially the same physical technologies, making similar products, and... View Details

Keywords: Flow Production; Ford; General Motors; Competitiveness; Information Technology; Organizational Design; Production; Auto Industry

2024
Working Paper

The Effect of a System for Sharing Best Practices Within Pre-existing Peer Networks

By: Shelley Xin Li and Tatiana Sandino

Peer networks, such as enterprise social networks (ESNs), can facilitate knowledge transfer across employees. However, such systems can also lead to information overload or difficulty in finding useful information. We examine data from a natural field experiment where... View Details

Keywords: Social and Collaborative Networks; Communication Technology; Knowledge Sharing; Sales

October 2012
Case

Riding the Wave of Technological Change at RE/MAX, LLC.

By: Lynda M. Applegate, Ramiro Montealegre and Jeffrey Sweeney

David Liniger, cofounder of RE/MAX, LLC., wondered if his business was prepared to exploit the next wave of business opportunities in the real estate market. This industry had moved from one in which broker/owners controlled all of the consumers' access to information,... View Details

Keywords: General Management; Business Strategy; Entrepreneurship; Business Model; Information Technology; Transformation; Organizational Change and Adaptation

September 2022
Article

Regulatory Spillover and Workplace Racial Inequality

By: Letian Zhang

This paper suggests that affirmative action bans in the U.S. public sector may influence racial inequality in the private sector. Since the 1990s, nine states have banned affirmative action practice in public universities and state governments. Though these bans have... View Details

Keywords: Inequality; Regulation; Law; Organizational Norm; CEO; Affirmative Action; Organizations; Private Sector; Equality and Inequality; Diversity; Race; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms

Find at Harvard

October 1994 (Revised November 1994)
Case

British Airways: Using Information Systems to Better Serve the Customer

By: W. Earl Sasser and Norman Klein

Explores the uses of scanning technology, interactive software, and powerful data bases to assist customer relations representatives in resolving customer complaints. Competitive alliances in international markets are noted, but the focus is on the evolving commitment... View Details

Keywords: Debates; Customer Focus and Relationships; Globalized Markets and Industries; Service Delivery; Alliances; Information Technology; Aerospace Industry