Publications

23 Feb 2011
News

Low Risk, High Reward

September 1994
Case

Marks & Spencer: Sir Richard Greenbury's Quiet Revolution

By: Joseph L. Bower and John B. Matthews Jr.

Marks & Spencer (M&S) is one of the world's greatest companies. In 1994, its management was chosen the most admired in Europe by 637 peers. The case explores how Sir Richard Greenbury, appointed the new chairman of the company in 1991, transformed his inheritance into... View Details

Keywords: Growth and Development Strategy; Business or Company Management; Business Strategy; Management Teams; Global Strategy; Multinational Firms and Management; Europe; United States

Find at Harvard

01 Jun 2023
HBS Case

A Nike Executive Hid His Criminal Past to Turn His Life Around. What If He Didn't Have To?

Miller vowed to hide his criminal past from the business world—a secret he managed to keep for more than 40 years. That was back in 1982, when arrest and prison records were recorded on paper, stored in filing cabinets, and were much... View Details

Keywords: by Dina Gerdeman; Apparel & Accessories

2017
Chapter

Entrepreneurship in Larger Companies

By: William R. Kerr

Entrepreneurship in large and established companies is vital for their long-term success. Incumbent firms face many challenges ranging from global competition to digitization. In times past, being caught flat-footed might have set a company back several years, but it... View Details

Keywords: Corporate Entrepreneurship

February 2011
Case

Chegg: Textbook Rental Takes Flight

By: Thomas R. Eisenmann, William A. Sahlman and Evan W. Richardson

In late 2010, Silicon Valley-based Chegg, the leading online college textbook rental company, is scaling rapidly. The case recounts Chegg's history from its origins as a distant competitor to Craigslist in college classified listings through a pivot into textbook... View Details

Keywords: Change Management; Higher Education; Entrepreneurship; Books; Growth and Development Strategy; Growth Management; Service Operations; Renting or Rental; Online Technology; Education Industry; Service Industry; California

November 1988 (Revised July 1997)
Case

Technology Transfer at a Defense Contractor

By: Linda A. Hill

At a time of great changes in the corporate environment, Larry Yoshino, a design lab manager at Parsons Controls Corp., faces a delay in a costly defense project due to the inability of one of his subordinates to gain the cooperation of engineers at Parsons'... View Details

Keywords: Organizational Change and Adaptation; Change Management; Conflict Management; Managerial Roles; Management Teams; Employees; Competitive Strategy; Projects

November 2019 (Revised February 2020)
Case

Hormel Foods

By: David E. Bell and Natalie Kindred

In 2019, CEO Jim Snee is weighing how to shape the image of Hormel Foods, one of the largest U.S. meat and food companies, at a time when the industry faces unprecedented scrutiny. Based in the small town of Austin, Minnesota, the nearly 130-year-old firm is best known... View Details

Keywords: Brand Portfolio Strategy; Brands and Branding; Product; Strategy; Marketing Strategy; Risk Management; Consumer Products Industry; Consumer Products Industry; Consumer Products Industry; United States; China

29 Jan 2009
Working Paper Summaries

An Exploration of the Japanese Slowdown during the 1990s

Keywords: by Diego A. Comin

30 Jun 2003
Research & Ideas

Are You Supporting Your B Players?

labeled. "If you want to threaten a really smart person who is task driven, question his or her competency. That's the very soul of who they are," he said. These managers also keep busy schedules and are reluctant to slow down... View Details

Keywords: by Martha Lagace

03 Jul 2013
What Do You Think?

What Are the Limits of Transparency?

cautioned us not to expect too much from a policy of transparency, saying "If the company culture operates better within the founder's vision of transparency, all well and good, be transparent. But to trust transparency alone to engender trust in View Details

Keywords: by James Heskett

July 2018
Teaching Note

Cumplo.com

By: Frank V. Cespedes

Teaching Note for HBS No. 818-039. Teaching Note for HBS No. 818-039. Cumplo is a Chilean-based fin-tech startup that provides investors and small businesses with opportunities to access loans and investments in ways distinct from traditional financial institutions in... View Details

Keywords: Fintech; Alternative Finance; Crowdfunding; Crowdlending; Marketing Strategy; Growth and Development Strategy; Social Entrepreneurship; Expansion; Financial Services Industry; Latin America; South America; Chile

August 1994
Case

Saturn Corp.'s Module II Decision

In the Spring of 1994, Saturn Corp. was setting sales records by attracting more than 25,000 buyers per month. Saturn officials believed there was a long-term opportunity to sell 400,000 to 500,000 cars per year in the United States and selected international markets.... View Details

Keywords: Cost vs Benefits; Production; Expansion; Manufacturing Industry; Auto Industry; Retail Industry; Tennessee; United States

Asim Ijaz Khwaja is the Director of the Center for International Development and the Sumitomo-Foundation for Advanced Studies on International Development Professor of International Finance and Development at the Harvard Kennedy School, and co-founder of the View Details

Research Summary

Overview

Professor Sawyer’s research focuses on U.S. political economy in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, concentrating on the development of competition policy and the administrative state. While the conventional history of U.S. competition policy portrays the... View Details

March 2014
Teaching Note

E-Cigarettes: Marketing Versus Public Health

By: John A. Quelch

Electronic cigarettes (e-cigarettes) were heralded by some as a healthcare game changer, enabling smokers to switch to a new product which carried lower risk of cancer. However, there were concerns about the public health risk of e-cigarettes, particularly the chance... View Details

September 2019 (Revised June 2021)
Case

Blenheim Chalcot

By: John R. Wells and Benjamin Weinstock

In April 2019, Manoj Badale and Charles Mindenhall, co-founders of Blenheim Chalcot, were contemplating how they might go about developing their portfolio. Since founding the company as an internet consultancy called netdecisions in 1998, Badale and Mindenhall had... View Details

Keywords: Venture Capital; Entrepreneurship; Business Model; Growth and Development Strategy; United Kingdom; United States; India

26 Jan 2009
Research & Ideas

Where is Home for the Global Firm?

[PDF]. To start, responding strategically to these changes requires a reconceptualization of what a corporate home is, says Desai. "Managers need to make conscious choices about how to unbundle the activities that have traditionally been centered in a home country... View Details

Keywords: by Martha Lagace

Web

Doctoral

New Ideas for a Changing World New Ideas for a Changing World Some of the greatest intellectual challenges of our time are emerging from the broad fields of business management. Harvard Business School... View Details

July 2018 (Revised March 2019)
Teaching Note

Hilti (A): Fleet Management?

By: Ramon Casadesus-Masanell and Jan Rivkin

This Teaching Note accompanies the case HBS No. 718-419, “Hilti (A): Fleet Management.” It provides guidelines for class discussion, as well as a board plan and transcripts of the associated videos, Hilti Fleet Management Video Supplements.
The associated case... View Details