Publications

August 2006 (Revised May 2007)
Case

Management Levels at Staples (A): Company and Organization

By: David A. Garvin and Lynne Levesque

One of six cases that describe the roles and responsibilities of managers at each of the hierarchical levels of management within the U.S. Stores business unit of Staples, the world's largest office supply company. Together, the cases form a complete integrated... View Details

Keywords: Cost vs Benefits; Leadership; Management Practices and Processes; Managerial Roles; Operations; Performance Effectiveness; Strategic Planning; Perspective; Retail Industry

July 2020 (Revised January 2021)
Case

Pattern Brands

By: Sunil Gupta, Elie Ofek and Julia Kelley

In March 2020, direct-to-consumer (DTC) company Pattern Brands needed to decide how to allocate resources across its different brands. Pattern Co-Founders Nick Ling and Emmett Shine hoped to avoid the pitfalls faced by some DTC companies—such as inability to scale and... View Details

01 May 2013
What Do You Think?

Why Isn’t ‘Servant Leadership’ More Prevalent?

Summing Up Is the Term "Servant Leadership" an Oxymoron? Servant leadership (SL) is a concept that triggers a great deal of interest, judging by my e-mail inbox and the number View Details

Keywords: by Jim Heskett

March 2009 (Revised August 2010)
Case

The Posse Foundation: Implementing a Growth Strategy

The Posse Foundation selected high-potential, non-traditional students to attend selective colleges as part of a group of 10 from the same city. The organization had developed an ambitious growth plan, but because it focused on the most selective colleges, the pool of... View Details

Keywords: Diversity; Higher Education; Social Entrepreneurship; Growth and Development Strategy; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Personal Development and Career; Partners and Partnerships; Nonprofit Organizations; Education Industry

Find at Harvard

October 2006 (Revised November 2007)
Case

Gianna Angelopoulos-Daskalaki and the 2004 Athens Olympic Games (A)

By: Christopher Marquis, Doug Guthrie and Yannis Katsarakis

Gianna Angelopoulous-Daskalaki led the bidding organization that secured the 2004 Olympics for Athens and then later the preparations for those Games. Tracks her leadership style and how she and her team won the bid. After substantial planning problems threatened to... View Details

Keywords: Leadership Style; Bids and Bidding; Planning; Social Enterprise; Sports; Public Administration Industry

January 2021 (Revised February 2021)
Case

TCS: From Physical Offices to Borderless Work

By: Prithwiraj Choudhury and Malini Sen

Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), a multinational IT services company headquartered in Mumbai, is a subsidiary of one of India’s most reputed conglomerates, the Tata Group. In 2020, TCS was valued at $144.7 billion, the highest for any company in the IT sector,... View Details

Keywords: Remote Work; Organizational Structure; Change Management; Transformation; Decision Choices and Conditions; Customer Satisfaction; Information Technology Industry; India; Asia; United States; Europe

10 Jan 2017
Blog Post

From Product Development to Business School

I sat there silently screaming. Eyes flitting across the room at the faces sitting around the table gathered for a Brita leadership team meeting. They couldn’t possibly do it, I thought to myself, clutching my 3D-printed prototype like a... View Details

Keywords: Technology; Manufacturing; Consumer Products / Retail

21 Dec 2017
News

Why Sexual Harassment Persists and What Organizations Can Do to Stop It

October 2005
Case

Saskatchewan Wheat Pool 2005

By: Ray A. Goldberg and Mary L. Shelman

CEO Mayo Schmidt had just guided his firm through five difficult years. Survival had come with the difficult decision to change the 80-year-old agricultural cooperative into a Canadian business corporation. The Saskatchewan Wheat Pool (SWP) now faced the future with a... View Details

Keywords: Change Management; Customer Value and Value Chain; Capital; Technological Innovation; Leading Change; Demand and Consumers; Partners and Partnerships; Expansion; Technology Adoption; Food and Beverage Industry; Canada

Find at Harvard

February 2001 (Revised October 2002)
Background Note

Entrepreneurial History: A Conceptual Overview

By: Nancy F. Koehn

Analyzes HBS cases on five entrepreneurs and the companies they built: Josiah Wedgwood, Henry Heinz, Marshall Field, Howard Schultz of Starbucks, and Michael Dell. These five cases and their accompanying teaching notes comprise a course module on entrepreneurial... View Details

Keywords: Transition; Demand and Consumers; Competition; Business History; Entrepreneurship; Customer Focus and Relationships; Business Strategy; Society

Program

Strategy: Building and Sustaining Competitive Advantage

Summary In the fight for market leadership and the continuous drive toward improved returns, your company needs to devise an effective strategy—and execute it flawlessly. This program prepares you to tackle or lead that challenge in all... View Details

Program

Real Estate Management Program

Summary In today's increasingly unpredictable, competitive real estate sector, your ability to make the best decisions requires a thorough grasp of how the industry is evolving and how the relationships among design, development,... View Details

Keywords: Real Estate; Real Estate

January 2023
Article

Inequality Regimes in Sub-Saharan Africa from Precolonial Times to the Present

By: Ewout Frankema, Michiel de Haas and Marlous van Waijenburg

While current levels of economic inequality in Sub-Saharan Africa receive ample attention from academics and policymakers, we know little about the long-run evolution of inequality in the region. Even the new and influential ‘global inequality literature’ that is... View Details

Keywords: Economic Inequalty; Equality and Inequality; History; Africa