Publications

SSRN

December 2010
Article

The Case for Professional Boards

By: Robert C. Pozen

When the world's largest financial institutions had to be rescued from insolvency in 2008, many experts laid the blame at the feet of corporate boards. But insufficient board oversight is a problem that had supposedly been solved in 2002. As the United States... View Details

Keywords: Financial Institutions; Insolvency and Bankruptcy; Governing and Advisory Boards; Failure; Accounting Audits; Quality; Behavior; Legal Liability; Experience and Expertise; Corporate Governance; Governance Controls; Performance Effectiveness; United States

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From Cotton Mill to Business Empire: The Emergence of Regional Enterprises in Modern China

The demise of state-owned enterprises, the transformation of collectives into shareholding cooperatives, and the creation of investment opportunities through stock markets indicate China’s movement from a socialist, state-controlled economy... View Details

November 2002 (Revised February 2010)
Case

Intel Corporation: 1968-2003

By: Ramon Casadesus-Masanell, David B. Yoffie and Sasha Mattu

Describes three stages in Intel's history: the initial success and then collapse in DRAMs and EPROMs, its transition to and dominance in microprocessors, and its move to become the main supplier of the building blocks for the Internet economy. Allows a rich discussion... View Details

Keywords: History; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Internet and the Web; Information Technology; Competitive Strategy; Corporate Strategy; Industry Structures; Information Technology Industry; Technology Industry

20 Sep 2017
News

Japan Is Counting on Shareholder Activism to Improve Its Economy

Spring–Fall 2015
Article

Whither Uber? Competitive Dynamics in Transportation Networks

By: Benjamin Edelman

Transportation Network Companies offer notable service advances—but do they comply with the law? I offer evidence of some important shortfalls, then consider how the legal system might appropriately respond. Though it is tempting to forgive many violations in light of... View Details

Keywords: Transportation Network Company; Uber; Lyft; Regulation; Lawfulness; Transportation Networks; Laws and Statutes; Law Enforcement; Transportation Industry; Information Technology Industry

December 2019 (Revised June 2024)
Case

The Dutch East India Company in 1612 (A)

By: Lynn S. Paine and Giuseppe Dari-Mattiacci

The Dutch East India Company’s board of directors must decide what to do about an impending legal requirement to liquidate the company’s assets and return to shareholders their capital and any profits earned during a ten-year lock-up period. The charter granted to the... View Details

Keywords: Corporate Governance; Globalized Firms and Management; Organizational Structure; Laws and Statutes; Financial Markets; Business and Shareholder Relations; Business and Government Relations; Business History; Shipping Industry; Netherlands

2009
Working Paper

Capitalizing On Innovation: The Case of Japan

By: Robert Dujarric and Andrei Hagiu

Japan's industrial landscape is characterized by hierarchical forms of industry organization, which are increasingly inadequate in modern sectors, where innovation relies on platforms and horizontal ecosystems of firms producing complementary products. Using three... View Details

Keywords: Globalized Markets and Industries; Government Legislation; Innovation and Invention; Industry Structures; Horizontal Integration; Vertical Integration; Manufacturing Industry; Japan

Article

Moving Beyond Schumpeter: Management Research on the Determinants of Technological Innovation

By: Gautam Ahuja, Curba Morris Lampert and Vivek Tandon

Schumpeter's conjecture that large monopolistic firms were the key source of innovation in modern industrial economies has been the underpinning for much work on the topic of innovation. In this review paper we consciously move beyond the Schumpeterian tradition of... View Details

Keywords: Technological Innovation; Management; Strategy

March 2010 (Revised January 2012)
Case

Microsoft's IP Ventures

By: Josh Lerner and Ann Leamon

Microsoft's IP Ventures program, through which Microsoft spun out promising but unused technologies into new companies, is a new approach to corporate venture capital. The program provides "IP for equity" and has proven very successful in achieving its main... View Details

Keywords: Corporate Entrepreneurship; Venture Capital; Equity; Financing and Loans; Investment; Intellectual Property; Rights; Software; Washington (state, US)

March 1999
Case

City of Charlotte (B)

By: Robert S. Kaplan

This case shows how two operating departments-transportation and police-translate the high-level corporate scorecard for the city into departmental balanced scorecards. The transportation department follows a highly structured approach designed to link initiatives... View Details

Keywords: Crime and Corruption; Global Strategy; National Security; Balanced Scorecard; Organizational Design; Technology Adoption; Public Administration Industry; Transportation Industry

Article

Culture Is Not the Culprit: When Organizations Are in Crisis, It's Usually Because the Business Is Broken

By: Jay W. Lorsch and Emily McTague

When organizations get into big trouble, fixing the culture is usually the prescription. That's what most everyone said GM needed to do after its recall crisis in 2014—and ever since, CEO Mary Barra has been focusing on creating "the right environment" to promote... View Details

Keywords: Culture; Cultural Reform; Organizational Culture; Crisis Management; Business Processes

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February 2015 (Revised August 2016)
Case

Nokia's Bridge Program: Redesigning Layoffs (A)

By: Sandra J. Sucher and Susan J. Winterberg

"Not another Bochum." Nokia Board Chairman Jorma Ollila was clear in the goals he set for the 2011 restructuring that Nokia's new CEO, Stephen Elop, had decided was necessary to address the dramatically changed competitive environment the company faced in smartphones... View Details

Keywords: Layoffs; Plant Closure; Outplacement; Shared Value; Business or Company Management; Job Cuts and Outsourcing; Restructuring; Employee Relationship Management; Telecommunications Industry

14 Oct 2010
Working Paper Summaries

Reversing the Queue: Performance, Legitimacy, and Minority Hiring

Keywords: by Andrew Hill & David Thomas; Sports

04 Nov 2013
Research & Ideas

The Real Cost of Bribery

analyze the negative effects of bribery on corporate performance. The results of his study, detailed in the paper Firm Competitiveness and Detection of Bribery, surprised him. As it turns out, the biggest problem with View Details

Keywords: by Carmen Nobel

2013
Working Paper

Managers and Market Capitalism

By: Rebecca Henderson and Karthik Ramanna

In a capitalist system based on free markets, do managers have responsibilities to the system itself? If they do, should these responsibilities shape their behavior when they are engaging in the political process in an attempt to structure the institutions of... View Details

Keywords: Market Design; Economic Systems; Managerial Roles; Government and Politics

2019
Working Paper

Design Rules, Volume 2: How Technology Shapes Organizations: Chapter 9 Organizing to Rationalize

By: Carliss Y. Baldwin

The purpose of this chapter is to explain what the technologies of flow production with stochastic bottlenecks require and reward in organizations. I argue that organizations successfully implementing these technologies are likely to have unified governance and... View Details

Keywords: Information Technology; Organizational Design; Management Teams; Business History

October 2001 (Revised January 2002)
Case

OAO YUKOS Oil Company

By: Malcolm S. Salter and Joshua N. Rosenbaum

This case presents the history and current position of Russia's second-largest oil company, YUKOS, as it seeks listing on the NYSE as an ADR and attempts to rid itself from a punishing "governance discount" by the capital markets. This is a company with a history of... View Details

Keywords: Stocks; Capital Markets; Corporate Governance; Developing Countries and Economies; Energy Sources; Energy Industry; Russia