Publications

21 Nov 2023
Op-Ed

The Beauty Industry: Products for a Healthy Glow or a Compact for Harm?

In my recently published book Deeply Responsible Business, I write about business leaders since the 19th century who have acted responsibly, often by putting the welfare of their communities above the idea of maximizing profits. I make a sharp distinction between... View Details

Keywords: by Geoffrey Jones; Beauty & Cosmetics

07 Aug 2012
Working Paper Summaries

Financial vs. Strategic Buyers

Keywords: by Marc Martos-Vila, Matthew Rhodes-Kropf & Jarrad Harford

March 2014
Teaching Note

Andrew Sullivan and Faraway Ltd.

By: Frank V. Cespedes

Andrew Sullivan is an entrepreneur with an innovative product and impending sales calls on two important retail buyers. The (A) case provides information about Sullivan, his business, and the economics of his business model. The (B) and (C) cases provide information... View Details

Keywords: Sales; Marketing; Entrepreneurship; Retail Industry; Consumer Products Industry; England

Web

The Founding of U.S. Steel and the Power of Public Opinion | Baker Library | Bloomberg Center | Harvard Business School

Corporation with a Soul. Garden City, NY: Doubleday, Page & Company, 1921. American Iron and Steel Institute. The Men Who Make Steel. New York: American Iron and Steel Institute, 1936. American Iron and Steel Institute. The Men Who View Details

Web

Finance - Faculty & Research

Economics in 1997, to John Lintner who co-created the Capital Asset Pricing Model and made significant contributions to dividend policy , and Gordon Donaldson whose work helped shape the field of corporate finance . We strive to understand how managers and firms View Details

16 May 2023
HBS Case

How KKR Got More by Giving Ownership to the Factory Floor: ‘My Kids Are Going to College!’

One thing that stuck with Pete Stavros from the dinner-table conversations of his youth was that capitalism seemed fundamentally broken for his father, who earned an hourly wage working construction. The incentive was not there for Stavros’ dad and his peers to try to... View Details

Keywords: by Avery Forman

March 2022
Article

When Less Is More: Consumers Prefer Brands that Donate More in Relative versus Absolute Terms

By: Elizabeth A. Keenan, Anne V. Wilson and Leslie K. John

When trying to make a good impression on consumers through charitable giving, is it better for brands to maximize the overall dollars they donate or how much they give in relative terms; for example, the proportion of profits? Across five studies we show that consumers... View Details

Keywords: Cause-related Marketing; Charitable Donations; Generosity; Altruism; Philanthropy and Charitable Giving; Brands and Branding; Consumer Behavior

Find at Harvard

26 Jul 2010
Research & Ideas

Yes, You Can Raise Prices in a Downturn

higher prices," says Frank V. Cespedes, a senior lecturer at Harvard Business School, who spent 12 years running a professional services firm. That's right. Higher prices, not lower. “Competing on price is ultimately a bet on your... View Details

Keywords: by Sean Silverthorne; Retail; Consumer Products

Article

Four Ways to Build a Productive Sales Culture

By: Frank V. Cespedes and Steven Maughan

This article distinguishes sales efficiency (SE) initiatives (e.g., CRM, training, and KPI dashboards) from sales optimization (SO) decisions (e.g., aligning sales tasks with business strategy, customer selection, and deployment of sales resources across... View Details

Keywords: Strategy; Sales

November 2014 (Revised February 2016)
Case

DoubleDutch

By: Frank V. Cespedes and Matthew G. Preble

Lawrence Coburn and Pankaj Prasad, co-founders of the event solution startup DoubleDutch, have to make a significant decision about their young company's sales function. DoubleDutch's key product was a mobile application (app) and event management platform that... View Details

Keywords: Sales Management; Selling; Marketing Management; Strategy Implementation; Business Marketing; Sales Force Management; Salesforce Management; Marketing; Sales; Marketing Strategy; Strategy; Entrepreneurship; Business Startups; Technology Industry; United States; Europe; Asia

View Details

Keywords: federal government; real estate

31 Jan 2022
Research & Ideas

Where Can Digital Transformation Take You? Insights from 1,700 Leaders

to know their customers like never before. Rather than expecting customers to buy whatever a company sells, the most successful companies proactively anticipate and discover customers’ problems and desires and innovate accordingly.... View Details

Keywords: by Linda A. Hill, Ann Le Cam, Sunand Menon, and Emily Tedards

07 Nov 2023
News

Love and Money

people have, which is, no money can't buy love or no, of course, money can't buy happiness. But I think about it as much more complex than that. I think that money can help you View Details

06 Sep 2011
Research & Ideas

How Small Wins Unleash Creativity

All good managers understand the importance of making sure that every member of a team feels personally motivated and necessary throughout the workday, lest their work should stagnate and suffer. But what's the key to igniting creativity,... View Details

Keywords: by Carmen Nobel

August 2017 (Revised September 2018)
Case

Audubon in 2017: The Turnaround

By: V. Kasturi Rangan

The case briefly describes the 112-year history of the organization and focuses particularly on the changes wrought by its new leader David Yarnold who was brought in by the board in 2010. Under Yarnold's leadership the organization went through two strategic plans... View Details

Keywords: Nonprofit Strategy; Change Management; Change; Leadership; Nonprofit Organizations; Strategy; Transformation

June 2007 (Revised April 2009)
Case

Intel 2006: Rising to the Graphics Challenge

By: Willy C. Shih and Elie Ofek

Examines the evolution of the PC hardware industry over the span of two and a half decades. The open architecture design of the IBM Personal Computer followed by the rapid appearance of clones drove a high level of standardization and modularity in the industry, and... View Details

Keywords: History; Customer Value and Value Chain; Decision Choices and Conditions; Information Infrastructure; Competitive Strategy; Mergers and Acquisitions; Technology Industry