Publications

April 2001
Teaching Note

MindSpring TN

By: Jeffrey F. Rayport, Steven Silverman and William A. Sahlman

Teaching Note for (9-899-178). For book only - not listed on case. View Details

Keywords: Customer Satisfaction; Growth and Development Strategy; Mergers and Acquisitions; Organizational Culture; Competitive Strategy; Web Services Industry

01 Dec 1997
News

A Conversation with John Doerr (MBA '76)

the most satisfaction in your work? Doerr: Helping great teams come together, led by a terrific entrepreneur, and having them create new products or services that change the world. View Details

01 Mar 2018
News

Money (Actually) Can Buy Happiness

greater overall satisfaction with their lives. One of the things we are working on now is understanding how decisions about time, money, and happiness play out in the context of romantic relationships. What is the optimal way you and your... View Details

Keywords: April White

July–August 2025
Article

How the Busiest People Find Joy

By: Leslie A. Perlow, Sari Mentser and Salvatore J. Affinito

Joy, along with achievement and meaningfulness, is one of the three keys to a satisfying life. Yet it’s the missing piece for many ambitious individuals, the authors found after examining data on how nearly 2,000 professionals spend their days. Jam-packed schedules are... View Details

Keywords: Well-being; Satisfaction; Work-Life Balance; Happiness

2018
Working Paper

Status Inconsistency: Variance in One's Status Across Groups Harms Well-being but Improves Perspective-taking

By: Catarina Fernandes and Alison Wood Brooks

Most people belong to many different groups. While some people experience consistently high or low status across all of their groups, others experience wildly different levels of status in each group. In this research, we examine how status inconsistency – the degree... View Details

Keywords: Status; Social Hierarchies; Well-being; Perspective Taking; Status and Position; Groups and Teams; Satisfaction; Perspective

March 2017
Exercise

Designing Transformational Customer Experiences

By: Stefan Thomke

Anyone who has recently travelled, gone shopping, or tried to have a problem solved may have little recollection of the experience. Worse yet, some are frustrated by the lack of responsiveness or empathy that they encountered. The reality is that most customer... View Details

Keywords: Customer Experience; Exercise; Learning By Doing; LEGO; Storytelling; Customer Satisfaction; Design; Innovation and Management; Transformation; Service Delivery

April 2003 (Revised September 2005)
Case

Celebrity Cruises, Inc.: A Taste of Luxury

By: Frances X. Frei, Corey B. Hajim and Christian Hempell

Describes the complex operations of the cruise industry. Positioned between luxury cruise lines and mass market lines, Celebrity struggles to find ways to create customer loyalty and increase profitability. View Details

Keywords: Customer Satisfaction; Profit; Product Positioning; Operations; Luxury; Shipping Industry

August 2002
Background Note

Customer Benefit Stack

By: Das Narayandas

Describes a process to understand customer benefits created in industrial markets using the metaphor of a customer benefit stack. View Details

Keywords: Customer Satisfaction; Customer Value and Value Chain; Marketing Strategy; Product Marketing; Manufacturing Industry

October 1993 (Revised July 1997)
Case

Measure of Delight: The Pursuit of Quality at AT&T Universal Card Services (A)

By: Roy D. Shapiro and Michael D. Watkins

AT&T's Universal Card Services (UCS) has been extremely successful during its short lifetime. Dedicated to improving service quality and customer satisfaction, chief quality officer Rob Davis and his quality team have designed and put into place an unusual measurement... View Details

Keywords: Customer Satisfaction; Policy; Compensation and Benefits; Performance Evaluation; Quality; System; Telecommunications Industry

July 2005 (Revised March 2007)
Case

Kansai Digital Phone: Zutto, Gaining Japanese Loyalty

By: Francisco de Asis Martinez-Jerez and James Robert Dillon

Ted Katagi, marketing strategy manager of Kansai Digital Phone (KDP), utilizes customer lifetime value as a key metric to prioritize initiatives in an emergency plan to turn around the company. KDP is a regional phone company in Japan with less than stellar... View Details

Keywords: Customer Relationship Management; Customer Value and Value Chain; Customer Satisfaction; Telecommunications Industry; Electronics Industry; Japan; United States

01 Oct 1997
News

Class of '97 Placement Statistics Similar for September and January Cohorts

Preliminary placement figures (as of August 1997)* Total September Cohort January Cohort Average satisfaction with job offer (on a scale of 1-low to 7-high) 6.1 6.1 6.1 Average number of companies contacted 20 19 21 Average number of... View Details

2016
Working Paper

The Impact of Supplier Inventory Service Level on Retailer Demand

By: Nathan Craig, Nicole DeHoratius and Ananth Raman

To set inventory service levels, suppliers must understand how changes in inventory service level affect demand. We build on prior research, which uses analytical models and laboratory experiments to study the impact of a supplier's service level on demand from... View Details

Keywords: Customer Satisfaction; Forecasting and Prediction; Learning; Consumer Behavior; Service Delivery; Performance Expectations; Apparel and Accessories Industry; Service Industry