Publications

25 Sep 2000
Research & Ideas

More Than the Sum of Its Parts: The Impact of Modularity on the Computer Industry

The computer age began some six decades ago with general-purpose machines with Star Wars-like names such as ENIAC and EDVAC. They were powered by vacuum tubes, big enough to fill an entire room, and developed by mathematicians under the auspices of what was then known... View Details

Keywords: by Staff; Consumer Products; Consumer Products; Consumer Products

July 2012
Case

Johannes Linden: Managing the Global Executive Committee

By: Linda A. Hill and Mark Rennella

Johannes Linden is the Director of the Washer and Dryer division of Fluss, a large Swiss appliance manufacturer. Soon after the company completes its revenue projections and bonus targets for the upcoming year, Linden shares some good news with his leadership team, the... View Details

Keywords: Leadership Style; Groups and Teams; Organizational Culture; Management Style; Motivation and Incentives; Power and Influence; Multinational Firms and Management; Consumer Products Industry; Consumer Products Industry; Switzerland

08 Feb 2016
Research & Ideas

The Civic Benefits of Google Street View and Yelp

Even as citizens generate more data than ever before, most cities haven’t taken full advantage of that information flow to improve services and become more efficient. “Historically, cities have been moving in analog, trying to measure things with imperfect data in... View Details

Keywords: by Michael Blanding; Consumer Products

16 Dec 2008
First Look

First Look: December 16, 2008

Publication:Annual Review of Psychology 60 (2009): 475-499 Abstract As technology has simplified meeting basic needs, humans have cultivated increasingly psychological avenues for occupying their consumption... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

18 Oct 2011
First Look

First Look: October 18

environmentally beneficial functions: it diverts waste from landfill and it produces renewable energy. At the same time, the waste-to-energy firm serves and collects revenue from two types of customers: waste generators who pay for waste disposal service and... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

Web

Brand Name Management - The Art of American Advertising

effectively,—he must know how to apply psychology to advertising.” 42 Indeed, with increasing sophistication businesses began to employ a number of marketing conventions that not only communicated general information about a product, but... View Details

October 2003 (Revised February 2004)
Case

Cape Wind

By: John T. Gourville and Kerry Herman

Cape Wind has proposed placing a 170-tower wind farm, with each tower more than 400-feet tall, in Nantucket Sound. Not surprisingly, public reaction is mixed. Some view the wind farm as clean, renewable energy. Others view it as an eyesore and a desecration of a valued... View Details

Keywords: Change Management; Renewable Energy; Consumer Behavior; Problems and Challenges; Natural Environment; Behavior; United States

April 2011
Teaching Note

Porcini's Pronto: "Great Italian cuisine without the wait!" (Brief Case)

By: James L. Heskett and Richard Luecke

Teaching Note to 4277. View Details

Keywords: Franchising; Syndication; Quantitative Analysis; Performance Measurement; Human Resource Management; Incentives; Motivation; Management; Motivation and Incentives; Consumer Behavior; Mathematical Methods; Franchise Ownership; Human Resources; Performance Evaluation

28 Jul 2014
Research & Ideas

Eyes Shut: The Consequences of Not Noticing

to get involved in a national consumer awareness campaign aimed at protecting consumers from gas can explosions. Elmburg felt he needed Walmart's cooperation because the gas cans produced by Blitz and sold... View Details

Keywords: by Max H. Bazerman; Retail

01 Aug 2008
What Do You Think?

Has the Time Come for “Stretch” in Management?

flat-footed on the issue of fuel efficiency? Granted, Detroit was busy catering to consumer demands for more profitable, lower-mileage vehicles. But at the same time, could stretch have given greater urgency to responses to alternative... View Details

Keywords: by Jim Heskett

01 Dec 2015
News

Case Study: Bionic Banking

fees at 1 percent or higher, I get a really bad vibe from the fund. I think many consumers are wising up to how much fees eat into their portfolio performance over the long term, and 1 percent or more is a View Details

Web

Bibliography - The Art of American Advertising

resource (Google login required) Friedman, Walter. Birth of a Salesman: The Transformation of Selling in America . Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2004. Garvey, Eleanor. The Adman in the Parlour: Magazines and the Gendering of View Details

Profile

Prita Kumar

nutritionist and certified trainer. Kumar’s father is a marketing research professor and the Kumar dinner table often felt more like a business meeting on the consumer retail sector than a family meal. The nightly discussions focused on... View Details

07 Jun 2016
Op-Ed

Can Brand Trump Win a Presidency?

TripAdvisor. Brand Trump has been extended to other categories, from steaks, to education, to apparel. Not all of these ventures have succeeded. Few guests see the competencies of a good hotelier as relevant to designing distinctive quality suits. But, for a minority... View Details

Keywords: by John A. Quelch; Advertising; Media & Broadcasting

26 Aug 2014
First Look

First Look: August 26

Abstract—To create social ties to support their professional or personal goals, people actively engage in instrumental networking. Drawing from moral psychology research, we posit that this intentional behavior has unintended consequences... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

April 2006
Background Note

Designing Sustainable Service Models

By: Frances X. Frei

Taught as the second module in a Harvard Business School course on Managing Service Operations. Addresses the challenge of designing service models that effectively incorporate a customer operating role, as well as how to align operations to deliver value to both the... View Details

Keywords: Business Model; Customers; Design; Managerial Roles; Consumer Behavior; Service Operations; Power and Influence; Value

February 1998 (Revised February 1999)
Case

Amway Japan Limited

In April 1997, the president of Amway Japan (AJL, Tokyo, Japan), pondered how to reverse the first performance decline the company has experienced since entering the Japanese direct selling market in 1979. Established as the tenth overseas subsidiary of Amway Corp. of... View Details

Keywords: Strategic Planning; Motivation and Incentives; Business Subsidiaries; Distribution Channels; Customer Satisfaction; Consumer Products Industry; Michigan; Tokyo