Publications

2010
Chapter

Feeling Good about Giving: The Benefits (and Costs) of Self-interested Charitable Behavior

By: L. Anik, L. B. Aknin, M. I. Norton and E. W. Dunn

While lay intuitions and pop psychology suggest that helping others leads to higher levels of happiness, the existing evidence only weakly supports this causal claim: research in psychology, economics, and neuroscience exploring the benefits of charitable giving has... View Details

Keywords: Advertising; Cost vs Benefits; Philanthropy and Charitable Giving; Outcome or Result; Relationships; Research; Behavior; Happiness; Motivation and Incentives

September 2009 (Revised May 2011)
Case

Acumen Fund: Measurement in Impact Investing (A)

By: Alnoor Ebrahim and V. Kasturi Rangan

Acumen Fund is a global venture capital firm with a dual purpose: it looks for a return on its investments, and it also seeks entrepreneurial solutions to global poverty. This case examines Acumen's new projects in Kenya. The organization's investment committee and its... View Details

Keywords: Decision Choices and Conditions; Venture Capital; Investment Return; Philanthropy and Charitable Giving; Risk Management; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Business and Government Relations; Social Enterprise; Financial Services Industry; Kenya

12 Jul 2020
Research & Ideas

Solving COVID'S Mental Health Crisis

get an annual budget from the provincial government but philanthropy still plays an important role in funding new programs and research and augmenting services.” The Foundation, which is one of Canada’s largest charities, provided $48.5... View Details

Keywords: by Howard Stevenson and Shirley Spence; Health

January 2001
Case

Merck Global Health Initiatives (A)

By: James E. Austin, Diana Barrett and James Weber

The case series focuses on Merck's drug donation program and then raises new issues facing management about what to do about HIV/AIDS in Africa given the company's development of a new therapy. Describes collaboration among many parties including the Gates Foundation,... View Details

Keywords: Programs; Philanthropy and Charitable Giving; Health Disorders; Health Care and Treatment; Private Sector; Public Sector; Alliances; Problems and Challenges; Pharmaceutical Industry; Botswana

October 2010
Article

The Emerging Capital Market for Nonprofits

By: Robert S. Kaplan and Allen S. Grossman

Many of our largest and most successful companies today did not exist 50 years ago. During this same time interval, companies that ranked among top in the 1960s have disappeared, been merged out of existence, or become much smaller presences in the U.S. industrial... View Details

Keywords: Capital Markets; Investment Funds; Philanthropy and Charitable Giving; Corporate Accountability; Management Practices and Processes; Infrastructure; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Performance Effectiveness; Nonprofit Organizations

Find at Harvard

12 Mar 2006
Research & Ideas

Global Poverty Needs a Global Answer

to be published by Princeton University Press. In this recent interview conducted by e-mail, Lodge is hopeful that the World Development Corporation will be formed. He explains why nonprofits aren't the answer to ending poverty and asks that executives look beyond... View Details

Keywords: by Cynthia Churchwell

07 Jun 2011
First Look

First Look: June 7

discretion. Corporate philanthropy is our setting to study how a differentiated structural element, the corporate foundation, constrains the influence of individual senior managers and directors on corporate strategy. Our analysis of... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

17 Feb 2022
Blog Post

The Fifth Year of Short Intensive Programs (SIPs) at HBS

Times’ Ross Douthat, and Harvard University President Larry Bacow. Sessions included “Leadership as the Courage to Care” with Bob Chapman, chairman and CEO of Barry-Wehmiller; “Spiritual Philanthropy in Emerging Markets” with Professor... View Details

01 Dec 2009
News

Seven Honored with Alumni Achievement Award

Partner U.S. Venture Partners Bowes Jr. After founding U.S. Venture Partners in San Francisco in 1981, Bill Bowes helped shape companies such as Sun Microsystems, Callaway Golf, Applied Biosystems, and Ross Stores. More recently, he has focused on venture View Details

Keywords: Susan Young; awards; fishing; Funds, Trusts, and Other Financial Vehicles; Finance; Beverage and Tobacco Product Manufacturing; Manufacturing; General Merchandise Stores; Retail Trade

01 Jun 2013
News

Lesson Plans

uses a venture philanthropy model that makes early- and growth-stage investments in NGOs focused on high-quality, affordable schools; human capital development; technology in education; and school accountability." "When the business... View Details

Keywords: Educational Support Services; Educational Services; Elementary and Secondary Schools; Educational Services

December 2006 (Revised February 2007)
Case

Opportunity International: Measurement and Mission

By: Herman B. Leonard, Marc J. Epstein and Melissa Tritter

After a "first career" in business, HBS graduate Christopher Crane becomes CEO of a worldwide microfinance network. The organization's twin challenges are: 1) developing metrics to give it an accurate picture of its situation and impacts, and 2) generating rapid... View Details

Keywords: Microfinance; Measurement and Metrics; Problems and Challenges; Growth and Development Strategy; Business and Stakeholder Relations; Business Model; Nonprofit Organizations; Philanthropy and Charitable Giving; Financial Services Industry

10 Oct 2000
Research & Ideas

Cross-Sector Collaboration: Lessons from the International Trachoma Initiative

Luff, Manager, Corporate Philanthropy Programs at Pfizer, Inc.] and Dr. Cook [Joe Cook, head of the Program for Tropical Disease Research at the Clark Foundation] was facilitated by a personal connection that helped to initiate the... View Details

Keywords: by Diana Barrett, James Austin & Sheila McCarthy

June 2008 (Revised July 2008)
Case

The Miami Project to Cure Paralysis

By: Robert Steven Kaplan, Christopher Marquis and Brent Kazan

Marc Buoniconti is the co-founder of the Miami Project to Cure Paralysis, a nonprofit medical research organization. The project was founded in 1985 by Marc and his father Nick, a former Hall of Fame football player, when Marc suffered a spinal cord injury. In 2007,... View Details

Keywords: Investment; Philanthropy and Charitable Giving; Health Testing and Trials; Leadership; Growth and Development Strategy; Mission and Purpose; Research and Development; Nonprofit Organizations; Health Industry; Miami

01 Oct 1999
News

The View from the Pit

changing system. Barrett's commitment to social service has inspired her to see philanthropy as a lifelong habit - one that she would like to pass on to her students. Describing her own life as an extremely diversified portfolio, Barrett... View Details

Keywords: Judith A. Ross

September 2017 (Revised February 2018)
Case

Becton Dickinson: Global Health Strategy

By: Mark R. Kramer and Sarah Mehta

Becton, Dickinson and Company (BD) was a medical technology firm headquartered in Franklin Lakes, New Jersey, with 43,000 employees and 2016 revenues of $12.5 billion. For several years, the company had pursued developing products that created shared value, defined as... View Details

Keywords: Shared Value; Creating Shared Value; Odon Device; Medical Technology; Value Creation; Values and Beliefs; Philanthropy and Charitable Giving; Health; Health Care and Treatment; Health Testing and Trials; Emerging Markets; Social Issues; Competitive Strategy; Medical Devices and Supplies Industry; Africa; Asia; Middle East