best practices - Publications - Faculty & Research

01 Mar 2021
What Do You Think?

What Does Remote Work Mean for Middle Managers?

consciously working with your superior to obtain the best possible results for you, your boss, and the company.” However, it didn’t trigger the amount of follow-on research that the subject deserved after early interest in the topic died... View Details

Keywords: by James Heskett

30 Jun 2003
Research & Ideas

Are You Supporting Your B Players?

managers, but an "inclusion" issue. People start to feel that they're no longer "in the club." Herb Kelleher, chairman of Southwest, decided to create a club of 114,000 employees, said DeLong. They don't espouse one theory and embrace its opposite.... View Details

Keywords: by Martha Lagace

19 Aug 2021
Op-Ed

Don't Ignore Your Employees' Misery—TAKE Control

popular sentiment could prove disastrous for employers trying to retain professional and highly skilled talent. And while speed is required, leaders also need a long-term view. They need to envision the practices that will be common View Details

Keywords: by Hise O. Gibson and MaShon Wilson

30 Nov 2016
What Do You Think?

How Do Leaders Manage the Tension Between Pride and Arrogance?

recommended) being attentive to the changes in the external environment communicating with middle managers and leading by example, motivating employees to speak, listening to customers.” Several asked whether the phenomenon in question is View Details

Keywords: by James Heskett

08 Feb 2010
HBS Case

Looking Behind Google’s Stand in China

downside consequences are more certain. Google has some 700 employees in China, the best of whom are already finding alternative employment. So de facto, Google is going to be a much smaller entity in China. It seems unlikely to me that... View Details

Keywords: by Sean Silverthorne; Technology

06 Mar 2012
First Look

First Look: March 6

now a dynamic and growing business that attracts the best and the brightest. It is tempting to declare the industry a roaring success. But its purpose is to serve the needs of U.S. households and firms, and by this standard its... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

03 Dec 2020
Research & Ideas

Cut Payroll Costs with Transparency, Fairness, and Compassion

and layoffs. Questions that CEOs raised with us included: “What are best practices for digital terminations?” and “If the economy worsens and you have to consider reducing payroll, what’s the most effective... View Details

Keywords: by Boris Groysberg and Sarah Abbott

10 Sep 2020
Research & Ideas

The COVID Two-Step for Leaders: Protect and Pivot

improvement and innovation. Below are three suggestions for enabling continuous improvement in your company: Call on cross-functional teams to help solve problems In order to achieve greater efficiency, one best View Details

Keywords: by Boris Groysberg and Katherine Connolly Baden

26 Nov 2001
Research & Ideas

How Toyota Turns Workers Into Problem Solvers

period, they showed us how work was actually done in practice in dozens of plants. Kent and I went to Toyota plants and those of suppliers here in the U.S. and in Japan and directly watched literally hundreds of people in a wide variety... View Details

Keywords: by Sarah Jane Johnston; Manufacturing; Transportation; Auto

03 Jul 2008
What Do You Think?

Are Followers About to Get Their Due?

in large organizations. Participants work hard either in support of or against the policies and practices of their leaders. As Kellerman puts it, "they care enough to try to have an impact." Clearly it's in the View Details

Keywords: by Jim Heskett

30 Jul 2013
First Look

First Look: July 30

chlorine tablets to purify their drinking water? Behavioral economics has shown us that we don't always act in our own best interests. This is as true of health decisions as it is of economic ones. An array of biases, limits on cognition,... View Details

Keywords: Anna Secino

14 Jun 2010
Research & Ideas

The Hard Work of Measuring Social Impact

multiple actors and causal mechanisms that are still poorly understood. In such cases, it can still be useful to try to measure what an organization is doing and whether its strategies are working to influence societal change. But there's a tradeoff in terms of the... View Details

Keywords: by Julia Hanna

21 Feb 2005
Op-Ed

Is Business Management a Profession?

individuals. In response to the recent scandals, politicians and government officials have stepped in to pass new laws and create new regulations, while prominent persons on Wall Street and elsewhere in the business community have issued their own calls for reform in... View Details

Keywords: by Rakesh Khurana, Nitin Nohria & Daniel Penrice

30 Mar 2020
Research & Ideas

The New Rules for Remote Work: Pandemic Edition

leaders need a new game plan. We asked Harvard Business School professors to provide practical advice for managing large-scale, long-term remote work at a time when many employees are not only distracted by the commotion in their homes,... View Details

Keywords: by Dina Gerdeman

06 Dec 2017
What Do You Think?

Is It Time To Break Up Amazon, Apple, Facebook, or Google?

a company for doing the best job they can and succeed?” Others argued that market definition is changing in ways that render United States anti-trust policy outdated in an increasingly global economy. As Craig Parietti & Partners put... View Details

Keywords: by James Heskett; Technology; Web Services

08 Sep 2015
Research & Ideas

Knowledge Transfer: You Can't Learn Surgery By Watching

Organizations, in which he argues that observation and imitation are rarely the best ways for employees to learn on the job. “There are some realms of life where that is true, but for the most part, problems in business are more... View Details

Keywords: by Michael Blanding; Health

15 Jun 2007
Research & Ideas

Remembering Alfred Chandler

linkages he saw and analyzed. “Al Chandler had one of the best darn smiles this side of the Continental Divide." —Nancy F. Koehn Second, he wrote about the past but this work was always anchored by his own eye on the present. Al... View Details

Keywords: by Sean Silverthorne

27 Apr 2020
Research & Ideas

How Remote Work Changes What We Think About Onboarding

practice of onboarding new employees. Although hiring is already a forgotten luxury for many firms, at least for the time being, others are still bringing aboard new people, such as those who made hiring commitments before the outbreak... View Details

Keywords: by Boris Groysberg

19 Mar 2012
HBS Case

HBS Cases: Overcoming the Stress of ‘Englishnization’

to workers, who were expected to pay for their own English classes and learn during off-hours. Neeley, who drafted some best practices that the company began to implement, says Rakuten has quickly moved to... View Details

Keywords: by Kim Girard

15 Dec 2003
Research & Ideas

Women Leaders and Organizational Change

which they have been successful at demonstrating their competence and getting rewarded for it. Yet, these are the very people who, because they have achieved success and hold positions of power, may be best positioned to lead the sorts of... View Details

Keywords: by Mallory Stark

Publications