Publications

June 2013
Case

Ken Traub at American Bank Note Holographics

By: Suraj Srinivasan and Michael Norris

Ken Traub is hired as CFO for American Bank Note Holographics, the market-leading security holograph company in January 1999, but discovers on his first day that the company has misstated its financials and resigns. After consulting with the company for the next... View Details

Keywords: Information Technology; Moral Sensibility; Earnings Management; Crime and Corruption; Personal Development and Career; Management Teams; Technology Industry; Service Industry; United States

January 1976 (Revised June 1984)
Case

Megalith, Inc. -- Hay Associates (A)

By: John P. Kotter

In 1969, Megalith centralized its financial and control functions. John Boyd, senior vice president for finance, hired four brilliant young managers to "bring the group out of the stone age." By 1975, this management team had created a near-perfect finance office of... View Details

Keywords: Management Teams; Compensation and Benefits; Motivation and Incentives; Problems and Challenges

14 May 2012
News

Breaking the Smartphone Addiction

06 Oct 2021
News

Robots Are Hiding 27 Million Workers from Employers Who Need Them

21 Apr 2017
News

Can a French Political Upstart Ride Obama's Strategy to Victory?

Ryan L. Raffaelli

Ryan Raffaelli is the Marvin Bower Associate Professor of Business Administration at Harvard Business School. He created and teaches the MBA course "Leadership: Execution and Action Planning" (LEAP) and serves... View Details

Keywords: consulting; consulting; consulting; consulting; consulting; consulting; consulting; consulting; consulting

May 1998 (Revised February 1999)
Case

Diamond in the Rough (A)

By: Thomas J. DeLong and Catherine M. Conneely

Diamond Technology Partners, a consulting firm based in Chicago, was founded in 1994 by Mel Bergstein and Chris Moffitt, with investment from founding partners and Safeguard Scientifics. In April 1996, just after fiscal year-end, the two largest clients withdrew from... View Details

Keywords: Information Technology; Entrepreneurship; Going Public; Crisis Management; Finance; Consulting Industry; Chicago

July 2010 (Revised March 2013)
Case

Heidrick & Struggles and Standard Chartered Bank: Managing Global Key Accounts

By: Robert G. Eccles and Kerry Herman

Daren Kemp, a partner at leadership consultancy and executive search firm Heidrick & Struggles, is responsible for the firm's relationship with Standard Chartered Bank (Standard Chartered). Standard Chartered is one of 94 companies in Heidrick's strategic partners... View Details

Keywords: Customer Relationship Management; Service Delivery; Partners and Partnerships; Business Strategy; Consulting Industry; Consulting Industry

August 2001 (Revised March 2008)
Case

NerveWire, Inc.

By: Nitin Nohria and Anthony Mayo

NerveWire, a management consulting and systems integration provider based in Newton, MA, was closing in on its second anniversary. In the beginning days of NerveWire, the major challenge was recruiting--finding the right people who embodied its values and business... View Details

Keywords: Values and Beliefs; Leadership; Mission and Purpose; Behavior; Internet; Newton

November 1991 (Revised September 1993)
Case

Oak Industries Inc.

By: William A. Sahlman and Burton C. Hurlock

Describes Bill Antle's proposed restructuring plans for Oak Industries, a company composed of nine divisions which seem to be experiencing operating difficulties. During the last ten years the company has been involved in a number of acquisitions and divestitures, as... View Details

Keywords: Entrepreneurship; Business or Company Management; Operations; SWOT Analysis; Organizational Structure; Restructuring; Financial Management; Acquisition; Financial Markets

Find at Harvard

22 Dec 2010
News

Making the Decision to Replace Yourself

18 May 2020
News

Big Structural Change

15 Jan 2019
Blog Post

Interning in the Retail Sector

Jasmyn Beausejour, MBA 2019, describes his summer at Wayfair. As a native from Montreal and having worked in management consulting, Jasmyn was excited by the opportunity to analyze Wayfair’s expansion and segmentation into the Canadian market. His role pivoted from... View Details

Keywords: Consumer Products / Retail

Kris Johnson Ferreira

Kris Ferreira is the Edgerley Family Associate Professor of Business Administration in the Technology and Operations Management (TOM) Unit. She teaches the Supply Chain Management course in the MBA elective curriculum and analytics in numerous Executive Education... View Details

Keywords: retailing

Nancy F. Koehn

Nancy F. Koehn is a historian at the Harvard Business School where she holds the James E. Robison chair of Business Administration. Koehn's research focuses on crisis leadership and how leaders and their teams rise to the challenges of high-stakes situations. Her... View Details

Keywords: beauty products; clothing; consumer products; entertainment; fashion; marketing industry; retailing; health care; advertising; media

July 2021
Case

Performance Review: Joseph Park and Elena Ramírez

By: David G. Fubini and Patrick Sanguineti

Niya Jones, a Partner at a major management consulting firm, must review the work of two of her mentees––Joseph Park and Elena Ramírez––for their first end-of-year performance review as new Project Leaders. Both have produced strong results in their new roles, but... View Details

Keywords: Personal Development and Career; Management Style; Goals and Objectives; Management Analysis, Tools, and Techniques; Leadership Style

March 1987 (Revised July 1996)
Case

Kansas City Zephyrs Baseball Club, Inc.

By: Kenneth A. Merchant, Krishna G. Palepu and Joseph P. Mulloy

Describes a dispute between the owners of the major league baseball teams and the players' union about the profitability of the baseball teams. The issue is important because of the ongoing collective bargaining negotiations. A consultant is brought in to decide... View Details

Keywords: State Ownership; Compensation and Benefits; Entrepreneurship; For-Profit Firms; Accounting; Activity Based Costing and Management; Resource Allocation; Cost Accounting; Cost Management; Labor and Management Relations; Financial Management; Sports; Sports Industry; Kansas