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- All HBS Web (439)
- Faculty Publications (247)
- Teaching Interest
Managing Service Operations - MBA Elective Curriculum
By: Ryan W. Buell
World-class service organizations deeply understand the needs and behaviors of their customers, and design, manage, and improve their operating models accordingly. This course investigates the distinct challenges inherent in leading service operations, which make up... View Details
- January 1997
- Background Note
Buy Low, Sell High: Creating and Extracting Customer Value by Enhancing Organizational Performance
Provides an integrated framework for creating customer value and managing the firm profitably. Focuses on the use of product/service line management and effective customer service to achieve customer satisfaction and high profitability. View Details
Keywords: Customer Value and Value Chain; Framework; Performance Efficiency; Sales; Business Strategy; Customer Satisfaction; Profit; Product Marketing; Business or Company Management
Shapiro, Benson P. "Buy Low, Sell High: Creating and Extracting Customer Value by Enhancing Organizational Performance." Harvard Business School Background Note 597-071, January 1997.
- 20 Dec 2017
- Lessons from the Classroom
How to Design a Better Customer Experience
Click HereHarvard Business School Professor Stefan Thomke describes how his Executive Education students use LEGO blocks to design customer experiences. (Video by Executive Education) Why do some product or service experiences have enough... View Details
- 18 Nov 2009
- HBS Case
Customer Feedback Not on elBulli’s Menu
He's been called "the Salvador Dalí of the kitchen" for creations ranging from beetroot and yogurt ice-cream lollipops to a deconstructed Spanish omelet served in a parfait glass. Each year, some 2 million hopeful diners vie to be one of the fifty View Details
- Article
Cooks Make Tastier Food When They Can See Their Customers
By: Ryan W. Buell, Tami Kim and Chia-Jung Tsay
While existing theory suggests that increased contact between customers and employees diminishes efficiency, recent research demonstrates that when employees can see their customers, the beneficiaries of their efforts, the quality and efficiency of the service they... View Details
Keywords: Operational Transparency; Service Delivery; Service Operations; Service Management; Service Industry
Buell, Ryan W., Tami Kim, and Chia-Jung Tsay. "Cooks Make Tastier Food When They Can See Their Customers." Harvard Business Review 92, no. 11 (November 2014): 34–35.
- May 2011
- Article
Think Customers Hate Waiting? Not So Fast...
By: Ryan W. Buell and Michael I. Norton
Managers typically look for ways to reduce wait time to increase customer satisfaction. New research suggests there's a better approach: showing customers a representation of the effort, whether literal or not, being expended on their behalf while they wait. (The... View Details
Keywords: Customer Relationship Management; Service Delivery; Consumer Behavior; Performance Effectiveness; Customer Satisfaction
Buell, Ryan W., and Michael I. Norton. "Think Customers Hate Waiting? Not So Fast..." Harvard Business Review 89, no. 5 (May 2011).
- 1991
- Article
Job Satisfaction, Service Capability and Customer Satisfaction: An Examination of Linkages and Management Implications
By: Leonard A. Schlesinger and Jeffrey Zornitsky
Survey data from 1,277 employees and 4,269 customers of a personal lines insurance organization were analyzed with the following results: (a) employee perceptions of service quality are positively related to both job satisfaction and self-perceived service capability;... View Details
Schlesinger, Leonard A., and Jeffrey Zornitsky. "Job Satisfaction, Service Capability and Customer Satisfaction: An Examination of Linkages and Management Implications." Human Resource Planning 14, no. 2 (1991): 141–149.
- 05 Jun 2019
- News
When Customers Want to See the Human Behind the Product
- 16 May 2011
- Research & Ideas
What Loyalty? High-End Customers are First to Flee
Satisfaction Buell's general research agenda considers how firm-level decisions affect customer actions and firm performance. He is continuing to collaborate with Campbell and Frei on a research project that... View Details
Keywords: by Julia Hanna
- May 2016
- Case
OPET: Precision Marketing in Uncertain Times
By: Rajiv Lal, Esel Çekin and Eren Kuzucu
During Timucin Guler’s decade at OPET, a prominent fuel distributor in Turkey, he transformed the definition of marketing in the company. Under Guler’s lead, OPET, once a local player in the downstream distribution market, became the second largest fuel distributor in... View Details
Keywords: Customer Satisfaction; Customer Service; Emerging Market; Focusing On Customers; Competition; Turkey; Loyalty Program; Marketing Strategy; Downstream Distribution; Customer Relationship Management; Energy Industry; Turkey
Lal, Rajiv, Esel Çekin, and Eren Kuzucu. "OPET: Precision Marketing in Uncertain Times." Harvard Business School Case 516-087, May 2016.
- 17 Sep 2001
- Research & Ideas
Let Customers Call the Shots
technologies could be used to create a captive one-to-one relationship between firms and consumers, so that customers could literally be viewed as assets. We should start to realize that things are not that simple. Ultimately, a... View Details
Keywords: by Martha Lagace
- 2014
- Chapter
Customer Experience and Service Design
By: Uday S. Karmarkar and Uma R. Karmarkar
While services already dominate economic activity in all major economies in the world, there has been curiously little investigation into many aspects of service management. For example, while product design and development have received a great deal of attention, the... View Details
Keywords: Service Design; Service Management; Product Design; Service Operations; Customer Satisfaction; Service Industry
Karmarkar, Uday S., and Uma R. Karmarkar. "Customer Experience and Service Design." Chap. 7 in Managing Consumer Services: Factory or Theater? edited by Enzo Baglieri and Uday Karmarkar, 109–130. Springer, 2014.
- 28 Feb 2022
- Research & Ideas
How Racial Bias Taints Customer Service: Evidence from 6,000 Hotels
terms of business outcomes, they're not developing the best customer relationships they could.” Companies that fix disparities in their service delivery are likely to boost customer View Details
Keywords: by Pamela Reynolds
- 2009
- Chapter
Creating Superior Customer Value in a Connected World
By: Ranjay Gulati
"In the early twenty-first century, customers are more demanding than ever, and difficult economic times make them all the more so. As customers tighten their wallets and increase their demands, firms face greater pressure to provide superior customer value. Reducing... View Details
- 2022
- Working Paper
Mitigating the Negative Effects of Customer Anxiety Through Access to Human Contact
By: Michelle A. Kinch and Ryan W. Buell
Prior research in social psychology has shown that when people feel anxious, they seek advice from others. However, companies that operate in high-anxiety settings (like financial services, health care, and education) are increasingly deploying self-service... View Details
Keywords: Anxiety; Self-service; Empirical Operations; Behavioral Operations; Customers; Emotions; Service Delivery; Interpersonal Communication; Customer Satisfaction; Trust
Kinch, Michelle A., and Ryan W. Buell. "Mitigating the Negative Effects of Customer Anxiety Through Access to Human Contact." Harvard Business School Working Paper, No. 19-089, February 2019. (Revised November 2023.)
- March 2011
- Exercise
Customer Intelligence Advantage: Module 2 Assignment
By: F. Asis Martinez Jerez
This exercise directs students to analyze a customer-centric firm by first understanding the elements that characterize a customer-centric organization, then by capturing and comparing this firm's approach to customer-centricity. Students interview three levels in the... View Details
Keywords: Business Units; Customer Focus and Relationships; Customer Satisfaction; Employees; Knowledge Sharing; Knowledge Use and Leverage; Leadership; Competitive Advantage
Martinez Jerez, F. Asis. "Customer Intelligence Advantage: Module 2 Assignment." Harvard Business School Exercise 111-118, March 2011.
- 28 Apr 2022
- News
Why Companies Should Pay More Attention to Customers Last in Line
- 21 Jul 2003
- Research & Ideas
Don’t Get Buried in Customer Data—Use It
Cisco relies on three layers of customer data to inform its efforts to improve customer satisfaction: The overall satisfaction survey that View Details
Keywords: by Jean Ayers
- 14 May 2021
- News
4 Strategies to Simplify the Customer Journey
- 26 Mar 2019
- Working Paper Summaries