Publications

July 1996
Case

Williams-Sonoma, Inc.--1990

By: Nancy F. Koehn and Michael Dearing

Howard Lester, chairman and CEO, has just completed a second offering of common stock in Williams-Sonoma, Inc. ($218.2 million 1989 sales). Having targeted $500 million in retail sales, Lester's challenge is to: 1) prioritize growth investments in five existing catalog... View Details

Keywords: Corporate Strategy; Alignment; Customer Value and Value Chain; Competitive Strategy; Retail Industry

November 2006 (Revised September 2007)
Case

The Bollingers: Negotiating with Wal-Mart (A)

By: James K. Sebenius and Ellen Knebel

Describes the negotiations by Howard and Marilyn Bollinger over supplying a new product line to Wal-Mart, the world's largest retailer. The (A) case outlines the Bollingers' development of their product, the Wallpockett, documents their negotiation preparation for... View Details

Keywords: Negotiation Preparation; Product Development; Supply Chain; Problems and Challenges; Retail Industry

December 2019
Background Note

An (Abbreviated) Perspective on Entrepreneurship

By: Mitchell Weiss and Benjamin Henkes

Among the many competing definitions of entrepreneurship, the one adopted in “The Entrepreneurial Manager” at HBS was authored by Howard Stevenson in the 1980s and elaborated on in the decades since. Stevenson provided a managerial take on the term—he described... View Details

Keywords: Entrepreneurial Managers; Entrepreneurship

June 2017
Teaching Note

Project Sun Devil and Project Paris

By: Nori Gerardo Lietz and Alexander W. Schultz

Tony Lee is preparing to present a project to the investment committee of Howard Street Capital. He will be recommending an investment in Project Sun Devil, a high-quality 225-unit student housing rental property near Tempe, Arizona. Tony Lee will compete for capital... View Details

Keywords: General Management; Financial Analysis; Return On Assets; Accounting; Performance Measurement; Financial Ratios; Return On Equity; Financial Statements; Profitability Analysis; Portfolio Investment; Portfolio Management; Real Estate; Property; Investment Portfolio; Investment Return; Analysis; Real Estate Industry; United States

February 2013 (Revised June 2017)
Case

Project Sun Devil and Project Paris

By: Nori Gerardo Lietz

Tony Lee is preparing to present a project to the investment committee of Howard Street Capital. He will be recommending an investment in Project Sun Devil, a high-quality 225-unit student housing rental property near Tempe, Arizona. Tony Lee will compete for capital... View Details

Keywords: General Management; Financial Analysis; Return On Assets; Accounting; Performance Measurement; Financial Ratios; Return On Equity; Financial Statements; Profitability Analysis; Portfolio Investment; Portfolio Management; Real Estate; Property; Investment Portfolio; Investment Return; Real Estate Industry; United States

2012
Working Paper

Big C, Little C, Howard, and Me: Approaches to Understanding Creativity

By: Teresa M. Amabile

This essay, which highlights some of the major contributions that Howard Gardner has made to creativity research, contrasts his approach to my own. While he analyzed cases of "Big C" (world-renowned creativity), I have focused on the more ordinary "Little c"... View Details

Keywords: Creativity; Research; Learning

March 24, 2015
Article

Starbucks' 'Race Together' Campaign and the Upside of CEO Activism

By: Aaron Chatterji and Michael W. Toffel

When Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz asked his baristas to engage customers in a discussion about race in America, it was a clear case of the growing trend of "CEO activism." Despite the criticism of that particular initiative, CEO activism—from Shultz to Chick-Fil-A's... View Details

Keywords: Leadership; Social Issues; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Communication Strategy; Race

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08 Sep 2015
First Look

September 8, 2015

in press Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America Compared to Men, Women View Professional Advancement as Equally Attainable, but Less Desirable By: Gino, Francesca, Caroline A. Wilmuth, and Alison Wood Brooks Abstract—Women are... View Details

Keywords: Carmen Nobel

Research Summary

Enduring Success

By: Howard H. Stevenson

Harvard Business School graduates have achieved many different kinds of success as leaders of businesses, as entrepreneurs and in their public and private lives. After authoring or co-authoring 150 cases, serving on many corporate and non- profit boards, Howard... View Details

Article

The Economy of Fear: H.P. Lovecraft on Eugenics, Economics and the Great Depression

By: Sophus A. Reinert

The early twentieth-century weird writer Howard Phillips Lovecraft is today best remembered for his genre defining style of academic noir pulp fiction. Yet in focusing on certain tropes of his work, such as the many memorable monsters he created to populate his... View Details

Keywords: H.P. Lovecraft; Society; Economics

February 2001 (Revised October 2002)
Background Note

Entrepreneurial History: A Conceptual Overview

By: Nancy F. Koehn

Analyzes HBS cases on five entrepreneurs and the companies they built: Josiah Wedgwood, Henry Heinz, Marshall Field, Howard Schultz of Starbucks, and Michael Dell. These five cases and their accompanying teaching notes comprise a course module on entrepreneurial... View Details

Keywords: Transition; Demand and Consumers; Competition; Business History; Entrepreneurship; Customer Focus and Relationships; Business Strategy; Society

October 2009
Article

Negotiation Analysis: From Games to Inferences to Decisions to Deals

By: James K. Sebenius

Exemplified by the pioneering work of Howard Raiffa and often expressed in the pages of the Negotiation Journal, the emergent prescriptive field of "negotiation analysis" progressively developed from Raiffa's early contributions to game theory and to his later... View Details

Keywords: Decision Choices and Conditions; Negotiation Participants; Negotiation Preparation; Negotiation Process; Negotiation Tactics; Game Theory

February 5, 2009
Comment

In Praise of Marketing

By: John A. Quelch

Many dismiss marketing as manipulative, deceptive, and intrusive. Marketing, they argue, focuses too much of our attention on material consumption. More recently, Benjamin Barber, in his 2007 book Consumed, claims that marketing is "sucking up the air from every other... View Details

Keywords: Marketing; Consumer Loyalty; Local Vs. Global Branding; Multi-national Brands; Misleading and Fraudulent Advertising; Customer Value and Value Chain; Customer Satisfaction; Globalized Economies and Regions; Cross-Cultural and Cross-Border Issues; Multinational Firms and Management; Globalized Markets and Industries; Brands and Branding; Marketing Communications; Marketing Strategy; Product Positioning

2011
Working Paper

Matthew: Effect or Fable?

In a market context, a status effect occurs when actors are accorded differential recognition for their efforts depending on their location in a status ordering, holding constant the quality of these efforts. In practice, because it is very difficult to measure... View Details

Keywords: Risk and Uncertainty; Status and Position; Measurement and Metrics; Quality

January–February 2018
Article

The New CEO Activists

By: Aaron K Chatterji and Michael W. Toffel

Though corporations have been lobbying the government and making campaign donations for a long time now, in recent years a dramatic new trend has emerged in U.S. politics: CEOs are taking very public stands on thorny political issues that have nothing to do with their... View Details

Keywords: Government Policy; Rights; Leadership & Corporate Accountability; Sustainability; Leadership; Corporate Accountability; Policy; Social Issues; Communication Intention and Meaning; United States