Publications

13 Feb 2020
Book

Open Your Organization to Honest Conversations

lose hope in their organization and become cynical and passive. “People who are this discouraged stop bothering to collaborate with others to improve the organization,” he says. The antidote: Organizations... View Details

Keywords: by Dina Gerdeman

25 Jul 2005
Research & Ideas

An Organization Your Customers Understand

Imagine an organization made up of a variety of three-dimensional shapes. Rectangular blocks represent the functions: manufacturing, R&D, and sales and marketing. The spheres are regional offices. Pyramids represent product groups—one... View Details

Keywords: by Robert Simons

2015
Chapter

Innovating without Information Constraints: Organization, Communities, and Innovation when Information Costs Approach Zero

By: Elizabeth J. Altman, Frank Nagle and Michael Tushman

Innovation has traditionally taken place within an organization's boundaries and/or with selected partners. This Chandlerian approach to innovation has been rooted in transaction costs, organizational boundaries, and information processing challenges associated with... View Details

Keywords: Knowledge Sharing; Cost; Innovation and Management; Collaborative Innovation and Invention

2011
Working Paper

Organizations in the Shadow of Communities

By: Siobhan O'Mahony and Karim R. Lakhani

The concept of a community form is drawn upon in many subfields of organizational theory. Although there is not much convergence on a level of analysis, there is convergence on a mode of action that is increasingly relevant to a knowledge-based economy marked by porous... View Details

Keywords: Knowledge Sharing; Organizational Culture; Civil Society or Community; Boundaries; Information Technology; Theory; Value Creation

Read Now

18 May 2012
Working Paper Summaries

Organization Design for Distributed Innovation

Keywords: by Carliss Y. Baldwin

19 Dec 2013
Working Paper Summaries

Innovating Without Information Constraints: Organizations, Communities, and Innovation When Information Costs Approach Zero

Keywords: by Elizabeth J. Altman, Frank Nagle & Michael L. Tushman

09 Jul 2020
News

It’s Time to Reset Decision-Making in Your Organization

July 2007
Article

A Two-Person Game of Information Transmission

By: Jerry R. Green and Nancy L. Stokey

We consider a statistical decision problem faced by a two player organization whose members may not agree on outcome evaluations and prior probabilities. One player is specialized in gathering information and transmitting it to the other, who takes the decision. This... View Details

Keywords: Game Theory; Cheap Talk; Communication Games; Communication; Information

Find at Harvard

01 Mar 2009
News

Honoring HBS’s Organization Men

A SEMINAL WORK: Lorsch and Lawrence, together again. A celebration of the past and a look to the future were all part of the program at an evening last December with HBS professor emeritus Paul Lawrence and professor Jay Lorsch, authors of View Details

Keywords: Information; Information; Information; Information

2009
Chapter

Creativity, Improvisation, and Organizations

By: Colin M. Fisher and Teresa M. Amabile

Although the literatures on both organizational creativity and organizational improvisation have been expanding in recent years, the links between these literatures have not been deeply explored. This chapter explores those links to create a conceptualization of... View Details

Keywords: Body of Literature; Innovation and Invention; Organizational Culture; Research; Creativity; Theory

Find at Harvard

18 Nov 2014
Blog Post

Company Information Day Recap

A few weeks ago we successfully kicked off first-year recruiting with Company Information Day (CID). 49 companies representing 22 industries based in Boston, New York, Seattle, San Francisco, Sao Paulo, and more filled the HBS campus.... View Details

January 1995 (Revised November 1996)
Case

Avalon Information Services, Inc.

By: Lynn S. Paine and Wilda White

The Privacy Review Committee of Avalon Information Services must decide how to deal with concerns voiced by its retail supermarket customers about the privacy of consumer data collected through Avalon's point-of-sale data collection program. One customer is proposing... View Details

Keywords: Mission and Purpose; Safety; Demand and Consumers; Rights; Analytics and Data Science; Information Technology; Ethics; Information Industry

August 2006 (Revised May 2007)
Case

Management Levels at Staples (A): Company and Organization

By: David A. Garvin and Lynne Levesque

One of six cases that describe the roles and responsibilities of managers at each of the hierarchical levels of management within the U.S. Stores business unit of Staples, the world's largest office supply company. Together, the cases form a complete integrated... View Details

Keywords: Cost vs Benefits; Leadership; Management Practices and Processes; Managerial Roles; Operations; Performance Effectiveness; Strategic Planning; Perspective; Retail Industry

May 2009
Case

Ceres Gardening Company: Funding Growth in Organic Products

By: John H. McArthur and Sunru Yong

Ceres is a leading player in the growing organic gardening industry, selling seeds, small plants, and related items. Their distribution depends heavily on retail sales through independent nurseries and garden centers. Because these small dealers are unable to finance... View Details

Keywords: Accounting Procedures; Marketing; Business Growth; Plant-Based Agribusiness; Marketing Strategy; Expansion; Business Growth and Maturation; Marketing Channels; Credit; Financial Statements; Sales; Retail Industry; Agriculture and Agribusiness Industry

28 Nov 2011
Research & Ideas

Rethinking the Fairness of Organ Transplants

recipients get organs as they become available—decisions that must be based on various priority and fairness criteria. “The new system will explicitly give points based on the likelihood of survivability.” The method—the work of Nikolaos... View Details

Keywords: by Dennis Fisher; Health

August 1995 (Revised September 1995)
Background Note

Designing and Managing the Information Age IT Architecture

By: Lynda M. Applegate

The co-evolution of technology, work, and the workforce over the past 30 years has dramatically influenced our concept of organizations and the industries within which they compete. No longer simply a tool to support "back-office" transactions, IT has become a... View Details

Keywords: Design; Management; Organizations; Information Technology

October 1992 (Revised February 1995)
Background Note

Note on the Federal Sentencing Guidelines for Organizations

By: Lynn S. Paine

Describes the federal guidelines used by judges for sentencing organizations convicted of criminal wrong-doing under U.S. law as of November 1, 1991. Describes the guidelines' approach to calculating criminal fines for organizations, determining an organization's... View Details

Keywords: Crime and Corruption; Governance Compliance; Law Enforcement; Laws and Statutes; Organizations; Legal Services Industry; United States

2019
Chapter

Teams and Team Effectiveness in Health Services Organizations

By: Bruce J. Fried and Amy C. Edmondson

Book Abstract: Completely updated to address the challenges faced by modern health care organizations, this edition of Shortell and Kaluzny's Health Care Management: Organization Design and Behavior offers a more global perspective on how the United States and... View Details

Keywords: Groups and Teams; Performance Effectiveness; Health; Health Industry