Publications
Publications
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- All HBS Web
(880)
- Faculty Publications (102)
- March 2015
- Article
Business Model Evaluation: Quantifying Walmart's Sources of Advantage
By: Humberto Brea-Solís, Ramon Casadesus-Masanell and Emili Grifell-Tatjé
We develop an analytical framework on the basis of the economics of business performance to provide quantitative insight into the link between a firm's business model choices and its profit consequences. The method is applied to Walmart by building a qualitative... View Details
- February 2015 (Revised September 2016)
- Teaching Note
Making stickK Stick: The Business of Behavioral Economics
By: Leslie K. John and Michael Norton
Email mking@hbs.edu for a courtesy copy.
This Teaching Note explains the theory of the case and teaching plan for the case: Making sticK Stick: The Business of Behavioral Economics (514019). The case focuses on a... View Details
This Teaching Note explains the theory of the case and teaching plan for the case: Making sticK Stick: The Business of Behavioral Economics (514019). The case focuses on a... View Details
Keywords: Behavioral Economics; Behavior Change; B2B Vs. B2C; Human Resource Management; Marketing Of Innovations; Health ＆ Wellness; Weight Loss; Charitable Giving; Marketing; Consumer Behavior; Entrepreneurship; Internet and the Web; Health; Business Model; Sales; Human Resources; Health Industry; United States
- 2015
- Chapter
Negotiations: Statistical Aspects
'Negotiation analysis' seeks to develop prescriptive theory and useful advice for negotiators and third parties. It generally emphasizes the parties' underlying interests, alternatives to negotiated agreement, approaches to productively manage the inherent tension... View Details
- October 2014
- Article
Sovereigns, Upstream Capital Flows and Global Imbalances
By: Laura Alfaro, Sebnem Kalemli-Ozcan and Vadym Volosovych
We construct measures of net private and public capital flows for a large cross-section of developing countries considering both creditor and debtor side of the international debt transactions. Using these measures, we demonstrate that sovereign-to-sovereign... View Details
- Article
Learning Through Noticing: Theory and Evidence from a Field Experiment
By: Rema Hanna, Sendhil Mullainathan and Joshua Schwartzstein
We consider a model of technological learning under which people "learn through noticing": they choose which input dimensions to attend to and subsequently learn about from available data. Using this model, we show how people with a great deal of experience may... View Details
- Article
The (Perceived) Meaning of Spontaneous Thoughts
By: Carey K. Morewedge, Colleen Giblin and Michael I. Norton
Spontaneous thoughts, the output of a broad category of uncontrolled and inaccessible higher-order mental processes, arise frequently in everyday life. The seeming randomness by which spontaneous thoughts arise might give people good reason to dismiss them as... View Details
- Article
Better Accounting Transforms Health Care Delivery
By: Robert S. Kaplan and Mary L. Witkowski
The paper describes the theory and preliminary results for an action research program that explores the implications from better measurements of health care outcomes and costs. After summarizing Porter's outcome taxonomy (Porter 2010), we illustrate how to use process... View Details
- Article
The Effect of Institutional Factors on the Value of Corporate Diversification
By: Venkat Kuppuswamy, George Serafeim and Belen Villalonga
Using a large sample of diversified firms from 38 countries we investigate the influence of several national-level institutional factors or 'institutional voids' on the value of corporate diversification. Specifically, we explore whether the presence of frictions in a... View Details
- March 2014 (Revised August 2015)
- Technical Note
Technology Innovations in K-12 Education
By: John J-H Kim, Roniesha Copeland and Christine S. An
This background note on technology innovations in education offers a market overview of the edtech sector and discusses trends, common challenges, and criticisms encountered in exploring edtech ventures. The note introduces the promise of educational technology as it... View Details
- February 2014
- Article
Learning by Supplying
By: Juan Alcacer and Joanne Oxley
Learning processes lie at the heart of our understanding of how firms build capabilities to generate and sustain competitive advantage: learning by doing, learning by exporting, learning from competitors, users, and alliance partners. In this paper we focus attention... View Details
- December 2013
- Case
Clique Pens: The Writing Implements Division of U.S. Home
By: Frank V. Cespedes and James Kindley
The Clique Pens Writing Implements division of U.S. Home is a manufacturer of a full line of pens, pencils, markers, and art supplies. Despite solid sales, division president Elise Ferguson has seen gross margins drop from 42% in 2010 to just over 36% in 2012 as a... View Details
- 2014
- Working Paper
Sharing Design Rights: A Commons Approach for Developing Infrastructure
By: Nuno Gil and Carliss Y. Baldwin
This study empirically investigates the relationship between design structure and organization structure in the context of new infrastructure development projects. Our research setting is a capital program to develop new school buildings in the city of Manchester, UK.... View Details
- September–October 2013
- Article
The Role of Organizational Scope and Governance in Strengthening Private Monitoring
By: Lamar Pierce and Michael W. Toffel
Governments and other organizations often outsource activities to achieve cost savings from market competition. Yet such benefits are often accompanied by poor quality resulting from moral hazard, which can be particularly onerous when outsourcing the monitoring and... View Details
Keywords: Crime and Corruption; Decision Choices and Conditions; Corporate Accountability; Governance Compliance; Policy; Management Practices and Processes; Demand and Consumers; Market Design; Market Entry and Exit; Market Transactions; Service Delivery; Service Operations; Business Processes; Organizational Structure; Performance Effectiveness; Performance Expectations; Practice; Transportation; Transportation Industry; Service Industry; United States; New York (state, US)
- July 2013 (Revised March 2015)
- Case
Carl Zeiss and Free-Form Production: Can We See Clearly Yet?
By: Willy Shih
The prescription eyeglass lens industry was complicated and highly fragmented, and even though many of the tools and techniques employed have been relatively unchanged over the last century, there was still a surprising pace of innovation. An aging population around... View Details
- November 2012
- Article
The Organization of Firms Across Countries
By: Nicholas Bloom, Raffaella Sadun and John Van Reenen
We argue that social capital as proxied by trust increases aggregate productivity by affecting the organization of firms. To do this we collect new data on the decentralization of investment, hiring, production, and sales decisions from Corporate Headquarters to local... View Details
Keywords: Decentralization; Social Capital; Theory Of The Firm; Firm Objectives, Organization, And Behavior; Business Economics; Management Of Technological Innovation And R＆D; Technological Change: Choices And Consequences; Diffusion Processes; Organizational Structure; Performance Productivity; Trust; Technology Adoption; Multinational Firms and Management
- June 2012
- Article
The Transparency Paradox: A Role for Privacy in Organizational Learning and Operational Control
Using data from embedded participant-observers and a field experiment at the second largest mobile phone factory in the world, located in China, I theorize and test the implications of transparent organizational design on workers' productivity and organizational... View Details
Keywords: Transparency; Privacy; Organizational Learning; Operational Control; Organizational Performance; Chinese Manufacturing; Field Experiment; Rights; Interpersonal Communication; Management Practices and Processes; Ethics; Corporate Disclosure; Performance Productivity; Boundaries; Organizations; Social and Collaborative Networks; Labor and Management Relations; Power and Influence; Manufacturing Industry; China
- 2012
- Working Paper
Componential Theory of Creativity
The componential theory of creativity is a comprehensive model of the social and psychological components necessary for an individual to produce creative work. The theory is grounded in a definition of creativity as the production of ideas or outcomes that are both... View Details
- 2012
- Working Paper
Learning by Supplying
By: Juan Alcacer and Joanne Oxley
Learning processes lie at the heart of our understanding of how firms build capabilities to generate and sustain competitive advantage: learning by doing, learning by exporting, learning from competitors, users, and alliance partners. In this paper we focus attention... View Details
- July 2011 (Revised September 2012)
- Case
Industrial Metrology: Getting In-Line? (A)
By: Willy Shih
Metrology plays a key role in the manufacture of mechanical components. Traditionally it is used extensively in a pre-process stage where a manufacturer does process planning, design, and ramp-up, and in post-process off-line inspection to establish proof of quality.... View Details
- 2010
- Working Paper
Performance Tradeoffs in Team Knowledge Sourcing
By: Bradley R. Staats, Melissa Valentine and Amy C. Edmondson
This research examines how teams organize knowledge sourcing (obtaining access to others' knowledge or expertise) and investigates the performance trade-offs involved in two approaches to knowledge sourcing in teams. One approach a team can take is to specialize, such... View Details