Publications

This note describes a module—taught as part of Operations Strategy, a second–year MBA elective at Harvard Business School—that helps students understand and manage the tradeoff between specialization and diversification in operations. The module introduces students to... View Details

Keywords: Operations; Diversification; Organizational Design; Curriculum and Courses

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Health Care - Faculty & Research

Publications Faculty Michael E. Porter Regina E. Herzlinger Robert S. Kaplan Robert S. Huckman Amy C. Edmondson... View Details

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Technology & Operations Management Awards & Honors - Faculty & Research

Operations Management Society (POMS). Robert S. Huckman : Awarded the Inaugural David J. Fine Distinguished Visiting Professor in Healthcare Administration from the University... View Details

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Team - Institute For Strategy And Competitiveness

School, Harvard Law School, Dell Medical School, and the International Consortium for Health Outcomes Measurement. Harvard Business School Michael E. Porter M.B.A., Ph.D., Bishop William Lawrence University Professor Robert View Details

Research Summary

Consumerism and the Distributed Delivery of Health Care

This stream of Professor Huckman's work examines the growing tendency for health care to be delivered in a more distributed manner. Examples of this phenomenon include health IT, teleradiology, medical travel, remote monitoring of chronic medical conditions, and retail... View Details

March 2003
Article

Technological Development and Medical Productivity: The Diffusion of Angioplasty in New York State

By: David M. Cutler and Robert S. Huckman

A puzzling feature of many medical innovations is that they simultaneously appear to reduce unit costs and increase total costs. We consider this phenomenon by examining the diffusion of percutaneous transluminal coronary angioplasty (PTCA)—a treatment for coronary... View Details

Keywords: Innovation and Invention; Cost; Health Care and Treatment; Health Disorders; Performance Improvement; Product; New York (state, US)

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November 2003 (Revised April 2010)
Case

Flextronics International, Ltd.

By: Robert S. Huckman and Gary P. Pisano

Describes Flextronics' evolution from providing outsourced manufacturing services for original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) in the electronics industry to developing entire unbranded products for purchase by OEMs. In 2001, Flextronics began a development program that... View Details

Keywords: Growth and Development Strategy; Product Development; Production; Service Operations; Performance Effectiveness; Electronics Industry; Manufacturing Industry

Educators

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Faculty & Researchers - Managing the Future of Work

2021. The Challenge of Rebuilding U.S. Domestic Supply Chains , Harvard Business Review, 2021. With Robert S. Huckman and James Wyner. Global Supply Chains in a Post-Pandemic... View Details

Article

Can Big-Box Retailers Provide Local Health Care?

National retailers, most notably Walmart and Best Buy, are making big bets on their ability to fill this need for local health care. At first glance, these moves are a bit surprising given that these companies have not traditionally been focused on health care... View Details

Keywords: Health Care and Treatment; Service Delivery; Local Range; Retail Industry; Health Industry

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Past Issues - Alumni

Goldberg and Visiting Lecturer Michael Kaufman Prognosis Professor Robert S. Huckman and Peter Slavin, president of Massachusetts General Hospital, on how the pandemic will... View Details

November 2002 (Revised August 2003)
Case

MedSource Technologies

Considers the issues facing Richard Effress, MedSource's chairman and CEO, as the firm approaches the Precision Cut project--the first test of MedSource's capabilities as an integrated, contract manufacturer in the medical device industry. MedSource Technologies was... View Details

Keywords: Product Development; Production; Mergers and Acquisitions; Product Design; Supply Chain Management; Management Teams; Medical Devices and Supplies Industry; United States

Educators

TeachingInterests

Managing Health Care Delivery - Executive Education

While delivering patient care has always been a primary goal of health care organizations, financial outcomes have long been the metric by which success is measured. Increasingly, however, health care leaders are being held accountable for... View Details

19 Apr 2011
First Look

First Look: April 19

Authors:Jonathan R. Clark and Robert S. Huckman Abstract The long-standing argument that focused operations outperform others stands in contrast to claims about the benefits of... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

2009
Working Paper

Fluid Tasks and Fluid Teams: The Impact of Diversity in Experience and Team Familiarity on Team Performance

By: Robert S. Huckman and Bradley R. Staats

In this paper, we consider how the structures of tasks and teams interact to affect team performance. We study the effects of diversity in experience on a team's ability to respond to task changes, by separately examining interpersonal team diversity (i.e., differences... View Details

Keywords: Familiarity; Knowledge Use and Leverage; Groups and Teams; Projects; Experience and Expertise; Diversity; India

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27 Sep 2016
First Look

September 27, 2016

concentration in the origins of invention. Download working paper: https://www.hbs.edu/faculty/Pages/item.aspx?num=51660 Cohort Turnover and Operational Performance: The July Phenomenon in Teaching Hospitals By: Song, Hummy, View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

Article

Fluid Tasks and Fluid Teams: The Impact of Diversity in Experience and Team Familiarity on Team Performance

By: Robert S. Huckman and Bradley R. Staats

In this paper, we consider how the structures of tasks and teams interact to affect team performance. We study the effects of diversity in experience on a team's ability to respond to task changes by separately examining interpersonal team diversity (i.e., differences... View Details

Keywords: Management; Groups and Teams; Performance; Problems and Challenges; Projects; Experience and Expertise; Change; Diversity; Information Technology Industry; India

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March 2018
Teaching Note

Twine Health

By: Robert S. Huckman and Ariel D. Stern

In late 2014, Dr. John Moore (CEO), Frank Moss (chairman), and Scott Gilroy (CTO) of Twine Health (Twine) had to resolve several challenges that threatened to restrict the widespread dissemination of its sole product, Twine. Twine was a cloud-based platform that... View Details

Keywords: Health Care; Chronic Disease; Digital Health; Health Acceleration Challenge; Strategy; Disease Management; Health; Health Care and Treatment; Information Technology; Mobile and Wireless Technology; Technology Adoption; Health Industry; United States; Massachusetts

March 2015
Case

The I-PASS Patient Handoff Program

By: Robert S. Huckman and Michael Norris

In 2015, the I-PASS Patient Handoff Program Team, led by six pediatricians around the U.S., had to determine the best way to disseminate their program that had been proven to reduce communication errors in patient handoffs in hospital settings. Should they turn it into... View Details

Keywords: Health Care; Hospitals; Operations Improvement; Entrepreneurship; Health Care and Treatment; Health Industry; United States

Educators