Publications

06 Dec 2017
Blog Post

The 23rd Annual Harvard Business School Tech Conference

However, we did not want to just stop there. We took our discussions and conversations a step further to talk about the responsibilities that we have as current and future leaders to make the technology View Details

Keywords: Technology

June 2018
Article

Personal and Social Usage: The Origins of Active Customers and Ways to Keep Them Engaged

By: Clarence Lee, Elie Ofek and Thomas Steenburgh

We study how digital service firms can develop an active customer base, focusing on two questions. First, how does the way that customers use the service postadoption to meet their own needs (personal usage) and to interact with one another (social usage) vary across... View Details

Keywords: Customer Engagement; Adoption Routes; Word-of-Mouth; Digital Marketing; Bayesian Estimation; Customers; Communication; Consumer Behavior; Marketing; Internet and the Web; Analytics and Data Science

July 2000 (Revised July 2001)
Case

Sycamore Networks

By: Joseph B. Lassiter III and Daniel J. Green

Founders Desh Deshpande and Dan Smith reflect on Sycamore's sales strategies and consider how going public might affect the morale of its key employees. In the optical networking sector, technological change and exploding demand has created a market for talent in which... View Details

Keywords: Applied Optics; Entrepreneurship; Sales; Business Strategy; Initial Public Offering; Retention; Employees; Communication Technology; Technological Innovation; Communications Industry; Communications Industry

Educators

October 14, 2019
Article

The Truth About Open Offices: There Are Reasons Why They Don't Produce the Desired Interactions

By: Ethan Bernstein and Ben Waber

It’s never been easier for workers to collaborate—or so it seems. Open, flexible, activity-based spaces are displacing cubicles, making people more visible. Messaging is displacing phone calls, making people more accessible. Enterprise social media such as Slack and... View Details

Keywords: Buildings and Facilities; Interpersonal Communication; Communication Technology; Design; Human Resources; Performance Productivity; Organizational Design

Register to Read

June 2012
Article

Leadership Is a Conversation

By: Boris Groysberg and Michael Slind

Globalization and new technologies have sharply reduced the efficacy of command-and-control management and its accompanying forms of corporate communication. In the course of a recent research project, the authors concluded that by talking with employees, rather than... View Details

Keywords: Employees; Management Style; Interpersonal Communication; Leadership; Cooperation; Partners and Partnerships

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2021
Article

Venture Capital Booms and Startup Financing

By: William Janeway, Ramana Nanda and Matthew Rhodes-Kropf

We review the growing literature on the relationship between venture capital booms and startup financing, focusing on three broad areas: First, we discuss the drivers of large inflows into the venture capital asset class, particularly in recent years—which are related... View Details

Keywords: Venture Capital; Business Startups; Innovation and Invention; Policy

December 1990
Case

Allen-Bradley's ICCG: Repositioning for the 1990s

By: Nitin Nohria

Allen-Bradley's Industrial Computer and Communication Group (ICCG) underwent a period of rapid transformation in the 1980s, instituting a wide array of innovations from product development to information systems. In 1990 the Ohio-based group announced a major... View Details

Keywords: Organizational Change and Adaptation; Technological Innovation; Information Technology; Organizational Culture; Business Organization; Problems and Challenges; Information Technology Industry

Educators

January 2002
Case

Teledesic

By: Thomas R. Eisenmann, Daniel J. Green and Douglas R Rogers

Management of a satellite-delivered broadband data communications company sets strategy in an uncertain environment, using Michael Porter's scenario planning tools to assess likely outcomes and determine which actions to take. This case draws a distinction between... View Details

Keywords: Business Model; Business or Company Management; Infrastructure; Strategic Planning; Risk and Uncertainty; Strategy; Internet; Information Technology Industry

29 Jun 2022
Blog Post

Harvard Business School Announces the 2022-2023 Blavatnik Fellows

Harvard-affiliated postdocs as they build their promising life science ventures by developing their leadership talents and providing mentorship and community during their entrepreneurial journey. To date, Blavatnik Fellows have created 30... View Details

16 Jun 2009
First Look

First Look: June 16

communities have demonstrated astonishing levels of innovation, knowledge accumulation, collaboration, and collective intelligence. Now, leading organizations are bringing the Web's novel tools and philosophies inside, creating Enterprise... View Details

Keywords: Martha Lagace

Research Summary

Internalizing Global Value Chains: A Firm-Level Analysis

By: Laura Alfaro

In recent decades, advances in information and communication technology and falling trade barriers have led firms to retain within their boundaries and in their domestic economies only a subset of their production stages. A key decision facing firms worldwide is the... View Details

April 2019
Article

Internalizing Global Value Chains: A Firm-Level Analysis

By: Laura Alfaro, Pol Antràs, Davin Chor and Paola Conconi

In recent decades, advances in information and communication technology and falling trade barriers have led firms to retain within their boundaries and in their domestic economies only a subset of their production stages. A key decision facing firms worldwide is the... View Details

Keywords: Global Value Chains; Sequential Production; Incomplete Contracts; Demand and Consumers; Customer Value and Value Chain; Globalization

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2017
Working Paper

Internalizing Global Value Chains: A Firm-Level Analysis

By: Laura Alfaro, Pol Antràs, Davin Chor and Paola Conconi

In recent decades, advances in information and communication technology and falling trade barriers have led firms to retain within their boundaries and in their domestic economies only a subset of their production stages. A key decision facing firms worldwide is the... View Details

Keywords: Global Value Chains; Sequential Production; Incomplete Contracts; Demand and Consumers; Customer Value and Value Chain; Globalization

Read Now

03 Nov 2016
Working Paper Summaries

Ideological Segregation among Online Collaborators: Evidence from Wikipedians

Keywords: by Shane Greenstein, Yuan Gu, and Feng Zhu

2013
Working Paper

Where do the Most Active Customers Originate and How Can Firms Keep Them Engaged?

By: Clarence Lee, E. Ofek and Thomas Steenburgh

In this paper, we study how firms offering Web services can acquire and develop an active customer base. We focus on two basic questions. First, how does the method of customer acquisition affect the way customers use the service to meet their own needs and to interact... View Details

Keywords: Customer Engagement; Adoption Routes; Hidden Markov Models; Search; Word-of-Mouth; Digital Media; Customer Relationship Management; Internet and the Web; Mathematical Methods; Consumer Behavior; Entrepreneurship; Marketing Reference Programs; Web Services Industry

27 Oct 2011
Research & Ideas

Horrible Boss Workarounds

what employees can do to resist them. As she states in a recent column in Harvard Business Review, "The best cure for horrible bosses is wonderful colleagues." Bad boss behavior #1: failure to communicate. At any level of management, it's important that... View Details

Keywords: by Carmen Nobel

Summer 2016
Article

Open Content, Linus' Law, and Neutral Point of View

By: Shane Greenstein and Feng Zhu

The diffusion of the Internet and digital technologies has enabled many organizations to use the open-content production model to produce and disseminate knowledge. While several prior studies have shown that the open-content production model can lead to high-quality... View Details

Keywords: Prejudice and Bias; Internet and the Web; Balance and Stability; Operations; Knowledge Management; Knowledge Dissemination

October 2016 (Revised April 2018)
Case

ASICS: Chasing a 2020 Vision

By: Elie Ofek, Nobuo Sato and Akiko Kanno

In early 2016, Motoi Oyama, president and CEO of ASICS, a major sports apparel and footwear manufacturer based in Japan, lays out his company’s growth plan for the upcoming 5 years. The new plan set ambitious goals in terms of revenue and profit increases. At the heart... View Details

Keywords: Brand Management; Sports Apparel; Competitive Positioning; Direct To Consumer Marketing; Retail Formats; Lifestyle Brands; Information Technology; Competition; Brands and Branding; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Digital Platforms; Product Positioning; Marketing Channels; Sports; Retail Industry; Apparel and Accessories Industry; Sports Industry; Entertainment and Recreation Industry

Educators