Publications

January 2010 (Revised August 2011)
Case

United Breaks Guitars

By: John A. Deighton and Leora Kornfeld

When social media propagate a complaint about poor customer service, an international media event ensues. How do viral videos spread and what can firms do about them? This case dissects an incident in which a disgruntled customer used YouTube and Twitter to spread a... View Details

Keywords: Communication Technology; Customer Satisfaction; Marketing Communications; Marketing Strategy; Consumer Behavior; Network Effects; Service Delivery; Social and Collaborative Networks; Internet; Air Transportation Industry

21 Nov 2019
Research & Ideas

Do TV Debates Sway Voters?

Intense preparation helped Hillary Clinton command the podium in her first debate with Donald Trump in September 2016—the most-watched presidential debate in US history. In one of the debate’s most memorable moments, Clinton called out Trump for ridiculing a beauty... View Details

Keywords: by Danielle Kost

March 2022
Case

BTS & ARMY

By: Doug J. Chung and Kay R. Koo

The South Korean K-pop band, BTS, is shattering linguistic boundaries and reshaping the global music industry. BTS became the first band in Billboard history to simultaneously top the Billboard Artist 100, Billboard Hot 100, and Billboard 200; and the sixth act to have... View Details

Keywords: Entertainment; Music Entertainment; Marketing; Brands and Branding; Social and Collaborative Networks; Social Enterprise; Consumer Behavior; Music Industry; Entertainment and Recreation Industry

24 Jul 2017
Research & Ideas

People Have an Irrational Need to Complete 'Sets' of Things

pseudo-set framing could influence gift-giving behavior during its 2016 holiday online fundraising campaign. More than 7,000 potential donors were randomly (but evenly) directed to one of three landing pages. The first page emphasized... View Details

Keywords: by Carmen Nobel

22 Jan 2014
Working Paper Summaries

Separating Homophily and Peer Influence with Latent Space

Keywords: by Joseph P. Davin, Sunil Gupta & Mikołaj Jan Piskorski

08 Sep 2022
Book

Gen Xers and Millennials, It’s Time To Lead. Are You Ready?

leadership and the role of serving others through collaboration. At the video services provider Vimeo, Anjali Sud persuaded both managers and employees to follow her insight that the firm could perform better as a software company for business customers, rather than... View Details

Keywords: by Lane Lambert

2017
Working Paper

Salience through Information Technology: The Effect of Balance Availability on the Smoothing of SNAP Benefits

By: Andrew Hillis

Recipients of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) run out of most benefits before halfway through a benefit deposit cycle. I study the introduction of a mobile software application, Fresh EBT, that enables beneficiaries to check their available balance... View Details

Keywords: Mobile Technology; Welfare or Wellbeing; Technology Adoption; Behavior

Read Now

26 Jan 2016
First Look

January 26, 2016

employees, since some of them may naturally engage in behaviors to offset the negative effects of longer commutes. Drawing on psychological research on self-control, we theorize how engaging in future-oriented thinking about the tasks to... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

September 2011
Article

The Labor Illusion: How Operational Transparency Increases Perceived Value

By: Ryan W. Buell and Michael I. Norton

A ubiquitous feature of even the fastest self-service technology transactions is the wait. Conventional wisdom and operations theory suggests that the longer people wait, the less satisfied they become; we demonstrate that due to what we term the labor illusion, when... View Details

Keywords: Internet and the Web; Perception; Valuation; Service Delivery; Consumer Behavior; Performance Effectiveness; Customer Satisfaction; Service Industry

19 May 2015
First Look

First Look: May 19

wealth of data it provides about agents' behavior and about the Bitcoin system itself. This article presents the platform's design principles and properties for a non-technical audience; reviews its past, present, and future uses; and... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

21 Apr 2009
First Look

First Look: April 21, 2009

centers of power for the pharmaceutical industry. A comparison of the United States and Germany in particular, and the United States and European Union more generally, suggests that how countries resolve tensions between protecting patients and empowering View Details

Keywords: Martha Lagace

29 Oct 2012
Research & Ideas

Are You Paying a Tip--or a Bribe?

Holden Professor of Organizational Behavior at Stanford, and Daniella Kupor, a doctoral student at Stanford. "It is generally considered a good-natured prosocial thing to tip, but bribing is considered to be antisocial and... View Details

Keywords: by Dina Gerdeman

September 2022 (Revised May 2024)
Case

Navya: Steering toward a Driverless Future

By: Julian De Freitas, Elie Ofek, Shaun Ingledew and Tonia Labruyere

In 2022, Sophie Desormière arrived at French roboshuttle producer Navya, tasked with charting a new course in a challenging sector. The company, which had recently listed on the Paris Stock Exchange, was burning through cash reserves and needed to transform the promise... View Details

Keywords: Autonomous Vehicles; Market Entry and Exit; Opportunities; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Consumer Behavior; Business Model; Auto Industry; Transportation Industry; France; United States

06 Jan 2014
Research & Ideas

Technology Re-Emergence: Creating New Value for Old Innovations

Behavior unit at Harvard Business School. "Successful companies may be able to reposition a 'dying' technology by redefining its identity and value for the customer." Raffaelli details his research in the paper Technology... View Details

Keywords: by Carmen Nobel; Consumer Products; Consumer Products; Consumer Products

23 Sep 2008
First Look

First Look: September 23, 2008

Business School from the 1960s onward marks the decisive ascendancy of economics, and particularly financial economics, in business education over the other behavioral disciplines, as well as the decisive ascendancy of business schools as... View Details

Keywords: Martha Lagace

April 2008
Case

A Day in the Life of Alex Sander: Driving in the Fast Lane at Landon Care Products

By: Larry E. Greiner and Elizabeth Collins

Alex Sander is a new product manager whose drive and talents are attractive to management, but whose intolerant style has alienated employees. This tension is presented against the backdrop of a 360° performance review process. Sander works in the Toiletries Division... View Details

Keywords: Management Style; Conflict Management; Behavior; Management Practices and Processes; Talent and Talent Management; Mergers and Acquisitions; Problems and Challenges; Consumer Products Industry; United States; Europe

April 2019 (Revised October 2020)
Case

Kraft Heinz: The $8 Billion Brand Write-Down

By: Jill Avery

On Friday, February 22, 2019, following an unexpected and disappointing earnings report, The Kraft Heinz Company’s stock price fell 27%, wiping out $16 billion in market value. CEO Bernardo Hees had announced that the company had taken a $15.4 billion asset write-down,... View Details

April 2010
Case

Metabical: Pricing, Packaging, and Demand Forecasting Recommendations for a New Weight Loss Drug

By: John A. Quelch and Heather Beckham

Metabical is a new weight loss drug from Cambridge Sciences Pharmaceuticals intended for moderately overweight individuals. In anticipation of final FDA approval, the senior director of marketing, Barbara Printup, prepares for the product launch and must make several... View Details

Keywords: Return On Investment; Forecasting; Pricing Policies; Demand Planning; Marketing Strategy; Price; Consumer Behavior; Investment Return; Forecasting and Prediction; Product Launch; Planning; Brands and Branding; Pharmaceutical Industry