Publications

19 Jun 2018
Research Event

Has Environmental Sustainability Lost its Relevance?

iPhoto For businesses and other organizations seeking to overcome roadblocks to sustainability over the last few decades, much can be learned from the debates I heard at the recent Harvard Business School conference, Understanding and Overcoming Roadblocks to... View Details

Keywords: by Geoffrey G. Jones; Energy

04 Apr 2011
HBS Case

Reinventing the National Geographic Society

emerging. Various units operated as independent fiefdoms. In 1998, Fahey was named CEO, and the task was clear: build an organization to thrive for the next 100 years. To do so, he "assembled a View Details

Keywords: by Sean Silverthorne; Publishing

January 2010 (Revised January 2014)
Case

Twitter

By: Mikolaj Jan Piskorski, David Chen, Bill Heil and Aaron Smith

Twitter is a micro-blogging company that allows users to send short text updates to others. The site is used by people, including celebrities, government officials, and businesses. It helps to raise money for non-profit organizations and provides first-responders with... View Details

Keywords: Blogs; Revenue; Information Publishing; Growth and Development Strategy; Social and Collaborative Networks; Web

21 Dec 2010
First Look

First Look: December 21

puzzling. We conducted an ethnographic investigation to examine the nature of events that compelled managers to engage in redundant communication. Our study of the... View Details

29 Oct 2020
Blog Post

Delving Deeper into Development with the MBA/MPA-ID Program – a Q+A with Zainab Raji (MBA/MPA-ID 2022)

in Winter 2019 I joined Deloitte’s Risk Advisory practice in Atlanta shortly after graduating from Emory with the goal of deepening my accounting expertise. At Deloitte, I designed and tested risk controls... View Details

18 Jun 2001
Research & Ideas

Tech Investment the Wise Way

Excerpted with permission from "The Dual Edged Role of the Business Model in Leveraging Corporate Technology Investments," in Taking Technical Risks: How Innovators, Executives, and Investors View Details

Keywords: by Henry Chesbrough & Richard S. Rosenbloom

31 Jan 2012
First Look

First Look: Jan. 31

financial management and the usefulness of formal hedging of agricultural production risks was offered to randomly selected farmers in Gujarat,... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne & Carmen Nobel

November 2020
Article

Disrupting the Disruptors or Enhancing Them? How Blockchain Re‐Shapes Two‐Sided Platforms

By: Daniel Trabucchi, Antonella Moretto, Tommaso Buganza and Alan MacCormack

The importance of platform‐based businesses in the modern economy is growing continuously and becoming increasingly relevant. Specifically, the deployment of digital technologies has enhanced the applicability of two‐sided business models, enabling companies to act not... View Details

Keywords: Blockchain; Two-Sided Platforms; Business Model; Innovation and Invention; Technological Innovation

Find at Harvard

04 Jan 2022
What Do You Think?

Firing McDonald’s Easterbrook: What Could the Board Have Done Differently?

cause or not. Each situation is different. It may depend on the nature of the CEO’s shortcomings and the terms of their contract. Was the problem merely poor View Details

Keywords: by James Heskett

February 2010 (Revised November 2013)
Case

Living PlanIT

By: Robert G. Eccles, Amy C. Edmondson, Susan Thyne and Tiona Zuzul

Living PlanIT is a start-up company that has developed a new, innovative business model for sustainable urbanization. This model reflects the software and technology backgrounds of its founders, Steve Lewis and Malcolm Hutchinson, and is in vivid contrast to other... View Details

Keywords: Business Model; Business Startups; Development Economics; Entrepreneurship; City; Technological Innovation; Environmental Sustainability; Urban Development; Construction Industry; Green Technology Industry; Real Estate Industry; Portugal

01 Jul 2014
Working Paper Summaries

Creating Reciprocal Value Through Operational Transparency

Keywords: by Ryan W. Buell, Tami Kim & Chia-Jung Tsay

01 Oct 2001
News

David B. Price, Jr.: Aiming High

—it's the challenge of leading a major company in the turbulent global economy. A longtime executive at Monsanto and BFGoodrich, Price believes that the turmoil caused by... View Details

Keywords: Margie Kelley; Management of Companies and Enterprises; Management of Companies and Enterprises

29 Apr 2014
First Look

First Look: April 29

on the circumstances and prospects of a company. In fact, companies often turn to outsiders because they have failed to recruit, train, and... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

Web

Blavatnik Fellowship in Life Science Entrepreneurship - Health Care

Startup Culture.” Industry Access Fellows build a network of connections across the life science industry in various ways. They are matched with Key Advisory Board members who serve as their mentors throughout the program View Details

August 2024
Case

Pioneering Pain Management: CWC Alliance Combats the Opioid Epidemic

By: Susanna Gallani, Karen L. Sedatole and Sarah Mehta

Set in March 2024, this case is about CWC Alliance (CWC), a nonprofit working to prevent opioid addiction in the U.S. Founder Cammie Wolf Rice launched CWC in 2018 after her son, Christopher Wolf, died of a heroin overdose. Wolf’s dependence on opioids stemmed from a... View Details

Keywords: Health Care and Treatment; Innovation and Invention; Jobs and Positions; Nonprofit Organizations; Expansion; Growth and Development Strategy; Service Delivery; Mission and Purpose; Health Industry; United States; Georgia (state, US); Atlanta

30 Apr 2001
Research & Ideas

Why Evolutionary Software Development Works

Given the importance of software, the lack of research on the best ways to manage its development is surprising. Many different models have been proposed since the much cited... View Details

Keywords: by Alan MacCormack; Technology

September 8, 2009
Article

The New Governance Paradigm

By: Nathaniel Foote and Michael Beer

Boards members of failed banks in 2008 or of the many companies like Enron who were caught up in scandals are by and large honorable, well intentioned, and competent people. So what went wrong and what can be done about it. This article argues that the problem lies in... View Details

Keywords: Corporate Governance; Competency and Skills; Banks and Banking; Failure; Goals and Objectives; Leadership; Management Practices and Processes; Ethics; Performance; Governing and Advisory Boards; Crime and Corruption

Find at Harvard

2025
Working Paper

Dynamic Personalization with Multiple Customer Signals: Multi-Response State Representation in Reinforcement Learning

By: Liangzong Ma, Ta-Wei Huang, Eva Ascarza and Ayelet Israeli

Reinforcement learning (RL) offers potential for optimizing sequences of customer interactions by modeling the relationships between customer states, company actions, and long-term value. However, its practical implementation often faces significant challenges.... View Details

Keywords: Dynamic Policy; Deep Reinforcement Learning; Representation Learning; Dynamic Difficulty Adjustment; Latent Variable Models; Customer Relationship Management; Customer Value and Value Chain; Foreign Direct Investment; Analytics and Data Science