Publications

29 Mar 2019
Blog Post

My Concerns About Learning Accounting at HBS

first day at HBS. My name is Melanie Sperling and I am a first-year student here at HBS. Before attending school, I worked for four years at the One Love Foundation – America’s leader in health relationship education - View Details

2017
Chapter

Innovation Policies

By: Ramana Nanda and Matthew Rhodes-Kropf

Past work has shown that failure tolerance by principals has the potential to stimulate innovation, but has not examined how this affects which projects principals will start. We demonstrate that failure tolerance has an equilibrium price – in terms of an investor’s... View Details

Keywords: Innovation; Investing; Abandonment Option; Failure Tolerance; Innovation and Invention; Venture Capital; Attitudes; Investment; Failure

2017
Working Paper

Innovation Policies

By: Ramana Nanda and Matthew Rhodes-Kropf

Past work has shown that failure tolerance by principals has the potential to stimulate innovation, but has not examined how this affects which projects principals will start. We demonstrate that failure tolerance has an equilibrium price ― in terms of an investor's... View Details

Keywords: Innovation; Investing; Abandonment Option; Failure Tolerance; Venture Capital; Attitudes; Investment; Failure; Innovation and Invention

SSRN

01 Jul 2013
Research & Ideas

Crowdfunding a Poor Investment?

When Congress passed President Obama's JOBS Act in March 2012, one of the most intriguing provisions would enable crowdfunding—the ability for large groups of anonymous investors to fund startups. More than a year after the law was... View Details

Keywords: by Michael Blanding; Financial Services

15 Oct 2019
Cold Call Podcast

Goldman Sachs’ $500 Million Bet on Small Businesses

Keywords: Re: Leonard A. Schlesinger; Financial Services

28 Aug 2012
First Look

First Look: August 28

The Brazil-USA Cotton Dispute and the Incremental Balancing of Interests Author: Arthur A. Daemmrich Publication: Trade, Law and Development (summer 2012) Abstract The World... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

02 Feb 2007
What Do You Think?

Is There Too Little “Know Why” In Business?

"Purpose is just one part of the whole process . We definitely have to concretize the steps we intend to do, break down the core purpose to objectives, and then to relevant action plans ." Shrikant Sortur reminded us of... View Details

Keywords: by Jim Heskett

October 2010 (Revised July 2013)
Case

ActionAid International: Globalizing Governance, Localizing Accountability

By: Alnoor Ebrahim and Rachel Gordon

As a global NGO working in 45 countries, ActionAid International aims to eradicate poverty by addressing its underlying causes such as injustice and inequality. This case follows a series of radical transformations implemented by the organization's CEO, Ramesh Singh—a... View Details

Keywords: Local Range; Globalized Firms and Management; Corporate Accountability; Corporate Governance; Leading Change; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Organizational Structure; Nonprofit Organizations; Power and Influence; Johannesburg; London

Educators

March 24, 2020
Article

Delayed Negative Effects of Prosocial Spending on Happiness

By: Armin Falk and Thomas Graeber

Does prosocial behavior promote happiness? We test this longstanding hypothesis in a behavioral experiment that extends the scope of previous research. In our Saving a Life paradigm, every participant either saved one human life in expectation by triggering a targeted... View Details

Keywords: Prosocial Behavior; Altruism; Happiness; Well-being; Spending; Behavior

28 Sep 2013
News

All the Right Moves

2013
Working Paper

Testing Coleman's Social-Norm Enforcement Mechanism: Evidence from Wikipedia

By: Mikolaj J. Piskorski and Andreea Gorbatai

Since Durkheim, sociologists have believed that dense network structures lead to fewer norm violations. Coleman (1990) proposed one mechanism generating this relationship and argued that dense networks provide an opportunity structure to reward those who punish norm... View Details

Keywords: Governance Compliance; Governance Controls; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Information Publishing; Social and Collaborative Networks; Social Issues; Societal Protocols

SSRN

November 2011
Article

How Great Companies Think Differently

By: Rosabeth Moss Kanter

Corporate leaders have long subscribed to the belief that the sole purpose of business is to make money. That narrow view, deeply embedded in the American capitalist system, molds the actions of most corporations, constraining them to focus on maximizing short-term... View Details

Keywords: Decision Choices and Conditions; Profit; Leadership; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Business and Shareholder Relations; Behavior; Social Issues; Competitive Advantage

Find at Harvard

August 2011
Supplement

Interview with Raj Datta, Former Chief Knowledge Officer of MindTree

By: David A. Garvin

MindTree is a mid-sized Indian IT services company known for its knowledge management practices, its collborative communities, and its strong culture and values. The CEO has a set a goal of becoming a $1 billion company by 2014; to reach that goal, employees must... View Details

Keywords: Knowledge Management; Social and Collaborative Networks; Innovation and Invention; Organizational Culture; Learning; Values and Beliefs; Information Technology Industry; Service Industry; India

07 Apr 2009
First Look

First Look: April 7, 2009

Addleshaw-Goddard (AG), the 15th largest law firm in the U.K., is seeking ways to serve larger clients on more important legal matters. Part of this strategy involves its "Client Development Centre (CDC)," an innovative idea... View Details

Keywords: Martha Lagace

06 Oct 2020
News

Clearing the Path to Citizenship

hoped to start a new life with their young son in their adopted country, but the immigration process would not be an easy one. “Everything was opaque and scary,” Wang says. “It was our one shot at being able to stay.” Stymied by the... View Details

Keywords: April White

07 Apr 2015
First Look

First Look: April 7

Legal Education What Courses Should Law Students Take? Lessons from Harvard's Big Law Survey By: Coates, John C., Jesse M. Fried, and Kathryn E. Spier Abstract—No abstract... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

2025
Chapter

Employer-Based Short-Term Savings Accounts

By: Sarah Holmes Berk, John Beshears, Jay Garg, James J. Choi and David Laibson

We study the introduction of a choice architecture design intended to increase short-term savings among employees at five U.K. firms. Employees were offered the opportunity to opt into a payroll deduction program that auto-deposits funds from each paycheck into a... View Details

Keywords: Personal Finance; Compensation and Benefits; Well-being; Behavior; Investment Funds; Employees; United Kingdom

January 2021 (Revised July 2022)
Case

Dwight D. Eisenhower: Changing the World

By: Robert Simons and Shirley Sun

This case describes the rise of Dwight (Ike) Eisenhower from a small town in Kansas to the pinnacle of power on the world stage. During his life, Eisenhower was leader of the Allied Forces in World War II, president of Columbia University, head of NATO, and president... View Details

Keywords: Leadership Development; Leadership; Values and Beliefs; Personal Characteristics; Leadership Style; Success; Work-Life Balance; Power and Influence

Educators

27 Jun 2022
Lecture

The Power of Trust

By: Sandra J. Sucher

We were delighted to be joined by Professor Sandra Sucher of Harvard Business School, a leading researcher on management practice and the author of The Power of Trust, to explore the core elements underpinning trust in business and to talk about some real-world... View Details

Keywords: Trust; Corporate Accountability; Organizational Culture; Leadership