Profit Vs. Growth - Publications - Faculty & Research

26 Nov 2001
Op-Ed

Why Corporate Budgeting Needs To Be Fixed

present to the future. After all, her compensation doesn't change whether she misses the target by a little or a lot; she still gets her full salary (assuming she doesn't get fired, of course). But by shifting profits forward—by prepaying... View Details

Keywords: by Michael C. Jensen

05 Sep 2019
Sharpening Your Skills

Making the Right Technical Hire

developers and 27 percent wanted sales leads, 13 percent were looking for growth marketers and 7 percent wanted front-end developers/UX/designers. Sure, it’s fine to look for a generalist [or augmenting your team with an outsourced dev... View Details

Keywords: by Julia Austin; Technology

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Partners & Fellows | Social Enterprise | Harvard Business School

Coney Island Prep Connecticut Office of the Governor Consumer Financial Protection Bureau Detroit Economic Growth Corporation Dillard University Draper Richards Kaplan Foundation Endeavor Global Environmental Defense Fund Equal Justice... View Details

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Technology & Operations Management Awards & Honors - Faculty & Research

"Residential Battery Storage - Reshaping the Way We Do Electricity" with Serguei Netessine. Christian Kaps : Winner of the 2024 People’s Choice Flash Talk Award at the INFORMS Early-Career Sustainable Operations Workshop for “Power vs.... View Details

01 Mar 2004
News

Derek Ferguson

Music, a retailer based in the Midwest. “Its biggest profit drivers were rap and hip-hop,” he remarks. “I remember thinking that there was a real opportunity to cater more directly to that customer base.” To learn more about the business,... View Details

Keywords: Julia Hanna; Performing Arts, Spectator Sports, and Related Industries; Arts, Entertainment

20 Aug 2008
Op-Ed

The Time is Right for Creative Capitalism

small number of rivals—for market power. (Indeed, at the Harvard Business School where I have taught business history to thousands of MBAs, students often compare the early growth of Standard Oil to that of Microsoft 100 years later. They... View Details

Keywords: by Nancy Koehn

06 Jun 2005
What Do You Think?

Is a “Level Playing Field” a Good Thing?

China and India as competition but as profit centers to improve our short term return on investment. We need to reexamine that paradigm. . . . Sometimes the kids in the global community don't play fair. We don't have to take our ball... View Details

Keywords: by James Heskett

01 Feb 2021
What Do You Think?

Has the New Economy Finally Arrived?

worked out. It may have contributed to the thinking behind the “dot-com bubble,” which was characterized by a wave of IPOs for organizations built around the information economy, ballooning stock options, and new attitudes toward company value (with View Details

Keywords: by James Heskett

01 May 2019
What Do You Think?

What Should the Leadership of YouTube Do?

2014, facing the task of bolstering the Company’s growth and financial performance. Two years earlier she had come up with the controversial insight that a more profitable business model for YouTube should... View Details

Keywords: by James Heskett; Entertainment & Recreation; Media & Broadcasting

06 Mar 2012
First Look

First Look: March 6

relation between profitability and sales growth in high corruption countries. None of those differences is observed across firms with high and low abnormal anticorruption disclosures in low corruption... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

31 May 2017
What Do You Think?

Can Amazon Do What Walmart Couldn’t, Stop the 'Wheel of Retailing'?

the company’s growth and profit was the size of the global retail market itself. No competitors could successfully undercut such a retail phenomenon. The wheel of retailing had been stopped! Until, of... View Details

Keywords: by James Heskett; Retail

16 Aug 2018
News

Working with a Giver’s Spirit

business owners that promotes economic growth by mentoring and supporting high-impact entrepreneurs. Ko was looking for a new managing director of the Philippine chapter of Entrepreneurs’ Organization, and Ayala’s name kept surfacing. At... View Details

Keywords: Constantine von Hoffman

23 Jun 2023
News

Highlights from the Spring 2023 Alumni Board Meeting

Alumni Board members on campus for their annual spring meeting // Credit: Panfoto Hard work, with humility for humanity, is the spirit that animates Harvard Business School's MBA program today, Matt Weinzierl, Senior Associate Dean and Chair of the MBA Program, told... View Details

01 Mar 2023
News

Step Change

At Consoleya, a coworking space in Cairo’s former French Consulate, multiple levels of meeting rooms and workspaces operate at capacity, from a ground-floor café to a rooftop deck. The scene—coders bent over laptops, concepts scrawled on whiteboards, clusters of people... View Details

Keywords: Julia Hanna; photographed by Abdelrahman Gabr – Koree; entrepreneurship; women; venture capital; Egypt; developing economies; Finance

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Rare Disease Day – Small Numbers, Big Challenges… and Big Opportunities - Blog: Health Supplement

people. Globally, there are about 350 million people , or 8% of the population, with a rare disease, yet only 5% of these diseases have an approved therapy. It’s a “ small numbers, big problem ” dilemma that is historically overlooked, largely because it’s hard to make... View Details

06 Aug 2012
Research & Ideas

Strategic Intelligence: Adapt or Die

reports for a decade, but never did anything about it. By 2000, its profits had collapsed, and at that point it was impossible to do anything about it until the company finally went bankrupt in 2009. That's why I always say View Details

Keywords: by Michael Blanding

March 2017 (Revised September 2017)
Case

Facebook Fake News in the Post-Truth World

By: John R. Wells and Carole A. Winkler

In January 2017, Mark Zuckerberg, founder and CEO of Facebook, was surrounded by controversy. The election of Donald Trump as the next president of the United States in November 2016 had triggered a national storm of protests, and many attributed Trump’s victory to... View Details

Keywords: Facebook; Fake News; Mark Zuckerberg; Donald Trump; Algorithms; Social Networks; Partisanship; Social Media; App Development; Instagram; WhatsApp; Smartphone; Silicon Valley; Office Space; Digital Strategy; Democracy; Entry Barriers; Online Platforms; Controversy; Tencent; Agility; Social Networking; Gaming; Gaming Industry; Computer Games; Mobile Gaming; Messaging; Monetization Strategy; Advertising; Digital Marketing; Business Ventures; Acquisition; Mergers and Acquisitions; Business Growth and Maturation; Business Headquarters; Business Organization; For-Profit Firms; Trends; Communication; Communication Technology; Forms of Communication; Interactive Communication; Interpersonal Communication; Talent and Talent Management; Crime and Corruption; Voting; Demographics; Entertainment; Games, Gaming, and Gambling; Moral Sensibility; Values and Beliefs; Initial Public Offering; Profit; Revenue; Geography; Geographic Location; Global Range; Local Range; Country; Cross-Cultural and Cross-Border Issues; Globalized Firms and Management; Globalized Markets and Industries; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Government and Politics; International Relations; National Security; Political Elections; Business History; Recruitment; Selection and Staffing; Information Management; Information Publishing; News; Newspapers; Innovation and Management; Innovation Strategy; Technological Innovation; Knowledge Dissemination; Human Capital; Law; Leadership Development; Leadership Style; Leading Change; Business or Company Management; Crisis Management; Goals and Objectives; Growth and Development Strategy; Growth Management; Management Practices and Processes; Management Style; Management Systems; Management Teams; Managerial Roles; Marketing Channels; Social Marketing; Network Effects; Market Entry and Exit; Digital Platforms; Marketplace Matching; Industry Growth; Industry Structures; Monopoly; Media; Product Development; Service Delivery; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Mission and Purpose; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Organizational Culture; Organizational Structure; Public Ownership; Problems and Challenges; Business and Community Relations; Business and Government Relations; Groups and Teams; Networks; Rank and Position; Opportunities; Behavior; Emotions; Identity; Power and Influence; Prejudice and Bias; Reputation; Social and Collaborative Networks; Status and Position; Trust; Society; Civil Society or Community; Culture; Public Opinion; Social Issues; Societal Protocols; Strategy; Adaptation; Business Strategy; Commercialization; Competition; Competitive Advantage; Competitive Strategy; Corporate Strategy; Customization and Personalization; Diversification; Expansion; Horizontal Integration; Segmentation; Information Technology; Internet and the Web; Mobile and Wireless Technology; Internet and the Web; Applications and Software; Information Infrastructure; Digital Platforms; Internet and the Web; Mobile and Wireless Technology; Valuation; Advertising Industry; Communications Industry; Entertainment and Recreation Industry; Information Industry; Information Technology Industry; Journalism and News Industry; Media and Broadcasting Industry; Service Industry; Technology Industry; Telecommunications Industry; Video Game Industry; United States; California; Sunnyvale; Russia

Citation

Educators

Purchase

July 2023 (Revised February 2024)
Case

Clair

By: Lauren Cohen, Grace Headinger and Marcos Quirno

Clair was founded with a simple mission: to expedite America’s workers access to their hard-earned wages. In the headwinds of the COVID-19 pandemic, the startup had successfully raised a seed round of $4.5 million, and within two years the earned wage access (EWA)... View Details

Keywords: Fintech; Ewa; Lending; Technology; Business Startups; Growth and Development Strategy; Social Enterprise; Business Strategy; Business Model; Mission and Purpose; Venture Capital; Profit; Financial Services Industry; United States