Publications

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June 2008 (Revised August 2008)
Case

World Wildlife Fund US

By: Jane Wei-Skillern and Kerry Herman

World Wildlife Fund US is a leading international conservation nonprofit that operates within a global network of WWF organizations. This case examines WWF US's strategy to achieve its mission of protecting natural wildlife and resources. In contrast to traditional... View Details

Keywords: Globalized Firms and Management; Partners and Partnerships; Environmental Sustainability; Nonprofit Organizations; Social and Collaborative Networks; Trust; Integration; Sumatra; United States

April 2017 (Revised October 2017)
Case

Wal-Mart Update, 2017

By: David B. Yoffie and Eric Baldwin

In 2017 Wal-Mart was still the world’s largest company, with over $480 billion in annual revenue and operations in 28 countries. Although it had mostly vanquished its rival discount retailers in the U.S., it was struggling to find the right growth strategy. Facing a... View Details

Keywords: E-Commerce Strategy; Strategy; Competitive Strategy; Business Growth and Maturation; Growth and Development Strategy; Global Range; Business Strategy; Corporate Strategy; E-commerce; Retail Industry

February 2016 (Revised September 2020)
Case

T-Mobile in 2013: The Un-Carrier

By: John Beshears, Francesca Gino, Jonathan Lee and Sean (Yixiang) Wang

By 2013, the U.S. wireless industry was in the midst of a costly transition. As consumers began to embrace more sophisticated mobile devices, the industry's four main players spent heavily to improve their infrastructures for providing reliable high-speed data... View Details

Keywords: Business Model; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Product Positioning; Competition; Wireless Technology; Telecommunications Industry; United States

2013
Chapter

Open Innovation and Organizational Boundaries: Task Decomposition, Knowledge Distribution and the Locus of Innovation

By: Karim R. Lakhani, Hila Lifshitz-Assaf and Michael L. Tushman

This chapter contrasts traditional, organization-centered models of innovation with more recent work on open innovation. These fundamentally different and inconsistent innovation logics are associated with contrasting organizational boundaries and organizational... View Details

Keywords: Innovation; Organizational Boundaries; Institutional Logics; Modular Innovation; Open Innovation; Knowledge Sharing; Innovation Strategy; Organizational Design; Boundaries; Collaborative Innovation and Invention

January 1990 (Revised October 1993)
Case

Monsanto's March into Biotechnology (A)

By: Gary P. Pisano

Very early in the history of biotechnology (about 1979), Monsanto made a major commitment to move into this field. This case recounts the history from the point of view of the eminent scientist hired to head up corporate R&D. He took Monsanto from a very traditional... View Details

Keywords: History; Transition; Biotechnology Industry; Agriculture and Agribusiness Industry

06 Apr 2022
News

Five Principles of Purposeful Leadership

Beyond the Holacracy Hype

Holacracy and other forms of self-organization have received a lot of press. Proponents hail them as "flat" environments that foster flexibility, engagement, productivity, and efficiency. Critics say they're naive, unrealistic experiments. My coauthors and I argue,... View Details

Article

Oral History and the Business History of Emerging Markets

By: Geoffrey Jones and Rachael Comunale

This article highlights the benefits that rigorous use of oral history can offer to research on the contemporary business history of emerging markets. Oral history can help fill some of the major information voids arising from the absence of a strong tradition of... View Details

Keywords: Oral History; Corruption; Business History; Emerging Markets; Entrepreneurship; Globalization; Business and Government Relations; Government and Politics; Asia; Africa; Latin America

September 2009
Article

Virtue out of Necessity? Compliance, Commitment and the Improvement of Labor Conditions in Global Supply Chains

By: Akshay Mangla, Richard Locke and Matthew Amengual

Private, voluntary compliance programs, promoted by global corporations and nongovernmental organizations alike, have produced only modest and uneven improvements in working conditions and labor rights in most global supply chains. Through a detailed study of a major... View Details

Keywords: Working Conditions; Ethics; Supply Chain; Governance Compliance; Globalization

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Web

Placement - Doctoral

Placement Tradition of Success The demand for faculty at business schools has never been greater. Graduates of the HBS Doctoral Programs have gone on to become prominent scholars in a wide range of disciplines at many of the world’s most... View Details

17 Aug 2023
Research & Ideas

‘Not a Bunch of Weirdos’: Why Mainstream Investors Buy Crypto

checking accounts. Moreover, these investors are drawn by the lure of potentially higher returns in a “lottery-style payoff” than investors expect with traditional investments. Plus, the COVID-19 stimulus money led new investors to... View Details

Keywords: by Ben Rand

26 Jan 2009
Research & Ideas

Where is Home for the Global Firm?

Not so long ago, multinational firms were associated with a specific national identity. Caterpillar was a prototypical U.S. company. Honda was a classic Japanese company. The location of headquarters of these and other firms served as proof, and nations took pride in... View Details

Keywords: by Martha Lagace

March 2011
Case

Cash Flow Productivity at PepsiCo: Communicating Value to Retailers

PepsiCo developed a new metric that better measured the value added by Pepsi products than did gross margin, the traditional metric used by retailers to determine shelf space and promotional activity. The new metric, cash flow productivity, captured the value of... View Details

Keywords: Customer Relationship Management; Cash Flow; Measurement and Metrics; Distribution; Performance Productivity; Value Creation; Food and Beverage Industry; Retail Industry

March 2002
Case

Women and Power: Stories From Around the Globe

By: Kathleen L. McGinn, Alexis Lefort and Nicole Nasser

This case uses vignettes and statistics of the broader issue discussed in each vignette to explore some of the ways in which gender is played out in the struggle for power and control. Disenfranchised groups--those not allowed access to critical resources--have little... View Details

Keywords: Equality and Inequality; Gender; Power and Influence

November 2000
Case

Wit Capital: Evolution of the Online Investment Bank (B)

Describes the evolution of Wit Capital from its origins as a small brewery to an online investment bank advising both small technology-based companies seeking to raise capital and large companies seeking to acquire Internet companies, as well as offering retail... View Details

Keywords: Internet and the Web; Disruptive Innovation; Service Delivery; Investment Banking; Entrepreneurship

May 1999 (Revised November 2000)
Case

AES Global Values

By: Lynn S. Paine

Members of the development team for the AES Corp.'s power plant project in India must decide what plant technology to specify in their application for techno-economic clearance from the government of India's Central Electric Authority. Their choice is between more... View Details

Keywords: Business Ventures; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Environmental Sustainability; Energy Generation; Technology Adoption; Energy Industry; India; United States