Publications
Publications
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(2,008)
- Faculty Publications (436)
- September 2022
- Background Note
On CUE: The Quest for Optimal Customer Unit Economics
By: Elie Ofek, Barak Libai and Eitan Muller
Startups are often evaluated by how well they perform on unit economics, defined as the ratio of a customer’s lifetime value (LTV) to acquisition costs (CAC). A common target for unit economics, advocated by many VCs and analysts, is 3:1 (i.e., LTV/CAC=3). While there... View Details
- September 2022
- Case
ROI vs. ROI: The Grupo Baobá Family Office
By: Lauren Cohen, Hao Gao, Jiawei Ye and Grace Headinger
Fernando Scodro, a third-generation member of his family, mulled over the next step in integrating an ESG strategy into his family office’s investment portfolio. While his family office, Grupo Baobá, had made excellent progress in incorporating his family’s values into... View Details
- August 2022
- Supplement
Sweet Teez Bakery: Projecting the Dough’s Rise Financial Supplement
By: Emily R. McComb, Mel Martin and Amy Klopfenstein
Abstract: In 2021, the HBS Impact Investment Fund student team met with entrepreneur Teresa Maynard, who had applied for a $25,000 impact investment loan. The students thought the former Harvard Data Scientist’s bakery business, Sweet Teez Bakery, showed promise.... View Details
- August 2022 (Revised November 2024)
- Case
Sweet Teez Bakery: Projecting the Dough's Rise
By: Emily R. McComb, Mel Martin and Amy Klopfenstein
In 2021, the HBS Impact Investment Fund student team met with entrepreneur Teresa Maynard, who had applied for a $25,000 impact investment loan. The students thought the former Harvard Data Scientist’s bakery business, Sweet Teez Bakery, showed promise. Maynard had... View Details
- August 2022 (Revised September 2023)
- Case
Evaluating the Impact of Hillside Harvest
By: Archie L. Jones, Mel Martin and Amy Klopfenstein
In fall 2021, the HBS Impact Investment Fund student team had just finished their last round of due diligence on the BIPOC-founded premium hot sauce company Hillside Harvest. They thought the business had a fine performance, showing potential to grow into a successful... View Details
- August 2022 (Revised May 2025)
- Case
Fresh Food Generation
By: Brian Trelstad, Amy Klopfenstein and Mel Martin
This case highlights one of five BIPOC entrepreneurs in the Boston area as part of the HBS Impact Investment Fund. In fall 2021, a team of HBS students reviewed the financial statements of Fresh Food Generation (FFG), a Dorchester, Massachusetts-based food service... View Details
- August 2022
- Teaching Plan
Janet Ames (A), (B), (C), (D)
By: Brian Trelstad
Teaching Plan for HBS Case Nos. 320-076, 320-077, 320-078, and 322-051. The series of Janet Ames cases follow a fictional alumna of Harvard Business School into her consulting career in Boston. Over the series of cases, Ames is first offered the opportunity to join... View Details
Keywords: Philanthropy; Board; Non-profit Management; Career Changes And Transitions; Evaluation; Personal Development and Career; Opportunities; Decision Choices and Conditions; Philanthropy and Charitable Giving; Governing and Advisory Boards; Social Enterprise; Social Entrepreneurship; Nonprofit Organizations; Management; United States
- July 2022 (Revised January 2024)
- Case
Kovi: Changing Brazil's Mobility Landscape
By: Lynda M. Applegate, Michael Norris and Alexis Lefort
Kovi, a car rental startup located in São Paulo, Brazil, provides affordable access to rental cars for rideshare drivers. The case examines the origins of the company, provides background on the auto and rideshare industries in Brazil, and follows the CEO, Adhemar... View Details
- Article
The C-Suite Skills That Matter Most
By: Raffaella Sadun, Joseph B. Fuller, Stephen Hansen and PJ Neal
Landing a job as a CEO today is no longer all about industry expertise and financial savvy. What companies are really seeking are leaders with strong social skills. That’s what the authors discovered after analyzing nearly 7,000 job descriptions for C-suite roles.... View Details
- June 2022 (Revised November 2023)
- Case
Individual FoodService, Kelso, and Ken Sweder
By: Jo Tango and Alys Ferragamo
When and how much risk to take? In October 2020, Ken Sweder, CEO of Individual FoodService (“IFS”), contemplated this question as he evaluated a proposal to acquire Brady Industries, a distributor of janitorial and sanitation products. Sweder and his private equity... View Details
- June 2022
- Teaching Plan
Pacesetters
By: Jeffrey J. Bussgang and Mel Martin
Teaching Plan for HBS Case No. 322-019. City Sealcoating CEO Keith Chaney had just publicly called out the Boston Chamber of Commerce for their slow progress on their supplier diversity program, Pacesetters. Established in 2018 by regional business leaders,... View Details
- June 2022
- Case
The SAH Group: The Time is Right
By: Juan Alcacer and Alpana Thapar
In January 2021, Jalila Mezni, cofounder and CEO of the SAH Group, was preparing to present the company’s future growth plans to its board of directors. The Tunisian company was a leading producer and distributor of personal care and packaged hygiene products. In 2019,... View Details
- May 2022 (Revised April 2024)
- Case
Third Point in 2020: Growth Is Where the Value Is?
By: Robin Greenwood, James Williams and Denise Han
In early May 2020, Daniel Loeb’s team at Third Point was evaluating a potential growth opportunity in the Walt Disney Company and whether investor activism might play a role. Battered by the effects of COVID-19, the company’s stock had initially tumbled to $86 and then... View Details
- March 2022
- Case
The Goldman Sachs 10,000 Small Businesses Program: 2009-2021
By: Leonard A. Schlesinger and Julia Kelley
In December 2021, more than a decade after its founding, Goldman Sachs’s 10,000 Small Businesses program was still going strong — and the firm now needed to evaluate potential program modifications to reach a wider group of small business owners. Launched in the... View Details
Keywords: COVID-19 Pandemic; Small Business; Business Education; Curriculum and Courses; Government and Politics; Knowledge; Knowledge Dissemination; Labor; Employment; Human Capital; Management; Goals and Objectives; Organizations; Mission and Purpose; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Programs; Networks; Social Enterprise; Society; Strategy; Demographics; Diversity; Financial Services Industry; North and Central America; United States; New York (city, NY); New York (state, US)
- March 2022 (Revised January 2023)
- Case
Innovation at Moog Inc.
By: Brian J. Hall, Ashley V. Whillans, Davis Heniford, Dominika Randle and Caroline Witten
This case focuses on the challenges of incentivizing innovation within Moog, an engineering company based in New York state that designs and builds guidance systems for space, air, and land-based travel. The case enables students to grapple with the challenges of using... View Details
Keywords: Innovation; Innovation Lab; Innovation Management; Motivation; Incentives; Culture; Compensation; Compensation And Benefits; Scalability; Business Growth and Maturation; Collaborative Innovation and Invention; Independent Innovation and Invention; Innovation and Management; Innovation Leadership; Innovation Strategy; Organizational Culture; Performance Consistency; Performance Effectiveness; Performance Efficiency; Performance Productivity; Performance Evaluation; Creativity; Motivation and Incentives; Aerospace Industry; Transportation Industry; United States
- March 2022
- Teaching Note
Sawiris Foundation: Elevating Education in Egypt
By: Brian Trelstad and Alpana Thapar
Teaching Note for HBS Case No. 322-023. Founded in 2001 by the Sawiris family, one of the wealthiest families in Egypt, the Sawiris Foundation for Social Development (SFSD) invested in human capital and provision of basic social services for the most marginalized... View Details
- February 2022 (Revised January 2024)
- Supplement
Winning Business at Russell Reynolds (C)
By: Ethan Bernstein and Cara Mazzucco
In an effort to make compensation drive collaboration, Russell Reynolds Associates’ (RRA) CEO Clarke Murphy sought to re-engineer the bonus system for his executive search consultants in 2016. As his HR analytics guru, Kelly Smith, points out, that risks upsetting—and... View Details
- January 2022 (Revised November 2023)
- Case
Expanding the Culture of Learning at Kraft Heinz
By: Ashley V. Whillans and Carolyn Watson
The Kraft Heinz Company (KHC) was an American food company formed in 2015 by the merger of Kraft Foods Group, Inc and the H.J. Heinz Company. The company sold food products like Heinz Ketchup, Kraft Mac & Cheese, Kool-Aid, and Philadelphia cream cheese to supermarkets,... View Details
Keywords: Learning; Culture; Work Culture; Workplace Practices; Mergers; Mergers and Acquisitions; Competitive Advantage; Human Capital; Training; Performance Evaluation; Growth and Development; Personal Development and Career; Employee Relationship Management; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Organizational Culture; Food and Beverage Industry
- January 2022 (Revised March 2022)
- Module Note
Analysis of Financial and Non-Financial Information for Forecasting Performance
This note describes the main themes and cases of a teaching module on the analysis of information from, and outside of, financial statements for forecasting firms’ future financial performance. The module’s pedagogical goal is to deepen students’ understanding of the... View Details
- January 2022 (Revised February 2022)
- Case
Introducing EVA at ISS: A Better Way to Evaluate CEO Performance and Compensation?
By: Jonas Heese, Charles C.Y. Wang and James Weber
In early 2019, Anthony Campagna, the global director of fundamental research at ISS EVA, a unit of the proxy advisory firm Institutional Shareholder Services (ISS), was preparing to release ISS's analyses of public company performance and CEO compensation ahead of Say... View Details