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01 Dec 2000
News

Everything Old Is New Again: The History of Technological Frontiers

Spar, adding dryly, "Ayn Rand is alive and well and living in Silicon Valley." These prognosticators, from Spar's perspective, ignore the fact that there are precedents — technological breakthroughs in the course of history that were, for... View Details

Keywords: Laura Singleton; Microsoft; News, Library, Internet, and Other Services; Information; Broadcasting (except Internet); Information

12 Apr 2004
Research & Ideas

Waking Up a Sleeping Company

I joined the company. The company's long history of success had led to a soft underbelly that manifested itself in a lack of discipline. The company was extremely values-centered, but its internal norms of... View Details

Keywords: by Bill George

August 2002 (Revised February 2005)
Case

Gillette Company (D): Implementing Change

By: Rosabeth M. Kanter

How a strategic change agenda is implemented depends on leaders below the top in every function and geographic region translating the agenda into actions. But those actions do not always unfold as planned. This case examines the first 16 months of a turnaround from the... View Details

Keywords: Business History; Competitive Strategy; Strategic Planning; Change Management; Organizational Design; Organizational Culture; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Behavior; Leading Change; Retail Industry

20 Sep 2019
Research & Ideas

Solving the Riddle of How Companies Grow Over Time

getting bigger or richer; “growth involves changes to the internal ‘machinery’ of the firm itself,” according to the paper. The researchers used Compustat, a dataset of all United States companies listed on the stock exchange from 1959 to... View Details

Keywords: by Michael Blanding; Manufacturing

15 Mar 2017
Blog Post

Tips on Holding Effective Company Recruiting Events

Hosting a company recruiting event is a great way to build brand awareness and engage with students. Based on student feedback, here are some ideas to consider when preparing to come to campus or hosting a virtual event. Invite Dynamic... View Details

Keywords: All Industries

August 2002 (Revised February 2005)
Case

Gillette Company (C): Strategies for Change

By: Rosabeth M. Kanter and James Weber

Examines the strategic change agenda set by a new CEO as the initial priorities in the turnaround of this leading global consumer products company. View Details

Keywords: Business History; Global Strategy; Competitive Advantage; Competitive Strategy; Leading Change; Change Management; Retail Industry

1999
Chapter

British Trading Companies and Industrial Development

By: G. Jones

Keywords: Business Ventures; History; Great Britain

March 2018 (Revised December 2019)
Case

Edward Lewis: Essence Magazine

By: Steven Rogers and Jacqueline Adams

Essence, the first magazine aimed at African-American women, was created by four, young, Black entrepreneurs in the aftermath of massive racial and political upheaval in the United States in 1968. The venture was a financial, branding and cultural success. By 2005, the... View Details

26 Apr 2016
News

How Companies Escape the Traps of the Past

December 2016 (Revised May 2018)
Case

Ebony Magazine

By: Steven Rogers and Derrick Jackson

For nearly 75 years, the Johnson Publishing Company has been the most successful African American magazine publisher. Its flagship Ebony magazine was an iconic coffee table fixture for decades in black households of all classes, making founder John H. Johnson... View Details

September 2020
Case

Keeping It in the Family at the Hayden Saw Company

By: V.G. Narayanan and John Masko

In 2019, Board Chair and third-generation shareholder Helen Fullerton was preparing for a meeting to discuss Ohio-based Hayden Saw Company’s (Hayden) future as a family business. As the company entered its fifth decade, the Hayden family was dealing with three distinct... View Details

Keywords: Family Business; Corporate Governance; Family Ownership; Business and Shareholder Relations; Family and Family Relationships; Governing and Advisory Boards; Construction Industry; Ohio; United States

December 2019 (Revised June 2024)
Case

The Dutch East India Company in 1612 (A)

By: Lynn S. Paine and Giuseppe Dari-Mattiacci

The Dutch East India Company’s board of directors must decide what to do about an impending legal requirement to liquidate the company’s assets and return to shareholders their capital and any profits earned during a ten-year lock-up period. The charter granted to the... View Details

Keywords: Corporate Governance; Globalized Firms and Management; Organizational Structure; Laws and Statutes; Financial Markets; Business and Shareholder Relations; Business and Government Relations; Business History; Shipping Industry; Netherlands

Web

Georges F. Doriot: Educating Leaders, Building Companies

Clubs Faculty & Research Business & Environment Business History Christensen Center for Teaching & Learning Entrepreneurship Faculty & Research Global Healthcare HBS Working Knowledge Institute for Strategy & Competitiveness Leadership... View Details

2009
Other Unpublished Work

The Pecora Hearings

By: David Moss, Cole Bolton and Eugene Kintgen

In 1932, in the depths of the Great Depression, the Senate Banking Committee began a much-publicized investigation of the nation's financial sector. The hearings, which came to be known as the Pecora hearings after the Banking Committee's lead counsel Ferdinand... View Details

Keywords: Financial History; Financial Crisis; Financial Markets; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Government Legislation; Laws and Statutes; Business and Government Relations; Financial Services Industry

Web

Oral History, Business History and Business Archives in India - Creating Emerging Markets

increasing number of Indian companies sought to create corporate archives, including oral history collections. There was also considerable discussion of the ongoing challenges faced by researchers who sought... View Details

July 2018
Case

LIXIL Group Corporation: Building a New Company in an Old Industry

By: Boris Groysberg and Akiko Kanno

In the spring of 2018, Kinya Seto, president and CEO of LIXIL Group Corporation, a major housing and building products and services company, called a meeting at the company’s head office in central Tokyo to discuss how to implement the new three-year strategic plan.... View Details

Keywords: Turnaround; Leadership And Change Management; Consolidation; Change Management; Leadership; Global Strategy; Business Model; Consumer Products Industry; Manufacturing Industry; Japan

January 2007 (Revised December 2007)
Case

Digital China Holdings Limited: Managing the Transition from a Product-oriented to a Service-oriented Company

By: F. Warren McFarlan, Guoqing Chen, Kai Reimers and Xunhua Guo

Digital China is the largest Chinese independent systems integrator (IBM and HP are larger). Describes their history and their current strategy and invites the student to advise them as to how they should continue to grow in the future. This is the closest China... View Details

Keywords: History; Information Technology; Service Operations; Growth and Development Strategy; Technology Industry; China

1998
Chapter

British Overseas Banks as Free-Standing Companies 1830-1994

By: G. Jones

Keywords: History; Business Ventures; Globalized Firms and Management; Banks and Banking; Banking Industry; Great Britain