Publications

2000
Book

The Origin and Evolution of New Businesses

By: Amar Bhide

Keywords: Entrepreneurship; Innovation; Firm Growth

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2013
Working Paper

Entrepreneurs, Firms and Global Wealth since 1850

By: G. Jones

This working paper integrates the role of entrepreneurship and firms into debates on why Asia, Latin America and Africa were slow to catch up with the West following the Industrial Revolution and the advent of modern economic growth. It argues that the currently... View Details

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October 2018
Case

Recipe for Success: Growth and Evolution at Cafe Cupcake

By: Anthony Mayo and Heather Beckham

Café Cupcake (CC) is a fast-casual restaurant chain that offers artisan cupcakes and light fare throughout the southeastern United States and Texas. This case chronicles the growth and evolution of Café Cupcake. It also considers the specific human resource challenges... View Details

Keywords: Growth and Development Strategy; Human Resources; Management; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Organizational Culture; Food and Beverage Industry

January 2014
Case

Maricopa, Inc.: Finding the Right Treatment for Growth

By: William A. Sahlman, Thomas R. Eisenmann, Joseph B. Fuller and Shikhar Ghosh

The founders of Maricopa, Inc., a startup that sold proprietary hair-care products directly to salons, were preparing a board presentation to address the young company's inability to meet financial projections. While the products had caught on with customers, the... View Details

Keywords: Business Startups; Financial Condition; Venture Capital; Financial Strategy; Financing and Loans; Expansion; Planning; Fashion Industry; Iowa

September 2023 (Revised February 2024)
Case

Accelerating with Caution: Forecasting and Managing birddogs' Growth

By: Mark Egan

As 2017 was drawing to a close, birddogs’ founder and CEO, Peter Baldwin, was working with his CFO Jack Sullivan to prepare for 2018. Their task at hand? To predict the demand for their product in the coming season, determine the appropriate investments in working... View Details

Keywords: Inventory; Working Capital; Forecasting and Prediction; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Financing and Loans; Apparel and Accessories Industry

March 2022
Article

Revealing Corruption: Firm and Worker Level Evidence from Brazil

By: Emanuele Colonnelli, Spyridon Lagaras, Jacopo Ponticelli, Mounu Prem and Margarita Tsoutsoura

We study how the disclosure of corrupt practices affects the growth of firms involved in illegal interactions with the government using randomized audits of public procurement in Brazil. On average, firms exposed by the anti-corruption program grow larger after the... View Details

Keywords: Crime and Corruption; Corporate Disclosure; Business Growth and Maturation; Brazil

09 Jul 2024
Research & Ideas

Are Management Consulting Firms Failing to Manage Themselves?

top-management, CEO-focused client services. Consulting firms make growth their primary objective It’s worth recalling that these strategy firms were founded on the core... View Details

Keywords: by David Fubini; Consulting

13 Apr 2015
Research & Ideas

3 Ways Firms Can Profit From Environmental Investments

In the course of her work, Rebecca Henderson meets business executives who don't address the threat of climate change because they don't believe that it exists. Her recommendation: They should consider investments in environmental sustainability anyway, assuming that... View Details

Keywords: by Carmen Nobel; Energy; Utilities

08 Aug 2017
Working Paper Summaries

The Role of Taxes in the Disconnect Between Corporate Performance and Economic Growth

Keywords: by Urooj Khan, Suresh Nallareddy, and Ethan Rouen

February 2000 (Revised April 2005)
Case

Gray Security: Building a South African Services Firm

Describes Gray Security Services, an entrepreneurial South African firm that has recently gone through a financial restructuring with the help of Brait Capital Partners, a private equity firm. Gray provides complete security services to companies in South Africa, other... View Details

Keywords: Initial Public Offering; Entrepreneurship; Equity; Growth and Development Strategy; Service Industry; South Africa

2022
Working Paper

Passing the Mic: Career and Firm Outcomes of Executive Interactions

By: Wei Cai, Ethan Rouen and Yuan Zou

We exploit a unique feature of conference calls to study one type of interaction among executives—directly inviting colleagues to respond to analysts’ questions. We find that the frequency of initiating interaction is positively associated with an executive’s ability,... View Details

Keywords: Conference Calls; CEO Succession; Executive Interactions; Promotion; Interpersonal Communication; Personal Development and Career; Retention

04 Feb 2013
Research & Ideas

Are the Big Four Audit Firms Too Big to Fail?

socializing or collectivizing the potential costs of exercising their professional judgment. Some risk-taking is needed in any professional activity; it is from such risks that innovation and growth emerge." For client-managers, this... View Details

Keywords: by Martha Lagace; Accounting

September 2023
Supplement

Accelerating with Caution: Forecasting and Managing birddogs’ Growth (B)

By: Mark Egan

As 2017 was drawing to a close, birddogs’ founder and CEO, Peter Baldwin, was working with his CFO Jack Sullivan to prepare for 2018. Their task at hand? To predict the demand for their product in the coming season, determine the appropriate investments in working... View Details

Keywords: Working Capital; Forecasting and Prediction; Expansion; Production; Apparel and Accessories Industry

13 Oct 2003
Research & Ideas

How to Pick Managers for Disruptive Growth

We suspect that the mistakes happen when firms choose managers at any level—from CEO to business unit head to project manager—based on what we call "right stuff" thinking, borrowing the term from Tom Wolfe's famous book and the... View Details

Keywords: by Michael Raynor

21 Apr 2003
Research & Ideas

Are Crummy Products Your Next Growth Opportunity?

Business School professor Clayton M. Christensen. At the Harvard Business School Entrepreneurship Conference 2003, Christensen provided an advance peek at his new book, which follows on his influential The Innovator's Dilemma: When New Technologies Cause Great View Details

Keywords: by Sean Silverthorne

Article

Effects of Cultural Ethnicity, Firm Size, and Firm Age on Senior Executives' Trust in Their Overseas Business Partners: Evidence from China

By: Crystal Jiang, Roy Y.J. Chua, Masaaki Kotabe and Janet Murray

We investigate trust relationships between senior business executives and their overseas partners. Drawing on the similarity-attraction paradigm, social-categorization theory, and the distinction between cognition- and affect-based trust, we argue that executives trust... View Details

Keywords: Ethnicity; Culture; Management Teams; Cognition and Thinking; Networks; Globalized Firms and Management; Partners and Partnerships; Business Growth and Maturation; Size; Trust; China

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15 Oct 2024
Cold Call Podcast

What Sequoia Capital Can Teach Leaders About Sustaining Long-Term Growth

Keywords: Re: Jo Tango & Christina M. Wallace; Financial Services

2014
Working Paper

Dodging the Taxman: Firm Misreporting and Limits to Tax Enforcement

By: Paul Carrillo, Dina Pomeranz and Monica Singhal

Reducing tax evasion is a key priority for many governments, particularly in developing countries. A growing literature has argued that the ability to verify taxpayer self-reports against reports from third parties is critical for modern tax enforcement and the growth... View Details

Keywords: Governance Compliance; Taxation; Ecuador

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