Service Quality And Standards Department - Publications - Faculty & Research

28 May 2019
Research & Ideas

Investor Lawsuits Against Auditors Are Falling, and That's Bad News for Capital Markets

world invest in US listed companies because the US legal regime offers a high level of investor protection. High quality auditing is a big part of this protection. When our investor protections standards go... View Details

Keywords: by Martha Lagace; Financial Services; Financial Services

March 2018 (Revised September 2019)
Case

Chewy.com (A)

By: Jeffrey F. Rayport and Matthew G. Preble

In late 2013, Ryan Cohen, cofounder and CEO of online pet products retailer Chewy.com, faces a “bet the company decision”—whether to stay with a third-party logistics provider (3PL) for all of its e-commerce fulfillment or to take the function in house. Cohen worries... View Details

Keywords: Pet Food; Pet Products; Retail; Growth and Development Strategy; Service Operations; Decision Choices and Conditions; E-commerce; Service Industry; Service Industry; Florida; United States

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21 Dec 2009
Research & Ideas

Good Banks, Bad Banks, and Government’s Role as Fixer

biggest money center banks, had zero risk of loss. They did not fully disclose what was happening, and they did not put up enough capital to cover potential risks. Now, the FASB [Financial Accounting View Details

Keywords: by Roger Thompson; Financial Services; Financial Services

April 2009
Case

Performance Management at Intermountain Healthcare

By: Richard M.J. Bohmer and Alexander Romney

Intermountain Healthcare is a 21-hospital integrated delivery system serving Utah and southern Idaho that is nationally recognized for its highly structured approach to managing the quality of clinical care. This case describes Intermountain's system for improving... View Details

Keywords: Financial Strategy; Health Care and Treatment; Standards; Service Delivery; Outcome or Result; Motivation and Incentives; Health Industry; Idaho; Utah

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08 May 2018
First Look

First Look at New Research and Ideas, May 8, 2018

Medicare cannot directly monitor HAI rates and instead relies on providers accurately self-reporting HAIs in claims to correctly assess penalties. Consequently, the incentives for providers to improve View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

24 Aug 2016
Research & Ideas

Can Obamacare Be Saved?

providers to improve services to Americans. Source: gpointstudio In 2015, there was an average of 6.9 plans to choose from in each state. This fell to 6.5 in 2016, and even before Aetna's decision, the... View Details

Keywords: by John A. Quelch and Emily Boudreau; Insurance; Health

17 Jan 2020
In Practice

6 Traits That Set Top Business Leaders Apart

delegate responsibility for designing and implementing plans to achieve those ends to the maximum degree possible." Joseph B. Fuller (@JosephBFuller), professor of management practice and co-leader of the... View Details

Keywords: by Danielle Kost

12 Sep 2017
First Look

First Look at New Research and Ideas, September 12, 2017

others—have become “hub firms” because they control access to billions of mobile customers coveted by all kinds of product and service providers. These hubs drive increasing returns to scale View Details

Keywords: Carmen Nobel

08 Jul 2015
What Do You Think?

Do Americans Work Too Much and Think About Work Too Little?

"The Problem With Work Is Overwork," The New York Times, May 31, 2015, p. BU4. James Heskett is coauthor with W. Earl Sasser, Jr. and Leonard A. Schlesinger of the upcoming book, What Great Service... View Details

Keywords: by James Heskett; Financial Services

14 Jul 2020
Research & Ideas

Restarting Under Uncertainty: Managerial Experiences from Around the World

other multinationals immediately detected new operational and commercial approaches across their international branches and standardized and... View Details

Keywords: by Raffaella Sadun, Andrea Bertoni, Alexia Delfino, Giovanni Fassio, and Mariapaola Testa

05 Sep 2017
First Look

First Look at New Research and Ideas, September 5, 2017

standard errors, balanced panel). Three subsequent experiments involving American and Indian participants established the causal effect of psychologically experiencing a polluted vs. clean environment on... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

27 Jan 2015
First Look

First Look: January 27

The Effect of Service Quality and Competition on Demand By: Balasubramanian, Karthik, and David F. Drake Abstract—The use of electronic money... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

28 Feb 2022
Research & Ideas

How Racial Bias Taints Customer Service: Evidence from 6,000 Hotels

Hotels, restaurants, and other businesses in the service industry often thrive or die depending on whether they provide exemplary customer service, but new research shows that the color of a customer’s skin... View Details

Keywords: by Pamela Reynolds

13 Oct 2015
Research & Ideas

Does Business Get Done the Same Way in Emerging and Developed Countries?

government relations is part of the inner circle. You can look at Turkcell and see it as a typical emerging-market story. Government intervention is everywhere. Regulators even set prices, service by... View Details

Keywords: by Sean Silverthorne

19 Jul 2010
Research & Ideas

How Mercadona Fixes Retail’s ’Last 10 Yards’ Problem

about how poor operational decisions create unnecessary complications that lead to quality problems and lower labor productivity and, in general, make life hard for retail employees." Ton is interested... View Details

Keywords: by Julia Hanna; Retail; Food & Beverage

28 Jun 2010
HBS Case

Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center

Technology and Operations Management course (TOM), the case offers valuable takeaways for future managers of any complex service organization. "It's a good TOM case in that it includes hard numbers... View Details

Keywords: by Julia Hanna; Health

18 Apr 2007
HBS Case

How Magazine Luiza Courts the Poor

"Magazine Luiza: Building a Retail Model of 'Courting the Poor.'" "Magazine Luiza has made a business of targeting the bottom of the pyramid and is beloved as a company by employees and... View Details

Keywords: by Julia Hanna; Retail

January–February 2022
Article

Mobilizing the U.S. Military’s TRICARE Program for Value-Based Care: A Report From the Defense Health Board

By: Robert S. Kaplan, Paul R. Schaettle, Vivian S. Lee, Michael D. Parkinson, Gregory H. Gorman and Michael-Anne Browne

The U.S. Military Health System spends about $50 billion annually through its TRICARE health plans to provide care to 9.6 million active duty service members, retirees, and their families. TRICARE, historically, has used the predominant U.S. fee-for-service payment... View Details

Keywords: Military Health System; Value-based Healthcare; Health Care and Treatment; United States

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March 1987 (Revised October 1993)
Case

Au Bon Pain: The French Bakery Cafe, The Partner/Manager Program

By: W. Earl Sasser

In recent years, Au Bon Pain (ABP), a chain of upscale French bakeries/sandwich cafes based in Boston, confronted a set of human resource problems endemic to the fast food industry (i.e., a labor shortage which made it difficult to attract and maintain quality crew... View Details