Publications

10 Oct 2005
Research & Ideas

Corporate Responsibility and the Environment: What is the Right Thing To Do?

by Harvard Business School professor Forest Reinhardt, considered whether firms should and do engage extensively in CSR. This essay, in other words, considered empirical evidence. View Details

Keywords: by Manda Salls

25 Jan 2000
Research & Ideas

Strategic Alliances

Timberland's sponsorship of City Year events and City Year–organized projects for Timberland employees—that made clear their mutual interest in making a positive impact on society. By the third, or integrative, stage of a relationship... View Details

Keywords: by Nancy O. Perry

30 Apr 2001
Research & Ideas

Entering the Age of Alliances

The twenty-first century will be the age of alliances. In this age, collaboration between nonprofit organizations and corporations will grow in frequency and strategic importance. Collaborative relationships will increasingly migrate from the traditionally... View Details

Keywords: by James Austin

22 Aug 2005
Research & Ideas

Balancing the Future Against Today’s Needs

leaders must bring to bear a new perspective on how growth efforts are situated in their companies, how they measure and reward executing the present and building the future, and how they align behaviors to their specific growth initiatives. Planting New Trees In An... View Details

Keywords: by Paul Michelman

08 Apr 2002
Research & Ideas

How to Negotiate “Yes” Across Cultural Boundaries

into their negotiating approach. It's a lesson many companies have learned the hard way. And influence on negotiations need not be driven by an informal, underlying power structure, as U.S. Stone Container Corporation learned. While... View Details

Keywords: by James K. Sebenius

12 Oct 1999
Research & Ideas

Value Judgments: Business Ethics Across Borders

terms of not only financial performance but management practices and reputation in the community. The result of her efforts is the MBA elective course Globalization, Culture, and Management. According to Paine, as students examine the values and beliefs embraced View Details

Keywords: by Judith A. Ross

24 Nov 2008
Research & Ideas

Harvard Business School Discusses Future of the MBA

For the school that so boldly launched the MBA 100 years ago and went on to become the bluest of blue-chip brands in business education, it seemed only fitting that Harvard Business School should mark its centennial year by examining the... View Details

Keywords: by Roger Thompson & HBS Bulletin; Education

November 2022
Article

A Language-Based Method for Assessing Symbolic Boundary Maintenance between Social Groups

By: Anjali M. Bhatt, Amir Goldberg and Sameer B. Srivastava

When the social boundaries between groups are breached, the tendency for people to erect and maintain symbolic boundaries intensifies. Drawing on extant perspectives on boundary maintenance, we distinguish between two strategies that people pursue in maintaining... View Details

Keywords: Culture; Machine Learning; Natural Language Processing; Symbolic Boundaries; Organizations; Boundaries; Social Psychology; Interpersonal Communication; Organizational Culture

Find at Harvard

October 2023 (Revised March 2024)
Case

KOKO Networks: Bridging Energy Transition and Affordability with Carbon Financing

By: George Serafeim, Siko Sikochi and Namrata Arora

The problem was massive: two million hectares of African forests were lost annually to charcoal production for cooking, an area equivalent to 13 times Greater London, resulting in one billion tons of carbon emissions yearly. At the same time, an estimated 700,000... View Details

Keywords: Clean Tech; Digital; Carbon Credits; Carbon Offsetting; Climate Change; Entrepreneurship; Energy Sources; Environmental Sustainability; Health; Market Design; Business Startups; Transition; Environmental Regulation; Policy; Energy Industry; Consumer Products Industry; Africa; Kenya; Rwanda

March 2016 (Revised June 2016)
Case

Gotong Royong: Toward Sustainable Palm Oil

By: Rebecca Henderson, Hann-Shuin Yew and Monica Baraldi

In late 2015, Jeff Seabright, chief sustainability officer at Unilever, had to report to Unilever CEO Paul Polman on the effort to transform palm oil cultivation. Historically, palm oil was produced using unsustainable methods that included burning large tracts of... View Details

Keywords: Sustainability; Environment; Industry Self-regulation; Corporate Image; Corporate Strategy; Indonesia; Malaysia

10 Jan 2005
Research & Ideas

Motivation and the Cross-Sector Alliance

relevant for the third sector. The Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) is a global CSO, until recently headquartered in Oaxaca (Mexico), which supports the sustainable management of the world's forests. In this task, the FSC faced the... View Details

Keywords: by James Austin, Ezequiel Reficco & SEKN research team

2021
Working Paper

An Empirical Study of Time Allotment and Delays in E-commerce Delivery

By: M. Balakrishnan, MoonSoo Choi and Natalie Epstein

Problem definition: We study how having more time allotted to deliver an order affects the speed of the delivery process. Furthermore, we seek to predict orders that are likely to be delayed early in the delivery process so that actions can be taken to avoid delays.... View Details

Keywords: Logistics; E-commerce; Mathematical Methods; AI and Machine Learning; Performance Productivity

SSRN

June 2015 (Revised October 2015)
Case

High Liner Foods, 2015

By: John R. Wells and Galen Danskin

In 2015, Canadian-based High Liner Foods Ltd was one of North America's largest frozen fish processors with extensive shares of both the food service and retail channels in Canada, the USA and Mexico. With over C$1 billion in revenues, the company had grown four fold... View Details

Keywords: Strategic Analysis; Strategic Decision Making; Family Business; Commodities; Strategic Planning; Strategy; Competitive Strategy; Food and Beverage Industry; North America; Canada

Research Summary

Overview

The Information Age has introduced well-received opportunities to track performance. Fitbits and Fuelbands allow individuals to track their own performance; companies like Uber and leading hospitals help you choose a driver or a doctor based on how others rated... View Details

Keywords: Management Accounting; Disclosure; Performance Measurement; Incentives; Control; Education; Education Industry; Health Industry; Transportation Industry; Energy Industry; Auto Industry; United States; Japan; India

October 2020 (Revised November 2020)
Case

Wilderness Safaris: Impact Investing and Ecotourism Conservation in Africa

By: James E. Austin, Megan Epler Wood and Herman B. "Dutch" Leonard

In 2018 the majority ownership of publicly owned Wilderness Safaris, the leading high-end ecotourism company in Africa with safari operations in eight countries, was acquired by The Rise Fund, one of the world’s largest private social impact investing funds, and by FS... View Details

October 2007
Article

Opinion: Place Your Bets on the Future You Want

By: Forest Reinhardt

This piece posits that success in a carbon-constrained world will be determined by innovation and acumen, requiring companies to make bold moves. View Details

Keywords: Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Innovation and Invention; Knowledge Use and Leverage; Leadership; Success; Environmental Sustainability; Climate Change; Competitive Advantage