Publications

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November 2017
Teaching Note

Predicting Consumer Tastes with Big Data at Gap

By: Ayelet Israeli and Jill Avery

CEO Art Peck was eliminating his creative directors for The Gap, Old Navy, and Banana Republic brands and promoting a collective creative ecosystem fueled by the input of big data. Rather than relying on artistic vision, Peck wanted the company to use the mining of big... View Details

March 2020
Supplement

People Analytics at Teach For America (B)

By: Jeffrey T. Polzer and Julia Kelley

This is a supplement to the People Analytics at Teach For America (A) case. In this supplement, situated one year after the A case, Managing Director Michael Metzger must decide how to apply his team's predictive models generated from the previous year’s data. View Details

Keywords: Analytics; Human Resource Management; Data; Workforce; Hiring; Talent Management; Forecasting; Predictive Analytics; Organizational Behavior; Recruiting; Analytics and Data Science; Forecasting and Prediction; Recruitment; Selection and Staffing; Talent and Talent Management

November 2012
Article

The Organization of Firms Across Countries

By: Nicholas Bloom, Raffaella Sadun and John Van Reenen

We argue that social capital as proxied by trust increases aggregate productivity by affecting the organization of firms. To do this we collect new data on the decentralization of investment, hiring, production, and sales decisions from Corporate Headquarters to local... View Details

Keywords: Decentralization; Social Capital; Theory Of The Firm; Firm Objectives, Organization, And Behavior; Business Economics; Management Of Technological Innovation And R＆D; Technological Change: Choices And Consequences; Diffusion Processes; Organizational Structure; Performance Productivity; Trust; Technology Adoption; Multinational Firms and Management

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April 2010 (Revised November 2010)
Background Note

Moral Decision-Making: Reason, Emotion & Luck

By: Michael A. Wheeler and Julianna Pillemer

This extensive note synthesizes current psychological and neuroscientific research on how people make decisions with moral implications. Research summaries and scenarios illustrate critical issues. View Details

Keywords: Decision Making; Moral Sensibility; Leadership; Science; Emotions

Educators

Thomas Graeber is an Assistant Professor of Business Administration in the Negotiation, Organizations & Markets Unit at Harvard Business School. He teaches Negotiations in the MBA elective curriculum.

As an empirical behavioral and experimental... View Details

February 2016 (Revised March 2022)
Case

Express Scripts: Promoting Prescription Drug Home Delivery (B)

By: John Beshears, Patrick Rooney and Jenny Sanford

The pharmacy benefit manager (PBM) sector processes prescription drug claims on behalf of companies that offer a prescription drug benefit to their employees. This case follows Bob Nease, Chief Scientist at Express Scripts, as he considers methods to promote home... View Details

Keywords: Pharmaceuticals; Prescription Drugs; Pharmacy Benefit Manager; PBM; Healthcare; Behavioral Economics; Choice Architecture; Active Choice; Health Care and Treatment; Service Delivery; Decision Choices and Conditions; Order Taking and Fulfillment; Compensation and Benefits

Educators

09 May 2018
Research & Ideas

A Simple Way for Restaurant Inspectors to Improve Food Safety

new research about how scheduling affects worker behavior. The potential result: Americans could avoid 19 million foodborne illnesses, nearly 51,000 hospitalizations, and billions of dollars of related medical costs. Government health... View Details

Keywords: by Carmen Nobel; Food & Beverage; Service

Ryann Noe

Ryann Noe is a doctoral candidate in the Organizational Behavior program jointly offered by Harvard Business School and the Department of Sociology at Harvard University.

Her research examines how industries and technologies emerge and evolve, with a focus... View Details

Lakshmi Ramarajan

Professor Ramarajan is the Diane Doerge Wilson Professor of Business Administration in the Organizational Behavior Unit at Harvard Business School. Her research examines the management and consequences of identities in organizations.

She teaches the... View Details

Keywords: nonprofit industry

Emily Truelove

Emily Truelove is an Assistant Professor of Business Administration in the Organizational Behavior Unit at Harvard Business School. She teaches LEAD in the MBA program. She also teaches in executive education programs, including Leadership for Senior Executives,... View Details

01 Apr 2008
Working Paper Summaries

No Harm, No Foul: The Outcome Bias in Ethical Judgments

Keywords: by Francesca Gino, Don A. Moore & Max H. Bazerman

05 Oct 2022
News

Behind the Research: James Riley

Research Summary

Capital Markets, Investment, and Competition

By: Michael E. Porter

Michael E. Porter's research into issues of capital allocation, first published in the report 'Capital Choices,' is the basis for continuing research that examines how U.S. capital markets distort competitive behavior and investment. A report to the Competitiveness... View Details

2014
Discussion Paper

The Promise of Microfinance and Women's Empowerment: What Does the Evidence Say?

By: Dina D. Pomeranz

The microfinance revolution has transformed access to financial services for low-income populations worldwide. As a result, it has become one of the most talked-about innovations in global development in recent decades. However, its expansion has not been without... View Details

05 Jul 2016
First Look

July 5, 2016

conservation for climate risk reduction. Although more comprehensive research programs to answer these questions are needed, some insights are emerging. Integrating two or more behavior change approaches... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

Research Summary

Overview

By: Aiyesha Dey

Professor Dey’s research explores governance and agency conflicts, board structure, governance regulation and corporate behavior, ownership structure, and the relation between executives’ characteristics and corporate behavior. In analyzing corporate governance... View Details

2008
Article

Warmth and Competence As Universal Dimensions of Social Perception: The Stereotype Content Model and the BIAS Map

By: A. J.C. Cuddy, S. T. Fiske and P. Glick

The stereotype content model (SCM) defines two fundamental dimensions of social perception, warmth and competence, predicted respectively by perceived competition and status. Combinations of warmth and competence generate distinct emotions of admiration, contempt,... View Details

Keywords: Perception; Competency and Skills; Prejudice and Bias; Emotions; Business Model; Behavior; Research; Competition; Status and Position; Cognition and Thinking; Groups and Teams

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2008
Chapter

I Read Playboy for the Articles: Justifying and Rationalizing Questionable Preferences

By: Zoe Chance and Michael I. Norton

When people behave in ways that might appear selfish, prejudiced or perverted, they engage in a host of strategies designed to justify questionable behavior with rational excuses: “I hired my son because he's more qualified”; “I promoted Ashley because she does a... View Details

Keywords: Decision Choices and Conditions; Ethics; Behavior; Strategy