Publications

March 2000
Case

Lockheed Martin: The Employer of Choice Mission

By: Clayton M. Christensen and Michael D Overdorf

A Lockheed Martin manager is faced with the decision of where to focus the organization's resources in order to develop a world-class employee development system. The manager's recommendation will serve as the basis for the company's goal of becoming an Employer of... View Details

Keywords: Organizational Culture; Resource Allocation; Decision Choices and Conditions; Employees; Human Resources; Leadership Development; Cost Management; Organizational Design; Aerospace Industry

Profile

Lisa Cousins

Why was earning your MBA at HBS important to you? I grew up in a very small town – you could call it “the middle of nowhere” – and have always been a bit of a dreamer, with aspirations to be a leader in the travel industry from a very... View Details

Keywords: Services; Entertainment / Media

January 2014 (Revised July 2016)
Case

Samuel Slater & Francis Cabot Lowell: The Factory System in U.S. Cotton Manufacturing

By: Tom Nicholas and Matthew Guilford

At the time of the American War of Independence (1776-1783) and for several decades after it, Great Britain dominated the global production of cotton textiles. In fact, Britain became so dominant in textile manufacturing and trading that Manchester, its industrial... View Details

Keywords: Technological Innovation; Production; Business History; Manufacturing Industry; Great Britain; Massachusetts

TeachingInterests

MBA Required Curriculum—Strategy

By: Benjamin C. Esty

The objective of this course is to help students develop the skills for formulating strategy. It provides an understanding of:

A firm's operative environment and how to sustain competitive advantage.
How to generate superior... View Details

TeachingInterests

Strategy

By: Frances X. Frei

The objective of this course is to help students develop the skills for formulating strategy. It provides an understanding of:

A firm's operative environment and how to sustain competitive advantage.
How to generate superior... View Details

07 Dec 2022
Blog Post

2022 Climate Symposium: Tackling Climate Together

The theme of the 2022 Annual Climate Symposium was “Tackling Climate Together” with a focus on the intersectionality of climate change and the critical need for businesses, individuals, policy makers, and consumers to come together to View Details

Journal of Economics & Management Strategy (JEMS)

Together with Prof. Daniel F. Spulber (Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University), I edit the Journal of Economics & Management Strategy (JEMS), the leading academic journal on the economics of strategy. JEMS is based at Harvard Business... View Details

January 2016
Case

Haiti Hope: Innovating the Mango Value Chain

By: Amy C. Edmondson and Jean-François Harvey

This case study examines a market-based approach to economic development through the eyes of NGO TechnoServe's project manager, implementing a US$9.5 million five-year public-private partnership between Coca-Cola, IDB, and USAID. The case ends at the beginning of the... View Details

March 2017 (Revised March 2022)
Case

Flashion: Art vs. Science in Fashion Retailing

By: Kris Ferreira and Karim R. Lakhani

Kate Wilson, retail analytics manager at Flashion, a fashion flash-sale site, is tasked with developing analytics to optimize pricing for first-exposure products on the site. Many in the industry have relied on years of experience and intuition to determine pricing—can... View Details

Keywords: Analytics; Pricing; Data; Service Operations; Forecasting and Prediction; Internet and the Web; Technology Adoption; Mathematical Methods; Decision Making; E-commerce; Retail Industry; Retail Industry; United States

Teaching Interest

MBA Required Curriculum-- Strategy Course

By: Ramon Casadesus-Masanell

The objective of this course is to help students develop the skills for formulating strategy. It provides an understanding of:

A firm's operative environment and how to sustain competitive advantage.
How to generate superior value for customers... View Details

Keywords: Strategy; Competitive Strategy; Competitive Advantage

July 1999 (Revised March 2002)
Case

Shanghai Volkswagen: Facing a New Era

Explores the development of the Chinese auto industry and of Shanghai Volkswagen (SVW), a successful joint venture in China. Established in 1984, SVW is a joint venture between Volkswagen of Germany and the Shanghai Automobile Industry Corp. (SAIC). One key element of... View Details

Keywords: Partners and Partnerships; Joint Ventures; Supply Chain; Auto Industry; Shanghai; Germany

20 Mar 2000
Research & Ideas

Incubators: The New Venture Capitalists?

kicking off a panel discussion at Cyberposium 2000. "But I think it's fair to characterize the incubator space as rather a sleepy one." Until now, that is. Once largely the domain of universities and public economic development... View Details

Keywords: by Kenneth Liss

Article

Designing Sustainability at BMW Group: The Designworks/USA Experience

By: Kellie McElhaney, Michael W. Toffel and Natalie Hill

This case study describes how an industrial design company developed a sustainability management system (SMS) standard, designed and implemented an SMS throughout its business, and then became the first company in the world to achieve third-party SMS certification by a... View Details

Keywords: Design; Governance Compliance; Management Practices and Processes; Standards; Environmental Sustainability; Auto Industry; United States

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Teaching Interest

Strategy

By: Jan W. Rivkin

The objective of this course is to help students develop the skills for formulating strategy, and provides an understanding of:

A firm's operative environment and how to sustain competitive advantage.
How to generate superior value for... View Details

December 2003 (Revised April 2005)
Course Overview Note

Corporate Strategy: Course Note for Instructors

By: Bharat N. Anand

Introduces students to the concerns that impact a firm's choice of strategy, scope, and organization and assists in three central tasks that comprise the typical decision problem: diagnosing the sources of corporate advantage, evaluating the limits to such advantage,... View Details

Keywords: Corporate Strategy

October 1988 (Revised May 1990)
Case

Ford Motor Co.: The Product Warranty Program (A)

Raises powerful issues concerning product warranty policy as a strategic marketing variable. Also raises several exciting issues concerning the role of product policy in competitive battles, product line issues, interfunctional coordination issues, and some ethical... View Details

Keywords: Competition; Marketing Strategy; Insurance; Product; Policy; Manufacturing Industry; Manufacturing Industry; United States