Publications

January – February 2011
Article

Creating Shared Value

By: Michael E. Porter and Mark R. Kramer

The capitalist system is under siege. In recent years business has been criticized as a major cause of social, environmental, and economic problems. Companies are widely thought to be prospering at the expense of their communities. Trust in business has fallen to new... View Details

Keywords: Customer Value and Value Chain; Economic Growth; Economic Systems; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Environmental Sustainability; Trust; Human Needs; Welfare; Competitive Advantage; Value Creation

February 23, 2022
Article

Can WEB3 Bring Back Competition to Digital Platforms?

By: Christian Catalini and Scott Duke Kominers

Like the early Internet, blockchain and Web3 applications promise a new wave of decentralization and competition—yet at the same time, it is unclear which of the dynamics that drove concentration in online platforms and services will remain in force under the Web3... View Details

Keywords: Web3; Blockchain; Interoperability; Internet and the Web; Technological Innovation; Competition; Digital Platforms

Read Now

2016
Article

Do External Labor Market Job Switches Affect the Gender Compensation Gap?

By: Boris Groysberg, Paul M. Healy and Eric Lin

This paper investigates how external mobility influences the gender compensation gap for job switching executives. Using proprietary data for 2,034 executive placements from a global search firm, we find job switching narrows the gender gap by 45%, from 11% to 6%. We... View Details

Keywords: Executive Compensation; Gender

August 2021 (Revised February 2023)
Case

Fair Park Covid-19 Mass Vaccination Site (A)

By: Willy Shih

This case is an opportunity to apply the methods of the Toyota Production System (TPS) to the analysis of an everyday service application: administering Covid-19 vaccines. It describes the start-up of a drive-up Covid-19 mass vaccination site at the Texas State Fair... View Details

Keywords: Operations Improvement; Operations And Processes; Toyota Production System; COVID-19 Pandemic; Operations; Service Operations; Health Pandemics; Problems and Challenges; Goals and Objectives; Measurement and Metrics; Health Care and Treatment; Health Industry; United States; Texas

Educators

October 1995 (Revised October 1996)
Case

Singapore Unlimited: Building the National Information Infrastructure

By: Lynda M. Applegate, John L. King, Soon-Siong Neo and Carin-Isabel Knoop

Describes the actions taken by the government of Singapore to enable the country to survive and prosper after it achieved independence in the late 1960s. Recognizing that its small size, limited natural resources, but excellent location placed it in a vulnerable... View Details

Keywords: Information Technology; Natural Environment; Expansion; Policy; Infrastructure; Singapore; Southeast Asia

06 Mar 2021
News

What is a Celebrity Worth?

10 Jul 2023
In Practice

The Harvard Business School Faculty Summer Reader 2023

research goals. To further deepen my understanding of habit formation, I'm excited to revisit Atomic Habits by James Clear. This impactful book explores the power of small habits and their profound influence on personal and professional... View Details

Keywords: by Dina Gerdeman

05 Feb 2024
Research & Ideas

The Middle Manager of the Future: More Coaching, Less Commanding

need for good social skills.” But, Zhang also notes, social skills can have varied definitions, particularly in a global economy. What’s successful in one company or country might not be successful in the next one. "A lot of these come from parental View Details

Keywords: by Ben Rand

Research Summary

Technological Competition in Computing

By: Shane M. Greenstein

On what dimensions do computing platforms compete, and how does that competition help or hinder the deployment of technical standards? What principles shape choices over platform governance, and how do those choices shape competitive outcomes? In this line of... View Details

March 2021 (Revised January 2023)
Case

The Trouble with TCE

By: Vincent Pons, Rafael Di Tella and Galit Goldstein

Trichloroethylene, or TCE, was a chemical used by tens of thousands of businesses in the United States. It was an affordable tool for many. Yet, TCE had been associated with important health risks, including cancer and autoimmune disease. TCE potentially posed other... View Details

Keywords: Trichloroethylene; Toxicity; Lobbying; Chemicals; Health Disorders; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Policy; Ethics; Business and Government Relations; Chemical Industry; United States

Educators

15 Mar 2011
First Look

First Look: March 15

productivity on a subsequent task. Download the paper: http://www.hbs.edu/research/pdf/11-090.pdf Box-Tickers to Frame-Makers: Transformations in the Roles of Functional Experts Authors:Matthew Hall, Anette Mikes, and Yuval Millo Abstract How do experts increase their... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

2020
Book

Better, Not Perfect: A Realist's Guide to Maximum Sustainable Goodness

By: Max Bazerman

Every day, you make hundreds of decisions. They’re largely personal, but these choices have an ethical twinge as well; they value certain principles and ends over others. Bazerman argues that we can better balance both dimensions—and we needn’t seek perfection to make... View Details

Keywords: Decision Making; Moral Sensibility; Ethics; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact

Program

Private Equity and Venture Capital

industries Structure and negotiate better deals Make better investment decisions by examining the influence of risk, earnings, and organizational change Move quickly to select the best deals and negotiate with greater confidence Optimize... View Details

Keywords: Finance; Finance

November–December 2019
Article

Head, Heart or Hands: How Do Employees Respond to a Radical Global Language Change Over Time?

By: Sebastian Reiche and Tsedal Neeley

To understand how recipients respond to radical change over time across cognitive, affective, and behavioral dimensions, we conducted a longitudinal study of a mandated language change at a Chilean subsidiary of a large U.S. multinational organization. The... View Details

Keywords: Language; Communication; Change; Employees; Attitudes; Emotions; Globalized Firms and Management

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

Article

Turnkey or Tailored? Relational Pluralism, Institutional Complexity, and the Organizational Adoption of More or Less Customized Practices

By: Ryan Raffaelli and Mary Ann Glynn

We examine how the organizational adoption of new practices is influenced by relational pluralism, i.e., an organization's multiple ties to actors inside and outside its industry. We theorize that institutional mechanisms of practice diffusion underlying relational... View Details

Keywords: Networks; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Business Processes; Adoption; Customization and Personalization

April 2025
Article

Corporate Ownership and ESG Performance

By: Belen Villalonga, Peter Tufano and Boya Wang

Using a sample of 3083 firms from 62 countries over 18 years, we analyze how the structure and identity of firms' material owners influence their Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) performance. We find that firms with founding families or other individual... View Details

Keywords: ESG; CSR; Family Firms; Social Responsibility; Environment; Sustainability; Ownership; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Corporate Governance; Environmental Sustainability

Read Now

April 2022
Article

Does Context Outweigh Individual Characteristics in Driving Voting Behavior? Evidence from Relocations within the U.S.

By: Enrico Cantoni and Vincent Pons

We measure the overall influence of contextual versus individual factors (e.g., voting rules and media as opposed to race and education) on voter behavior, and explore underlying mechanisms. Using a U.S.-wide voter-level panel, 2008–18, we examine voters who relocate... View Details

Keywords: Voting; Behavior; Geographic Location; Personal Characteristics; Situation or Environment; United States