Publications

March 1998 (Revised March 1999)
Case

Dell Online

By: V. Kasturi Rangan and Marie Bell

Dell started online commerce for its PCs in 1996, and by 1997 had achieved a sales rate of $3 million a day. The case describes the internal process that led to these dramatic results and poses the question of how the firm should leverage this activity to meet Michael... View Details

Keywords: Consumer Behavior; Market Transactions; Goals and Objectives; Business Processes; Distribution Channels; Internet and the Web; Information Infrastructure; Competitive Advantage; Computer Industry; Retail Industry

16 Sep 2015
News

Harvard prof shares ways to lift inner-city economies

25 Aug 2015
News

What To Expect From The Economic Deceleration In China

08 Dec 2016
News

Airbnb: 1M listings use booking service that stems discrimination on platform

August 2013 (Revised December 2014)
Case

Taking Dell Private

By: David J. Collis, David B. Yoffie and Matthew Shaffer

In July 2012, Michael Dell, CEO and founder of Dell, Inc., met with a representative of Silver Lake Partners to explore taking his company private. The company, which he had founded in his dorm room as a college freshman and which had made him the youngest Fortune 500... View Details

Keywords: Strategy; Going Private; The PC Market; Market For Corporate Control; Corporate Strategy; Leveraged Buyouts; Change Management; Private Equity; Market Entry and Exit; Private Ownership; Information Infrastructure; Applications and Software; Internet and the Web; Computer Industry; Technology Industry; United States

December 2013
Article

How Google Sold Its Engineers on Management

By: David A. Garvin

High-performing knowledge workers often question whether managers actually contribute much, especially in a technical environment. Until recently, that was the case at Google, a company filled with self-starters who viewed management as more destructive than beneficial... View Details

Keywords: Organizational Behavior; Human Resource Management; Managing Change; Organizational Change; Analytics; Management; Leadership; Human Resources; Talent and Talent Management

11 Jun 2014
News

The Digital Opportunity Staring Credit Cards in the Face

14 Apr 2022
News

China Hesitates on Bailing Out Sri Lanka, Pakistan as Debt Soars

January 2011 (Revised December 2017)
Case

Tombstones

By: Timothy A. Luehrman and David Lane

This case consists primarily of excerpts from term sheets and prospectuses for six securities offerings made by US companies during 2009-2010, just after the financial crisis and recession of 2008-09. There are three issues of senior unsecured notes, one floating rate... View Details

Keywords: Financial Crisis; Equity; Debt Securities; Bonds; Motivation and Incentives; United States

13 Jul 2007
Working Paper Summaries

Economic Catastrophe Bonds

Keywords: by Joshua D. Coval, Jakub W. Jurek & Erik Stafford; Financial Services

2022
Case

Marathon Petroleum and Southwest Detroit: The Intersection of Community and Environment

By: Andrew J. Hoffman

Environmental racism describes the unequal burden of environmental hazards placed on disadvantaged communities through systems, policies, and practices. In such a situation, these people disproportionately live close to sources of toxic waste-what are referred to as... View Details

Keywords: Environmental Regulation; Pollutants; Pollution; Equality and Inequality; Social Issues; Poverty; Race; Health Disorders; Ethics

April 2010
Article

Low-energy Limit for Tunnelling Subject to an Eckart Potential Barrier

By: Samuel H Lipoff and Dudley R Herschbach

For two-body s-wave collisions subject to tunnelling though an Eckart potential barrier, cross-sections and rate coefficients in the low-energy regime can be evaluated in analytic form. These provide criteria for approach to the Wigner limit and a generic plot... View Details

January 2009 (Revised May 2011)
Case

China Mobile's Rural Communications Strategy

By: William C. Kirby, F. Warren McFarlan, G.A. Donovan and Tracy Manty

China Mobile was the world's leading mobile communications service provider with over 400 million customers. In some cities, its penetration rate was over 100%. With such huge successes, Chairman Wang Jianzhou was exploring ways to expand its customer base. Nearly... View Details

Keywords: Communication Technology; Mobile and Wireless Technology; Investment; Rural Scope; Strategy; Growth and Development Strategy; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Business and Government Relations; Telecommunications Industry; China

January 2022
Article

The Private Impact of Public Data: Landsat Satellite Maps Increased Gold Discoveries and Encouraged Entry

By: Abhishek Nagaraj

How does public data shape the relative performance of incumbents and entrants in the private sector? Using a simple theoretical framework, I argue that public data reduces investment uncertainty, facilitates the discovery of new market opportunities and increases the... View Details

Keywords: Public Data; Maps; Gold; Microeconomic Behavior; Economics; Data and Data Sets; Private Sector; Market Entry and Exit; Mining

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May–June 2019
Article

U-Shaped Conformity in Online Social Networks

By: Monic Sun, Michael Zhang and Feng Zhu

We explore how people balance their needs to belong and to be different from their friends by studying their choices of a virtual-house wall color on a leading Chinese social-networking site. The setting enables us to randomize both the popular color and the adoption... View Details

Keywords: Conformity; Normative Social Influence; Social Networks; Field Experiment; Social and Collaborative Networks; Behavior; Attitudes; Social Media

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2010
Other Unpublished Work

God, Government and Outsiders: The Influence of Religious Beliefs on Depositor Behavior in an Emerging Market.

By: Ayesha K. Khan and Tarun Khanna

This paper provides evidence that religious beliefs can have a significant impact on individual financial choices. Using proprietary panel data on the distribution of bank deposits across all commercial banks in Pakistan over a 33-month period, I find that Islamic... View Details

Keywords: Decision Choices and Conditions; Commercial Banking; Cross-Cultural and Cross-Border Issues; Consumer Behavior; Emerging Markets; Religion; Banking Industry; Pakistan

The use of M&A in bankruptcy has increased dramatically in recent years, leading to concerns that the Chapter 11 process has shifted toward excessive liquidation of viable firms. In this paper, we argue that the rise of M&A has blurred traditional... View Details

June 2021
Case

Modern Endowment Management: Paula Volent and the Bowdoin Endowment

By: Luis M. Viceira, Emily R. McComb and Dean Xu

This case examines modern endowment investment management through the lens of a leadership transition between Chief Investment Officers (CIOs). In March 2021, Paula Volent is about to step down as the CIO of the endowment of Bowdoin College after twenty-one years, and... View Details

Keywords: Investment Portfolio; Investment Banking; Growth Management; Investment Return; Capital Markets; Interest Rates; Competition; Cost Management; Risk Management; Financial Liquidity; Performance Evaluation