Publications

March 2015 (Revised April 2015)
Case

The Heat Is On: Emerging Ecosystems in the Thermostat Industry

By: David Collis and Ashley Hartman

Beth Wozniak, President of Honeywell Environmental and Combustion Controls (ECC) at Honeywell International Inc., spun around in her office chair, reflecting about how the classic, mature thermostat industry was rapidly evolving. In February 2014, Google paid $3.2... View Details

How does one approach the problem of designing the "right" objective for a given resource allocation problem? The notion of what is right can be fairly nebulous; we consider two issues that we see as key: efficiency and fairness. We approach the problem of designing... View Details

05 Jan 2024
Blog Post

Meet The HBS African American Student Union

Founded in 1968 by 5 Black students at Harvard Business School, the African American Student Union (AASU) is a community for all Black students at HBS inclusive of all backgrounds, familial situations, and social preferences. Our View Details

May 05 2020
Testimonial

Gain A Broad Perspective, Then Take A Closer Look

June 2019 (Revised April 2020)
Teaching Note

Vox Capital: Pioneering Impact Investing in Brazil

By: Julie Battilana, Marissa Kimsey and Falko Paetzold

Teaching Note for HBS No. 417-051. This Teaching Note provides conceptual foundations and teaching plan recommendations for the case on Vox Capital, a firm that launched one of the first impact investing funds in Brazil. The learning objectives are to understand how an... View Details

Keywords: Impact Investing; Social Performance Measurement; Social Entrepreneurship; Investment Funds; Social Enterprise; Brazil

Web

Innovation and Entrepreneurship - Edwin H. Land & Polaroid | Harvard Business School

and every dollar invested is directed towards making objects and products which do indeed enrich the world." 98 Through the lens of a scientist, innovator, View Details

11 Mar 2021
Blog Post

A Year as Co-Presidents: Q+A with AASU's Bukie Adebo (MBA 2021) and Alexis Jackson (MBA 2021)

engage with the local Black community, to offer more academic and career support to HBS students, and build a more robust pipeline of Black students. Bukie Adebo and Alexis... View Details

November 2005 (Revised December 2016)
Case

Bally Total Fitness (A): The Rise, 1962–2004

By: John R. Wells, Elizabeth A. Raabe and Gabriel Ellsworth

From a single, modest club in 1962, Bally Total Fitness had grown to become—in management’s words—the “largest and only nationwide commercial operator of fitness centers” in the United States in 2004. Bally had faced its share of challenges, but the last couple of... View Details

Keywords: Bally Total Fitness; Fitness; Gyms; Health Clubs; Chain; Securities And Exchange Commission; Paul Toback; Weight Loss; Exercise; Contracts; Personal Training; Retention; Accounting; Accounting Audits; Accrual Accounting; Finance; Advertising; Business Growth and Maturation; Business Model; For-Profit Firms; Customers; Customer Satisfaction; Public Equity; Financing and Loans; Revenue; Revenue Recognition; Geographic Scope; Multinational Firms and Management; Health; Nutrition; Business History; Lawsuits and Litigation; Management; Business or Company Management; Goals and Objectives; Growth and Development Strategy; Marketing; Operations; Service Delivery; Service Operations; Public Ownership; Problems and Challenges; Business and Shareholder Relations; Business Strategy; Competition; Corporate Strategy; Expansion; Segmentation; Trends; Cost Management; Profit; Growth and Development; Leadership Style; Five Forces Framework; Private Ownership; Opportunities; Motivation and Incentives; Competitive Strategy; Health Industry; United States; Illinois; Chicago

Web

Improve Decision-Making in Hiring: Common Pitfalls and How to Avoid Them - Recruiting

Insights & Advice 16 Jun 2023 Improve Decision-Making in Hiring: Common Pitfalls and How to Avoid Them Becca Carnahan & Christopher Moore Author HBS Team tag All Industries All Locations Diversity, Inclusion, & Belonging Recruiting Advice... View Details

Carolyn J. Fu

Carolyn Fu is an assistant professor of business administration in the Strategy Unit. She studies innovation strategy in the context of high degrees of social construction – where the value of an innovation is continuously redefined between firms and their... View Details

11 Apr 2014
Working Paper Summaries

Learning By Thinking: How Reflection Improves Performance

Keywords: by Giada Di Stefano, Francesca Gino, Gary Pisano & Bradley Staats

03 Feb 2009
First Look

First Look: February 3, 2009

Working Papers Goals Gone Wild: The Systematic Side Effects of Over-Prescribing Goal Setting Authors: Lisa D. Ordonez, Maurice E. Schweitzer, Adam D. Galinsky, and Max H.... View Details

Keywords: Martha Lagace

August 2006 (Revised July 2007)
Background Note

Governance of the Family Business Owners

By: John A. Davis

Reviews the principal ways in which the owners of a family business achieve their governance objectives of a suitable identity and sensible direction and the discipline to achieve these. Covers the responsibilities and rights of owners, plus governance procedures,... View Details

Keywords: Family Business; Corporate Governance; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Goals and Objectives; Family Ownership

February 2008 (Revised July 2008)
Case

Wanxiang Group: A Chinese Company's Global Strategy

By: Regina M. Abrami, William C. Kirby, F. Warren McFarlan, Keith Chi-ho Wong and Tracy Manty

With an almost forty-year history as a business in China, the Wanxiang Group has navigated through the significantly different political and economic changes in China to succeed as a global leader in the auto parts industry and to develop into a broad business... View Details

Keywords: Mergers and Acquisitions; Business Conglomerates; Global Strategy; Business History; Growth and Development Strategy; Vertical Integration; Auto Industry; Hangzhou; United States

Web

Navigating Your Worth: AI, Negotiations, and the Nature of Expertise - Course Catalog

edge technology allowing you to build your many clones of expertise. The goal of this session is to set students up to create valuable models that pave the way toward selling expertise and marketing ones... View Details

October 1984 (Revised May 1990)
Case

NIKE (A)

Describes the history of Nike, its economic strategy, and the industries in which it competes. The teaching objective is to ask the student to identify and evaluate Nike's economic/technical strategy. View Details

Keywords: Information Technology; Business History; Supply and Industry; Financial Strategy; Apparel and Accessories Industry; Apparel and Accessories Industry

June 2023 (Revised September 2023)
Simulation

Managing the Customer Journey Marketing Simulation: Adobe's Data-Driven Operating Model (DDOM)

By: Sunil Gupta, Rajiv Lal and Celine Chammas

Adobe started monitoring Annual Recurring Revenue (ARR), one of its primary metrics, when it shifted from selling its software in a box to selling the software as a subscription-based cloud service. They wanted to know when, where, and how much to invest in marketing.... View Details

Keywords: Customer Acquisition; Customer Journey; Marketing Strategy; Marketing; Customer Focus and Relationships; Budgets and Budgeting

Web

Seen and Unseen | Baker Library | Bloomberg Center | Harvard Business School

Unseen looks at how companies, advertisers, and artists in the late 19th and early 20th centuries used images of “the Indian” to promote the railroad, market specific messages, or sell a range of products... View Details

November 2012
Case

Occupy Wall Street

By: Rakesh Khurana and Eric Baldwin

This case examines the Occupy Wall Street movement, which emerged in late 2011 in response to the fallout from the global financial crisis of 2008 and the economic downturn that followed. Occupy Wall Street was born out of a sense of frustration with both a global... View Details

Keywords: Occupy Wall Street; Organizational Behavior; Income Inequality; Democracy; Financial Crisis; Campaign Finance; Globalization; Globalized Economies and Regions; Mission and Purpose; Organizational Culture