Publications

July 2021
Article

Electronic Trace Data and Legal Outcomes: The Effect of Electronic Medical Records on Malpractice Claim Resolution Time

By: Sam Ransbotham, Eric Overby and Michael C. Jernigan

Information systems generate copious trace data about what individuals do and when they do it. Trace data may affect the resolution of lawsuits by, for example, changing the time needed for legal discovery. Trace data might speed resolution by clarifying what events... View Details

Keywords: Analytics and Data Science; Lawsuits and Litigation; Digital Transformation; Welfare; Health Industry

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September 1983
Case

Bennett, Strang & Farris

A law firm must decide how to split partnership profits among the partners. Issues of seniority versus performance, performance evaluation, and lack of consensus of values dominate the discussions. View Details

Keywords: Partners and Partnerships; Profit Sharing; Legal Services Industry

Joshua R. Schwartzstein

Joshua Schwartzstein is a Professor of Business Administration in the Negotiation, Organizations & Markets Unit.

Professor Schwartzstein is a behavioral economist who focuses on incorporating psychologically realistic assumptions about... View Details

23 Sep 2019
News

The $100 Trillion Opportunity: The Race To Provide Banking To The World’s Poor

November 2004 (Revised February 2006)
Background Note

Note on Insider Trading Liability

By: Lynn S. Paine and Christopher Bruner

Provides a general description and overview of U.S. law on insider trading, including the basic theories of liability, the responsibilities of securities firm managers to prevent and detect insider trading, and the potential penalties for insider trading. A rewritten... View Details

Keywords: Insider Trading; Legal Liability; Ethics; Crime and Corruption; Finance

20 Nov 2019
Video

Zia Mody

Zia Mody, founder of AZB & Partners, a leading corporate law firm in India, describes her policy of providing mentorship and advice to women through marriage and motherhood in order to retain them as... View Details

24 Jun 2019
Blog Post

Dance to the Music: How Noa Torok Found Her Dream Job at SoundCloud

Noa Torok, MBA 2019, came to HBS with a blank slate. “I arrived with zero expectations,” she says. “I had no idea what I wanted to do.” Her prior experience had shown her the opposite – what she did not want to do. After studying both law... 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

Winter 2021
Article

Can Staggered Boards Improve Value? Causal Evidence from Massachusetts

By: Robert Daines, Shelley Xin Li and Charles C.Y. Wang

We study the effect of staggered boards (SBs) using a quasi-experiment: a 1990 law that imposed an SB on all Massachusetts-incorporated firms. The law led to an increase in Tobin's Q, investment in CAPEX and R&D, patents, higher-quality patented innovations, and... View Details

Keywords: Staggered Board; Entrenchment; Life-cycle; Tobin's Q; Innovation; Profitability; Investor Composition; Governing and Advisory Boards; Investment; Innovation and Invention; Institutional Investing; Value

SSRN

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2017
Article

Handgun Waiting Periods Reduce Gun Deaths

By: Michael Luca, Deepak Malhotra and Christopher Poliquin

Handgun waiting periods are laws that impose a delay between the initiation of a purchase and final acquisition of a firearm. We show that waiting periods, which create a “cooling off” period among buyers, significantly reduce the incidence of gun violence. We estimate... View Details

Keywords: Gun Policy; Gun Violence; Waiting Period; Injury Prevention; Policy; Safety; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; United States

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2016
Working Paper

Delaying Firearm Purchases Reduces Gun Violence

By: Michael Luca, Deepak Malhotra and Christopher Poliquin

Handgun waiting periods are laws that impose a two to seven-day delay between the purchase and delivery of a firearm. While states might institute waiting periods for different reasons (e.g., to allow for background checks), these delays also create a “cooling off”... View Details

Keywords: Government Legislation; Safety; Rights; Laws and Statutes; United States

14 Jun 2016
News

After Mass Shootings, It’s Often Easier to Buy a Gun

HBS Faculty Comment on Environmental Issues

Professor Shon Hiatt highlights the benefits of federalism in fostering state policy experimentation and explains the impact of these laws on innovation and entrepreneurship in the U.S. geothermal power sector. View Details

July 2013 (Revised June 2014)
Case

Collaborating for Growth: Duane Morris in a Turbulent Legal Sector

By: Heidi K. Gardner and Annelena Lobb

By the late 2000s, the law firm Duane Morris had transformed itself from a growing U.S. law firm to a significant global player. The firm's uniquely collaborative organizational culture, which featured a transparent, data-driven compensation system, practice-group... View Details

Keywords: Professional Service Firm; Collaboration; Performance Management; Risk and Uncertainty; Competition; Management Practices and Processes; Organizational Structure; Groups and Teams; Organizational Culture; Performance; Cooperation; Globalized Firms and Management; Compensation and Benefits; Volatility; Growth and Development Strategy; Legal Services Industry; United States

20 Nov 2019
Video

Zia Mody

Zia Mody, founder of AZB & Partners, a leading corporate law firm in India, describes the changing relationship... View Details

17 Jun 2015
News

Excellence Comes From Saying No

30 Mar 2020
News

Josephine Nelson on Workplace Surveillance

13 May 2019
News

Why this professor says you should root for Uber's IPO to fail

2009
Other Unpublished Work

The Pecora Hearings

By: David Moss, Cole Bolton and Eugene Kintgen

In 1932, in the depths of the Great Depression, the Senate Banking Committee began a much-publicized investigation of the nation's financial sector. The hearings, which came to be known as the Pecora hearings after the Banking Committee's lead counsel Ferdinand... View Details

Keywords: Financial History; Financial Crisis; Financial Markets; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Government Legislation; Laws and Statutes; Business and Government Relations; Financial Services Industry