Publications

August 2024
Technical Note

Introduction to Data Analysis in Python

By: Michael Parzen and Jo Ellery

This note introduces Python as a tool for data science, including the Pandas library for data analysis. View Details

Keywords: Analytics and Data Science

August 2005 (Revised March 2006)
Exercise

Data Analysis Exercise

By: Frances X. Frei

Keywords: Operations; Service Delivery; Management

September 2017 (Revised March 2018)
Case

Great Lakes Banking Group: Data Management

By: Shane Greenstein and Christine Snively

In May 2016, Michael Rechtin, an expert in international data center law, advised global financial services firm Great Lakes Banking Group (GLBG) on its plans to upgrade its data centers. The bank’s data processing and storage systems were in need of an update, and... View Details

Keywords: Information Infrastructure; Infrastructure; Operations; Information Management

October 2018 (Revised August 2023)
Case

Safecast: Bootstrapping Human Capital to Big Data

By: Ethan Bernstein and Stephanie Marton

On March 11, 2011, at 2:46pm, a 9.1-on-the-Richter-scale, six-minute long earthquake unleashed a tsunami that ravaged the Tohoku region of Japan, damaging the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power facility and releasing sufficient radioactive material into the air and ocean... View Details

March 2023
Module Note

Client Interviewing and Data Collection

By: David G. Fubini and Patrick Sanguineti

A module note for the Mastering Consulting and Advisory Skills (MCAS) course, "Client Interviewing and Data Collection" introduces the essentials of client interviews and provides best practices for early career consultants and advisors. View Details

January 2019 (Revised February 2024)
Teaching Note

Hubble Contact Lenses: Data Driven Direct-to-Consumer Marketing

By: Ayelet Israeli

Teaching Note for HBS No. 519-011. As its Series A extension round approaches, the founders of Hubble, a subscription-based, social-media fueled, direct-to-consumer (DTC) brand of contact lenses, are reflecting on the marketing strategies that have taken them to a... View Details

May 8, 2020
Article

Which Covid-19 Data Can You Trust?

By: Satchit Balsari, Caroline Buckee and Tarun Khanna

The COVID-19 pandemic has produced a tidal wave of data, but how much of it is any good? And as a layperson, how can you sort the good from the bad? The authors suggest a few strategies for dividing the useful data from the misleading: Beware of data that’s too broad... View Details

Keywords: COVID-19 Pandemic; Health Pandemics; Analytics and Data Science

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June 2020
Supplement

Ride-Hailing Services Data

By: E. Ofek

2021
Working Paper

Time and the Value of Data

By: Ehsan Valavi, Joel Hestness, Newsha Ardalani and Marco Iansiti

Managers often believe that collecting more data will continually improve the accuracy of their machine learning models. However, we argue in this paper that when data lose relevance over time, it may be optimal to collect a limited amount of recent data instead of... View Details

Keywords: Economics Of AI; Machine Learning; Non-stationarity; Perishability; Value Depreciation; Analytics and Data Science; Value

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December 2021
Case

Burning Glass Technologies: From Data to Product

By: Suraj Srinivasan and Amy Klopfenstein

In May 2021, Matt Sigelman, CEO of Burning Glass Technologies, a company that provided labor market analytics for a variety of markets, navigates his company’s transition from data company to product company. Burning Glass originated as a service that used artificial... View Details

April 2006
Background Note

Informing Service Management with Customer Data

By: Frances X. Frei and Dennis Campbell

Taught as the third module in a Harvard Business School course on Managing Service Operations. Explores the role of data analysis in ongoing service management. Describes how to realize the maximum amount of value from analyses and use this information in... View Details

Keywords: Decision Making; Design; Analytics and Data Science; Service Operations; Mathematical Methods; Value

March 2018
Teaching Note

Data Breach at Equifax

By: Suraj Srinivasan and Quinn Pitcher

Teaching Note for HBS No. 118-031. View Details

September 2023
Case

Trilling Foods: Managing People with Data

By: Alexandra C. Feldberg and Jeffrey T. Polzer

Trilling Foods, a regional bricks-and-mortar grocery chain, has recently provided its frontline managers with new tools for using data. Allison Andersen, Trilling’s VP of Data Science, has spearheaded these efforts. Yet, as she works with Kent Wade, the general manager... View Details

Keywords: Digital Transformation; Management Practices and Processes; Training; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Food and Beverage Industry; Retail Industry

February 2005 (Revised November 2006)
Background Note

Using Data Desk for Statistical Analysis

By: Frances X. Frei and Dennis Campbell

Describes how to use the Data Desk software package to perform statistical analysis. View Details

Keywords: Mathematical Methods

September 1969 (Revised June 1976)
Case

Control Data Corp. (D)

Set in 1965, at a time when the company's mix of "sales" was shifting increasingly to customer leasing of its computers, the student is asked to evaluate possible revisions in the policies for depreciating the cost of a leased computer. View Details

Keywords: Accounting; Leasing