Publications

18 Aug 2022
Op-Ed

Your Best Employees Are Burning Out: A Framework for Retaining Talent

bolstered through strong union protection. Plus, employers were focused on maintaining a more competitive minimum wage, making sure their employees could actually live on these paychecks, and ensuring the amount increased with inflation. All of these View Details

Keywords: by Hise Gibson and MaShon Wilson

19 Dec 2023
Research & Ideas

15 Podcast Episodes That Grabbed Listeners in 2023

Ranjay Gulati talks to Tynan about her learning journey, and how she managed the risks of entrepreneurship while aiming to make a lasting impact. Saving BlackBerry: CEO John Chen Explains How to Make the Hard Calls John Chen was hired to... View Details

Keywords: by Danielle Kost

October 2023 (Revised March 2024)
Case

KOKO Networks: Bridging Energy Transition and Affordability with Carbon Financing

By: George Serafeim, Siko Sikochi and Namrata Arora

The problem was massive: two million hectares of African forests were lost annually to charcoal production for cooking, an area equivalent to 13 times Greater London, resulting in one billion tons of carbon emissions yearly. At the same time, an estimated 700,000... View Details

Keywords: Clean Tech; Digital; Carbon Credits; Carbon Offsetting; Climate Change; Entrepreneurship; Energy Sources; Environmental Sustainability; Health; Market Design; Business Startups; Transition; Environmental Regulation; Policy; Energy Industry; Consumer Products Industry; Africa; Kenya; Rwanda

17 Jul 2012
First Look

First Look: July 17

research had taken root. Over the past 35 years, examination of social and environmental influences on creativity has become increasingly vigorous, with broad implications for the psychology of human performance, and with applications to... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

25 Aug 2014
HBS Case

Starbucks Reinvented

Administration. "As a brand, leadership, and entrepreneurship scholar, I've been dogging Starbucks for a long time." On a 1995 trip to Seattle, Koehn visited a Starbucks store for the first time and was struck by what she saw... View Details

Keywords: by Julia Hanna; Food & Beverage

05 Jun 2020
Research & Ideas

How Anchor Investors Help Impact Funds Succeed

so-called impact funds, or funds that hope to create positive social or environmental impact. In Anchors Aweigh: Analysis of Anchor Limited Partner Investors in Impact Investment Funds, the authors describe anchors as “generally the first... View Details

Keywords: by Sean Silverthorne; Financial Services

March 2024
Case

From “BIG” Ideas to Sustainable Impact at ICL Group (A)

By: Linda A. Hill and Lydia Begag

In the summer of 2023, Eduard (“Eddie”) Croitoru, Vice President (VP) of ICL Group (“ICL”) Corporate Initiatives, was reflecting on ICL’s internal ideation program, the Business Innovation for Growth (BIG) Accelerator. When Raviv Zoller became the CEO of ICL in 2018,... View Details

21 Jun 2017
Book

Meet the Oddball Entrepreneurs Who Invented Green Businesses

Keywords: by Sean Silverthorne; Green Technology

10 Apr 2012
First Look

First Look: April 10

patterns with the calorie labeling present. These findings highlight the potential importance of portion control interventions that specifically activate consumers' self-control. Environmental Federalism in the European Union and the... View Details

Keywords: Carmen Nobel

26 Mar 2013
First Look

First Look: March 26

paper integrates the role of entrepreneurship and firms into debates on why Asia, Latin America, and Africa were slow to catch up with the West following the Industrial Revolution and the advent of modern economic growth. It argues that... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

November 2023 (Revised July 2024)
Case

'Care in Every Drop': Ayala Corporation and Manila Water (A)

By: Debora L. Spar, Paul Healy, Tricia Peralta and Julia M. Comeau

Since 1834, eight generations of the Ayala family have used their conglomerate to fund nation-building projects in the Philippines, including investments in tramcars, telecommunications, hospitals, and schools. In 1997, Ayala’s subsidiary, Manila Water, took control of... View Details

Keywords: Family Business; Economic Growth; Social Entrepreneurship; Climate Change; Natural Resources; Crisis Management; Failure; Privatization; Social Issues; Urban Development; Adaptation; Public Opinion; Mission and Purpose; Utilities Industry; Asia; Philippines

September 2020 (Revised June 2021)
Case

Algramo

By: Michael Chu, Monica Silva and Mariana Cal

Founded in 2013 by José Manuel Moller in Chile, Algramo first became known for addressing the “poverty tax” (the surcharge paid by lower income families for staples sold in smaller sizes) through specially-designed dispensers in low-income neighborhood grocery stores... View Details

Keywords: Packaging-as-a-wallet; Plastic Waste; Business At The Base Of The Pyramid; Reusable Packaging; Alliances With FMCGs To Meet ESG Goals; Social Entrepreneurship; Environmental Sustainability; Strategy; Value Creation; Goals and Objectives; Business Model; Consumer Products Industry; Latin America; South America; Chile

10 Jan 2022
Research & Ideas

How to Get Companies to Make Investments That Benefit Everyone

activity and put in place collective governance. By contrast, Nagle argues, the Amazon rainforest is subject to control by a gatekeeper—Brazil’s president Jair Bolsonaro, who must weigh national politics with environmental protections... View Details

Keywords: by Lane Lambert

January 2023 (Revised June 2024)
Case

Elon Musk at Tesla

By: George Serafeim and Amram Migdal

This case gives an overview of Elon Musk’s career arc through the lens of the 2003 founding of Tesla and its growth through 2022. Background information is included on Tesla’s unique strategic decisions, its operational and reputational struggles and successes, and the... View Details

January 2022 (Revised January 2024)
Case

ReNew Power: Leading the Energy Transition in India

By: Gunnar Trumbull and Malini Sen

Founder-CEO of one of India’s largest clean energy companies, ReNew Power, which develops, builds, and operates utility-scale wind and solar energy projects, has to decide the way forward for the company as the country and the world stand poised at the cusp of an... View Details

Keywords: Energy Generation; Renewable Energy; Energy Sources; Entrepreneurship; Private Equity; Initial Public Offering; Forecasting and Prediction; Trends; Transformation; Private Ownership; Environmental Sustainability; Energy Industry; India; Asia

June 2010 (Revised February 2011)
Case

The Fox Islands Wind Project (A)

By: Joseph B. Lassiter III, James Thomas Corcoran, Max Gazor, Dylan Hogarty and Alexander H. Somers, Jr.

The market for electricity on the Fox Islands of North Haven and Vinalhaven, Maine is unique and costly for residents. Historically, electricity prices on the islands had been three times the national average because of the high cost of importing electricity via an... View Details

Keywords: Business Startups; Renewable Energy; Social Entrepreneurship; Cost; Financing and Loans; Projects; Business and Community Relations; Environmental Sustainability; Green Technology Industry; Maine

October 2013 (Revised November 2016)
Case

Carbon Engineering

By: Joseph B. Lassiter III and Sid Misra

Dr. David Keith, President of Carbon Engineering, a company based in Calgary, Alberta, is commercializing a technology to capture carbon dioxide (CO2) from the atmosphere. The company plans to market the captured CO2 to produce low carbon transportation fuels in... View Details

30 Jun 2021
In Practice

The Harvard Business School Faculty Summer Reader 2021

many products and offer countless tips on how to lower your carbon footprint every day. Julia Austin (@austinfish) is an executive fellow at the Rock Center for Entrepreneurship and a former senior lecturer. Jeffrey Bussgang: Civil rights... View Details

Keywords: by Kathryn Haviland

February 2024
Supplement

Seeds of Innovation: GALY’s Quest to Cultivate the Future of Agriculture in the Lab

By: George Serafeim

In 2023, Luciano Bueno, CEO and founder of plant cell culture agriculture company GALY, was considering the best path forward for his company as he planned to pitch Series B investors. GALY, founded in 2019, aimed to produce cotton and other crops from cells grown in... View Details

Keywords: Business Model; Green Technology; Goods and Commodities; Growth and Development Strategy; Science-Based Business; Entrepreneurship; Plant-Based Agribusiness; Business Startups; Decisions; Technological Innovation; Production; Entrepreneurial Finance; Agriculture and Agribusiness Industry; Technology Industry; Boston; Sao Paulo