Publications

Find at Harvard

16 Apr 2001
Research & Ideas

Strategy and the Internet

companies were forced to adapt their ways of doing things to the software. As a result, IT has been a force for standardizing activities and speeding competitive convergence.... View Details

Keywords: by Michael E. Porter

2025
Working Paper

Extractive Taxation and the French Revolution

By: Tommaso Giommoni, Gabriel Loumeau and Marco Tabellini

We study the fiscal determinants of the French Revolution, exploiting plausibly exogenous variation in the salt tax—a large source of royal revenues and one of the most extractive forms of taxation of the Ancien Régime. Implementing a Regression Discontinuity... View Details

Keywords: Extractive Taxation; Regime Change; French Revolution; State Capacity; Taxation; History; Government Administration; Attitudes; Public Opinion

14 Oct 2002
Research & Ideas

The Widening Rift Between Corporations and Society

adversarialism, relationships in place of transactions. They want to take their lives in their own hands and they are willing to pay for what we call the deep support that will... View Details

Keywords: by Martha Lagace

October 2015 (Revised August 2018)
Case

Ozark Feed and Ag Corporation: The ERP Decision

By: Jan Hammond, Paul Kalmbach and Eric Bernstein

This case describes a medium-sized business that manufactures animal feed for commercial and companion animals. The company has been growing rapidly and is considering whether or not to implement an enterprise resource planning (ERP) system. Ozark currently uses an IT... View Details

Keywords: ERP Systems; Information Technology; Supply Chain Management; Growth Management; Performance Improvement; Animal-Based Agribusiness; Decision Choices and Conditions; Agriculture and Agribusiness Industry; Agriculture and Agribusiness Industry; Missouri; Oklahoma; Texas; Arkansas

May 2024 (Revised March 2025)
Case

MStudio and Djoli: Accelerating Startup Growth in Francophone Africa

By: Paul A. Gompers, Pippa Tubman Armerding and Temitayo Lawal

Djoli, a procurement platform, was one of the startups launched and supported by MStudio, a startup studio in Côte d'Ivoire, in 2023. After a year of operations, Djoli must look beyond MStudio, which had supported them financially and in kind in exchange for equity,... View Details

Keywords: Business Startups; Agriculture and Agribusiness Industry; Agriculture and Agribusiness Industry; Agriculture and Agribusiness Industry; Africa; Côte d'Ivoire

2019
Working Paper

Voting Trusts and Antitrust: Rethinking the Role of Shareholder Rights and Private Litigation in Public Regulation, 1880s to 1930s

By: Naomi R. Lamoreaux and Laura Phillips Sawyer

Scholars have long recognized that the states’ authority to charter corporations bolstered their antitrust powers in ways that were not available to the federal government. But they have also argued that the growth of large-scale enterprises operating in national and... View Details

Keywords: Voting Trusts; Antitrust; Business and Shareholder Relations; Lawsuits and Litigation; History; United States

November 2023 (Revised January 2024)
Case

Votorantim: Uniting Family and Business Across Generations

By: Christina R. Wing, Carla Larangeira and Pedro Levindo

Over a 105-year span, the Ermírio de Moraes family built Votorantim, one of Latin America’s largest industrial conglomerates, and among Brazil’s topmost businesses, also credited for helping “build” the country over decades. By early 2023, Votorantim included... View Details

Keywords: Corporate Governance; Family Ownership; Business and Shareholder Relations; Family and Family Relationships; Agriculture and Agribusiness Industry; Agriculture and Agribusiness Industry; Agriculture and Agribusiness Industry; Agriculture and Agribusiness Industry; Latin America

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

February 2016 (Revised July 2017)
Case

Leadership and Independence at the Federal Reserve

By: David Moss and Marc Campasano

“From the Great Depression, to the stagflation of the seventies, to the current economic crisis caused by the housing bubble, every economic downturn suffered by this country over the past century can be traced to Federal Reserve policy.” Ron Paul, a Republican from... View Details

Keywords: Government Legislation; Central Banking; Policy; Financial Crisis; Business and Government Relations; Banking Industry; Public Administration Industry; United States

30 Mar 2020
Research & Ideas

The New Rules for Remote Work: Pandemic Edition

remote work during this bizarre time, with so many people scrambling to get their work done while sharing close quarters with shut-in kids, spouses, and pets, is certainly not business as usual, even for... View Details

Keywords: by Dina Gerdeman

2023
Working Paper

Learning to Use: Stack Overflow and Technology Adoption

By: Daniel Jay Brown and Maria P. Roche

In this paper, we examine the potential impact of Q&A websites on the adoption of technologies. Using data from Stack Overflow – one of the most popular Q&A websites worldwide – and implementing an instrumental-variable approach, we find that users whose questions... View Details

Keywords: Technology Adoption; Knowledge Sharing

Article

Multitasking While Driving: A Time Use Study of Commuting Knowledge Workers to Assess Current and Future Uses

By: Thomaz Teodorovicz, Andrew L. Kun, Raffaella Sadun and Orit Shaer

Commuting has enormous impact on individuals, families, organizations, and society. Advances in vehicle automation may help workers employ the time spent commuting in productive work-tasks or wellbeing activities. To achieve this goal, however, we need to develop a... View Details

Keywords: In-vehicle User Interfaces; Time-use Study; Automated Vehicles; Knowledge Workers; Commuting

September–October 2013
Article

The Role of Organizational Scope and Governance in Strengthening Private Monitoring

By: Lamar Pierce and Michael W. Toffel

Governments and other organizations often outsource activities to achieve cost savings from market competition. Yet such benefits are often accompanied by poor quality resulting from moral hazard, which can be particularly onerous when outsourcing the monitoring and... View Details

Find at Harvard

14 Dec 2011
Research & Ideas

The New Measures for Improving Nonprofit Performance

[MCC], a US government agency that supports economic development in various countries. Its measures are typically very long-term outcomes and impacts: for example, increases in... View Details

Keywords: by Julia Hanna

March 2023
Teaching Note

Sustainability Reporting at Dollar Tree, Inc.

By: Suraj Srinivasan and Li-Kuan Ni

Teaching Note for HBS Case No. 122-044. The case discusses the ESG strategy of Dollar Tree Inc., a U.S. Fortune 500 company in the deep discount retail industry and the shareholder pressure faced by the company. In 2022, the company faced a shareholder resolution from... View Details

Keywords: ESG; Sustainability; Shareholder Activism; Dollar Tree; Sustainability Reporting; ESG Reporting; Board Of Directors; Shareholder Engagement; GHG; Environmental Accounting; Integrated Corporate Reporting; Trends; Communication; Announcements; Voting; Environmental Management; Climate Change; Environmental Sustainability; Values and Beliefs; Corporate Accountability; Corporate Disclosure; Corporate Governance; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Policy; Reports; Business or Company Management; Risk Management; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Outcome or Result; Strategic Planning; Business and Stakeholder Relations; Situation or Environment; Opportunities; Civil Society or Community; Social Issues; Public Opinion; Strategy; Adaptation; Alignment; Business Strategy; Corporate Strategy; Value Creation; Retail Industry; United States; Virginia

September 1989 (Revised December 1989)
Case

Siemens Electric Motor Works (A) and (B) (Combined)

Explores how a cost system can help support a firm's decision to change strategies. In the process, students are exposed to a simple activity-based cost system. Also examines Siemens policy for transferring products between sales and manufacturing divisions. Transfer... View Details

Keywords: Activity Based Costing and Management; Business Strategy; Technology Industry

13 Aug 2014
Lessons from the Classroom

Managing the Family Business: Entrepreneurs Needed for Long-Run Success

lines of business, rejuvenate the founder's legacy, and put the enterprise on a new growth path. Entrepreneurs (typically family members) working outside the business but with family financial support can... View Details

Keywords: by Michael J. Roberts

December 2015
Case

Negotiating the Path of Abraham, 2015 Progress and Challenges

By: James K. Sebenius

The Abraham Path board reviews the last five years and seeks to frame and act on its major strategic, negotiating, and operational challenges going forward. The Abraham Path Initiative seeks to revitalize a route of Middle East cultural tourism following Abraham's path... View Details