Publications

02 Jun 2020
News

How to Fix a Toxic Workplace, According to 2 Leadership Experts — Including One Who Was Brought in to Repair Uber's Culture

20 Jun 2016
Research & Ideas

When Predicting Other People's Preferences, You're Probably Wrong

about presuming preferences. When predicting other people’s tastes, we tend to erroneously assume that liking one thing precludes enjoying another, dissimilar option, according to a recent set of studies by researchers at Harvard Business... View Details

Keywords: by Carmen Nobel; Retail

03 Dec 2014
What Do You Think?

Can the Brilliant Jerk Be Managed Effectively?

Maxweles, who asked, "Was Steve Jobs possibly a 'brilliant jerk'? Could innovation be stifled by simply eliminating the uncomfortable individuals?" Lawrence Nwaru added, "We are all brilliant jerks in one form or the... View Details

Keywords: by James Heskett

08 Jan 2020
Research & Ideas

NFL Head Coaches Are Getting Younger. What Can Organizations Learn?

same time, the Los Angeles Rams “morphed from a plodding exemplar of mediocrity” to an explosive conference winner, also with the help of a modern, creative offensive system, helmed by the youngest coach in NFL history, Sean McVay. The... View Details

Keywords: by Boris Groysberg, Evan M.S. Hecht, and Abhijit Naik; Sports

05 May 2011
What Do You Think?

How Ethical Can We Be?

them, probably through a process, as Mike Flanagan put it, of "more open discussion at home, work and at play." Other suggestions came from C. J. Cullinane when he said "we can make better, fairer decisions View Details

Keywords: by Jim Heskett

15 Mar 2017
Lessons from the Classroom

More Than 900 Examples of How Climate Change Affects Business

This word cloud is composed of blog posts by more than 900 students describing how individual organizations are likely to be affected by climate change. Image by Patrick Clapp Last fall, first-year MBA students at Harvard Business School received a new assignment in... View Details

Keywords: by Carmen Nobel; Green Technology

July 2004 (Revised July 2005)
Case

Activision: The 'Kelly Slater's Pro Surfer' Project

By: Alan D. MacCormack, Enrico D"Angelo and Kerry Herman

Mike Ward, the producer in charge of developing the Kelly Slater's Pro Surfer game for Activision, must decide whether to launch the game in time for the 2002 Christmas season. Complicating his decision are the lukewarm response from consumers to TV test spots of the... View Details

Keywords: Games, Gaming, and Gambling; Product Development; Customer Satisfaction; Projects; Business or Company Management; Product Launch; Marketing Strategy; Decision Choices and Conditions; Industry Structures; Innovation Strategy; Entertainment and Recreation Industry; United States

17 Nov 2008
Research & Ideas

Decoding the Artful Sidestep

during political debates by posting the question asked for the duration of the politicians' answers. Mike and I expect this will increase the penalty for dodging a question, and in the intermediate term... View Details

Keywords: by Martha Lagace

10 Jan 2007
HBS Case

The Challenge of Managing National Security

attacks. Garry Emmons: The focus of your work is on how to manage integration within a highly differentiated organization. Post-9/11, how's the intelligence community doing on that score? Jan Rivkin: Intelligence issues are enormously complex, and I should say right at... View Details

Keywords: by Garry Emmons; Service

October 2019 (Revised August 2020)
Case

The Predictive Index

By: Lynda M. Applegate and James Weber

Mike Zani and Daniel Muzquiz needed to decide next steps to create a new category in the human resources consulting industry and scale their company.
Zani and Muzquiz, serial entrepreneurs, acquired Predictive Index in 2014. Previously, as clients of the... View Details

Keywords: Human Resources; Selection and Staffing; Talent and Talent Management; Recruitment; Corporate Entrepreneurship; Venture Capital; Change Management; Disruptive Innovation; Digital Platforms; Growth and Development Strategy; Consulting Industry; Service Industry; United States

01 Sep 2023
News

Money Does Grow on (Family) Trees

For 17 years, Andre Kearns (MBA 1999) has been tracing his family tree. One by one, he has added branches, grounding himself in a long and sometimes complicated lineage. Through family stories, forgotten heirlooms, and vital records, Kearns has traveled back through... View Details

Keywords: April White; Illustrations by Fabio Consoli; News, Library, Internet, and Other Services; Information

01 Dec 2019
News

Remix

So many boxes. Drew Dixon (MBA 2004) moved into this Brooklyn Heights apartment just a few days ago, as evidenced by the ratio of boxes emptied to those still filled. The living room, though, is an island of unpacked order, bobbing above... View Details

Keywords: Jen McFarland Flint; photographed by Chris Sorensen; #MeToo; DefJam; Arts, Entertainment

Invested in Detroit

April 11, 2018 - Karen Mills leads a discussion between Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan and JPMorgan Chase's President and CEO Jamie Dimon and Head of Corporate Responsibility Peter Scher for a discussion on cross-sector collaboration to drive economic opportunity in... View Details

19 Aug 2020
News

Krispy Kreme: Top-Line Up Double Digits Thru Pandemic (Podcast)

January 1998 (Revised April 2001)
Case

Acer America: Development of the Aspire

By: Christopher A. Bartlett and Anthony St. George

Follows the development, national launch, and global rollout of the Aspire, Acer's first new product developed outside of Taiwan. Implementing a very promising new PC concept proves challenging to Mike Culver and his U.S. team, who are plagued by coordination problems... View Details

Keywords: Global Strategy; Globalized Firms and Management; Organizational Design; Supply Chain; Problems and Challenges; Relationships; Business Subsidiaries; Product Launch; Computer Industry; United States; Taiwan

February 2005 (Revised November 2006)
Case

Hewlett-Packard (A)

By: Rohit Deshpande and Seth Schulman

Since its controversial merger with Compaq, Hewlett-Packard had been under pressure by analysts and some stockholders to divest itself of its low-margin PC business. For CEO Carly Fiorina and others on HP's management team, however, PCs seemed integral to the company's... View Details

Keywords: Problems and Challenges; Customer Focus and Relationships; Mergers and Acquisitions; Information Infrastructure; Business Strategy; Price; Computer Industry