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- March 2023 (Revised March 2024)
- Case
The Purdue Pharma Bankruptcy: Settling the Opioid Crisis
By: Kristin Mugford, Carin-Isabel Knoop and Susan Pinckney
How to get to a fair outcome for claimants in the Purdue Pharma bankruptcy given its significant role in the U.S. opioid crisis. View Details
Keywords: Regulation; Ethics; Fairness; Insolvency and Bankruptcy; Government Legislation; Courts and Trials; Laws and Statutes; Lawsuits and Litigation; Legal Liability; Crime and Corruption; Negotiation Offer; Negotiation Participants; Negotiation Style; Product Design; Product Development; Brands and Branding; Marketing Strategy; Trust; Government and Politics; Law; Negotiation; Operations; Ownership; Marketing; Social Psychology; Health Care and Treatment; Pharmaceutical Industry; United States
- March 2023 (Revised June 2023)
- Case
Layoffs in the Tech Industry: 2022–2023
By: Sandra J. Sucher and Marilyn Morgan Westner
This case examines the mass layoffs that swept through the tech industry (2022-2023) through the lens of four companies: Twitter, Stripe, Meta, and Google. How these companies implemented workforce change through mass layoffs raises critical questions applicable beyond... View Details
- 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
- Working Paper
Group Fairness in Dynamic Refugee Assignment
By: Daniel Freund, Thodoris Lykouris, Elisabeth Paulson, Bradley Sturt and Wentao Weng
Ensuring that refugees and asylum seekers thrive (e.g., find employment) in their host countries is a profound humanitarian goal, and a primary driver of employment is the geographic
location within a host country to which the refugee or asylum seeker is... View Details
- February 2023
- Article
Homophily and Acrophily as Drivers of Political Segregation
By: Amit Goldenberg, Joseph M. Abruzzo, Zi Huang, Jonas Schone, David Bailey, Robb Willer, Eran Halperin and James J. Gross
Political segregation is an important social problem, increasing polarization and impeding effective governance. Previous work has viewed the central driver of segregation to be political homophily, the tendency to associate with others who have similar views. Here we... View Details
- January 2023
- Case
Natura: Weathering the Pandemic at Brazil's Cosmetic Giant
By: Brian Trelstad, Pedro Levindo and Carla Larangeira
Brazil's Natura, a multi-brand cosmetics group, has taken several measures to safeguard the livelihoods of its thousands of employees and millions of sales representatives during the COVID-19 health and economic crisis. The company has also made strides in its efforts... View Details
Keywords: COVID-19 Pandemic; ESG Reporting; Acquisition; Customer Focus and Relationships; Decision Making; Social Entrepreneurship; Environmental Sustainability; Environmental Management; Climate Change; Ethics; Moral Sensibility; Values and Beliefs; Global Strategy; Corporate Governance; Health Pandemics; Human Resources; Human Capital; Crisis Management; Growth and Development Strategy; Marketing; Distribution Channels; Supply Chain; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Mission and Purpose; Organizational Culture; Customer Ownership; Relationships; Business and Community Relations; Business and Stakeholder Relations; Networks; Partners and Partnerships; Science-Based Business; Reputation; Human Needs; Social Issues; Strategy; Equality and Inequality; Beauty and Cosmetics Industry; Brazil; Latin America
- January 2023 (Revised November 2023)
- Technical Note
Ethical Analysis: Honesty and Self-Interest
By: Nien-hê Hsieh and Christopher Diak
Information asymmetry is pervasive in business and can often confer great advantage. This note distinguishes forms of deceptive behavior in the face of information asymmetry and aims to help students analyze their impermissibility. View Details
- 2023
- Working Paper
'It Wouldn’t Have Mattered Anyway': When Overdetermined Outcomes Justify Our Sins
By: Stephanie C. Lin, Julian J. Zlatev and Dale T. Miller
We identify and document an “overdetermined outcome defense” which occurs when one learns
that circumstances besides one’s own actions were sufficient to produce a negative effect (e.g.,
deciding not to go to the gym, but later discovering that the gym had been... View Details
- January 2023
- Supplement
Apple: Privacy vs. Safety (B)
By: Henry McGee, Nien-hê Hsieh and Christian Godwin
In 2020, as the COVID-19 pandemic swept across the globe, Apple and Google partnered to develop a contact tracing application that would collect information about users infected with the disease and notify those who they had been in contact with. While Apple/Google’s... View Details
Keywords: Iphone; Encryption; Data Privacy; Customers; Customer Focus and Relationships; Decision Making; Ethics; Values and Beliefs; Globalized Firms and Management; Government and Politics; Health; Health Pandemics; Leadership; Markets; Safety; Social Issues; Information Technology; Telecommunications Industry; Technology Industry; Consumer Products Industry; Electronics Industry; Health Industry; United States; Europe
- 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
Keywords: Business Ventures; Decision Making; Design; Energy; Renewable Energy; Engineering; Entrepreneurship; Environmental Management; Climate Change; Environmental Sustainability; Green Technology; Values and Beliefs; Governance; Innovation and Invention; Innovation Leadership; Innovation Strategy; Leadership; Leadership Style; Management; Goals and Objectives; Organizations; Mission and Purpose; Society; Social Issues; Strategy; Transportation; Value; Auto Industry; Transportation Industry
- January 2023
- Case
Thomas Buberl: Refounding AXA
By: Hubert Joly, Mihir Desai and Amram Migdal
In 2022, AXA and its CEO Thomas Buberl faced new types of challenges, including systemic risks such as climate change, geopolitical instability, public health crises, and social tensions caused by economic risks. AXA was one of the world’s largest insurers. Since... View Details
Keywords: Change; Change Management; Transformation; Transition; Trends; Environmental Management; Climate Change; Ethics; Values and Beliefs; Finance; Insurance; Management; Management Succession; Risk Management; Organizations; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Mission and Purpose; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Planning; Strategic Planning; Risk and Uncertainty; Society; Human Needs; Social Issues; Strategy; Adaptation; Business Strategy; Corporate Strategy; Insurance Industry; Europe; France; Paris
- 2024
- Working Paper
Consumers Hold Autonomous Vehicles Liable Even When Not at Fault
By: Julian De Freitas, Xilin Zhou, Margherita Atzei, Shoshana Boardman and Luigi Di Lillo
The deployment of autonomous vehicles (AVs) and the accompanying societal and economic benefits will greatly depend on how much liability AV firms will have to carry for accidents involving these vehicles, which in turn impacts their insurability and associated... View Details
- 2 Mar 2023 - 4 Mar 2023
- Conference Presentation
Ethical Risks of Autonomous Products: The Case of Mental Health Crises on AI Companion Applications
By: Julian De Freitas, K. Uguralp and Z. Oguz
- December 2022 (Revised September 2024)
- Teaching Note
Leonard Bernstein: Changing the World
By: Robert Simons and Shirley Sun
Teaching Note for HBS Case No. 122-056. The case traces the rise of Leonard Bernstein from a middle-class family in Boston to the conductor of the New York Philharmonic Orchestra. The case describes how he studied music intensely as a young man and developed mentors to... View Details
- December 2022 (Revised February 2023)
- Case
Daniel Defense: Responding to the Shooting at the Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, TX
By: Benjamin C. Esty and Daniel Fisher
At 11:33am on May 24, 2022, an 18-year-old man from Uvalde, Texas walked into the Robb Elementary School carrying a semi-automatic "AR-15-style” rifle manufactured by Daniel Defense and killed 19 children and two adults. Three days later, Representative Carolyn Maloney... View Details
Keywords: Gun Violence; Gun Policy; Second Amendment; Legal Liability; Government Legislation; Marketing Strategy; Business or Company Management; Product Marketing; Ethics; Corporate Accountability; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Moral Sensibility; Crime and Corruption; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Manufacturing Industry; Advertising Industry; United States
- 2022
- Chapter
Corporate Misconduct’s Relevance to Society through Everyday Misconduct
By: Eugene Soltes
Terms like "corporate misconduct" and "white-collar crime" typically bring to mind major scandals like Enron or Bernie Madoff. This popular perception overlooks another important—and in fact much more typical—type of deviance: "everyday misconduct." Everyday misconduct... View Details
- Winter 2022
- Article
Vaccines and the COVID-19 Pandemic: Lessons from Failure and Success
By: Scott Duke Kominers and Alex Tabarrok
The losses from the global COVID-19 pandemic have been staggering—trillions in economic costs, on top of significant losses of life, health, and well-being. The world made significant and successful investments in vaccines to mitigate the pandemic, yet there were... View Details
- November 2022 (Revised March 2023)
- Supplement
JUUL and the Vaping Revolution: A 2022 Update
By: Michael W. Toffel and Sarah Mehta
This slide deck provides a brief update (2019-2022) on the rise and fall of JUUL Labs, the maker of the popular JUUL e-cigarette. View Details
Keywords: Electronic Cigarettes; E-Cigarettes; Vaping; Nicotine Replacement; JUUL; Juuling; Government Regulation; Advertising; Advertising Campaigns; Digital Marketing; Customers; Innovation and Invention; Innovation Strategy; Marketing; Ethics; Brands and Branding; Marketing Communications; Marketing Strategy; Product Marketing; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Social Issues; Technology Industry; California
- November 2022 (Revised March 2023)
- Supplement
JUUL and the Vaping Revolution: A 2022 Update
By: Michael W. Toffel and Sarah Mehta
This case provides a brief update (2019-2022) on the rise and fall of JUUL Labs, the maker of the popular JUUL e-cigarette. View Details
Keywords: Electronic Cigarettes; E-Cigarettes; Vaping; Nicotine Replacement; JUUL; Juuling; Government Regulation; Advertising; Advertising Campaigns; Digital Marketing; Customers; Innovation and Invention; Innovation Strategy; Marketing; Ethics; Brands and Branding; Marketing Communications; Marketing Strategy; Product Marketing; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Social Issues; Technology Industry; California
- 2022
- Book
Complicit: How We Enable the Unethical and How to Stop
By: Max H. Bazerman
It is easy to condemn obvious wrongdoers such as Elizabeth Holmes, Adam Neumann, Harvey Weinstein, and the Sackler family. But we rarely think about the many people who supported their unethical or criminal behavior. In each case there was a supporting cast of... View Details