Publications

02 Jan 2024
Research & Ideas

10 Trends to Watch in 2024

The lightning-fast ascent of generative AI isn’t the only sea change on the horizon for businesses in the new year. The global economy is in flux as war, climate change, trade issues, and infrastructure problems demand attention. Many companies continue to struggle to... View Details

Keywords: by Rachel Layne

April 12, 2022
Article

Evaluation of Individual and Ensemble Probabilistic Forecasts of COVID-19 Mortality in the United States

By: Estee Y. Cramer, Evan L. Ray, Velma K. Lopez, Johannes Bracher, Andrea Brennen, Alvaro J. Castro Rivadeneira, Michael Lingzhi Li and et al.

Short-term probabilistic forecasts of the trajectory of the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States have served as a visible and important communication channel between the scientific modeling community and both the general public and decision-makers. Forecasting models... View Details

Keywords: COVID-19; Forecasting and Prediction; Health Pandemics; Mathematical Methods; Partners and Partnerships

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July–August 2013
Article

Six Ways to Sink a Growth Initiative

By: Donald L. Laurie and J. Bruce Harreld

The conventional wisdom about how best to pursue growth—launch a slew of initiatives in high-potential areas; appoint some promising young managers to lead them; locate them safely away from the established businesses—is a recipe for failure, according to the authors.... View Details

Keywords: Failure; Growth and Development Strategy

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25 Apr 2012
Research & Ideas

The Importance of Teaming

is a noun. A team is an established, fixed group of people cooperating in pursuit of a common goal. But what if a team disbands almost as quickly as it was assembled? For example, what if you work in an emergency services facility where the View Details

Keywords: Re: Amy C. Edmondson

2019
Working Paper

Bank Boards: What Has Changed Since the Financial Crisis?

By: Shiva Rajgopal, Suraj Srinivasan and Forester Wong

Several government-mandated committees investigating the financial crisis highlighted four key deficiencies in the composition of bank boards before the crisis: (i) group think among bank board members; (ii) absence of prior banking experience of board members; (iii)... View Details

Keywords: Banks and Banking; Governing and Advisory Boards; Corporate Governance; Financial Crisis; Change; Diversity

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18 Apr 2013
Working Paper Summaries

The Impact of Pooling on Throughput Time in Discretionary Work Settings: An Empirical Investigation of Emergency Department Length of Stay

Keywords: by Hummy Song, Anita L. Tucker & Karen L. Murrell; Health

January 2008 (Revised January 2008)
Case

Two Brattle Center: A Mental-Health Clinic in Search of a Viable Operating Model

By: Robert G. Eccles

Two Brattle Center (TBC) is a struggling for-profit private mental health clinic based in Harvard Square. Its founder, Dr. Joan Wheelis, is a nationally recognized practicing psychiatrist who has developed outpatient treatment programs based on Dialectical Behavior... View Details

Keywords: Business Model; For-Profit Firms; Decision Choices and Conditions; Financial Strategy; Health Care and Treatment; Health Disorders; Medical Specialties; Nonprofit Organizations; Emotions; Health Industry; United States

25 Jun 2024
Research & Ideas

Rapport: The Hidden Advantage That Women Managers Bring to Teams

research team studied the expansion of a leading food delivery platform and the resulting rise in fast-food sales to observe how managers adjusted worker staffing to handle spikes in demand. The team analyzed personnel and productivity... View Details

Keywords: by Kara Baskin; Food & Beverage

02 Apr 2024
Research & Ideas

Employees Out Sick? Inside One Company's Creative Approach to Staying Productive

importance of the rapport between the manager and worker to enable managers to make the staffing adjustments that are often necessary to meet fluctuating demand or convince workers to be trained in skills the firm requires. You Might Also... View Details

Keywords: by Michael Blanding; Fashion

09 Jun 2022
HBS Case

From Truck Driver to Manager: US Foods’ Novel Approach to Staff Shortages

in March 2020, the pandemic only exacerbated a longstanding issue. The shortage of drivers to deliver food supplies to the roughly 300,000 restaurants, hotels, hospitals, schools, and universities serviced by US Foods was not its only View Details

Keywords: by Pamela Reynolds

16 Nov 2021
HBS Case

How a Company Made Employees So Miserable, They Killed Themselves

less out of their control,” says Whillans. “It can make them feel more safe and secure, and move them out of a threat mindset into more of an opportunity mindset.” And management could have considered more creative solutions to staffing... View Details

Keywords: by Michael Blanding

July 1996 (Revised August 2024)
Case

Innovative Opportunities to Manage Health Care Delivery

By: Regina E. Herzlinger and D. Scott Lurding

The purpose of this case is: To familiarize the students with the changing landscape of health care delivery, through chains of retail medical centers and those offering value-based care (VBC).

To discuss fundamental managerial decisions about their... View Details

Keywords: Managed Care; Capitation; Strategy

31 Mar 2008
HBS Case

JetBlue’s Valentine’s Day Crisis

approach to reservations staffing while imposing contract terms that would call for all hands in the event of demand. "You can't be an organization that simultaneously and completely fulfills the wishes of employees, customers, and... View Details

Keywords: by Julia Hanna; Air Transportation

07 Jul 2019
HBS Case

Walmart's Workforce of the Future

Any discussion of the future of retail—or how we work—has to include Walmart. As of 2017, 90 percent of the US population lived within 10 miles of a Walmart store; with 11,766 locations worldwide and $514 billion in annual revenues, the discount store also has the... View Details

Keywords: by Julia Hanna; Retail

2008
Chapter

Corporate Honesty and Business Education: A Behavioral Model

By: Rakesh Khurana and Herbert Gintis

Since the mid-1970s neoclassical economic theory has dominated business school thinking and teaching in dealing with the nature of human motivation. However valuable in understanding competitive product and financial markets, neoclassical economic theory employs an... View Details

Keywords: Business Education; Ethics; Managerial Roles; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Organizational Culture; Business and Shareholder Relations; Mathematical Methods; Behavior

07 Feb 2023
Research & Ideas

Supervisor of Sandwiches? More Companies Inflate Titles to Avoid Extra Pay

the study estimates. Cohen’s study emerges as record inflation and chronic staffing shortages collide making compensation a top challenge in human resources. While the trend is most heavily concentrated in lower-paying sectors like... View Details

Keywords: by Scott Van Voorhis

05 May 2022
HBS Case

College Degrees: The Job Requirement Companies Seek, but Don't Really Need

right now in the US. Even though employers posted openings for 11 million non-farm jobs as of late 2021, 11.5 million Americans remained either unemployed or underemployed. As the economy struggles to recover from the COVID-19 pandemic, View Details

Keywords: by Jay Fitzgerald

16 Jul 2020
Research & Ideas

Restaurant Revolution: How the Industry Is Fighting to Stay Alive

Thomas Keller, whose restaurant group includes the French Laundry in Napa Valley and Per Se in Manhattan, employed 1,200 staff in his 13 restaurants, but by mid-March staffing was reduced to 18 employees across all restaurants. Panelists... View Details

Keywords: by Michael S. Kaufman, Lena G. Goldberg, and Jill Avery; Food & Beverage

August 2017 (Revised July 2019)
Case

GROW: Using Artificial Intelligence to Screen Human Intelligence

By: Ethan Bernstein, Paul McKinnon and Paul Yarabe

Over 10% of all 2017 university graduates in Japan used GROW, an artificial intelligence platform and mobile app developed by Tokyo-based people analytics startup IGS, to recruit for a job. This case puts participants in the shoes of IGS founder and CEO Masahiro... View Details

Keywords: Big Data; Artificial Intelligence; Talent and Talent Management; Recruitment; Selection and Staffing; Human Resources; Information Technology; AI and Machine Learning; Analytics and Data Science; Financial Services Industry; Air Transportation Industry; Advertising Industry; Manufacturing Industry; Technology Industry; Japan