Publications

October 2012 (Revised May 2014)
Case

J Sainsbury Plc, Road to Recovery

By: John R. Wells and Galen Danskin

In 2012, J Sainsbury Plc (Sainsbury's), the number three supermarket chain in the UK with £22.3 billion in sales, appeared to have put the troubles of the past behind it. For over 70 years, Sainsbury's had been the UK's largest grocer, but Tesco had overtaken it in... View Details

Keywords: United Kingdom; Retailing; Food; Tesco; Sainsbury; Strategy; Competitive Strategy; Global Strategy; Retail Industry; United Kingdom

2013
Working Paper

Did Bank Distress Stifle Innovation During the Great Depression?

By: Ramana Nanda and Tom Nicholas

We find a negative relationship between bank distress and the level, quality and trajectory of firm-level innovation during the Great Depression, particularly for R&D firms operating in capital intensive industries. However, we also show that because a sufficient... View Details

Keywords: Great Depression; R＆D; Bank Distress; Patents; Research and Development; Financial Crisis; Innovation and Invention; Banks and Banking; Banking Industry; United States

September – October 2011
Article

Manage the Culture Cycle

By: James L. Heskett

Organizational culture—the shared assumptions, values, and behaviors that determine "how we do things around here"—can be measured and shaped. In organizations with large numbers of customer-facing employees, it can account for up to half of the difference in operating... View Details

Keywords: Organizational Culture; Value; Behavior; Retention; Customer Focus and Relationships; Change Management; Learning; Innovation and Invention; Labor

2010
Working Paper

Advertising Disclosures: Measuring Labeling Alternatives in Internet Search Engines

By: Benjamin Edelman and Duncan S. Gilchrist

In an online experiment, we measure users' interactions with search engines, both in standard configurations and in modified versions with clearer labels identifying search engine advertisements. In particular, for a random subset of users, we change "Sponsored links"... View Details

Keywords: Online Advertising; Interactive Communication; Corporate Disclosure; Labels; Marketing Strategy; Consumer Behavior; Internet; Search Technology

23 Mar 2022
News

The Great Resignation Didn’t Start with the Pandemic

14 Nov 2023
Research & Ideas

The Network Effect: Why Companies Should Care About Employees’ LinkedIn Connections

the value they produce. The researchers correlated the network data to measures of success in innovation, such as investments in research and development and the number of awarded patents and their impact. The study found that companies... View Details

Keywords: by Ben Rand

20 Feb 2017
Working Paper Summaries

Where Should We Build a Mall? The Formation of Market Structure and Its Effect on Sales

Keywords: by Doug J. Chung, Kyoungwon Seo, and Reo Song; Retail; Real Estate; Construction

2023
Working Paper

Detecting Structural Breaks in Inflation Trends: A High-Frequency Approach

By: Alberto Cavallo and Gaston Garcia Zavaleta

We combine standard structural-break methods with high-frequency data to identify shifts in inflation trends. We use this approach to study the inflation dynamics of 25 countries from January 2022 to April 2023 and find evidence of a broad-based slowdown in about half... View Details

Keywords: Inflation and Deflation; Global Range; Economic Slowdown and Stagnation; Analysis; Price

Article

Research: The Cost of a Single U.S. Immigration Restriction

By: Dany Bahar, Prithwiraj Choudhury and Britta Glennon

On June 22, 2020, President Trump passed an Executive Order drastically cutting the number of highly skilled international workers eligible for non-immigrant visas to the U.S. To quantify the impact of this policy, the authors examined the immediate change in stock... View Details

Keywords: Work Visas; H1-B; Restriction; Impact; Immigration; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Cost; Economy

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April–May 2021
Article

The Effect of Retaliation Costs on Employee Whistleblowing

By: Jonas Heese and Gerardo Pérez Cavazos

We use large increases in unemployment insurance (UI) benefits to study the effects of expected retaliation costs on employee whistleblowing. Increases in UI benefits reduce the costs that arise from a job loss, one of the costliest forms of retaliation. We find that... View Details

Keywords: Employee Whistleblowing; Retaliation Costs; Labor Unemployment Insurance; Workplace Safety Inspections

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November 2014 (Revised June 2016)
Case

Lobbying at eCab

By: Karthik Ramanna

Erin Jones' ridesharing startup in her mid-sized hometown is finally picking up. She's hoping to reach a sustainable scale so that she can sell to a large player such as Uber in a year. But suddenly, she hits political roadblocks—the local Democratic mayor, facing a... View Details

March 2012
Article

Advertising Disclosures: Measuring Labeling Alternatives in Internet Search Engines

By: Benjamin Edelman and Duncan S. Gilchrist

In an online experiment, we measure users' interactions with search engines, both in standard configurations and in modified versions with clearer labels identifying search engine advertisements. In particular, for a random subset of users, we change "Sponsored links"... View Details

Keywords: Corporate Disclosure; Online Advertising; Measurement and Metrics; Internet; Search Technology; Education; Labels

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June 1980 (Revised December 1992)
Case

Parker House (B)

The management of Boston's historic Parker House, owned by Dunfey Hotels, has received a request from a tour wholesaler to book a large number of rooms at the hotel during summer and fall 1980. This booking is tied to bookings at two other Dunfey hotels that need this... View Details

Keywords: Product Positioning; Segmentation; Accommodations Industry; Boston

This note provides general information about climate change and its implications for business. Included is an overview of climate change science and a number of its impacts, including rising sea levels, changing weather patterns and extreme weather, pressure on... View Details

17 Jan 2008
Research & Ideas

If Marketing Experts Ran Elections

Editor's Note: Harvard Business School professor John Quelch writes a blog on marketing issues, called Marketing Know: How, for Harvard Business Online. It is reprinted on HBS Working Knowledge.For all the coverage of the Presidential primaries, only half of eligible... View Details

Keywords: by John A. Quelch

Research Summary

Competing Platforms

This paper focuses on platform-intermediated markets where there are a small number of firms on one side and analyzes the strategic competition among platforms to get the oligopolistic side on-board. Due to the prevalence of both same and cross-side externalities,... View Details

April 2024
Case

Managing AI Risks in Consumer Banking

By: Suraj Srinivasan, Satish Tadikonda, Paul Dongha, Manoj Saxena and Radhika Kak

In early 2024, Ruth Jones, head of digital banking at Signa Bank, a (fictitious) European consumer bank, was thinking about how to best incorporate GenAI capabilities to improve efficiencies and create new ways to improve the customer experience. Where were the biggest... View Details

Keywords: Customer Relationship Management; AI and Machine Learning; Risk Management; Opportunities; Customization and Personalization; Banking Industry; Europe

April 2021 (Revised April 2021)
Case

Project Restart: Deciding the Future of English Football

By: Nour Kteily and Deepak Malhotra

In March 2020, the English Premier League football (soccer) season was suspended partway through due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Two months later the season remained in limbo, with a looming deadline to decide whether to attempt to complete the season or curtail it—and... View Details

Keywords: COVID-19 Pandemic; Sports; Health Pandemics; Decision Making; Fairness; Values and Beliefs; Business and Stakeholder Relations; Motivation and Incentives; Outcome or Result; Perception; Negotiation; Sports Industry; United Kingdom

August 2020
Teaching Note

Sesame Workshop (C): Mission Critical Responses to Global and National Crises

By: Rosabeth Moss Kanter and Joyce J. Kim

Teaching Note for Case No. 321-016. Beginning in March 2020, Sesame Workshop navigated a global pandemic, which caused unemployment, businesses shutdowns, school closures, and remote work environments along with a racial justice crisis, with a renewed mission that led... View Details

Keywords: Pandemic; Children; Health Pandemics; Social Issues; Crisis Management; Mission and Purpose; Education; Leadership; Education Industry; Media and Broadcasting Industry