Publications

October 2018 (Revised July 2023)
Case

The Boston Beer Company (A): New CEO

By: Christina R. Wing and Marco Iansiti

In 1984, when the Boston Beer Company’s Samuel Adams Boston Lager was first sold, founder Jim Koch had helped ignite a craft beer movement by making small-batch premium beers in an era of industry consolidation. By 2018, Boston Beer was a publicly traded company that... View Details

Keywords: Beer/brewing Industry; Succession; Leadership; Change; Supply Chain; Change Management; Entrepreneurship; Supply Chain Management; Management Succession; Food and Beverage Industry; United States; Boston

01 Jul 2015
Research & Ideas

A Bank That Takes Parmesan as Collateral: The Cheese Stands a Loan

how the bank essentially replaces an expensive part of the operations process for dairy farmers in the Emilia Romagna region of Northern Italy. Besides holding the cheese as insurance, Credem stores and ages... View Details

Keywords: by Carmen Nobel; Banking; Banking

June 2025
Article

What Board-level Control Mechanisms Changed in Banks Following the 2008 Financial Crisis? A Descriptive Study

By: Shelly Li, Shivram Rajgopal, Suraj Srinivasan and Yu Ting Forester Wong

Following the 2008 financial crisis, the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission (FCIC) identified major shortcomings in bank board governance, contributing to systemic risk management failures. This study adapts a management control framework and empirically examines... View Details

Keywords: Board Of Directors; Management Control; Governing and Advisory Boards; Governance Controls; Risk Management; Change Management; Banks and Banking; Financial Crisis

SSRN

Read Now

18 Apr 2023
Research & Ideas

What Happens When Banks Ditch Coal: The Impact Is 'More Than Anyone Thought'

Consumers who are eager to mitigate climate change can take many actions, such as reducing the number of airline flights they take or installing solar panels on their homes. But the planet is in a race against time, and individual action alone won’t help most countries... View Details

Keywords: by Barbara DeLollis; Financial Services; Mining

March 2007
Article

Local Company Politics: A Proposal

By: Raymond Fisman and Eric D. Werker

Corrupt politicians, and poor government more generally, are commonly viewed as a primary barrier to economic progress. The roots to these problems run deep in many political systems across the developing world, and attempts at reform have rarely found much success.... View Details

Keywords: Behavior

Read Now

2018
Working Paper

Bank Risk-Taking and the Real Economy: Evidence from the Housing Boom and Its Aftermath

By: Antonio Falato, Giovanni Favara and David Scharfstein

The short-termism of lenders amplifies boom-bust credit cycles, leading in turn to real costs for the aggregate economy. During the U.S. housing credit boom, publicly-traded banks increased mortgage lending activity and relaxed standards much more than privately-held... View Details

Keywords: Risk and Uncertainty; Financial Markets; Investment; Corporate Finance; Banks and Banking

Read Now

20 Jan 2014
Research & Ideas

Language Wars Divide Global Companies

As global companies increasingly adopt a dominant language, usually English, which all employees must use to simplify communications and increase collaboration, many are dismayed to find an unexpected outcome. Results are exactly opposite... View Details

Keywords: by Kim Girard

July–August 2023
Article

What Smart Companies Know About Integrating AI

By: Silvio Palumbo and David Edelman

AI has the power to gather, analyze, and utilize enormous volumes of individual customer data to achieve precision and scale in personalization. The experiences of Mercury Financial, CVS Health, and Starbucks debunk the prevailing notion that extracting value from AI... View Details

Keywords: AI and Machine Learning; Customization and Personalization; Integration; Technology Adoption

Register to Read

01 Jun 2017
Cold Call Podcast

Building India’s First $100 Billion Company

Keywords: Re: Sunil Gupta; Banking; Banking

February 1999 (Revised March 2004)
Case

QI-TECH: A Chinese Technology Company for Sale

QI-TECH, is a Chinese manufacturer of precision coordinate measurement machines. A foreign investor who holds 50% of QI-TECH must negotiate a sale with its Chinese partner and a potential buyer (a large Western measurement machine company). For this purpose the foreign... View Details

Keywords: Machinery and Machining; Negotiation; Valuation; Joint Ventures; Financing and Loans; Manufacturing Industry; China

02 Aug 2021
What Do You Think?

Can Companies with Remote Management Succeed?

idiosyncratic to one organization? All banks operating in a conventional format? All companies relying heavily on collaborative work? All companies with great cultures? Or is... View Details

Keywords: by James Heskett

January 1997 (Revised November 1997)
Case

Fojtasek Companies and Heritage Partners, The: March 1995

By: Samuel L. Hayes III and Josh Lerner

The Fojtasek Companies, a family business, faces several financing choices to address generational succession issues. Several buyouts have expressed interest in acquiring the firm outright; an investment bank has proposed a leveraged recapitalization; and a private... View Details

Keywords: Family Ownership; Financing and Loans; Private Equity; Mergers and Acquisitions; Investment Banking; Partners and Partnerships; Management Succession; Capital Structure; Financial Strategy

October 2015
Article

How Smart, Connected Products Are Transforming Companies

By: Michael E. Porter and James E. Heppelmann

The evolution of products into intelligent, connected devices is revolutionizing business. In a November 2014 article, "How Smart, Connected Products Are Transforming Competition," Harvard Business School professor Michael Porter and PTC president and CEO James... View Details

Keywords: Organizational Change and Adaptation; Technological Innovation; Information Technology; Organizational Structure; Operations; Business Strategy

Register to Read

2000
Chapter

Value Creation and Process Management: Evidence from Retail Banking

By: Frances X. Frei and Patrick T. Harker

Keywords: Value Creation; Business Processes; Business or Company Management; Commercial Banking; Banking Industry

December 2000 (Revised April 2006)
Case

Promise (A): Building a Consumer Finance Company in Japan

Describes Promise, the third-largest consumer finance company in Japan. Promise was created in 1963 by an entrepreneur and has grown rapidly, especially in the 1990s when commercial banks struggled. Promise's core business consists of providing unsecured loans of up to... View Details

Keywords: Capital Structure; Entrepreneurship; Financial Institutions; Financial Services Industry; Japan

18 Jun 2024
Research & Ideas

Central Banks Missed Inflation Red Flags. This Pricing Model Could Help.

It’s no secret the Federal Reserve and other central banks weren’t prepared for the swift, steep curve of inflation’s climb after COVID-19 snarled supply chains in 2021 and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine sent energy prices soaring in 2022.... View Details

Keywords: by Rachel Layne; Banking; Banking

December 2018
Case

CIR Group: Passing Wealth through the Generations

By: Lauren Cohen, Christopher J. Malloy and Elena Corsi

Rodolfo, Marco, and Edoardo De Benedetti had received from their father his controlling shares in COFIDE, a publicly listed holding company that held 45.8% of CIR Group, another publicly listed holding. The latter held majority shares in GEDI, Italy’s largest print... View Details

Keywords: Succession Planning; Transferring Shares; Wealth Management; Holding Structures; Family Ownership; Ownership Stake; Management Succession; Governing and Advisory Boards; Policy; Media and Broadcasting Industry; Health Industry; Italy

2022
Book

Deep Purpose: The Heart and Soul of High-Performance Companies

By: Ranjay Gulati

This book offers a compelling reassessment and defense of purpose as a management ethos, documenting the vast performance gains and social benefits that become possible when firms manage to get purpose right. Few business topics have aroused more skepticism in recent... View Details

Keywords: Purpose; Business And Society; Organizations; Mission and Purpose; Performance Effectiveness; Organizational Culture