Publications
Publications
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- All HBS Web
(1,114)
- Faculty Publications (122)
- February 2003 (Revised August 2004)
- Case
Flextronics: Deciding on a Shop Floor System for Producing the Microsoft Xbox
By: Jeffrey T. Polzer and Alison Berkley Wagonfeld
Jim McCusker must guide a group decision-making process aimed at getting input and buy-in from key people in California, Mexico, and Austria to choose a shop floor IT system for Flextronics. McCusker is Flextronics' account manager for the Microsoft Xbox project.... View Details
- November 2002 (Revised May 2003)
- Case
Epicentric
Describes a set of decisions confronting the management of a software company that sells portal management tools to large companies. Management must raise additional funds under difficult circumstances. View Details
- September 2002 (Revised October 2002)
- Case
Managing Knowledge and Learning at NASA and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL)
By: Dorothy A. Leonard and David Kiron
Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) faces a serious loss of knowledge--both because of the "faster, better, cheaper" mandate for Mars missions and from the retirement of key personnel. An extensive knowledge management system for NASA/JPL includes formal knowledge-capture... View Details
- July 2002 (Revised December 2002)
- Case
Mercer Management Consulting (A)
By: Thomas J. DeLong and Michael Echenberg
Insurance giant Marsh & McLennan acquires management consulting firms Temple, Barker & Sloane (TBS) in 1987 and Strategic Planning Associates (SPA) in 1990 and sets out to merge the two. The merger proceeds slowly and painfully. Following the February 1990 merger,... View Details
- May 2002 (Revised October 2002)
- Case
Dell--New Horizons
By: V. Kasturi Rangan and Marie Bell
Founded in 1984, Dell Corp. has achieved phenomenal growth, and by 2000 had topped $25 billion in sales and over $2 billion in net income. In the 4th quarter of 2000, however, the PC industry's average 30-year growth rate crashed to a negative 10%. Dell must make... View Details
- December 2001
- Case
SinoSecurities.com
By: F. Warren McFarlan and Fred Young
Describes a complex software project that has run into difficulties. Students must decide whether to press forward, stop the project, or reconfigure it. Illustrates many of the similarities to challenges facing U.S. and Chinese companies in this difficult arena. View Details
- October 2001 (Revised March 2008)
- Case
Anagene, Inc.
By: Robert S. Kaplan and Christina L. Darwall
An entrepreneurial, publicly traded biotech company has begun production and sales of its core product--cartridges that permit DNA samples to be analyzed on a microchip. In the early quarters, sales are difficult to forecast and the company has experienced fluctuating... View Details
- March 2001 (Revised April 2002)
- Case
Ginzel et al v. Kolcraft Enterprises et al (A)
Examines the wrongful death lawsuit brought by the family of an infant who died after a portable crib collapsed. The manufacturer, Kolcraft, licensed the Playskool brand name from the co-defendant, Hasbro Industries. Raises difficult questions about what the two... View Details
- December 1999 (Revised October 2003)
- Case
BRL Hardy: Globalizing an Australian Wine Company
Two new product launch decisions face Christopher Carson, managing director of BRL Hardy, Europe. Responsible for the European operations of a major Australian wine company, Carson has begun to globalize his strategy beyond selling the parent company's wines. After a... View Details
- December 1999
- Case
Sendwine.com
By: Thomas R. Eisenmann, Charmaine C Ess and Ann A. O'Hara
Sendwine.com, an online retailer of premium gifts of wine by the bottle, faced decisions about its growth strategy in mid-1999. Mike Lannon, president and founder, had established his company as a prominent player in an increasingly crowded field. But with success came... View Details
- October 1998 (Revised January 1999)
- Case
Echlin vs. SPX
By: Paul M. Healy, Bjorn N. Jorgensen and Penny Joseph
Echlin has received a hostile takeover offer from SPX. Both companies have been undertaking major restructurings, and Echlin's shareholders face a difficult decision of whether to support current management or sell out to SPX. Students are asked to analyze the two... View Details
- 1998
- Working Paper
Some Evidence on the Optimal Welfare State Based on Subjective Data
By: Rafael Di Tella and Robert MacCulloch
It is often difficult to evaluate all the costs and benefits of the welfare state. This paper suggests an alternative approach based on surveys of citizen satisfaction with welfare programs. In the first part of the paper we estimate the level of unemployment benefits... View Details
- September 1996 (Revised July 1997)
- Case
Grupo Sidek (A)
By: Kenneth A. Froot and Alberto Moel
A large Mexican conglomerate, active in tourism, real estate, and steel, is faced with difficult macroeconomic conditions beginning with the Peso crisis of December 1994. The conglomerate had extensive dollar-indexed liabilities and was caught in a crunch when the... View Details
- May 1996 (Revised March 1998)
- Case
SaleSoft, Inc. (A)
By: Das Narayandas
SaleSoft, a start-up firm, markets Comprehensive Sales Automation Solutions (CSAS) that automate a firm's sales, marketing, and service functions. Even though the product has received very favorable responses from prospects, product complexity and a long buying cycle... View Details
- December 1994 (Revised May 1999)
- Case
3M Optical Systems: Managing Corporate Entrepreneurship
By: Christopher A. Bartlett and Afroze A Mohammed
A middle-level division manager must decide whether he should support an investment request for a third attempt at launching a new product developed by a struggling business unit. Describes the long, difficult process by which the unit has developed the product--a... View Details
- September 1994 (Revised January 1997)
- Case
This Case Sucks: Beavis, Butt-head, and TV Content (A)
By: Joseph L. Badaracco Jr. and Jerry Useem
Beginning in 1992, "Beavis and Butt-head," an animated series on MTV about two uncivilized teenaged misfits, became both a runaway popular sensation and the symbol of a heated national debate about violent and inappropriate programming on television. Especially after... View Details
- May 1993 (Revised January 1994)
- Case
Cummins Engine Company, The: Starting Up "B" Crankshaft Manufacturing at the San Luis Potosi Plant
By: Robert H. Hayes
Cummins Engine Co. is starting up production of diesel engine crankshafts in its plant in central Mexico. This operation requires much tighter tolerances than any product previously produced at the plant, and the young (recent MBA) manager who is in charge of the... View Details
- June 1990 (Revised October 1991)
- Case
Lake Pleasant Bodies Case (A)
Presents a classic dilemma in legal ethics--the conflict between an attorney's obligations as an attorney, in this case to protect a client's confidentiality, and his or her own moral obligations as a person. An attorney must decide how to respond to the father of a... View Details
- December 1987 (Revised May 1991)
- Case
One Leather Street
By: William J. Poorvu and Jeffrey A. Libert
Presents a problem involving rehabilitating a small office building in Boston. Describes an investment decision which is knowingly underfunded. As construction proceeds, the developer realizes that it is not up to building code and faces difficult business and ethical... View Details
- July 1977
- Article
Social Roles, Social Control and Biases in Social Perception Processes
By: L. D. Ross, T. M. Amabile and J. Steinmetz
To make accurate social judgments, an individual must both recognize and adequately correct for the self-presentation advantages or disadvantages conferred upon actors by their social roles. Two experiments using 120 undergraduates examined social perceptions formed... View Details