Publications

September 2006 (Revised October 2007)
Case

Shinsei Bank: Developing an Integrated Firm

By: Thomas J. DeLong and Masako Egawa

Tom Pedersen, newly appointed chief learning officer (CLO) of Shinsei Bank in Japan, pondered how he could facilitate development of an integrated culture and transformation of the organization. Shinsei Bank had not developed longstanding tradition or a strong... View Details

Keywords: Integration; Mission and Purpose; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Talent and Talent Management; Organizational Culture; Performance Evaluation; Cooperation; Diversity; Japan

Educators

03 Apr 2019
Working Paper Summaries

Learning or Playing? The Effect of Gamified Training on Performance

Keywords: by Ryan W. Buell, Wei Cai, and Tatiana Sandino

20 Mar 2012
Working Paper Summaries

The Stock Selection and Performance of Buy-Side Analysts

Keywords: by Boris Groysberg, Paul Healy, George Serafeim, Devin Shanthikumar & Gui Yang; Financial Services

June 2012
Article

A Reexamination of Tunneling and Business Groups: New Data and New Methods

By: Jordan I. Siegel and Prithwiraj Choudhury

One of the most rigorous methodologies in the corporate governance literature uses firms' reactions to industry shocks to characterize the quality of governance. This methodology can produce the wrong answer unless one considers the ways firms compete. Because... View Details

Keywords: Corporate Governance; Mergers And Acquisitions; Business Economics; Firm Organization; Firm Performance; Groups and Teams; Analytics and Data Science

May 2008 (Revised May 2010)
Background Note

Organizational Alignment, Performance, and Change in Professional Service Firms

By: John J. Gabarro

This note describes the relationship between organizational alignment and performance in professional service firms and how to use McKinsey 7S Alignment to diagnose a firm's or practice's alignment, identify misalignments and determine how to bring about the changes... View Details

Keywords: Organizations; Alignment; Performance; Change; Service Industry

Educators

14 Dec 2011
Research & Ideas

The New Measures for Improving Nonprofit Performance

How can nonprofit leaders address such conflicting demands? Harvard Business School Working Knowledge recently spoke with two leaders in the field of nonprofit performance management. Mario Morino is cofounder and chairman of Venture... View Details

Keywords: by Julia Hanna

21 Nov 2011
Lessons from the Classroom

The New Challenge of Leading Financial Firms

acquisition, development, and retention is a key topic for financial firms that Groysberg raises in his new book, Chasing Stars: the fact that stars often suffer a decrease in performance when they move from... View Details

Keywords: by Carmen Nobel; Financial Services

9 May 2011 - 11 May 2011
Conference Presentation

How Firms Respond to Mandatory Information Disclosure

By: Anil Doshi, Michael Toffel and Glen W. S. Dowell

When new institutional pressures arise, which organizations are particularly likely to resist or acquiesce? When subjected to new information disclosure mandates, an increasingly popular form of market-based government regulation, which types of organizations are... View Details

Keywords: Corporate Disclosure; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Environmental Regulation; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Organizational Change and Adaptation

July 2004
Article

Determinants of Control System Design in Divisionalized Firms

By: Margaret A. Abernethy, Jan Bouwens and Laurence van Lent

We investigate two determinants of two choices in the control system of divisionalized firms, namely decentralization and use of performance measures. The two determinants are those identified in the literature as important to control system design: (1) information... View Details

Keywords: Design; Organizational Design; Business Divisions; Management Systems; Performance Evaluation

2013
Working Paper

Entrepreneurs, Firms and Global Wealth since 1850

By: G. Jones

This working paper integrates the role of entrepreneurship and firms into debates on why Asia, Latin America and Africa were slow to catch up with the West following the Industrial Revolution and the advent of modern economic growth. It argues that the currently... View Details

SSRN

2014
Working Paper

Profits and Economic Development

By: Dan Schwab and Eric Werker

Are rents, or excess profits, good for development? Using industry-level manufacturing data, this paper demonstrates a negative effect of rents, measured by the mark-up ratio, on productivity growth. The negative effect is strongest in poor countries, suggesting that... View Details

Keywords: Firm Performance; Rent; Mark-up; Competition; Manufacturing; Development Economics; Profit; Economic Growth; Renting or Rental

SSRN

Research Summary

Firm Performance, Senior Management, and Managerial Representation

While my work on strategic human capital studies how the characteristics of management shape performance, this work in effect focuses on the reverse: how performance shapes a key characteristic of the firm's management

Working with Professor David Thomas,... View Details

14 Nov 2011
Working Paper Summaries

The Impact of Corporate Sustainability on Organizational Process and Performance

Keywords: by Robert G. Eccles, Ioannis Ioannou & George Serafeim; Accounting

November 2016 (Revised April 2018)
Case

Darby's Investment in Sirma: Professionalizing an Entrepreneurial Firm

By: Suraj Srinivasan and Eren Kuzucu

In March 2010, Burak Dalgın (HBS MBA 2004) led private equity firm Darby's investment in Sırma, a local Turkish water and beverage company. Sırma was owned and managed by members of two Turkish business families. The existing management, while being highly... View Details

Keywords: Control Systems; Variance Analysis; Emerging Markets; Debt; Family Ownership; Turkey; Valuation; Business or Company Management; Private Equity; Financial Reporting; Investment; Budgets and Budgeting; Food and Beverage Industry; Turkey

Educators

January 2021
Article

Turbulence, Firm Decentralization and Growth in Bad Times

By: Philippe Aghion, Nicholas Bloom, Brian Lucking, Raffaella Sadun and John Van Reenen

What is the optimal form of firm organization during “bad times”? We present a model of delegation within the firm to show that the effect is ambiguous. The greater turbulence following macro shocks may benefit decentralized firms because the value of local information... View Details

Keywords: Decentralization; Growth; Turbulence; Great Recession; Organizational Design; System Shocks; Economic Growth; Performance

29 Apr 2014
Working Paper Summaries

Comparing the Cash Policies of Public and Private Firms

Keywords: by Joan Farre-Mensa

April 2018
Article

Consumers Avoid Buying from Firms with Higher CEO-to-Worker Pay Ratios

By: Bhavya Mohan, Tobias Schlager, Rohit Deshpandé and Michael I. Norton

We document a novel driver of consumer behavior: pay ratio disclosure. Swiss corporation performance data gathered during a legally mandated pay ratio referendum reveals that salient high pay ratios are associated with decreased firm sales (Pilot Study). An... View Details

Keywords: Pay Ratio; Wage Fairness; Purchase Intention; Customers; Wages; Fairness; Consumer Behavior