Publications

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27 Oct 2008
Lessons from the Classroom

Achieving Excellence in Nonprofits

of the same form that are not social-mission-driven. Q: What are some of the critical issues facing nonprofit boards and their leaders today? A: The biggest challenge is keeping focused on key goals; developing a strategy for accomplishing them; and View Details

Keywords: by Sean Silverthorne

Article

Capture New Value from Your Existing Tech Infrastructure

By: Stefan Thomke and Anthony Rodrigo

When senior managers think about how to respond to the threats and opportunities of technological change, they often dream of the same thing: If they just could start a new company or division that isn’t held back by conventional thinking or outdated business models.... View Details

Keywords: Innovation; Technology; Ecosystem; Incubators; Technological Innovation; Telecommunications Industry; South Asia; Malaysia

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13 Dec 2014
News

The openness revolution

September 2002 (Revised March 2006)
Case

Environmental Power Corporation: Changing Manure Into Gold?

By: Ray A. Goldberg and Laure Mougeot Stroock

In 2002, Environmental Power Corp. (EPC), a small company developing renewable energy projects, was attempting to commercialize its "digester," a facility that extracted methane from manure, reduced manure's environmental impact, and generated electricity. The company... View Details

Keywords: Commercialization; Energy Generation; Renewable Energy; Environmental Sustainability; Investment; Projects; Wastes and Waste Processing; Corporate Finance; Business and Government Relations; Energy Industry

May 2024 (Revised April 2025)
Case

Leading Culture Change at Microsoft Western Europe

By: Amy C. Edmondson and Cat Huang

In 2023, Cindy Rose, President of Microsoft Western Europe, faced a critical decision. Rose grappled with the potential impact of widespread layoffs on psychological safety and the cultural transformation she had championed since her arrival. When Rose had first joined... View Details

Keywords: Leadership; Organizational Culture; Transformation; Collaborative Innovation and Invention; Job Cuts and Outsourcing; Problems and Challenges; Motivation and Incentives; Groups and Teams; Business or Company Management; Technology Industry; Europe

March 2011
Article

The New Path to the C-Suite

By: Boris Groysberg, L. Kevin Kelly and Bryan MacDonald

Job requirements at the top of corporations have changed. Companies have come to expect much more from their C-level executives, who need new and different skills to deal with today's business realities. Exactly what abilities do firms want in their leaders—now and in... View Details

Keywords: Experience and Expertise; Leadership; Management Skills; Personal Development and Career

Find at Harvard

30 Jul 2009
Working Paper Summaries

Fluid Teams and Fluid Tasks: The Impact of Team Familiarity and Variation in Experience

Keywords: by Robert S. Huckman & Bradley R. Staats; Video Game; Web Services

26 Sep 2011
HBS Case

HBS Cases: Lady Gaga

important for managers in the music industry to understand how to effectively manage touring." As is the way of HBS cases, Lady Gaga(A) ends with a cliff-hanger, laying out the manager's choices without... View Details

Keywords: by Carmen Nobel; Entertainment & Recreation; Music

2021
Working Paper

Supply- and Demand-Side Effects in Performance Appraisals: The Role of Gender and Race

By: Iris Bohnet, Oliver P. Hauser and Ariella Kristal

Performance reviews in firms are common but controversial. Managers’ subjective appraisals of their employees’ performance and employees’ self-evaluations might be affected by demographic characteristics, interact with each other as self-evaluations are typically... View Details

Keywords: Performance Appraisals; Gender; Race; Performance Evaluation

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2017
Working Paper

Knowledge Flows within Multinationals—Estimating Relative Influence of Headquarters and Host Context Using a Gravity Model

By: Prithwiraj Choudhury, Mike Horia Teodorescu and Tarun Khanna

From the perspective of a multinational subsidiary, we employ the classic gravity equation in economics to model and compare knowledge flows to the subsidiary from the MNC headquarters and from the host country context. We also generalize traditional economics gravity... View Details

Keywords: Multinationals; Knowledge Flows; Cosine Similarity; Gravity Model; Multinational Firms and Management; Knowledge Dissemination; Business Headquarters; Immigration

May 2019
Background Note

Developing Yourself as a Leader: A Framework for Millennial High Potentials & Emerging Leaders: How to PACE Your Self-Development

By: Ethan Bernstein and Kirstin Lynde

Millennials are redefining what it means to develop future leaders. In business organizations, leadership development—defined as “the expansion of a person's capacity to be effective in leadership roles and processes“—has traditionally been the work of corporate... View Details

Keywords: Talent and Talent Management; Human Resources; Leadership Development; Leadership Style; Leadership; Goals and Objectives; Management Skills; Management Style

May 2025
Case

'Net Zero in Action': Impact Investing at the McKnight Foundation

By: Lauren Cohen, Christina R. Wing and Sophia Pan

Elizabeth McGeveran, Vice President of Investments at the McKnight Foundation, reflected on how to effectively advance the organization’s net-zero strategy. The foundation had committed 10% of its endowment to building a portfolio of impact investments and was among... View Details

Research Summary

Informing Brand Marketing Practice

Susan M. Fournier is involved with several projects relating more generally to brand managment issues. These include boardroom-level projects (with Professors Thomas Madden and Franke Fehle of the University of South Carolina, and sponsored by Interbrand) on the... View Details

11 Apr 2007
Research & Ideas

Adding Time to Activity-Based Costing

generate increased profits. They provide the link between customer satisfaction and improved financial performance. Scorecard measures of the incidence of unprofitable customers and the magnitude of losses from unprofitable relationships... View Details

Keywords: by Sarah Jane Gilbert

Web

Employment Data

Finance 38% General Management 13% Marketing 11% Other 5% Strategic Planning 8% Locations United States: 88% Mid-Atlantic 5% Midwest 6% Northeast 49% South 5% Southwest 6% West 17% International: 12% Asia 5%... View Details

25 Jul 2005
Research & Ideas

Fool vs. Jerk: Whom Would You Hire?

jerk. Things got a lot more interesting, though, when people faced the choice between competent jerks and lovable fools. Ask managers about this choice—and we've asked many of them, both as part of our research and in executive education... View Details

Keywords: by Tiziana Casciaro & Miguel Sousa Lobo

March 2015 (Revised December 2016)
Case

Evans Food

By: Sunil Gupta

In April 2014, Hector Guerra (GMP 16) was discussing his company's dilemma with his living group of the General Management Program (GMP) at the Harvard Business School. Guerra was Vice President of Operations at Evans Food, a $100 million company, which produced pork... View Details

Keywords: Food; Production; Cost Management; Supply Chain; Retail Industry; Food and Beverage Industry; United States

February 2025
Case

Blue Owl Financing of Ping Identity

By: Victoria Ivashina and Srimayi Mylavarapu

In the fall of 2022, Blue Owl Capital's investment committee evaluated a potential investment in the technology sector. The proposed transaction centered on Ping Identity Corporation (“Ping”), a fast-growing identity access management (IAM) software company that was... View Details

Keywords: Mergers and Acquisitions; Borrowing and Debt; Cash Flow; Investment; Privatization; Financial Services Industry; Technology Industry