Publications

14 Nov 2017
First Look

New Research and Ideas: November 14, 2017

practical solutions to real-world problems. By redesigning both the rules that guide market transactions and the infrastructure that enables those transactions to take place, market designers can address a broad range of market failures. In this paper, we illustrate... View Details

Keywords: Carmen Nobel

December 2012
Case

Delwarca Software Remote Support Unit

By: Roy D. Shapiro and Paul E. Morrison

Delwarca Software provides business software to large corporate clients around the world. The firm serves customers who prefer to assemble corporate solutions using a combination of software programs from various suppliers rather than implementing a single enterprise... View Details

Keywords: Service Operations; Service Delivery; Mathematical Methods; Applications and Software; Problems and Challenges; Customer Satisfaction; Information Technology Industry

28 Oct 2008
First Look

First Look: October 28, 2008

important predictor of product performance, product variety, process flexibility and industry evolution. We explore this relationship in the software industry by use of a technique called Design Structure Matrices (DSMs), which allows us... View Details

Keywords: Martha Lagace

October 2004 (Revised November 2004)
Case

Mavens & Moguls: Creating a New Business Model

By: Myra M. Hart, Victoria Winston and Kristin Lieb

Mavens & Moguls is a "virtual" marketing-consulting firm of approximately 40 professionals. Examines the processes by which its founder, Paige Arnof-Fenn, learns the business, builds a power network of industry experts and potential customers, and uses this expertise... View Details

Keywords: Internet and the Web; Values and Beliefs; Work-Life Balance; Organizational Structure; Organizational Culture; Operations; Networks; Business Model; Growth Management; Business Growth and Maturation; Entrepreneurship; Growth and Development Strategy; Consulting Industry

Web

HBS - The year in Review

procession to Harvard Yard with Harvard University President, Lawrence Bacow. Afterward, graduates crossed the stage at HBS and celebrated with their families and friends. Commencement Press Release Dean’s Awards Four members of the HBS... View Details

06 May 2014
First Look

First Look: May 6

August 2013 Management Science The Impact of Corporate Sustainability on Organizational Processes and Performance By: Eccles, Robert G., Ioannis Ioannou, and George Serafeim Abstract—We investigate the effect of corporate sustainability... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

2012
Working Paper

Relational Contracts and Organizational Capabilities

By: R. Gibbons and R. Henderson

A large literature identifies unique organizational capabilities as a potent source of competitive advantage, yet our knowledge of why capabilities fail to diffuse more rapidly-particularly in situations in which competitors apparently have strong incentives to adopt... View Details

Keywords: Competitive Advantage; Motivation and Incentives; Management Practices and Processes; Contracts; Competency and Skills; Relationships; Complexity

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Web

Topics - HBS Working Knowledge

Model (23) Business Offices (4) Business Plan (2) Business Processes (4) Business Startups (39) Business Strategy (31) Business Units (1) Business Ventures (153) Business and Community Relations (8) Business and Government Relations (44)... View Details

November–December 2020
Article

Rethinking the On-Demand Workforce

By: Joseph B. Fuller, Manjari Raman, Allison Bailey and Nithya Vaduganathan

As companies struggle with chronic skills shortages and changing labor demographics, a new generation of talent platforms, offering on-demand access to highly trained workers, has begun to help. These platforms include marketplaces for premium expertise (such as Toptal... View Details

Keywords: Talent Acquisition; Platforms; Skilled Labor Recruitment; Gig Economy; Talent and Talent Management; Selection and Staffing; Internet and the Web; Strategy; Digital Platforms

Find at Harvard

January 2020
Case

Celata Bioinnovations

By: John R. Wells and Benjamin Weinstock

In December 2019, Jon Hu (HBS ‘19) and Dr. Samantha Dale Strasser, co-founders of Celata Bioinnovations, were raising $1 million to launch their company. They had founded Celata less than six months earlier with the aim of redefining the drug discovery process.... View Details

2023
Article

Evaluating Explainability for Graph Neural Networks

By: Chirag Agarwal, Owen Queen, Himabindu Lakkaraju and Marinka Zitnik

As explanations are increasingly used to understand the behavior of graph neural networks (GNNs), evaluating the quality and reliability of GNN explanations is crucial. However, assessing the quality of GNN explanations is challenging as existing graph datasets have no... View Details

Keywords: Analytics and Data Science

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August 2002 (Revised January 2003)
Case

Siebel Systems: Anatomy of a Sale, Part 1

By: John A. Deighton and Das Narayandas

How does a $2 million software sale happen? This case traces efforts by Siebel Systems to sell lead management software to discount broker Quick & Reilly. The buying process is mapped out over four years. Covers in detail the last six months—from Siebel's initial... View Details

Keywords: Leadership; Management Analysis, Tools, and Techniques; Marketing Strategy; Consumer Behavior; Organizational Structure; Behavior; Competition; Applications and Software; Technology Industry

October 1996 (Revised December 1996)
Case

United Electric Controls

By: H. Kent Bowen, Jody H. Gittell and Sylvie Ryckebusch

United Electric Controls (UE) was a small, traditional family-owned manufacturing company when Dave Reis, the youngest member of the Reis family, took over the business. This case describes Reis's efforts to change UE's traditional work practices in order to make the... View Details

Keywords: Change Management; Family Business; Production; Business Strategy; Human Resources; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Decisions; Growth and Development Strategy; Information Technology; Electronics Industry; Manufacturing Industry; United States

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18 Jul 2023
News

The First Five Years: Brooke Biederman (MBA 2019)

informs the development of the project. This has been tremendous fun for me the story idea for one of our most exciting children’s projects came from watching media M&A news on Squawk Box at the gym. We’re also nimble. When [Professor]... View Details

Keywords: Robert Bochnak

12 Aug 2008
First Look

First Look: August 12, 2008

309-003 The (B) case informs students of Fidelity's decision about pursuing a business process patent for its charitable gift fund and describes subsequent litigation and lawsuits filed by other companies... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

Web

2023 Reunion Presentations - Alumni

measure of company returns but are deeply flawed. We propose an alternative measure that isolates operational performance from financial engineering, titled Core Operating Shareholders Returns (COSRs). In the process of disentangling... View Details

May 2015
Case

Venture Republic, 2011

By: W. Carl Kester and Mayuka Yamazaki

In December 2011, the founders of Venture Republic, a Japanese developer and operator of on-line search engines for shopping and travel, faced a decison about whether or not to take the company private in a management buyout transaction just three years after an... View Details

Keywords: Management Buyout; MBO; Valuation Methodologies; Financing Decisions; Conflicts Of Interest; Governance; Japan; Search Engines; Going Private; Conflict of Interests; Internet and the Web; Valuation; Privatization; Financing and Loans; Corporate Governance; Web Services Industry; Japan

March 2023 (Revised January 2024)
Case

Deepa Bachu (A): Design Thinking at Pensaar Design

By: Thomas Graeber, Joshua Schwartzstein and Amram Migdal

In this case, set in June 2019 in Bangalore, Karnataka, India, Deepa Bachu of Pensaar Design and her team work with client ITC Ltd. to use design thinking and behavioral experiments to improve workplace safety and strive toward the company’s zero-accident goal. The... View Details