Small Business - Publications - Faculty & Research

14 Dec 2009
Research & Ideas

Can Entrepreneurs Drive People Movers to Success?

personal rapid transport, or PRT for short, has been percolating since the mid-1950s and is finally gaining ground, according to HBS professor Benjamin G. Edelman. Business and communities small and large... View Details

Keywords: by Martha Lagace; Transportation

16 Apr 2001
Research & Ideas

Depression or Euphoria? Navigating the Market’s Mood Swings

called a "true credit crunch," rendering capital scarce, new companies need to look more seriously at outsourcing. "Money was so easy [that small companies] could own and employ everything they need," he said. Instead,... View Details

Keywords: by Carrie Levine

26 Mar 2014
Research & Ideas

How Electronic Patient Records Can Slow Doctor Productivity

subtle way that you might be changing existing communication patterns among staff," says Harvard Business School Professor Robert S. Huckman, who recently cowrote The Impact of Electronic Health Record Use on Physician Productivity with... View Details

Keywords: by Dina Gerdeman; Health

August 2019 (Revised October 2019)
Case

Amandla Capital: Real Estate in Côte d‘Ivoire

By: John D. Macomber, Pippa Tubman Armerding and Dilyana Botha

This case describes Amandla Capital, a fledgling company in Cote d’Ivoire, facing three opportunities in the real estate and hospitality industries in Africa. It introduces students to several concepts: decision-making and cost-benefit analysis in real estate,... View Details

Keywords: Small Business; Decision Making; Decision Choices and Conditions; Cost vs Benefits; Finance; Assets; Asset Management; Investment Portfolio; Investment Return; Project Finance; Relationships

Citation

Educators

Purchase

16 Apr 2001
Research & Ideas

Angels Face the Innovator’s Dilemma

said. "There was financial protection in their business plan, that in the first year it would generate $10 million in revenue, in the second year $20 million, in the third year, $30 to $50 million. "And it was such a piddly... View Details

Keywords: by Martha Lagace; Financial Services

30 Jan 2019
What Do You Think?

Who Will Measure up to These Two Remarkable Leaders?

value for customers, and extraordinary returns to investors. Neither had extensive schooling in business administration. John Bogle earned a liberal arts degree from Princeton. Herb Kelleher received his from Wesleyan, with majors in... View Details

Keywords: by James Heskett; Air Transportation; Financial Services

12 Jun 2019
Research & Ideas

Investors Have More Than Money to Offer Entrepreneurs

Conversely, I’ve heard investors say they wish the leaders of their portfolio companies would be more transparent about challenges they are facing and ask for help. As one investor said to me, “They already sold me on the business and... View Details

Keywords: by Julia Austin

20 Aug 2014
Research & Ideas

Dragging Patent Trolls Into the Light

place for original work.) If it weren't for NPEs, the argument goes, resource-rich companies would be free to steal ideas of small inventors without fearing retaliatory lawsuits—and this would poison the View Details

Keywords: by Michael Blanding; Legal Services

10 Apr 2019
HBS Case

How Entrepreneurs Can Turn Lead Into Gold

writer based in the Boston area. Image credit: Gremlin Related Reading: Venture Investors Prefer Funding Handsome Men Amazon Web Services Changed the Way VCs Fund Startups Fintech's Game-Changing Opportunities for Small View Details

Keywords: by Michael Blanding; Financial Services

10 Feb 2015
First Look

First Look: February 10

into group processes, study diversity in the context of virtual interaction, and take advantage of opportunities for cross-disciplinary research. February 2015 European Business Review Preparing for Uncertainty: How to Use Creaction at... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

22 Feb 2016
Research & Ideas

The ‘Mother of Fair Trade’ was an Unabashed Price Protectionist

small businesses like her own, succeeded in pushing the boundaries of antitrust legislation. Edna Gleason, known as the “Mother of Fair Trade.” Courtesy of the journal Pharmacy in History. The photo first... View Details

Keywords: by Dina Gerdeman; Retail; Health; Legal Services

03 Mar 2014
HBS Case

Decommoditizing the Canned Tomato

of the Case Research and Writing Group. “No one believed that you could create a brand in tomatoes—a commodity!” The case details how, during an economic downturn, a small business in its fourth generation... View Details

Keywords: by Maggie Starvish; Agriculture & Agribusiness; Food & Beverage; Retail

27 Oct 2014
Research & Ideas

The Coffee Economy That Bloomed Out of Nowhere

another 30 years," says Lurtz, the Harvard-Newcomen Fellow at Harvard Business School. "How do you build these institutions that you need for market agriculture in a place where maybe there are laws on the books, but there's not much... View Details

Keywords: by Carmen Nobel; Food & Beverage; Agriculture & Agribusiness

14 Nov 2005
Research & Ideas

How Can Start Ups Grow?

those one-out-of-ten firms grow into successful, sustained enterprises? Assistant professor Mukti Khaire believes that small companies can grow by developing intangible social resources such as legitimacy, status, and reputation. In an... View Details

Keywords: by Sarah Jane Gilbert; Advertising

17 Oct 2007
Research & Ideas

Why Global Brands Work

Harvard Business School professor John Quelch writes a blog on marketing issues, called Marketing Know: How, for Harvard Business Online. It is reprinted on HBS Working Knowledge.Ford has finally woken up to... View Details

Keywords: by John A. Quelch; Auto

11 Oct 2022
Research & Ideas

Shrinking the Racial Wealth Gap, One Mortgage at a Time

minority borrowers,” they write. The findings also imply there may be similar disparities with other types of borrowing, such as small business loans, Sunderam says. However, there’s less data available to... View Details

Keywords: by Rachel Layne; Financial Services

10 May 2017
Research & Ideas

Amazon Web Services Changed the Way VCs Fund Startups

to recent research. Enter the era of “spray and pray,” where venture firms over the last decade have seeded more firms than previously, but with less upfront investment of time and money. As someone who teaches entrepreneurial finance, Harvard View Details

Keywords: by Michael Blanding; Banking; Financial Services; Information Technology

30 Jun 2020
Book

Capitalism Is More at Risk Than Ever

but the budgeting systems of well-run companies can easily cut off support for programs very early that are going nowhere. Lagace: Is there a role for entrepreneurs and small businesses in particular? Bower... View Details

Keywords: by Martha Lagace

April 2025
Case

Giving Up on a Passion: Elizabeth Rowe at the Boston Symphony Orchestra

By: Jon M. Jachimowicz, Maisie Wiltshire-Gordon and Alexis Lefort

For 20 years, Elizabeth Rowe was a world-renowned principal flutist with the Boston Symphony Orchestra. But in 2024, Rowe decided to leave her position to pursue a new full-time career as a leadership coach. At 50, Rowe was well under the typical retirement age, and,... View Details