Publications

14 Jul 2022
Research & Ideas

When the Rubber Meets the Road, Most Commuters Text and Email While Driving

sensors. Cars will likely become more automated over time as new technologies and features are introduced, the researchers note. "There is clearly a lot to do in car design, but perhaps even more broadly, to accommodate the fact that we... View Details

Keywords: by Jay Fitzgerald

01 Oct 2007
Research & Ideas

Encouraging Dissent in Decision-Making

can embrace these contradictions and make trade-offs to accommodate them. Adds Tushman, "Some groups 'exploit' and some 'explore,' and you don't want to mix them. The locus of these controversial issues is thus at the highest... View Details

Keywords: by Garry Emmons

October 2014 (Revised August 2018)
Case

Caesars Entertainment

By: Janice H. Hammond and Aldo Sesia

This case describes the introduction of a regression analysis model for forecasting guest arrivals to Caesars Palace hotel in Las Vegas, Nevada. The company will use the forecast to staff the front desk in the hotel. The staff is unionized and the company has little... View Details

Keywords: Forecasting; Staffing; Gaming; Gaming Industry; Hotel Industry; Decision Making; Forecasting and Prediction; Human Resources; Selection and Staffing; Entertainment; Games, Gaming, and Gambling; Operations; Service Delivery; Service Operations; Accommodations Industry; Accommodations Industry; Accommodations Industry; Accommodations Industry; Las Vegas

24 Jan 2005
Research & Ideas

Rethinking Activity-Based Costing

example, if the customer service department gets a new database system, the reps may be able to perform a standard credit check in 20 minutes rather than 50 minutes. To accommodate the improvement, just change the unit time estimate to 20... View Details

Keywords: by Robert S. Kaplan & Steven R. Anderson

29 Aug 2022
Op-Ed

Income Inequality Is Rising. Are We Even Measuring It Correctly?

inequality over time, researchers often use the Gini coefficient to capture the concentration of income in geographic locations. And in many cases, the Gini coefficient is a useful metric that accommodates such comparisons. However, the... View Details

Keywords: by Jon M. Jachimowicz, Kristin Blesch, and Oliver P. Hauser

20 Dec 2010
Research & Ideas

Panama Canal: Troubled History, Astounding Turnaround

maximum throughput in terms of the number of ships. Rather, the reason is that 35 percent of the planet's commercial shipping consists of ships too large to fit through the current locks, and Panama wants a piece of that business. The current locks measure 1,050' x... View Details

Keywords: by Sarah Jane Gilbert; Transportation

July 2017
Case

Centerbridge Partners and Great Wolf Resorts: Buying from a Highly Regarded Competitor

By: Josh Lerner, John D. Dionne and Amram Migdal

The case examines the March 2015 Centerbridge Partners investment decision regarding whether to acquire Great Wolf Resorts, a North American family-oriented indoor water parks and hotel operator, from a private equity (PE) competitor, Apollo Global Management. The case... View Details

Keywords: Private Equity Financing; Commercial Mortgage Backed Securities; CMBS; Secondary Buyouts; Business Ventures; Acquisition; Finance; Borrowing and Debt; Cost; Cost of Capital; Equity; Private Equity; Financial Instruments; Debt Securities; Accommodations Industry; Accommodations Industry; Accommodations Industry; North and Central America; United States

16 Jul 2020
Research & Ideas

Restaurant Revolution: How the Industry Is Fighting to Stay Alive

have shifted to takeout and delivery and enhanced their ability to accommodate curbside pickup and entryway handoff. Some developed takeout offerings of chef-prepared family style meals including wholly or partially prepared multi-meal... View Details

Keywords: by Michael S. Kaufman, Lena G. Goldberg, and Jill Avery; Food & Beverage

September 2017 (Revised November 2018)
Case

Marriott International: The Next 90 Years

By: Chiara Farronato and Gary Pisano

The case examines how Marriott should respond to the potential threats from new home-sharing platforms and the rise of online travel agencies. In 2017 Marriott was the largest hotel chain, with more than one million rooms and 7% of worldwide room supply. In the... View Details

16 Jun 2020
Research & Ideas

Your Customers Have Changed. Here's How to Engage Them Again.

closed a number of stores with less traffic to better enable deliveries to seniors, those with disabilities, and those in quarantine or self-isolation. Connect emotionally. To accommodate such demands, firms such as Deliveroo, Uber Eats,... View Details

Keywords: by Rohit Deshpandé, Ofer Mintz, and Imran S. Currim; Retail; Service

December 1993 (Revised April 2006)
Case

Marriott Corporation (A)

By: Lynn S. Paine and Charles A. Nichols

Marriott Corp.'s chairman and CEO must decide whether to recommend a restructuring of the company to the board of directors. The proposal he is considering would split the Marriott Corp., a premier hotel developer, owner, and manager, into two separate companies by a... View Details

Keywords: Business or Company Management; Restructuring; Governing and Advisory Boards; Decision Making; Ethics; Management Teams; Business and Shareholder Relations; Accommodations Industry

November 2010 (Revised April 2011)
Case

Aman Resorts

By: Eugene Soltes and Aldo Sesia

This case describes the operating model and philosophy of this high-end set of global properties. Aman relies on employees taking considerable initiative to deliver the highest quality personalized service in the hospitality industry. The case also highlights Aman's... View Details

Keywords: Business Model; Customer Focus and Relationships; Customer Satisfaction; Globalized Firms and Management; Employees; Service Delivery; Business Strategy; Accommodations Industry

September–October 2021
Article

Frontiers: Can an AI Algorithm Mitigate Racial Economic Inequality? An Analysis in the Context of Airbnb

By: Shunyuan Zhang, Nitin Mehta, Param Singh and Kannan Srinivasan

We study the effect of Airbnb’s smart-pricing algorithm on the racial disparity in the daily revenue earned by Airbnb hosts. Our empirical strategy exploits Airbnb’s introduction of the algorithm and its voluntary adoption by hosts as a quasi-natural experiment. Among... View Details

Keywords: Smart Pricing; Pricing Algorithm; Machine Bias; Discrimination; Racial Disparity; Social Inequality; Airbnb Revenue; Revenue; Race; Equality and Inequality; Prejudice and Bias; Price; Mathematical Methods; Accommodations Industry

SSRN

Find at Harvard

March 2008
Case

Shangri-La Hotels

By: Dennis Campbell and Brent Kazan

In November 2006, Symon Bridle, the newly appointed chief operating officer of Shangri-La Hotels and Resorts, was thinking about a number of organizational issues that presented challenges to Shangri-La's rapid expansion strategy. There were three major issues at hand:... View Details

Keywords: Employees; Growth and Development Strategy; Standards; Service Delivery; Organizational Culture; Accommodations Industry; China; Europe; North America

25 May 2021
Research & Ideas

White Airbnb Hosts Earn More. Can AI Shrink the Racial Gap?

White people who host rental properties on Airbnb earn significantly more per year than Black hosts, but a “race blind” pricing algorithm could help close that income gap, new research shows. Black hosts who rely on Airbnb’s algorithm to set enticing prices instead of... View Details

Keywords: by Lane Lambert; Accommodations; Accommodations

Research Summary

Overview

Over the last decade, technology companies like Amazon, Google, and Netflix have pioneered data-driven research and development processes centered on massive experimentation. However, as companies increase the breadth and scale of their experiments to millions of... View Details

18 Oct 2013
Working Paper Summaries

Monetary Policy Drivers of Bond and Equity Risks

Keywords: by John Y. Campbell, Carolin E. Pflueger & Luis M. Viceira

December 2002 (Revised January 2003)
Case

Four Seasons Goes to Paris: '53 Properties, 24 Countries, 1 Philosophy'

By: Roger H. Hallowell, David Bowen and Carin-Isabel Knoop

Illustrates how Four Seasons manages hotels in countries with strong and distinct national cultures. Focuses on how the chain meets its exacting service standards in a variety of settings worldwide, with special attention on France. View Details

Keywords: Service Delivery; Organizational Culture; Global Range; Global Strategy; Standards; Accommodations Industry; Paris

May 2016 (Revised September 2016)
Case

Hillside Beach Club: Delivering the Ultimate Family Vacation in the Mediterranean

By: Rajiv Lal and Gamze Yucaoglu

In 2015, Edip Ilkbahar, HBC’s founder and CEO, was looking over the plans for a new branch in Cyprus. Since the inception of the company by the Alarko Group of companies in 1994, Ilkbahar’s company had enjoyed high occupancy, high guest satisfaction, and high... View Details