Publications
Publications
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- All HBS Web
(776)
- Faculty Publications (203)
- 2010
- Chapter
Understanding and Coping with the Increasing Risk of System-Level Accidents
By: Dutch Leonard and Arnold M. Howitt
The world has seen a number of recent events in which major systems came to a standstill, not from one cause alone but from the interaction of a combination of causes. System-level accidents occur when anomalies or errors in different parts of an interconnected system... View Details
- 2009
- Other Paper
Trade Policy and Firm Boundaries
By: Laura Alfaro, Paola Conconi, Andrew F. Newman and Harald Fadinger
We examine how trade policy affects firms' organizational choices. We embed a model of firms' vertical integration decisions into a standard perfectly-competitive international trade framework. In the model, integration decisions are driven by a trade-off... View Details
- September 2009
- Article
Are You Having Trouble Keeping Your Operations Focused?
As a business broadens over time, it can lose the operational edge that led to its original success. Core strengths atrophy, efficiency or quality suffers, and sharper rivals close in to take advantage of the loss of focus. In his classic article "The Focused Factory"... View Details
- 1 Aug 2009
- Conference Presentation
Modularity for Value Appropriation - Drawing the Boundaries of Intellectual Property
Keywords: Value
- 1 Jul 2009
- Conference Presentation
Modularity for Value Appropriation - Drawing the Boundaries of Intellectual Property
- May 2009
- Case
Tokyo Electron Ltd.
By: Willy C. Shih and Andrew A. King
Tokyo Electron Ltd. operates in a constrained innovation environment, defined by modular boundaries that are long standing in the industry that it serves, the global semiconductor manufacturing industry. While the original motivation for these boundaries was division... View Details
- 2009
- Chapter
Collaboration Across Knowledge Boundaries within Diverse Teams: Reciprocal Expertise Affirmation as an Enabling Condition
By: Amy C. Edmondson, Kate Roloff and Lucy H. MacPhail
We review research on expertise diversity, psychological safety, team collaboration, and role identity to propose a model in which reciprocal affirmations of expertise identity among team members—a feature of the team environment that we conceptualize as a dimension of... View Details
- 1 Feb 2009
- Conference Presentation
Where Do Transactions Come From? Modularity, Transactions and the Boundaries of Firms
Keywords: Business Ventures
- 2009
- Working Paper
Virtual Team Learning: Reflecting and Acting, Alone or With Others
By: Deborah L. Soule and Lynda M. Applegate
This paper examines virtual team learning in new product development situations. New product development activities manifest novelty, uncertainty and complexity, presenting an extreme need for learning in the course of the work. We present data from an exploratory... View Details
- Article
Milestones in Marketing
By: John A. Quelch and Katherine Jocz
Marketing flourished in U.S. business schools in the prosperous years following World War II. Students preparing for assistant-product-manager positions at the likes of Procter & Gamble, Lever, and General Foods enrolled in courses in marketing management, management... View Details
- 2008
- Working Paper
The Sciences of Design: Observations on an Emerging Field
By: Sandeep Purao, Carliss Y. Baldwin, Alan Hevner, Veda C. Storey, Jan Pries-Heje, Brian Smith and Ying Zhu
The boundaries and contours of design sciences continue to undergo definition and refinement. In many ways, the sciences of design defy disciplinary characterization. They demand multiple epistemologies, theoretical orientations (e.g. construction, analysis or... View Details
- 2008
- Working Paper
Communication (and Coordination?) in a Modern, Complex Organization
By: Adam M. Kleinbaum, Toby E. Stuart and Michael L. Tushman
This is a descriptive study of the structure of communications in a modern organization. We analyze a dataset with millions of electronic mail messages, calendar meetings and teleconferences for many thousands of employees of a single, multidivisional firm during a... View Details
- June 2008
- Case
System on a Chip 2008: Global Unichip Corp.
By: Willy C. Shih, Chintay Shih, Chen-Fu Chien and Yuan-Chieh Chang
Though much of the semiconductor industry has shifted to a horizontal model, complexity driven by technological evolution is driving a shift in the perceived boundaries in the value chain. Global Unichip sees itself as a "virtual integrated device manufacturer," a... View Details
- May 2008
- Case
Thomas Green: Power, Office Politics and a Career in Crisis
By: W. Earl Sasser Jr. and Heather Beckham
The case describes the dilemma of a marketing manager, Thomas Green, who, after being rapidly promoted, is harshly criticized by his boss, Frank Davis. Green and Davis disagree on work styles and market projections. Green believes the sales goals set by Davis are based... View Details
- 2008
- Case
Thomas Green:Power, Office Politics and a Career in Crisis
By: W. Earl Sasser
The case describes the dilemma of a marketing manager, Thomas Green, who, after being rapidly promoted, is harshly criticized by his boss, Frank Davis. Green and Davis disagree on work styles and market projections. Green believes the sales goals set by Davis are based... View Details
- 2008
- Working Paper
Structural Closure and Exposure: Market Reactions to Announcements of Acquisitions and Divestitures
By: Mikolaj Jan Piskorski and Nitin Nohria
This paper develops an exchange-network perspective on corporate diversification and proposes two measures of corporate scope: structural closure and structural exposure. Structural closure focuses on exchanges of goods and services inside the firm... View Details
- February 2008 (Revised November 2008)
- Case
Radical Collaboration: IBM Microelectronics Joint Development Alliances
By: Willy Shih, Gary Pisano and Andrew A. King
IBM's "Radical Collaboration" model has been an innovative approach to meeting the challenges of the huge R&D and capital investments that are needed to stay competitive in the global semiconductor industry. This model has required a rethinking of what is proprietary,... View Details
- 14 Feb 2008
- Conference Presentation
Where Do Transactions Come From? Modularity, Transactions and the Boundaries of Firms
Keywords: Market Transactions
- February 2008
- Article
Where Do Transactions Come From? Modularity, Transactions, and the Boundaries of Firms
This article constructs a theory of the location of transactions and the boundaries of firms in a productive system. It proposes that systems of production can be viewed as networks, in which tasks-cum-agents are the nodes and transfers—of material, energy and... View Details