Publications

Article

You Can't Always Get What You Want: The Real Exchange Rate and Manufacturing Performance in a World of Global Value Chains

By: Laura Alfaro, Alejandro Cuñat, Harald Fadinger and Yanping Liu

Real exchange rate devaluations are typically seen as a viable development strategy, but the effectiveness of the approach may vary over time and across countries. This column explores this issue by focusing on the microeconomics of firm-level responses to exchange... View Details

Keywords: Manufacturing Performance; Real Exchange Rate; Global Value Chains; Economics; Production; Performance

Read Now

January 1982 (Revised November 1982)
Case

General Foods: Productivity Measurement Program

By: Robert H. Hayes and Kim B. Clark

Keywords: Performance Productivity; Performance Improvement; Strategy; Food and Beverage Industry

06 Jan 2020
Research & Ideas

Motivate Your High Performers to Share Their Knowledge

Many employees fall into a rut. They do their jobs and respond to challenges in a set way to deliver stable results. But consistency can give way to performance gaps between a company’s high achievers and its weakest links. Fortunately,... View Details

Keywords: by Michael Blanding

08 Jan 2014
What Do You Think?

Do Productivity Increases Contribute to Social Inequality?

Summing Up Does Social Equality Improve Productivity? Inequality in our society is an important and growing issue. It prompted a debate among respondents to this month's column about the causes, specifically the role played by innovation leading to increased View Details

Keywords: by James Heskett

October 1992 (Revised December 1997)
Case

Sterling Chemicals, Inc.: Quality and Productivity Improvement Program

Describes the design and implemenation of a quality improvement program. Sterling Chemical's management hoped the program would improve teamwork and productivity at the plant. View Details

Keywords: Quality; Groups and Teams; Performance Productivity; Performance Improvement; Chemical Industry

Web

Product Management - Course Catalog

vision? Pursuing Adjacent Products. How to find a new product adjacency? How to develop a MVP for a new product adjacency? How to shut down a poor performing View Details

April 2021
Article

Work-From-Anywhere: The Productivity Effects of Geographical Flexibility

By: Prithwiraj Choudhury, Cirrus Foroughi and Barbara Larson

An emerging form of remote work allows employees to work-from-anywhere, so that the worker can choose to live in a preferred geographic location. While traditional work-from-home (WFH) programs offer the worker temporal flexibility, work-from-anywhere (WFA) programs... View Details

Keywords: Geographic Flexibility; Work-from-anywhere; Remote Work; Telecommuting; Geographic Mobility; USPTO; Employees; Geographic Location; Performance Productivity

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February 2012 (Revised March 2012)
Module Note

Drivers of Productivity and Global Competitiveness

By: Diego Comin

Keywords: Trade; Performance Productivity; Global Range

Article

Productivity Orientation and the Consumption of Collectable Experiences

By: Anat Keinan and Ran Kivetz

This research examines why consumers desire unusual and novel consumption experiences and voluntarily choose leisure activities, vacations, and celebrations that are predicted to be less pleasurable. For example, consumers sometimes choose to stay at freezing ice... View Details

Keywords: Experience and Expertise; Innovation and Invention; Marketing Strategy; Consumer Behavior; Performance Productivity

19 Dec 2012
Research & Ideas

How to be Extremely Productive

project flopped, don't attack the person"). Deborah Blagg: Classic productivity books often focus on time management, but Extreme Productivity takes a much broader look. It reads more like a... View Details

Keywords: by Deborah Blagg

06 Apr 2016
Research & Ideas

Should Entrepreneurs Pitch Products or Ideas for Products?

In trying to secure financial backing for a new product, independent innovators generally face the question of how much to invest in development before showing it around. Should they create, say, a working prototype (and maybe even generate sales) or pitch the idea for... View Details

Keywords: by Carmen Nobel; Motion Pictures & Video; Entertainment & Recreation; Banking

Article

The Information Technology Ecosystem: Structure, Health, and Performance

By: Marco Iansiti and Gregory L. Richards

A number of modern industries are organized as complex networks of firms whose integrated efforts are necessary to deliver value to end customers. The complexity of these networks, or business ecosystems, and the associated interdependencies among firms, make... View Details

Keywords: Business Ventures; Networks; Value; Customers; Performance Productivity; Product; Applications and Software; Innovation and Invention; Competition; Business Model; Information Infrastructure; Information Technology Industry

February 2017
Case

Aston Martin: A Second Century of Performance and Luxury

By: Vish V. Krishnan, Karim R. Lakhani and Amram Migdal

Following the March 2016 launch of DB11, Aston Martin Lagonda Ltd.’s first new sports car platform in over a decade, this case discusses the future strategy of the famed British luxury auto manufacturer. Since its founding in 1902, Aston Martin has been characterized... View Details

April 2008
Teaching Note

A Day in the Life of Alex Sander: Driving in the Fast Lane at Landon Care Products (Brief Case)

Teaching Note for 2177 View Details

Keywords: Organizational Behavior; Leadership, Personal Strategy ＆ Style; Human Resource Management; Career Advancement; Product Management; 360-degree Feedback; Relationship Management; Managing Difficult Interactions; Top Performers; Conflict Management; Leadership; Organizations; Personal Development and Career; Human Resources; Product Marketing

August 1986 (Revised May 1993)
Case

Rohm and Haas (A): New Product Marketing Strategy

By: V. Kasturi Rangan and Lesley Susan

Joan Macey, Rohm and Haas' market manager for Metalworking Fluid Biocides, found that sales of a new biocide, Kathon MWX, was utterly disappointing. This was all the more puzzling since sales of her other product--Kathon 886 MW, a liquid biocide used only in... View Details

Keywords: Communication Strategy; Marketing Strategy; Product Launch; Distribution; Performance; Sales

Article

Four Ways to Build a Productive Sales Culture

By: Frank V. Cespedes and Steven Maughan

This article distinguishes sales efficiency (SE) initiatives (e.g., CRM, training, and KPI dashboards) from sales optimization (SO) decisions (e.g., aligning sales tasks with business strategy, customer selection, and deployment of sales resources across... View Details

Keywords: Strategy; Sales

2024
Working Paper

Incorporating Micro Data into Differentiated Products Demand Estimation with PyBLP

We delineate a general framework for incorporating many types of micro data from summary statistics to full surveys of selected consumers into Berry, Levinsohn, and Pakes (1995) style estimates of differentiated products demand systems. We extend recommended practices... View Details