Publications
Publications
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- All HBS Web
(1,594)
- Faculty Publications (242)
- August 2013 (Revised November 2013)
- Supplement
Ford vs. GM: The Evolution of Mass Production (B)
By: Willy Shih
This case explores the very different paths taken by the Ford Motor Company and the General Motors Corporation in the first three decades of the twentieth century. Henry Ford's Model T was a car for the masses. After considerable experimentation, Ford Motor... View Details
Keywords: Innovation; Exploration; Dominant Design; Business Growth and Maturation; Business History; Innovation and Management; Innovation Strategy; Technological Innovation; Leading Change; Growth and Development Strategy; Product Positioning; Product Design; Product Development; Business Strategy; Corporate Strategy; Vertical Integration; Auto Industry; Manufacturing Industry; Michigan
- July–August 2013
- Article
Looking Up and Looking Out: Career Mobility Effects of Demographic Similarity among Professionals
By: Kathleen L. McGinn and Katherine L. Milkman
We investigate the role of workgroup sex and race composition on the career mobility of professionals in "up-or-out" organizations. We develop a nuanced perspective on the potential career mobility effects of workgroup demography by integrating the social... View Details
- 2013
- Tool
Harvard Business Review's Go to Market Tools: Pricing for Profit
By: Thomas Steenburgh and Jill Avery
What price is right? Figuring out the best price for your product or service can be nerve-wracking. Your new product launch or marketing campaign's success—perhaps even your career advancement—may hinge on the price you choose. So how do you select a price that's... View Details
- March 2013
- Case
An Entrepreneur's New Product Development Journey
By: Elie Ofek
This case tracks the new product development process undertaken by Gauri Nanda, the founder and CEO of Nanda Home, as she ventures to innovate beyond her initial product launches. Having achieved commercial success with her first product Clocky, a roll away alarm clock... View Details
- Winter 2013
- Article
How to Identify the Best Customers for Your Business
By: Frank V. Cespedes, James P. Dougherty and Ben S. Skinner III
How can businesses achieve profitable growth so that their costs don’t grow faster than sales? This article focuses on scaling a venture’s sales process and provides a methodology for identifying core customers and some implications for governance criteria and... View Details
- 2013
- Case
The COFCO Group
By: F. Warren McFarlan, Zheng Xiaoming and Ziqian Zhao
COFCO was China's sole legitimate window for agricultural foreign trade before 1987. The reform of China's foreign trade system beginning in 1987 cost COFCO its monopoly position. Subsequently, the SOE giant capitalized on its foreign trade expertise to strategically... View Details
- 2013
- Teaching Note
The COFCO Group (TN)
By: F. Warren McFarlan, Zheng Xiaoming and Ziqian Zhao
COFCO was China's sole legitimate window for agricultural foreign trade before 1987. The reform of China's foreign trade system beginning in 1987 cost COFCO its monopoly position. Subsequently, the SOE giant capitalized on its foreign trade expertise to strategically... View Details
- 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
- December 2012 (Revised November 2014)
- Case
Lit Motors
By: Thomas R. Eisenmann and Alex Godden
In mid-2012 Lit Motors had created both engineering and design prototypes and conducted initial customer tests on less than $750,000 of investment. Lit Motors' founder, Daniel Kim, had started the company to design and manufacture an efficient electric 2-wheeled... View Details
- September 2012 (Revised May 2015)
- Case
Philips-Visicu
By: Regina E. Herzlinger, Natalie Kindred and Sara M. McKinley
Would the advent of global payment models and ACOs create sufficient demand for a telemedicine offering covering the care continuum, from hospitals to the home? This was the decision facing Royal Philips Electronics (Philips), the Netherlands-based producer of... View Details
Keywords: Health Care; Philips; Visicu; Telemedicine; eICU; Accountable Care Organization; ACO; Bundled Payment; Hospital To Home; Patient Monitoring Devices; Home Health Care; Health Care and Treatment; Communication Technology; Quality; Safety; Performance Productivity; Performance Capacity; Performance Efficiency; Consumer Behavior; Emerging Markets; Health Industry; Telecommunications Industry; Netherlands
- August 2012 (Revised November 2012)
- Case
Colorscope, Inc. (Abridged)
By: V.G. Narayanan
A small company in the graphic design business faces severe price competition. The company must respond by cutting costs and making process improvements. View Details
- June 2012
- Article
Pricing to Create Shared Value
By: Marco Bertini and John T. Gourville
Many companies are in competition with their customers to extract as much value as possible from every transaction. Pricing is their weapon of choice, and consumers fight back by rooting out and disseminating pricing policies that seem unfair. The problem is that... View Details
- April 2012
- Case
Bayonne Packaging, Inc.
By: Roy D. Shapiro and Paul E. Morrison
A printer and paper converter produces customized packaging used by industrial customers to deliver promotional materials, software, luxury beverages, and gift food and candy. The company specializes in creating innovative packaging solutions for its customers and... View Details
- 2012
- Working Paper
Is India's Manufacturing Sector Moving Away from Cities?
By: Ejaz Ghani, Arti Grover Goswami and William R. Kerr
This paper investigates the urbanization of the Indian manufacturing sector by combining enterprise data from formal and informal sectors. We find that plants in the formal sector are moving away from urban and into rural locations, while the informal sector is moving... View Details
- 2012
- Working Paper
How Short-Termism Invites Corruption—And What to Do About It
Researchers and business leaders have long decried short-termism: the excessive focus of executives of publicly traded companies-along with fund managers and other investors-on short-term results. The central concern is that short-termism discourages long-term... View Details
- March 2012 (Revised January 2013)
- Case
Boston Children's Hospital: Measuring Patient Costs
By: Robert S. Kaplan, Mary L. Witkowski and Jessica A. Hohman
The case describes two pilot projects on applying activity-based costing to measuring the cost of treating patients. It presents process maps and financial data relating to the processes used during (1) an office visit to a plastic surgeon for three different diagnoses... View Details
- November 29, 2011
- Article
The Role of The Board in Creating a Sustainable Strategy
By: Robert G. Eccles, Ioannis Ioannou and George Serafeim
While conceptually elegant, the belief that a corporation's role is to maximize value for shareholders is under increasing challenge as society's expectations for companies change. An equally elegant new concept that takes account of these dual pressures has yet to... View Details
Keywords: Value Creation; Business and Stakeholder Relations; Corporate Strategy; Business and Shareholder Relations; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Performance Expectations; Governing and Advisory Boards; Management Practices and Processes; Decisions; Risk and Uncertainty; Cost vs Benefits; Information
- 2013
- Working Paper
The Dynamics of Firm Lobbying
By: William R. Kerr, William F. Lincoln and Prachi Mishra
We study the determinants of the dynamics of firm lobbying behavior using a panel data set covering 1998–2006. Our data exhibit three striking facts: (i) few firms lobby, (ii) lobbying status is strongly associated with firm size, and (iii) lobbying status is highly... View Details
- August 2011 (Revised October 2014)
- Supplement
High Wire Act: Credit Suisse and Contingent Capital (B)
By: Clayton S. Rose and Aldo Sesia
The B case describes the process and terms of the very successful offerings of contingent capital in February 2011, as well as The Basel Committee's preliminary decision not to allow contingent capital to count as Tier 1 equity. View Details
Keywords: Cost vs Benefits; Decisions; Financial Crisis; Finance; Capital; Financial Instruments; Leadership
- July – August 2011
- Article
The Paradox of Samsung's Rise
By: Tarun Khanna, Jaeyong Song and Kyungmook Lee
Twenty years ago, few people would have predicted that Samsung could transform itself from a low-cost original equipment manufacturer to a world leader in R&D, marketing, and design, with a brand more valuable than Pepsi, Nike, or American Express. Fewer still would... View Details