Publications

01 Dec 2019
News

Organic Matter

with nearly 30 times the heat-trapping powers of CO2—represents 10 percent of US greenhouse gas emissions; according to the EPA, dairies and other livestock operations account for a third of that amount. California Bioenergy, founded in... View Details

Keywords: Julia Hanna; green business; agriculture; alternative energy; Agriculture

August 2009
Article

Mental Accounting and Small Windfalls: Evidence from an Online Grocer

By: John Beshears and Katherine L. Milkman

We study the effect of small windfalls on consumer spending decisions by comparing the purchases online grocery customers make when redeeming $10-off coupons with the purchases they make without coupons. Controlling for customer fixed effects and other variables, we... View Details

Keywords: Mental Accounting; Windfalls; Marginal Propensity To Consume; Coupons; Marketing Communications; Consumer Behavior; Accounting; Cognition and Thinking; Retail Industry

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21 Jan 2014
Blog Post

Kick-off to summer internship recruiting starts today

Interviews for first year students kicked off today. Over 109 companies will join us at the Double Tree Hotel to interview students for their summer internship programs. With over 35 industries represented,... View Details

2014
Other Teaching and Training Material

Strategy Reading: Introduction to Strategy

By: Ramon Casadesus-Masanell

"Introduction to Strategy" provides a comprehensive overview of the strategy discipline and introduces the building blocks of strategy by providing overviews of fundamental conceptual frameworks. Students will learn how firms decide where to compete by exploring the... View Details

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

April 2018 (Revised October 2023)
Case

Coco Chanel: From Fashion Icon to Nazi Agent

By: Geoffrey Jones and Emily Grandjean

This case describes the career of the iconic French fashion designer Coco Chanel who created a transformational business during the first half of the 20th century. Beginning in her early adulthood, Chanel leveraged relationships with acquaintances, friends, and... View Details

Keywords: Business History; Biography; Entrepreneurship; Relationships; Brands and Branding; Ethics; Fashion Industry; Apparel and Accessories Industry

December 2001 (Revised February 2006)
Background Note

An Options-led Approach to Making Strategic Choices

By: Jan W. Rivkin

Summarizes some of the pitfalls of conventional strategic planning processes and proposes an alternative approach to making strategic choices. View Details

Keywords: Decisions; Management Practices and Processes; Strategic Planning; Strategy

01 Apr 2020
News

Why REITs Aren't Immune to the Market Crash

October 1994 (Revised March 1999)
Case

Ritz-Carlton: Using Information Systems to Better Serve the Customer

By: W. Earl Sasser, Thomas O. Jones and Norman Klein

Explores the interface of an information system that keeps track of guests and their preferences, and the people systems that deliver multiple services at Ritz-Carlton hotels. The luxury hotel chain's unique service credo and commitment to quality principles are... View Details

Keywords: Competency and Skills; Customer Satisfaction; Training; Recruitment; Service Delivery; Supply Chain Management; Luxury; Balance and Stability; Information Technology

March 2020
Teaching Note

onefinestay: Building a Luxury Experience in the Sharing Economy

By: Jill Avery and Anat Keinan

onefinestay was a two-sided marketplace that offered high-end home rentals to travelers who sought a more authentic and local experience than a typical upscale hotel might provide. After five years of rapid growth, it was time to do a comprehensive analysis of the... View Details

29 Apr 2021
News

Why Virtual Away Days May Be Here to Stay

January 2019
Case

Richard Taylor—African-American Investors Break into Boston's Downtown Real Estate Market

By: Steven Rogers and Alyssa Haywoode

African-American investors in Boston could typically invest in commercial real estate opportunities that were located in the “community,” neighborhoods where people of color live. But it was tough to break in and invest in the downtown market. But when an opportunity... View Details

Keywords: Real Estate; Investing; African-american Investors; Hotels; Commercial Real Estate; Property; Investment; Opportunities; Race; Real Estate Industry; Boston

24 Sep 2018
News

Harvard Business School to Expand Case Studies Related to Artificial Intelligence

January 2014 (Revised November 2015)
Background Note

Rational Choice and Managerial Decision-Making

By: Willy Shih

This note discusses Herbert Simon's notion of bounded rationality: how managers may sometimes make suboptimal choices because of their limited ability to access or process information. View Details

Keywords: Rational Choice; Bounded Rationality; Satisficing; Herbert Simon; Agenda-setting; Choice; Alternatives; Decision Making; Decision Choices and Conditions; Decisions; Judgments

June 2021 (Revised October 2021)
Case

Nissan's Response to the COVID-19 Pandemic

By: Ananth Raman, William Schmidt and Ann Winslow

In January 2020, Ashwani Gupta took over as COO at Nissan Motor Corporation, and several weeks later, the COVID-19 pandemic began. Nissan’s Business Continuity Plan (BCP) had been key to the resilience of Nissan’s supply chain. It had enabled Nissan to recover from... View Details

Keywords: Operations; Supply Chain Management; Health Pandemics; Auto Industry; Manufacturing Industry; Japan; India

December 2020
Article

Consumer Reactance to Promotional Favors

By: Marco Bertini and Aylin Aydinli

Promotional favors are an increasingly popular but seldom researched form of price promotion where the receipt of the saving by consumers depends on an action on their part that is nonmonetary in nature, such as completing a questionnaire, posting a review, or making a... View Details

Keywords: Promotional Favors; Conditional Discounts; Psychological Reactance; Price Promotions; Pricing; Marketing; Price; Consumer Behavior

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Article

Transition to Clean Technology

By: Daron Acemoglu, Ufuk Akcigit, Douglas Hanley and William R. Kerr

We develop a microeconomic model of endogenous growth where clean and dirty technologies compete in production and innovation, in the sense that research can be directed to either clean or dirty technologies. If dirty technologies are more advanced to start with, the... View Details

Keywords: Technological Innovation; Entrepreneurship; Environmental Sustainability; Green Technology Industry

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June 2019
Case

ClearLife: From Prospect to Platform

By: Alexander Braun, Lauren Cohen, Mauro Elvedi and Jiahua Xu

ClearLife’s first product was a trading and analytics platform for participants in the U.S. life settlement market, the secondary market for life insurance. ClearLife played a key role in facilitating transactions and devising a common language for expressing value and... View Details

Keywords: Digital Platforms; Insurance; Entrepreneurship; Expansion; Diversification; Strategy