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Show Results For
- All HBS Web
(1,513)
- People (8)
- News (363)
- Research (806)
- Events (3)
- Multimedia (13)
- Faculty Publications (327)
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- December 2019 (Revised December 2022)
- Case
TXU (A): Powering the Largest Leveraged Buyout in History
By: Trevor Fetter, Erik Snowberg and Rebecca M. Henderson
This case is designed to support a lively discussion about the relative merits of shareholder vs. stakeholder perspectives in the context of a company that provides a vital public service that has important environmental implications. The 2007 purchase of TXU, the... View Details
Keywords: Leveraged Buyouts; Transformation; Insolvency and Bankruptcy; Environmental Sustainability; Business and Shareholder Relations; Business and Stakeholder Relations; Energy Generation; Non-Renewable Energy; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Utilities Industry; Energy Industry; Texas
Fetter, Trevor, Erik Snowberg, and Rebecca M. Henderson. "TXU (A): Powering the Largest Leveraged Buyout in History." Harvard Business School Case 320-064, December 2019. (Revised December 2022.)
- October 2003
- Case
Merrill Lynch: Supernova
Supernova is the name given to a new way to manage client relationships that originated in the Merrill Lynch Indianapolis offices. During a trial period, Supernova generated very good results among financial advisers and their customers, but challenged the traditional... View Details
Keywords: Organizational Change and Adaptation; Customer Relationship Management; Organizational Culture; Financial Services Industry; Indianapolis
Oliva, Rogelio, Roger H. Hallowell, and Gabriel R. Bitran. "Merrill Lynch: Supernova." Harvard Business School Case 604-053, October 2003.
- October 1993 (Revised December 1997)
- Case
General Dynamics: Compensation and Strategy (A)
William Anders became CEO of defense giant General Dynamics in 1991 as the Cold War was ending and as the industry became saddled with excess capacity. Observing that the company was underserving shareholders and required a massive change in its culture, Anders brought... View Details
Keywords: Motivation and Incentives; Corporate Strategy; Executive Compensation; Manufacturing Industry; United States
Murphy, Kevin J. "General Dynamics: Compensation and Strategy (A)." Harvard Business School Case 494-048, October 1993. (Revised December 1997.)
- 2022
- Working Paper
The Routledge Handbook of Digital Consumption, Chapter 41: The Internet’s Effects on Consumption: Useful, Harmful, Playful
By: John A. Deighton and Leora Kornfeld
This chapter considers how digital culture has changed over the past decade, as the internet has grown its scope and user base. Billions around the world connect daily to an ever-expanding set of applications. A framework for thinking about digital effects is offered:... View Details
Deighton, John A., and Leora Kornfeld. "The Routledge Handbook of Digital Consumption, Chapter 41: The Internet’s Effects on Consumption: Useful, Harmful, Playful." Harvard Business School Working Paper, No. 22-049, January 2022.
- 2017
- Working Paper
Malleable Monopoly Money: Does How You Pay For A Gift Card Affect How You Spend It?
By: Priya Raghubir and Shelle Santana
This research examines the malleability of a specific form of “monopoly” money (viz., Raghubir and Srivastava 2008), gift cards, and shows that the manner in which one purchases a gift card affects its subjective value and subsequent use. Study 1 shows that... View Details
- January 10, 2022
- Article
The Secret Ingredient of Thriving Companies? Human Magic
By: Hubert Joly
The traditional corporate approach to motivating people has been a combination of carrots and sticks: a system of financial incentives designed to mobilize everyone around a plan designed by a few smart people at the top. Multiple studies have confirmed that, for any... View Details
Keywords: Meaning; Purpose; Organizational Culture; Employees; Motivation and Incentives; Performance
Joly, Hubert. "The Secret Ingredient of Thriving Companies? Human Magic." Harvard Business Review (website) (January 10, 2022).
- November 2001 (Revised April 2003)
- Case
Camp Dresser & McKee: Getting Incentives Right
By: Ashish Nanda
"If you try to use money to motivate behavior, you are in a powerful and dangerous place, especially with engineers and scientists," remarked Tom Furman, CEO of Camp Dresser & McKee, Inc. (CDM), a consulting environmental engineering firm. Historically, CDM had... View Details
Nanda, Ashish, and M. Julia Prats. "Camp Dresser & McKee: Getting Incentives Right." Harvard Business School Case 902-122, November 2001. (Revised April 2003.)
- March 2013
- Article
Advertising's New Medium: Human Experience
Standard ad messaging and conventional creative executions and placements are rapidly becoming outmoded. To win consumers' attention and trust, marketers must think less about what advertising says to its targets and more about what it does for them. Rather than... View Details
Rayport, Jeffrey F. "Advertising's New Medium: Human Experience." Harvard Business Review 91, no. 3 (March 2013): 76–84.
- August 1990
- Case
Legacy Fund, Inc.
By: Jeffry A. Timmons and James Weber
Two young HBS graduates propose to create a new venture capital fund in 1989. The case focuses on: 1) evaluation of the venture capital industry; 2) whether there is an opportunity for a new specialized fund; 3) the structuring of risks and rewards in the fund; 4)... View Details
Timmons, Jeffry A., and James Weber. "Legacy Fund, Inc." Harvard Business School Case 291-010, August 1990.
- January 8, 2016
- Article
When You’ve Made Enough Money to Cause Family Tension
By: Josh Baron, Rob Lachenauer and Diane Coutu
This article discusses the transition successful business founders face when moving from intense business focus to managing significant wealth in their "Second Act." It highlights the shift towards creating a family enterprise, requiring shared financial... View Details
Keywords: Wealth; Family Business; Management Succession; Transition; Family and Family Relationships
Baron, Josh, Rob Lachenauer, and Diane Coutu. "When You’ve Made Enough Money to Cause Family Tension." Harvard Business Review (website) (January 8, 2016).
- July 2010
- Article
Is a Higher Calling Enough? Incentives Effects in the Church
By: Christopher Parsons, J. Hartzell and D. Yermack
We study the compensation and productivity of more than 2,000 Methodist ministers in a 43‐year panel data set. The church appears to use pay‐for‐performance incentives for its clergy, as their compensation follows a sharing rule by which pastors receive approximately... View Details
Keywords: Motivation and Incentives; Organizations; Religion; Performance Evaluation; Compensation and Benefits
Parsons, Christopher, J. Hartzell, and D. Yermack. "Is a Higher Calling Enough? Incentives Effects in the Church." Journal of Labor Economics 28, no. 3 (July 2010): 509–538.
- November 2008 (Revised January 2012)
- Case
Teena Lerner: Dividing the Pie at Rx Capital (Abridged)
By: Boris Groysberg, Victoria Winston and Robin Abrahams
Teena Lerner, the CEO of Rx Capital, had a problem. Her three-year-old hedge fund was highly profitable, but in 2004, one of her four equities analysts lost a lot of money for the firm. If Lerner followed her existing compensation system, designed to reward teamwork,... View Details
Keywords: Compensation and Benefits; Employee Relationship Management; Performance Evaluation; Groups and Teams; Financial Services Industry
Groysberg, Boris, Victoria Winston, and Robin Abrahams. "Teena Lerner: Dividing the Pie at Rx Capital (Abridged)." Harvard Business School Case 409-058, November 2008. (Revised January 2012.)
- Article
Reputation When Threats and Transfers Are Available
By: Ernesto Dal Bo, Pedro Dal Bo and Rafael Di Tella
We present a model where a long-run player is allowed to use both money transfers and threats to influence the decisions of a sequence of short-run players. We show that threats might be used credibly (even in arbitrarily short repeated games) by a long-lived player... View Details
Keywords: Crime and Corruption; Decision Choices and Conditions; Game Theory; Mathematical Methods; Interests; Power and Influence; Reputation
Dal Bo, Ernesto, Pedro Dal Bo, and Rafael Di Tella. "Reputation When Threats and Transfers Are Available." Journal of Economics & Management Strategy 16, no. 3 (Fall 2007).
- November 2000
- Background Note
Note on Employee Stock Ownership Plans (ESOPs) and Phantom Stock Plans
By: Dwight B. Crane and Indra Reinbergs
Provides a brief overview of employee stock ownership plans (ESOPs) and phantom stock plans for owners of closely held companies. ESOPs can be used as a tool of corporate financing, and can provide employees with ownership interests. Phantom stock plans can reward... View Details
Keywords: Financing and Loans; Employee Stock Ownership Plan; Motivation and Incentives; Management Teams; Corporate Governance; Ownership Stake; Taxation
Crane, Dwight B., and Indra Reinbergs. "Note on Employee Stock Ownership Plans (ESOPs) and Phantom Stock Plans." Harvard Business School Background Note 201-034, November 2000.
- 2016
- Blog
Building A Culture of Health - John A. Quelch: The Marketing of Prevention
By: John A. Quelch
The US will devote 17.5% of GDP to health care this year, around $3 trillion. Yet only 3 percent of that will be spent on prevention, including both primary prevention (preventing illness in the first place) and secondary prevention (preventing sick people getting... View Details
Keywords: Healthcare; Healthcare Marketing; Prevention; Wellbeing; Health; Marketing; Health Industry; Insurance Industry; Public Administration Industry; Europe; North and Central America
Quelch, John A. "The Marketing of Prevention." Building A Culture of Health - John A. Quelch (blog). May 12, 2016. http://johnquelch.org/the-marketing-of-prevention/.
- 2019
- Working Paper
Design Rules, Volume 2: How Technology Shapes Organizations: Chapter 13 Platform Systems vs. Step Processes—The Value of Options and the Power of Modularity
This is the first chapter in Part 3. Its purpose is to contrast the value structure of platform systems with step processes from a technological perspective. I first review the basic technical architecture of computers and argue that every computer is inherently a... View Details
Keywords: Platform Systems; Step Processes; Computer Architecture; Modularity; Information Technology; Digital Platforms
Baldwin, Carliss Y. "Design Rules, Volume 2: How Technology Shapes Organizations: Chapter 13 Platform Systems vs. Step Processes—The Value of Options and the Power of Modularity." Harvard Business School Working Paper, No. 19-073, January 2019.
- 2023
- Working Paper
Scoring and Funding Breakthrough Ideas: Evidence from a Global Pharmaceutical Company
By: Joshua Krieger, Ramana Nanda, Ian Hunt, Aimee Reynolds and Peter Tarsa
We study resource allocation to early-stage ideas at an internal startup program of
one the largest pharmaceutical firms in the world. Our research design enables us to
elicit every evaluator’s scores across five different attributes, before seeing how they
would... View Details
Keywords: Project Selection; Pharmaceuticals; Financing Innovation; Resource Allocation; Innovation and Invention; Research and Development
Krieger, Joshua, Ramana Nanda, Ian Hunt, Aimee Reynolds, and Peter Tarsa. "Scoring and Funding Breakthrough Ideas: Evidence from a Global Pharmaceutical Company." Harvard Business School Working Paper, No. 23-014, August 2022. (Revised November 2023.)
- September 2021
- Article
Gender Stereotypes in Deliberation and Team Decisions
By: Katherine B. Coffman, Clio Bryant Flikkema and Olga Shurchkov
We explore how groups deliberate and decide on ideas in an experiment with communication. We find that gender biases play a significant role in which group members are chosen to answer on behalf of the group. Conditional on the quality of their ideas, individuals are... View Details
Keywords: Gender Differences; Stereotypes; Teams; Economic Experiments; Gender; Prejudice and Bias; Groups and Teams; Perception
Coffman, Katherine B., Clio Bryant Flikkema, and Olga Shurchkov. "Gender Stereotypes in Deliberation and Team Decisions." Games and Economic Behavior 129 (September 2021): 329–349.
- May 2025
- Case
Dell Med: Transforming Care Delivery & Payment
By: Robert S. Kaplan, David N. Bernstein and Mary L. Witkowski
Health care in the U.S. and globally continues to undergo massive transformation, surging towards a system that rewards value for patients. However, widespread adoption of value-based health care remains a challenge. This case study focuses on the care delivery... View Details
Keywords: Integrated Practice Units; Outcomes Measurement; Time-Driven Activity-Based Costing; Health Care and Treatment; Business Strategy; Leading Change; Decisions; Transformation; Service Delivery; Adoption; Value; Health Industry; United States; Texas
Kaplan, Robert S., David N. Bernstein, and Mary L. Witkowski. "Dell Med: Transforming Care Delivery & Payment." Harvard Business School Case 125-117, May 2025.
- Article
Entrepreneurial Creativity Through Motivational Synergy
By: T. M. Amabile
This paper defines and describes entrepreneurial creativity, which is the generation and implementation of novel, appropriate ideas to establish a new venture. Entrepreneurial creativity can be exhibited in established organizations as well as in start-up firms. The... View Details
Keywords: Creativity; Motivation and Incentives; Organizational Culture; Entrepreneurship; Innovation and Invention
Amabile, T. M. "Entrepreneurial Creativity Through Motivational Synergy." Journal of Creative Behavior 31, no. 1 (March 1997): 18–26.