Publications

December 2021
Case

Burning Glass Technologies: From Data to Product

By: Suraj Srinivasan and Amy Klopfenstein

In May 2021, Matt Sigelman, CEO of Burning Glass Technologies, a company that provided labor market analytics for a variety of markets, navigates his company’s transition from data company to product company. Burning Glass originated as a service that used artificial... View Details

January 2016
Case

SAP SE: Autism at Work

By: Gary P. Pisano and Robert D. Austin

This case describes SAP's "Autism at Work" program, which integrates people with autism into the company's workforce. The company has a stated objective of making 1% of its workforce people with autism by 2020. SAP's rationale for the program is based on the belief... View Details

Keywords: Software; Human Resource Management; Diversity Management; Germany; Selection and Staffing; Innovation and Management; Applications and Software; Recruitment; Diversity; Information Technology Industry; Germany

01 Dec 2019
News

Bridging the Gap

current project follows a similar initiative from his time at Volkswagen with automotive parts maker Gestamp—which was in turn inspired by a YALP case, “Southwire and 12 for Life.” The case tells the story of a Georgia cable manufacturer View Details

Keywords: Julia Hanna; illustration by Josh Cochran; photographed by Melissa Golden; cross sector collaboration; local government; nonprofits; education; leadership; Administration of Economic Programs; Government

2022
White Paper

The Emerging Degree Reset: How the Shift to Skills-Based Hiring Holds the Keys to Growing the U.S. Workforce at a Time of Talent Shortage

By: Joseph B. Fuller, Christina Langer, Julia Nitschke, Layla O'Kane, Matthew Sigelman and Bledi Taska

Employers are resetting degree requirements in a wide range of roles, dropping the requirement for a bachelor’s degree in many middle-skill and even some higher-skill roles. This reverses a trend toward degree inflation in job postings going back to the Great... View Details

Keywords: Skills; Workforce; Talent; Human Resource Management; Selection and Staffing; Competency and Skills; Talent and Talent Management; Human Resources

11 Aug 2003
Research & Ideas

Why Budgeting Kills Your Company

managers can challenge the prices and even choose to go with outside vendors. Since the early 1990s, branch managers have had the authority to determine staffing levels and set staff salaries. At first, senior managers predicted that it... View Details

Keywords: by Loren Gary

25 May 2011
HBS Case

QuikTrip’s Investment in Retail Employees Pays Off

"The store is staffed knowing how long it takes to perform the various tasks," Ton says, explaining that employees frequently initiate a team-based, mutually accountable approach to their work. "It's not uncommon for them... View Details

Keywords: by Julia Hanna; Retail

01 Dec 2014
Research & Ideas

The Big Influence of Small Countries in the United Nations Secretariat

associate professor in the Business, Government and the International Economy unit at Harvard Business School, asks in a new working paper, Who Runs the International System? Power and Staffing at the United Nations Secretariat. He... View Details

Keywords: by Michael Blanding

16 Dec 2022
Research & Ideas

Why Technology Alone Can't Solve AI's Bias Problem

However, the researchers found smaller increases when using fair ranking for the shopping and event staffing tasks—with jumps between 2.5 and 13 percent—and they say that might be because participants associated these tasks with women.... View Details

Keywords: by Michael Blanding; Technology

03 Dec 2020
Research & Ideas

Cut Payroll Costs with Transparency, Fairness, and Compassion

company Sysco reduced staffing levels by a third via furloughs and layoffs but also did a deal with Kroger supermarkets to provide some of Sysco’s furloughed workers temporary work at distribution centers. Another option is to rotate... View Details

Keywords: by Boris Groysberg and Sarah Abbott

April 2021 (Revised June 2021)
Case

IBM: Design Thinking

By: Srikant M. Datar, Amram Migdal and Paul Hamilton

This case describes the 2012-2020 effort at IBM to implement design thinking throughout the company and hire thousands of designers to serve on every product team alongside technical engineers and developers and product managers. IBM’s design transformation is told... View Details

Keywords: Business Ventures; Business Divisions; Business Units; Business Organization; Change; Change Management; Transformation; Competency and Skills; Talent and Talent Management; Design; Human Resources; Recruitment; Selection and Staffing; Innovation and Invention; Collaborative Innovation and Invention; Innovation and Management; Innovation Strategy; Jobs and Positions; Job Design and Levels; Leading Change; Management; Business or Company Management; Goals and Objectives; Management Practices and Processes; Operations; Product; Product Design; Product Development; Organizations; Business Processes; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Organizational Design; Organizational Structure; Strategy; Adaptation; Adoption; Technological Innovation; Information Infrastructure; Information Technology; Technology Industry; Information Technology Industry; United States

08 Feb 2016
Blog Post

Applying to Business School as a Couple

For Kate Kingen and Patrick Garrison applying to business school was a mutual decision – and coming to HBS was a journey they decided to embark on together. Kate and Patrick first met in New York City when they were both working as analysts at Deutsche Bank. They... View Details

Web

HBS - Financials | Supplemental Financial Information

year earlier. The School’s staff grew to a budgeted 1,325 FTEs in fiscal 2022, from 1,289 in the prior year. To capitalize on new opportunities, the School invested to expand the faculty, increase Information Technology staffing to... View Details

October 2003 (Revised November 2006)
Case

GE's Talent Machine: The Making of a CEO

By: Christopher A. Bartlett and Andrew N. McLean

GE believes its ability to develop management talent is a core competency that represents a source of sustainable competitive advantage. This case traces the development of GE's rich system of human resource policies and practices under five CEOs in the post-war era,... View Details

Keywords: Decision Choices and Conditions; Capital; Selection and Staffing; Leadership Development; Management Succession; Corporate Strategy

October 2018
Case

P-Will at DISCO

By: Ethan Bernstein, Naoko Jinjo and Yuna Sakuma

From the outside, DISCO—a Japan-based manufacturer of precision tools for semiconductor production devices—appeared to be a rather ordinary company that had achieved rather extraordinary success: it had simultaneously achieved 70% global market share, had lifted its... View Details

Keywords: Human Capital; P-Will; DISCO; Semiconductors; Self-Managed Organizations; Governance; Human Resources; Selection and Staffing; Management Practices and Processes; Management Systems; Organizational Structure; Organizational Design; Semiconductor Industry; Japan

September 2016
Article

Whitened Résumés: Race and Self-Presentation in the Labor Market

By: Sonia K. Kang, K. A. DeCelles, András Tilcsik and Sora Jun

Using interviews, a laboratory experiment, and a résumé audit study, we examine racial minorities’ attempts to avoid anticipated discrimination in labor markets by concealing or downplaying racial cues in job applications, a practice known as "résumé whitening."... View Details

Keywords: Prejudice and Bias; Selection and Staffing; Job Search; Race

Find at Harvard

September 2015 (Revised February 2017)
Case

MOD Pizza: A Winning Recipe?

By: Boris Groysberg, John D. Vaughan and Matthew Preble

Scott and Ally Svenson, the founders of MOD Pizza, had to make a number of decisions in planning how to scale their small company. They wanted to grow MOD from 45 stores as of May 2015 to 200 stores by the end of 2016, and while the two believed that MOD could manage... View Details

Keywords: Entrepreneurship; Employees; Employee Relationship Management; Selection and Staffing; Leadership; Growth and Development Strategy; Marketing; Service Delivery; Organizational Culture; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Mission and Purpose; Service Industry; United States

September 2023 (Revised July 2024)
Case

Honest Jobs: A Path to Redemption

By: Paul A. Gompers and Jeffrey Barkas

Founded by a formerly incarcerated job seeker, Honest Jobs' mission is to be the hub where people with criminal records come to build careers and employers come to find great talent. Honest Jobs faced early challenges as a two-sided platform for justice-involved job... View Details

Keywords: Business Startups; Venture Capital; Recruitment; Entrepreneurial Finance; Selection and Staffing; Digital Platforms; Job Search; Mission and Purpose; Expansion; Employment Industry; United States; Colorado; Ohio; Texas