Publications

June 2023
Case

Investing in the Climate Transition at Neuberger Berman

By: George Serafeim and Benjamin Maletta

By mid-2023, Neuberger Berman (NB), an active asset manager, had grown its assets under management to about half a trillion dollars and took pride in its client centricity and innovative spirit. Responding to client demand for investment products that integrated... View Details

June 2023
Case

Tractor Supply Co

By: David L. Ager and Michael A. Roberto

In February 2023, Hal Lawton, CEO of Tractor Supply Co, the largest farm and ranch retailer in the United States reflected on the company’s 70% growth between 2019 and 2022. Economists had begun to predict an economic downturn and experts were predicting softening... View Details

Keywords: COVID-19 Pandemic; Demand and Consumers; Economic Slowdown and Stagnation; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Retail Industry

2023
Working Paper

Design-Based Confidence Sequences: A General Approach to Risk Mitigation in Online Experimentation

By: Dae Woong Ham, Michael Lindon, Martin Tingley and Iavor Bojinov

Randomized experiments have become the standard method for companies to evaluate the performance of new products or services. In addition to augmenting managers’ decision-making, experimentation mitigates risk by limiting the proportion of customers exposed to... View Details

Keywords: Performance Evaluation; Research and Development; Analytics and Data Science; Consumer Behavior

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2023
Working Paper

Sovereign Default and the Decline in Interest Rates

By: Max Miller, James Paron and Jessica Wachter

Sovereign debt yields have declined dramatically over the last half-century. Standard explanations, including aging populations and increases in asset demand from abroad, encounter difficulties when confronted with the full range of evidence. We propose an explanation... View Details

Keywords: Inflation and Deflation; Interest Rates; Debt Securities

May 2023 (Revised November 2023)
Case

Arcos Dorados: Decarbonizing McDonald's in Latin America

By: George Serafeim, Michael W. Toffel, Jenyfeer Martinez Buitrago and Mariana Cal

This case describes the decarbonization strategy of Arcos Dorados—McDonald’s largest independent franchisee, operating in 20 countries and territories in Latin America and the Caribbean—and how the company measured its greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, including those... View Details

Keywords: Environmental Accounting; Animal-Based Agribusiness; Plant-Based Agribusiness; Change Management; Forecasting and Prediction; Environmental Sustainability; Food; Growth Management; Supply Chain; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Strategy; Agriculture and Agribusiness Industry; Food and Beverage Industry; Green Technology Industry; Consumer Products Industry; Latin America; North and Central America; South America

May 2023
Article

Do Internal Control Weaknesses Affect Firms' Demand for Financial Skills? Evidence from U.S. Job Postings

By: Janet Gao, Kenneth J. Merkley, Joseph Pacelli and Joseph H. Schroeder

Ineffective internal controls over financial reporting often relates to a lack of qualified personnel with sufficient accounting and technical expertise. In this study, we examine whether firms respond to internal control failures by increasing their demand for... View Details

Keywords: Internal Controls; Labor Demand; Accounting; Financial Reporting; Experience and Expertise; Recruitment; Competency and Skills; Corporate Finance

May–June 2023
Article

Need for Speed: The Impact of In-Process Delays on Customer Behavior in Online Retail

By: Santiago Gallino, Nil Karacaoglu and Antonio Moreno

The impact of delays has been widely studied in various offline services. The focus of this study is online services, and we explore the impact of in-process delays—measured by website speed—on customer behavior. We leverage novel retail and website speed data to... View Details

Keywords: Online Retail; Quasi-experiments; Abandonment; Synthetic Control; E-commerce; Internet and the Web; Consumer Behavior; Policy; Retail Industry

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2024
Working Paper

Operational Impact of Communication Channels: Evidence from Last-Mile Delivery Services

By: Natalie Epstein, Santiago Gallino and Antonio Moreno

Communication channels are often used to improve customer satisfaction and behavior. This paper studies how they can be used to enhance operational performance.
We partner with a last-mile delivery company and, through natural and field experiments, explore... View Details

Keywords: Customer Satisfaction; Consumer Behavior; Logistics; Communication

May 2023
Article

Self-Preferencing at Amazon: Evidence from Search Rankings

By: Chiara Farronato, Andrey Fradkin and Alexander MacKay

We study whether Amazon engages in self-preferencing on its marketplace by favoring its own brands (e.g., Amazon Basics) in search. To address this question, we collect new micro-level consumer search data using a custom browser extension installed by a panel of study... View Details

Keywords: Consumer Behavior; E-commerce; Product Positioning; Brands and Branding

May–June 2023
Article

Unmasking Behaviors During the Pandemic with Video Analytics

By: Shunyuan Zhang, Kaiquan Xu and Kannan Srinivasan

In 2020, as the novel coronavirus spread globally, face masks were recommended in public settings to protect against and slow down viral transmission. People complied to varying extents, and their reactions may have been driven by a variety of psychological factors.... View Details

Keywords: COVID-19 Pandemic; Social Influence; Social Norms; Health Pandemics; Behavior

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April 2023
Supplement

Fresh Food Generation

By: Brian Trelstad

Instructors should consider the timing of making videos available to students, as they may reveal key case details.

This case highlights one of five BIPOC entrepreneuers in the Boston area as part of the HBS Impact Investment Fund. In fall 2021, a team of... View Details

Keywords: Growth and Development Strategy; Entrepreneurship; Race; Food and Beverage Industry

2024
Working Paper

Using LLMs for Market Research

By: James Brand, Ayelet Israeli and Donald Ngwe

Large language models (LLMs) have rapidly gained popularity as labor-augmenting tools for programming, writing, and many other processes that benefit from quick text generation. In this paper we explore the uses and benefits of LLMs for researchers and practitioners... View Details

Keywords: Large Language Model; Research; AI and Machine Learning; Analysis; Customers; Consumer Behavior; Technology Industry; Information Technology Industry

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March–April 2023
Article

Pricing for Heterogeneous Products: Analytics for Ticket Reselling

By: Michael Alley, Max Biggs, Rim Hariss, Charles Herrmann, Michael Lingzhi Li and Georgia Perakis

Problem definition: We present a data-driven study of the secondary ticket market. In particular, we are primarily concerned with accurately estimating price sensitivity for listed tickets. In this setting, there are many issues including endogeneity, heterogeneity in... View Details

Keywords: Price; Demand and Consumers; AI and Machine Learning; Investment Return; Entertainment and Recreation Industry; Sports Industry

March 31, 2023
Article

What Is the Optimal Pattern of a Customer Journey?

By: Julian De Freitas

Even though customer experience (CX) leaders are becoming increasingly focused on optimizing their firms’ customer journeys, they face a clear challenge: Which touchpoints along the journey should they invest in? That is, which moments when the customer interacts with... View Details

Keywords: Consumer Behavior; Customers; Brands and Branding

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March 2023
Case

Moderna

By: Marco Iansiti, Karim R. Lakhani, Hannah Mayer, Kerry Herman, Allison J. Wigen and Dave Habeeb

This multimedia case follows the story of Moderna and its entry into vaccine development in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. In summer 2020, Stephane Bancel, CEO of biotech firm Moderna, faces several challenges as his company races to develop a vaccine for COVID-19.... View Details

Keywords: Health Pandemics; Research and Development; Digital Transformation; Health Testing and Trials; Biotechnology Industry; Pharmaceutical Industry

March 2023
Case

MrBeast: Building a YouTube Empire

By: Anita Elberse and Oliver Band

Wednesday November 16, 2022 was a historic day in the ascent of Jimmy Donaldson, better known as MrBeast, to the top echelon of YouTube creators. That day he became the YouTuber with the most subscribers ever—a total of 112 million. The meteoric rise of the 24-year-old... View Details

Keywords: Philanthropy and Charitable Giving; Power and Influence; Internet and the Web; Entrepreneurship; Growth and Development Strategy; Motion Pictures and Video Industry; Motion Pictures and Video Industry

March 2023 (Revised December 2023)
Background Note

Economic Analysis: The Hidden Costs of Layoffs and Managing Staff Reductions

By: Sandra J. Sucher, Marilyn Morgan Westner and Christopher Diak

Globally, over the past fifty years, more companies have used layoffs to cut costs during periods of decreased demand or economic downturns. But layoffs have far-reaching consequences, generate hidden costs, and harm the company in myriad ways. This note reviews ways... View Details

Keywords: Human Resource Management; Layoffs; Furloughs; Human Resources; Management Practices and Processes; Employee Relationship Management; Resignation and Termination; Compensation and Benefits; United States

2023
Chapter

Marketing Through the Machine’s Eyes: Image Analytics and Interpretability

By: Shunyuan Zhang, Flora Feng and Kannan Srinivasan

he growth of social media and the sharing economy is generating abundant unstructured image and video data. Computer vision techniques can derive rich insights from unstructured data and can inform recommendations for increasing profits and consumer utility—if only the... View Details

Keywords: Transparency; Marketing Research; Algorithmic Bias; AI and Machine Learning; Marketing

March 2023
Teaching Note

Ransomware Attack at Colonial Pipeline Company

By: Suraj Srinivasan and Li-Kuan Ni

Teaching Note for HBS Case No. 123-069. On the morning of May 7, 2021, Colonial Pipeline Company became aware that the company had been the victim of a malicious ransomware attack that had stolen and locked up company data. The extortionists demanded 75 bitcoins (worth... View Details