Publications

Research Summary

Giving Time Gives You Time

Four experiments reveal a counterintuitive solution to the common problem of feeling that one doesn't have enough time: giving some of it away. Although people's objective amount of time cannot be increased (there are only 24 hours in a day), this research... View Details

22 May 2018
First Look

New Research and Ideas, May 22, 2018

engineered composition leather extracted from waste leather using an environmentally friendly process. The end product looked, smelled, and felt like natural leather. Scalable marketplace adoption of... View Details

Keywords: Dina Gerdeman

2025
Working Paper

The Invention of Corporate Governance

By: Yueran Ma and Andrei Shleifer

The analysis of corporate governance begins with a central feature of modern capitalism—the separation of ownership and control in large corporations—first empirically documented by Berle and Means (1932). Such separation entails several agency problems reflecting... View Details

Keywords: Corporate Governance; Law; Business and Shareholder Relations

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07 Oct 2013
Research & Ideas

The Case for Combating Climate Change with Nuclear Power and Fracking

political process allows these taxes—or subsidies—to be hidden in rules, regulations, and foreign policy decisions. "The resulting market prices for energy should be enforced in international trade with... View Details

Keywords: by Carmen Nobel; Energy; Utilities

25 May 2016
Research & Ideas

How Consumers and Businesses are Reshaping Public Health

their conditions and possible treatments, often sharing their experiences with others in online communities. They are more inclined to question authority, and to raise issues with their doctors, care... View Details

Keywords: by John A. Quelch; Health

31 Jan 2022
Research & Ideas

Where Can Digital Transformation Take You? Insights from 1,700 Leaders

privacy and security. Social responsibility in the broadest sense, roundtable participants said, has become a competitive “must,” essential for attracting talent and building trust with customers. Six... View Details

Keywords: by Linda A. Hill, Ann Le Cam, Sunand Menon, and Emily Tedards

14 Mar 2011
Research & Ideas

Water, Electricity, and Transportation: Preparing for the Population Boom

By 2050, the Earth's population will likely exceed 9 billion people, up 30 percent from 6.9 billion today, according to projections from both the US Census Bureau and the United Nations. What's more, the population in the world's cities is expected to increase by 3... View Details

Keywords: by Carmen Nobel

January 16, 2020
Article

How Global Leaders Should Think About Solving Our Biggest Problems

By: Mark R. Kramer, Marc W. Pfitzer and Helge Mahne

The corporate social conscience will soon be on full display in Davos, Switzerland, where global leaders from business, government, and civil society will assemble on January 21 for the annual meeting of the World Economic Forum. Hundreds of millions of dollars will be... View Details

Keywords: Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Social Issues; Global Range; Partners and Partnerships; Strategy

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2011
Book

I Moved Your Cheese: For Those Who Refuse to Live as Mice in Someone Else's Maze

By: Deepak Malhotra

Now a Wall Street Journal Best-seller! If you were a mouse trapped in a maze and someone kept moving the cheese, what would you do? Over a decade ago, the best-selling business fable Who Moved My Cheese? offered its answer to the question: accept that change is... View Details

Keywords: Leadership; Success; Personal Development and Career; Problems and Challenges; Opportunities; Creativity

October 1991 (Revised September 1998)
Case

Maxwell Appliance Controls

By: Robert S. Kaplan

A profitable manufacturing division of a large company is looking for new ways to identify sources of productivity improvements. Led by its senior finance officer, an activity-based cost system is developed to identify activities performed for its highly varied product... View Details

Keywords: Activity Based Costing and Management; Management Teams; Quality; Performance Improvement; Organizational Culture; Problems and Challenges; Production; Manufacturing Industry

July 2001 (Revised March 2002)
Case

Progressive Insurance: Disclosure Strategy

By: Amy P. Hutton and James Weber

Progressive Insurance had refused to play Wall Street's earning game. Progressive didn't manage reported earnings nor did management give guidance to analysts. Management then considered taking their unique disclosure strategy one step further to become the first to... View Details

Keywords: Earnings Management; Stocks; Corporate Disclosure; Insurance; Volatility; Insurance Industry; United States

28 May 2019
Research & Ideas

Investor Lawsuits Against Auditors Are Falling, and That's Bad News for Capital Markets

of frivolous litigation. Raising the bar higher is a good thing then, to reduce waste of resources spent in litigation. But just reducing investor protections is a recipe for weakened capital markets. Investor coalitions View Details

Keywords: by Martha Lagace; Financial Services; Accounting

March 2025 (Revised March 2025)
Case

Seattle's Climate Pledge Arena: Ticket to a Greener Future

By: Rosabeth Moss Kanter and Jacob A. Small

Tim Leiweke reviewed how his development group and partners had completely rebuilt an aging Seattle landmark into the world’s greenest arena, carrying the visible name Climate Pledge Arena. It had attracted a new National Hockey League franchise, the Kraken, and... View Details

Keywords: Environmental Sustainability; Leadership; Bids and Bidding; Standards; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Green Buildings; Innovation Leadership; Partners and Partnerships; Power and Influence; Operations; Green Technology Industry; Entertainment and Recreation Industry; Seattle

December 2018 (Revised January 2020)
Case

Husk Power: Scaling the Venture

By: Benjamin N. Roth, Joseph B. Lassiter III and Natalia Rigol

In January 2018, Manoj Sinha—founder and CEO of Husk Power—was contemplating raising $20 million to scale operations for a second time. From 2007 through 2013, Husk built 80 biomass waste plants that provided electricity to 250,000 villagers and shop owners spread... View Details

Keywords: Scaling; Energy; Entrepreneurship; Emerging Markets; Growth and Development Strategy; Energy Industry; India

2008
Working Paper

Extending Producer Responsibility: An Evaluation Framework for Product Take-Back Policies

By: Michael W. Toffel, Antoinette Stein and Katharine Lee

Manufacturers are increasingly being required to adhere to product take-back regulations that require them to manage their products at the end of life. Such regulations seek to internalize products' entire life cycle costs into market prices, with the ultimate... View Details

Keywords: Product; Cost; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Environmental Sustainability

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05 Sep 2017
First Look

First Look at New Research and Ideas, September 5, 2017

https://cb.hbsp.harvard.edu/cbmp/product/617058-PDF-ENG Harvard Business School Case 818-010 Hacking Heroin “Hacking Heroin” was the first hackathon that Annie Rittgers, founder of Cincinnati-based 17a, had organized or even attended. “There will continue to be a lot... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

Article

To Drive Efforts...Don't Tiptoe Around Your Legal Risk

By: Edward Chang and Bonnie Levine

Many Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) initiatives are scuttled because DEI leaders and legal teams feel themselves to be at odds over questions of acceptable risk. DEI leaders see lawyers as guardians of the status quo, whereas legal experts, trained to... View Details

Keywords: Diversity; Risk Management; Legal Liability