Publications

2025
Working Paper

Generative AI and the Nature of Work

By: Manuel Hoffmann, Sam Boysel, Frank Nagle, Sida Peng and Kevin Xu

Recent advances in artificial intelligence (AI) technology demonstrate a considerable potential to complement human capital intensive activities. While an emerging literature documents wide-ranging productivity effects of AI, relatively little attention has been paid... View Details

Keywords: Generative Ai; Digital Work; Open Source Software; Knowledge Economy; AI and Machine Learning; Open Source Distribution; Organizational Structure; Performance Productivity; Labor

SSRN

October 2024 (Revised December 2024)
Case

Kering Eyewear

By: Rohit Deshpandé, Dante Roscini and Elena Corsi

In June 2024, Roberto Vedovotto, CEO of Kering Eyewear, prepared to discuss the future of the recently acquired brands LINDBERG, a Danish optical eyewear brand, and Maui Jim, an American sunglasses brand. Vedovotto founded Kering Eyewear in 2014, convincing... View Details

Keywords: Marketing Strategy; Brands and Branding; Product Marketing; Mergers and Acquisitions; Business or Company Management; Growth and Development Strategy; Luxury; Fashion Industry; Apparel and Accessories Industry; Consumer Products Industry; Italy; Europe; China

October 2024
Case

Edizione

By: Cynthia A. Montgomery, Dante Roscini, Elena Corsi and Hugo Etchegoyhen

This case study examines the diversification and transformation of Edizione, the Benetton family's holding company originally established to reinvest dividends from the Benetton clothing brand. Edizione expanded significantly in the late 1990s and early 2000s,... View Details

October 2024
Case

GLIN Impact Capital

By: Ethan Rouen and Akiko Saito

In 2024, the co-founders of the venture capital fund GLIN Impact Capital face a critical inflection point as they consider launching a second, significantly larger impact investment fund in Japan. Founded in 2021 by the three Harvard Business School alumni, GLIN is one... View Details

Keywords: Venture Capital; Investment Funds; Growth and Development Strategy; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Power and Influence; Japan

October 2024
Case

Sacoor Brothers: From Co-Family CEOs to No Family CEOs?

By: Lauren Cohen, David Ager and Alpana Thapar

Sacoor Brothers, a luxury clothing retail company, was founded in 1989 in Lisbon, Portugal, by four brothers—Malik, Salim, Rahimo, and Moez. After establishing a strong presence in Portugal, the brothers were drawn to the rapidly growing retail markets in the Middle... View Details

October 2024 (Revised April 2025)
Case

Nvidia

By: Andy Wu and Matt Higgins

This case study examines Nvidia's strategic pivot from gaming GPUs to becoming a leader in general-purpose computing and AI. It explores how Nvidia leveraged its GPU architecture to dominate the growing fields of data center acceleration and AI training, outpacing... View Details

Keywords: Strategy; Technological Innovation; AI and Machine Learning; Product Development; Manufacturing Industry; Technology Industry; Electronics Industry; United States; China; Taiwan

October 2024
Case

Parexel: Scaling Up and Industry Dynamics

By: Regina E. Herzlinger and Ben Creo

Through the lens of biopharmaceutical contract research organization (CRO) PAREXEL, this case traces the evolution of the firm as it reinvents itself in response to the transformation of the CRO sector from a small, secondary cluster of firms into a major player with... View Details

Keywords: Research; Innovation and Invention; Business Model; Transformation; Globalization; Information Technology; Competitive Advantage; Pharmaceutical Industry

October 2024 (Revised January 2025)
Case

MDH Partners: Evolving a Family Legacy

By: Christina R. Wing and Sarah Mehta

This case is about succession planning for MDH Partners, an Atlanta-based industrial real estate investment firm founded in 2005. When Jeffrey Small, Jr. cofounded MDH Partners, he named the company in honor of his grandfather, Mark Durward (MD) Hodges, an early... View Details

Keywords: Buildings and Facilities; Business Ventures; Ownership; Business Exit or Shutdown; Family Business; Management Succession; Personal Development and Career; Financial Services Industry; Real Estate Industry; United States; Georgia (state, US); Atlanta

October 2024
Background Note

Outsourcing Primer

By: Willy C. Shih

This note provides some background on one of the key resource allocation decisions managers make as they develop and produce products and services: what should they do with the walls of their own firm, and what they should depend upon suppliers or contractors to... View Details

Keywords: Outsourcing; Offshoring And Outsourcing; Production; Product Development; Resource Allocation; Supply Chain Management; Manufacturing Industry; United States; Asia

2024
Working Paper

Case Studies of the Emulation of Chinese Entrepreneurial Business Models

By: Josh Lerner, Junxi Liu, Jacob Moscona and David Yang

This working paper presents four short case studies of emerging market businesses whose founders emulated Chinese firms. These examples are part of a more systematic pattern, documented extensively in Lerner et al. (2024), in which businesses developed in China were... View Details

Keywords: Emerging Markets; Business Ventures

2024
Other Unpublished Work

A Proposal for the IMF: A New Instrument of International Liquidity Provision for Emerging Markets and Developing Economies

By: Laura Alfaro, Guillermo Calvo, José de Gregorio, Augusto de la Torre, Pablo Guidotti, Enrique Mendoza, Ernesto Talvi, Liliana Rojas-Suarez and Andrés Velasco

This paper addresses a critical flaw in the international financial system: the failure to address the inherent asymmetry between countries that issue reserve currencies and those that do not, leaving the latter vulnerable during systemic liquidity crises. We propose... View Details

Keywords: Macroeconomics; Emerging Markets; Financial Markets; International Finance; Developing Countries and Economies; Latin America

2025
Working Paper

Bank Capital and the Growth of Private Credit

By: Sergey Chernenko, Robert Ialenti and David Scharfstein

We show that business development companies (BDCs), a significant source of private credit, are very well capitalized according to bank capital frameworks. These types of private credit funds have median risk-based capital ratios of about 36%, which is 26 percentage... View Details

Keywords: Financing and Loans; Capital; Credit; Financial Institutions

SSRN

October 2024
Article

Canary Categories

By: Eric Anderson, Chaoqun Chen, Ayelet Israeli and Duncan Simester

Past customer spending in a category is generally a positive signal of future customer spending. We show that there exist “canary categories” for which the reverse is true. Purchases in these categories are a signal that customers are less likely to return to that... View Details

Keywords: Churn; Churn Management; Churn/retention; Assortment Planning; Retail; Retailing; Retailing Industry; Preference Heterogeneity; Assortment Optimization; Customers; Retention; Consumer Behavior; Forecasting and Prediction; Retail Industry

Find at Harvard

October 2024
Article

Founder-CEO Compensation and Selection into Venture Capital-Backed Entrepreneurship

By: Michael Ewens, Ramana Nanda and Christopher Stanton

We show theoretically that a critical determinant of the attractiveness of VC-backed entrepreneurship for high-earning potential founders is the expected time to develop a startup’s initial product. This is because founder-CEOs’ cash compensation increases... View Details

Keywords: Entrepreneurship; Venture Capital; Executive Compensation

2024
White Paper

Hidden Workers: The Case for Caregivers

By: Joseph B. Fuller, Manjari Raman and Francis Hintermann

Keywords: Labor; Work-Life Balance; Selection and Staffing; Retention

October 2024
Article

Racial Inequality in Organizations: A Systems Psychodynamic Perspective

By: Sanaz Mobasseri, William A. Kahn and Robin J. Ely

This paper uses systems psychodynamic concepts to develop theory about the persistence of racial inequality in U.S. organizations and to inform an approach for disrupting it. We treat White men as the dominant group and Black people as the archetypal subordinate group... View Details

Keywords: Equality and Inequality; Race; Prejudice and Bias; Organizational Culture; Gender; Power and Influence; Employees; Attitudes

Find at Harvard

2025
Book

Retiring: Creating a Life That Works for You

By: Teresa M. Amabile, Lotte Bailyn, Marcy Crary, Douglas T. Hall and Kathy E. Kram

Retirement, as a major life transition, can be both thrilling and challenging in unexpected ways. Written by acclaimed authors in the fields of business leadership, careers, and work, this book goes beyond the typical financial and health-related advice on retirement,... View Details

Keywords: Retirement

Find at Harvard

October 2024 (Revised May 2025)
Case

Southern California Industrial: Freezer Drive

By: Arthur I Segel, Dwight Angelini and W. Matt Kelly

In the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, a Boston based real estate private equity firm was seeking to make their very first West Coast investments in hopes of establishing their presence in the strategic region. An exciting property suddenly became available on the... View Details

Keywords: Real Estate Development; Acquisition; Health Pandemics; Risk and Uncertainty; Expansion; Cost vs Benefits; Investment Return; Real Estate Industry

September 26, 2024
Article

A Better Way to Measure Social Impact

By: Robert S. Kaplan and Constance Spitzer

All impact investors report the financial returns from their funds and investments, and many provide metrics on intended social outcomes, such as numbers of individuals served, or quality jobs created. But investors do not supply metrics about their impacts on... View Details

Keywords: Impact Investing; Social Impact Investment; Inclusive Growth; Sustainability; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Environmental Sustainability

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