Publications

09 Jul 2009
Working Paper Summaries

Performance Pressure as a Double-Edged Sword: Enhancing Team Motivation While Undermining the Use of Team Knowledge

Keywords: by Heidi K. Gardner

April 1991
Case

Sun Hydraulics Corp. (A) and (B) (Abridged)

Involves the design and creation of a company with no formally-defined hierarchy. Describes the steps the founder takes to avoid the organizational politics he perceives as crushing the human contributions they were designed to harness. Fifteen years later, the company... View Details

Keywords: Management Style; Business or Company Management; Organizational Design; Organizational Structure

August 2011 (Revised November 2011)
Case

The U.S. Military Academy at West Point

By: Anat Keinan

The case examines an iconic institution's decision on whether or not to undertake a branding initiative. Founded in 1802, West Point has played a key role in America's history. It is one of the nation's oldest institutions of higher learning and is well known for... View Details

Keywords: Surveys; Resource Allocation; Brands and Branding; Business and Stakeholder Relations; Competitive Strategy; Education Industry; United States

June 10, 2022
Article

What Top Executives Can Learn from Junior Employees

By: Rosabeth Moss Kanter

Having reached the pinnacle of their careers, many top executives think their learning days are over. Their role, as they see it, is to make pronouncements, define strategy and impart to others the benefits of their vast experience—that is, to tell the employees below... View Details

Keywords: Executives; Mentoring; Innovation; Leadership; Employees; Learning; Change

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Research Summary

The New Social Contract: Contractors, Firms, and Agencies

The emergence of a 'new social contract' linking employees and organizations - perhaps most notable for the absence of a promise of lifelong job security - has been widely remarked. A related trend, less noted but potentially important, has been the emergence of a... View Details

June 2014
Supplement

Chung and Dasgupta: Information for Jordan Ramirez

By: Ian Larkin and Karen Huang

The "Promotion Process at Chung and Dasgupta, LLP" set of cases explores the roles of general and firm-specific human capital in employee performance measurement, feedback, and promotion/compensation decisions. In the cases, a leading law firm must decide whether to... View Details

Keywords: Performance Appraisal; Performance Measurement; Employee Feedback; Motivation; Promotions; Human Capital; Performance Evaluation; Management Systems; Compensation and Benefits; Retention; Legal Services Industry; United States; Massachusetts

Web

PhD Programs - Doctoral

objectives. Jointly administered by HBS and GSAS, the program includes core disciplinary training in sociology or psychology, as well as additional coursework in organizational behavior. Accounting & Management Accounting scholars study... View Details

August 2007
Case

Satelite Distribuidora de Petroleo

By: Lynda M. Applegate and Andrea M.A.F. Minardi

Marcelo Alecrim, the owner of SAT, a gas distribution company in Brazil, envisioned many growth opportunities but lacked financial resources to pursue them. He was approaching an American private equity fund to raise money. Describes Alecrim's challenge in creating SAT... View Details

Keywords: Business Model; Entrepreneurship; Private Equity; Growth and Development Strategy; Emerging Markets; Utilities Industry; Brazil

January 2023
Case

Thomas Buberl: Refounding AXA

By: Hubert Joly, Mihir Desai and Amram Migdal

In 2022, AXA and its CEO Thomas Buberl faced new types of challenges, including systemic risks such as climate change, geopolitical instability, public health crises, and social tensions caused by economic risks. AXA was one of the world’s largest insurers. Since... View Details

27 Sep 2011
First Look

First Look: September 27

able to reallocate resources and reconfigure assets to simultaneously explore and exploit. Using interviews and qualitative case studies from thirteen organizations, this article explores the actions senior View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

January 2016
Case

Open Innovation at Fujitsu (A)

By: Amy C. Edmondson and Jean-François Harvey

This case study examines the open innovation journey at Fujitsu, a global information and communication technology company. The case ends with the location decision between Tokyo, Japan, downtown San Francisco or Sunnyvale, California, regarding establishing a small... View Details

24 Jun 2009
Working Paper Summaries

Don’t Just Survive—Thrive: Leading Innovation in Good Times and Bad

Keywords: by Lynda M. Applegate & J. Bruce Harreld

April 2021 (Revised December 2023)
Case

The Mahindra Group: Leading with Purpose

By: Ranjay Gulati and Rachna Tahilyani

India headquartered Mahindra Group is a multibillion-dollar federation of companies operating across the globe. It is ahead of its time in articulating its purpose and mapping its values, something it had first done at inception and then refreshed yet again as ‘Rise’... View Details

Keywords: Mission and Purpose; Organizational Culture; Change Management; Communication Strategy; Family Ownership; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Revenue; Auto Industry; Financial Services Industry; Manufacturing Industry; Technology Industry; Asia; India; Mumbai; South Korea; Italy; United States

2021
Chapter

International Business History and the Strategy of Multinational Enterprises: How History Matters

By: Geoffrey Jones and Teresa da Silva Lopes

This chapter provides an overview of the evolution of international business over the long-run as well as the strategies of MNEs. It highlights how strategies became more complex over time with MNEs moving from being coordinators of resources and managers of... View Details

Keywords: Multinational; International Business; Internalization; Globalization; Theory; Multinational Firms and Management; Business History; Africa; Asia; Europe; Latin America; Middle East; North and Central America

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17 Oct 2016
HBS Seminar

Nicholas Bloom, Stanford University

23 Jun 2008
Working Paper Summaries

Using Financial Innovation to Support Savers: From Coercion to Excitement

Keywords: by Peter Tufano & Daniel Schneider; Financial Services

October 2007 (Revised June 2008)
Case

Leader(ship) Development

By: Scott A. Snook

Designed for use in the first year of an MBA program, can be included within a core course on leadership or used more broadly to orient students to their upcoming experience while in school. Offers a series of robust conceptual models to help students frame their... View Details

Keywords: Leadership Development; Framework; Business Education; Education Industry

March–April 2019
Article

Operational Transparency: Make Your Processes Visible to Customers and Your Customers Visible to Employees

By: Ryan W. Buell

Conventional wisdom holds that the more contact an operation has with its customers, the less efficiently it will run. But when customers are partitioned away from the operation, they are less likely to fully understand and appreciate the work going on behind the... View Details

Keywords: Operational Transparency; Customers; Services; Operations; Customer Focus and Relationships; Employees; Customer Satisfaction; Behavior; Service Industry