Publications

September 1988 (Revised December 1998)
Case

Donner Co.

By: Roy D. Shapiro

The management of a small manufacturer of circuit boards faces a number of production and operations management problems. The first day on this case is used to analyze the production capacity of various stages in the process and to examine bottlenecks and key... View Details

Keywords: Information Management; Management; Management Practices and Processes; Production; Performance Capacity; Problems and Challenges; Semiconductor Industry

11 Oct 2007
Working Paper Summaries

How Firms Respond to Being Rated

Keywords: by Aaron K. Chatterji & Michael W. Toffel

05 Oct 2009
Research & Ideas

The Vanguard Corporation

were going to succeed and prosper needed to manage risks better, have a stronger sense of purpose to motivate their employees, and satisfy a public already agitated about scandals such as Enron in the corporate world. What I didn't see... View Details

Keywords: by Sean Silverthorne

30 Mar 2020
Research & Ideas

The New Rules for Remote Work: Pandemic Edition

leaders need a new game plan. We asked Harvard Business School professors to provide practical advice for managing large-scale, long-term remote work at a time when many employees are not only distracted by the commotion in their homes,... View Details

Keywords: by Dina Gerdeman

July 2015 (Revised March 2021)
Case

Proxy Contest at DuPont

By: Jay W. Lorsch and Emily McTague

On January 9, 2015, Nelson Peltz of Trian Fund Management launched a proxy fight for four out of the twelve seats on the DuPont board. The fund had previously published a public letter addressed to shareholders outlining its proposal to break the company into three... View Details

Keywords: Board Of Directors; Hedge Fund; Activist Investing; Activist Investors; Proxy Fight; Corporate Governance; Governing and Advisory Boards; Investment Activism; Chemical Industry; United States

October 2001 (Revised October 2017)
Case

Pilgrim Bank (A): Customer Profitability

By: Frances X. Frei and Dennis Campbell

Provides a context in which students can explore managerial decision making that is critically informed by data analysis. The setting is a retail bank and the decision making relates to the bank's policy toward online banking. The management team is evaluating whether... View Details

Keywords: Banks and Banking; Customers; Profit; Banking Industry

Personal selling represents one of the most important elements in the marketing mix, and appropriate management of the sales force is vital to achieving the organization’s objectives. Among the various instruments of sales management, compensation plays a pivotal... View Details

30 Jun 2003
Research & Ideas

Are You Supporting Your B Players?

By day, managers run themselves ragged worrying about their A players: their stars, their rainmakers, their top 15 percent. By night, the same managers fret over their C players—their bottom 15 percent of... View Details

Keywords: by Martha Lagace

2008
Working Paper

CEO and CFO Career Penalties to Missing Quarterly Analysts Forecasts

By: Rick Mergenthaler, Shiva Rajgopal and Suraj Srinivasan

We find that missing the quarterly analyst consensus earnings forecast is associated with career penalties in the form of a reduced bonus, smaller equity grants, and a greater chance of forced dismissal for both CEOs and CFOs during the period 1993-2004. These results... View Details

Keywords: Earnings Management; Governing and Advisory Boards; Compensation and Benefits; Managerial Roles; Personal Development and Career

SSRN

28 Apr 2021
News

Psychological Safety in a Hybrid World

03 Jul 2013
What Do You Think?

What Are the Limits of Transparency?

information is delivered." One possible line would include information about a company's strategy. Brad Keller commented that "It takes more than just sharing financials or performance review data It is really a matter of being... View Details

Keywords: by James Heskett

August 2023 (Revised January 2024)
Case

Jake Becraft and Strand Therapeutics: The Making of an Entrepreneur

By: Satish Tadikonda, William Marks and Ananya Zutshi

Jake Becraft, a PhD student at MIT disillusioned in pursuit of his dreams of becoming an academic, serendipitously finds himself discussing the potential commercial applications of his work with Tasuku Kitada, his former postdoctoral research mentor. The two decide to... View Details

Keywords: Entrepreneurship; Business Startups; Business or Company Management

October 2014
Article

The Transparency Trap

By: Ethan Bernstein

To get people to be more creative and productive, managers increase transparency with open workspaces and access to real-time data. But less transparent work environments can yield more-transparent employees. Employees perform better when they can try out new ideas and... View Details

Find at Harvard

April 2008 (Revised July 2011)
Background Note

Strategic Decline

By: David J. Collis and Jan W. Rivkin

This note first documents the facts around the sustainability of competitive advantage. It then observes that the demise of a previously successful strategy, in the first instance, often comes from some change in the external environment. It, therefore, characterizes... View Details

Keywords: Competitive Advantage; Strategy; Situation or Environment; Organizational Change and Adaptation

2014
Working Paper

Adding Value Through Venture Capital in Latin America and the Caribbean

By: Josh Lerner, Ann Leamon, James Tighe and Susana Garcia-Robles

Venture capital (VC) investment has long been recognized as an engine for economic growth and development. Unlike bank loans, where the entrepreneur receives money and is left alone as long as the payments arrive on the pre-arranged schedule, venture capital... View Details

Keywords: Venture Capital; Value; Entrepreneurship; Investment; Latin America; West Indies

Read Now

March 2006 (Revised August 2006)
Case

Putnam Investments: Rebuilding the Culture

By: Nitin Nohria and Charles Nichols

Charles "Ed" Haldeman Jr. is promoted CEO of Putnam Investments after the firm was badly damaged by a series of improper trading practices. He is charged with the task of managing the crisis, repairing the company culture, and putting the firm back into a pattern of... View Details

Keywords: Crime and Corruption; Organizational Culture; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Ethics; Investment Funds; Investment; Leading Change; Decision Choices and Conditions; Financial Services Industry; United States

July 2020
Case

Kathy Fish at Procter & Gamble: Navigating Industry Disruption by Disrupting from Within

By: Emily Truelove, Linda A. Hill and Emily Tedards

When Kathy Fish, Procter & Gamble’s Chief Research, Development & Innovation Officer, and a 40-year company veteran, stepped into her role in 2014, she was concerned that the world’s leading consumer packaged goods company had lost its capability to produce a steady... View Details

Keywords: Female Protagonist; Organizational Change; Organizational Behavior; Culture Change; Digital; Innovation; Lean Startup; Experimentation; Metrics; Consumer Packaged Goods (CPG); Leadership; Leading Change; Change Management; Organizational Culture; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Disruption; Innovation and Invention; Digital Transformation