Familiarity - Publications - Faculty & Research

17 Sep 2018
Research & Ideas

Welcome to Retirement. Who Am I Now?

retirement, Amabile and colleagues found that, for many, the transition begins smoothly enough but then develops into retirees questioning their own identity and puzzling over how to structure their days as their familiar work life fades... View Details

Keywords: by Dina Gerdeman; Entertainment & Recreation

31 Aug 2015
Research & Ideas

How Ben Franklin’s ‘Way to Wealth’ Introduced American Capitalism to the World

“Early to bed and early to rise makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise.” “There are no gains without pains.” “One today is worth two tomorrows.” Some phrases are so familiar they seem to have always existed. Referenced in every imaginable... View Details

Keywords: by Julia Hanna

15 Nov 2022
Book

Stop Ignoring Bad Behavior: 6 Tips for Better Ethics at Work

earning billions, kept churning out its pills. By now, this story is a familiar one. But what is less well known is that the company had help not only from management consultant McKinsey & Company, which sold advice to Purdue on how... View Details

Keywords: by Pamela Reynolds

27 Jul 2020
Book

Reflection: The Pause That Brings Peace and Productivity

hard to find time for reflection and might even be eroding our capacity to reflect. What is reflection? The standard answer appears in familiar images. One is Rodin’s famous sculpture, “The Thinker.” Another is a Buddhist monk, sitting... View Details

Keywords: by Dina Gerdeman

02 Aug 2012
Working Paper Summaries

The Rich Get Richer: Enabling Conditions for Knowledge Use in Organizational Work Teams

Keywords: by Melissa A. Valentine, Bradley R. Staats & Amy C. Edmondson

Article

Moving Beyond Schumpeter: Management Research on the Determinants of Technological Innovation

By: Gautam Ahuja, Curba Morris Lampert and Vivek Tandon

Schumpeter's conjecture that large monopolistic firms were the key source of innovation in modern industrial economies has been the underpinning for much work on the topic of innovation. In this review paper we consciously move beyond the Schumpeterian tradition of... View Details

Keywords: Technological Innovation; Management; Strategy

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13 Nov 2013
Research & Ideas

Should Men’s Products Fear a Woman’s Touch?

Most eight-year-olds are familiar with cooties: an imaginary infectious disease spread through proximity to children of the opposite sex. We eventually outgrow the silly idea. But when it comes to the world of consumer products, fear of... View Details

Keywords: by Carmen Nobel; Consumer Products; Food & Beverage; Auto

Research Summary

Understanding Customers

In conventional business case studies, protagonists almost never have the option of stepping back to seek a new understanding of the customer. But to be effective in practice, managers need both the self-assurance and ability to initiate and pursue, with rigor and... View Details

July 1996 (Revised July 2025)
Case

Innovative Opportunities to Manage Health Care Delivery: THG/Healthy Shop

By: Regina E. Herzlinger and D. Scott Lurding

The purpose of this case is: To familiarize the students with the changing landscape of health care delivery, through chains of retail medical centers and those offering value-based care (VBC).

To discuss fundamental managerial decisions about their... View Details

Keywords: Managed Care; Capitation; Strategy

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06 Dec 2022
Research & Ideas

Latest Isn’t Always Greatest: Why Product Updates Capture Consumers

In another study, they found that when people were less familiar with a product category, they were also less likely to scrutinize the reworked version and instead assumed it was better. On the other hand, when they did have more... View Details

Keywords: by Michael Blanding; Consumer Products; Retail

01 Nov 1999
Research & Ideas

John H. Patterson and the Sales Strategy of the National Cash Register Company, 1884 to 1922

reprinted—and thereby according to the author "exposed"—the techniques of book canvassers, atlas salesmen, and lightning-rod peddlers. While it is not clear that Patterson was familiar with any of these scripts, it is likely... View Details

Keywords: by Walter A. Friedman

01 Oct 2007
Research & Ideas

Encouraging Dissent in Decision-Making

that lives and dies by its ideas." Edmondson says this reluctance to speak up stems variously from fears that superiors will not like the idea or that it may appear to criticize the status quo, which most people find reassuringly View Details

Keywords: by Garry Emmons

19 Apr 2004
Research & Ideas

Birth of the American Salesman

they became customers of that company and were targeted for follow-up calls or for more promotional material. They also became familiar with the product and were likely, unless disappointed with it, to continue to purchase from the... View Details

Keywords: by Laura Linard

06 Feb 2020
Research & Ideas

What We Learned from Reading Jeff Bezos’ Patents

familiar with Amazon, what is surprising is that two of these patents involve unmanned aerial vehicles, a technology that Amazon has yet to exploit to its full potential commercially. Bezos’ involvement in these patents suggests that he... View Details

Keywords: by Tricia Gregg and Boris Groysberg; Retail

21 Aug 2019
Research & Ideas

What Machine Learning Teaches Us about CEO Leadership Style

positive, but a negative facial expression may create the opposite meaning,” says Choudhury. Finding CEOs to test But where could the researchers find enough CEOs to conduct their study? It turns out that Khanna was familiar with the... View Details

Keywords: by Michael Blanding

Teaching Interest

Managing the Future of Work (MBA Education—Elective Curriculum)

By: Christopher T. Stanton

The nature and scope of work is changing rapidly, creating massive business challenges in the shadow of broader political and social shifts. HBS launched a major initiative in 2017 on Managing the Future of Work to define these workplace issues and... View Details

23 Sep 2022
Research & Ideas

8 Strategies to Sustain Business Innovation

strategy may be to pitch it as something both familiar and novel. McDonald likes to tell the story of how West Coast restaurants introduced exotic Japanese sushi to diners by promoting the California roll, which made the dish seem both... View Details

Keywords: by Lane Lambert

24 Feb 2016
Research & Ideas

Why It's Best to Take Tests Early in the Day

interviews become tired and more cynical throughout the day,” Gino says. Familiar with Gino’s time-of-day research, Sievertsen and Piovesan approached her with an enormous set of data from Denmark, which introduced a nationwide student... View Details

Keywords: by Carmen Nobel; Education

14 Jun 2021
Op-Ed

When Your Nerves Get the Best of You, Change the Narrative

mention the executives in my class. "Here’s some good news: We can engage with that anxiety productively." Many of us are familiar with this kind of anxiety. I’ve interviewed and studied many leaders whose confidence has faltered before a... View Details

Keywords: by Francesca Gino

11 Apr 2022
Research & Ideas

A World of Difference: What Keeps Companies from Becoming More Inclusive

pushes us in the wrong direction toward something that is fundamentally familiar and comfortable." Frei: I grew up in a house where judgment was a delicacy, so I instinctively go straight to judgment. It’s the trait I like least in... View Details

Keywords: by Jen McFarland Flint

Publications