Publications
Publications
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- All HBS Web
(3,160)
- Faculty Publications (655)
- June 2020 (Revised October 2020)
- Case
Muddy Waters vs. eHealth: The Debate of a 'Lifetime'
By: Jonas Heese and Cristo Liautaud
In May 2020, an analyst was assessing eHealth’s performance. eHealth was an online / tele-sales broker of health insurance products. The stock had recently hit all-time highs, closing at a peak of $146 on March 4, 2020. But now, May 4, 2020, eHealth traded at $103. The... View Details
- June 2020 (Revised February 2021)
- Case
Accounting for Leases at American Airlines (A)
By: Jonas Heese, Gerardo Pérez Cavazos and Julia Kelley
In March 2020, as coronavirus reduced demand for air travel, an analyst was forecasting American Airlines’ (American’s) first quarter financial results. To develop a forecast, she needed to familiarize herself with Accounting Standards Update (ASU) 2016-02, “Leases... View Details
Keywords: Accounting; Financial Reporting; Financial Statements; Finance; Governance; Corporate Accountability; Corporate Governance; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Governing and Advisory Boards; Leasing; Accounting Industry; Air Transportation Industry; North and Central America; United States
- May 2020
- Article
Identifying Sources of Inefficiency in Health Care
By: Amitabh Chandra and Douglas O. Staiger
In medicine, the reasons for variation in treatment rates across hospitals serving similar patients are not well understood. Some interpret this variation as unwarranted and push standardization of care as a way of reducing allocative inefficiency. However, an... View Details
- May 2020
- Article
Measuring Collaboration in Modern Organizations
By: Stephen Michael Impink, Andrea Prat and Raffaella Sadun
Internal communication has been a central theme in organizational economics, as employee collaboration provides insight into the structure of firms. Use of electronic communications data can be transformational for organizational economics, as these data provide a... View Details
- Article
The Changing Landscape of Auditors' Liability
By: Colleen Honigsberg, Shivaram Rajgopal and Suraj Srinivasan
We provide a comprehensive overview of shareholder litigation against auditors since the passage of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act (PSLRA). The number of lawsuits per year has declined, dismissals have increased, and settlements in recent years have... View Details
- 2020
- Working Paper
HBS COVID-19 Global Policy Tracker
By: Alberto Cavallo and Tannya Cai
The HBS COVID-19 Global Policy Tracker is an initiative by the Business, Government and the International Economy (BGIE) unit at Harvard Business School (HBS) to collect and standardize economic policies implemented as a response to the coronavirus pandemic around the... View Details
- Article
The Impact of Penalties for Wrong Answers on the Gender Gap in Test Scores
By: Katherine B. Coffman and David Klinowski
Multiple-choice exams play a critical role in university admissions across the world. A key question is whether imposing penalties for wrong answers on these exams deters guessing from women more than men, disadvantaging female test-takers. We consider data from a... View Details
- March–April 2020
- Article
What's Really Holding Women Back? It's Not What Most People Think
By: R. Ely and Irene Padavic
Ask people to explain why women remain so dramatically underrepresented in the senior ranks of most companies, and you will hear from the vast majority a lament that goes something like this: High-level jobs require extremely long hours, women's devotion to family... View Details
- March 2020
- Article
Which Early Withdrawal Penalty Attracts the Most Deposits to a Commitment Savings Account?
By: John Beshears, James J. Choi, Christopher Harris, David Laibson, Brigitte C. Madrian and Jung Sakong
Previous research has shown that some people voluntarily use commitment contracts that restrict their own choice sets. We study how people divide money between two accounts: a liquid account that permits unrestricted withdrawals and a commitment account that is... View Details
- Article
What We Can Learn from Five Naturalistic Field Experiments That Failed to Shift Commuter Behaviour
By: Ariella S. Kristal and A.V. Whillans
Across five field experiments with employees of a large organization (n = 68,915), we examined whether standard behavioural interventions (“nudges”) successfully reduced single-occupancy vehicle commutes. In Studies 1 and 2, we sent letters and emails with nudges... View Details
- December 2019 (Revised June 2025)
- Case
Mãe Terra and Unilever (A)
By: Lynn S. Paine, Ruth Costas and Priscilla Zogbi
The case concerns the sale of Mãe Terra, one of Brazil's leading brands for packaged organic foods, to the consumer goods giant Unilever in 2017. Working with Unilever management, Mãe Terra’s CEO Alexandre Borges must determine whether and how to keep Mãe Terra's B... View Details
Keywords: Mergers ＆ Acquisitions; Brand Management; Sustainability; Mergers and Acquisitions; Mission and Purpose; Social Enterprise; Corporate Governance; Governing and Advisory Boards; Environmental Sustainability; Organizational Culture; Food and Beverage Industry; Agriculture and Agribusiness Industry; Brazil; Latin America
- November 9, 2019
- Article
Effect of Revealing Authors' Conflicts of Interests in Peer Review: Randomized Controlled Trial
By: Leslie K. John, George Loewenstein, Andrew Marder and Michael Callaham
Objective: To assess the impact of disclosing authors’ conflict of interest declarations to peer reviewers at a medical journal.
Design: Randomised controlled trial.
Setting: The study was conducted within the manuscript review process at the... View Details
Design: Randomised controlled trial.
Setting: The study was conducted within the manuscript review process at the... View Details
- 2019
- Working Paper
Undisclosed Debt Sustainability
By: Laura Alfaro and Fabio Kanczuk
Over the past decade, non–Paris Club creditors, notably China, have become an important source of financing for low- and middle-income countries. In contrast with typical sovereign debt, these lending arrangements are not public, and other creditors have no information... View Details
- October 2019
- Article
Limited Investment Capital and Credit Spreads
Using proprietary credit default swap (CDS) data, I investigate how capital shocks at protection sellers impact pricing in the CDS market. Seller capital shocks—measured as CDS portfolio margin payments—account for 12% of the time-series variation in weekly spread... View Details
- September 2019 (Revised December 2022)
- Case
Cooking Down a Storm: Changing Culture at Pasta Serafina (A)
By: Susanna Gallani, Francesca Gino and Raffaella Sadun
Plant management at Pasta Serafina, a pasta producer in the south of Italy, is struggling to contain employee absenteeism. While the misbehavior is concentrated in a minority of the workers, its effects impact not only the plant’s performance, but also the climate and... View Details
- 2019
- White Paper
Impact-Weighted Financial Accounts: The Missing Piece for an Impact Economy
By: George Serafeim, T. Robert Zochowski and Jennifer Downing
Reimagining capitalism is an imperative. We need to create a more inclusive and sustainable form of capitalism that works for every person and the planet. Massive environmental damage, growing income and wealth disparity, stress, and depression within developed... View Details
- July–August 2019
- Article
Coupling Labor Codes of Conduct and Supplier Labor Practices: The Role of Internal Structural Conditions
By: Yanhua Bird, Jodi L. Short and Michael W. Toffel
Exploitive working conditions have spurred companies to pressure their suppliers to adopt labor codes of conduct and to conform their labor practices to the standards set forth in those codes. Yet little is known about whether organizational structures such as codes... View Details
- June 2019
- Article
Brokers vs. Retail Investors: Conflicting Interests and Dominated Products
By: Mark Egan
I study how brokers distort household investment decisions. Using a novel convertible bond dataset, I find that consumers often purchase dominated bonds—cheap and expensive versions of otherwise identical bonds coexist in the market. The empirical evidence suggests... View Details
- Article
Four Things No One Will Tell You About ESG Data
By: Sakis Kotsantonis and George Serafeim
As the ESG finance field and the use of ESG data in investment decision-making continue to grow, the authors seek to shed light on several important aspects of ESG measurement and data. This article is intended to provide a useful guide for the rapidly rising number of... View Details
Keywords: ESG; ESG (Environmental, Social, Governance) Performance; ESG Reporting; Data Analytics; Sustainability; Sustainability Reporting; CSR; Transparency; Investment Management; Socially Responsible Investing; Sustainable Finance; Sustainable Development; Inclusion; Inclusive Growth; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Corporate Accountability; Investment; Management; Climate Change; Corporate Governance; Diversity; Integrated Corporate Reporting
- March 2019
- Case
The Sustainability Accounting Standards Board (Abridged)
By: Julie Battilana and Michael Norris
In 2014, as the Sustainability Accounting Standards Board (SASB) has just brought former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg on as chairman of the board, Jean Rogers, founder and CEO, struggles with how best to ensure the nonprofit’s financial sustainability while... View Details