Publications

July 2009 (Revised May 2010)
Case

Pfizer: Letter from the Chairman (A)

By: Robert L. Simons and Natalie Kindred

This case explores maximizing shareholder value as a goal in executive decision making. Over a period of nine years, three different Pfizer CEOs make critical decisions intended to increase shareholder value. But the results are disappointing. To allow students to... View Details

Keywords: Decision Choices and Conditions; Corporate Accountability; Corporate Governance; Annual Reports; Business and Shareholder Relations; Value Creation; Pharmaceutical Industry; United States

Forthcoming
Article

Sending a Message: An Empirical Assessment of Responses to Punitive and Non-punitive Compliance Messaging Strategies

By: Jodi L. Short, Michael W. Toffel, Elizabeth A. Keenan and Melissa Ouellet

Regulators operate in an increasingly hostile political environment. The U.S. Supreme Court is ramping up efforts to curtail the authority of administrative agencies. The second election of Donald Trump to the presidency has unleashed a torrent of anti-regulatory... View Details

Keywords: Field Experiment; Compliance; Compliance Programs; Compliance Policies; Regulatory Enforcement; Environmental Regulation; Environmental Policy; Government Experimentation; Governance Compliance; Government Administration; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Business and Government Relations; Construction Industry; Public Administration Industry; California; United States

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24 Jan 2017
First Look

First Look at New Research: January 24, 2017

there were strong financial returns to technological development. Finally, we document an inverted-U shaped relationship between inequality and innovation but also show that innovative places tended to be more socially mobile. Our new... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

09 Dec 2015
Research Event

How Do You Predict Demand and Set Prices For Products Never Sold Before?

How can a retailer use its own data to determine what to charge for products it has never sold before? That’s a question Kris Ferreira considered during a presentation at Future Assembly, an event at Harvard Business School where View Details

Keywords: by Carmen Nobel; Retail; Apparel & Accessories

Joseph Pacelli

Joseph Pacelli is the Gerald Schuster Associate Professor of Business Administration in the Accounting and Management Unit. He currently teaches Business Analysis and Valuation (BAV) in the MBA elective curriculum.

Professor Pacelli’s research covers topics... View Details

December 2001
Exercise

Exercise on Employee Stock Option Dilution

By: Brian J. Hall

Discusses the effects of option dilution on stock prices and shareholder value. To simplify the example and isolate the complexity of option dilution, we make a number of simplifying assumptions. View Details

Keywords: Stocks; Price; Employee Stock Ownership Plan; Business and Shareholder Relations; Complexity; Value

Find at Harvard

September 2019 (Revised August 2021)
Case

It's All About Family: Esas Group

By: Christina R. Wing and Alpana Thapar

This case describes how Ali Sabancı and his sister Emine Sabancı Kamışlı, shareholders of Esas Group, one of Turkey’s largest family-owned investment firms, worked to grow and professionalize the business. While their father Şevket Sabancı, played an instrumental role... View Details

Keywords: Family Business; Governance; Growth and Development Strategy; Turkey

Suraj Srinivasan is the Philip J. Stomberg Professor of Business Administration, a member of the Accounting and Management faculty unit, and chair of the View Details

Keywords: accounting industry; financial services

February 2017
Case

Clear Channel (A): The Rise, 1972–2003

By: John R. Wells and Gabriel Ellsworth

At the end of 2003, Clear Channel Communications, Inc., a diversified media group with revenues of $8.9 billion, could claim leadership positions in all three of its main businesses. Clear Channel Broadcasting was the largest radio-station operator in the world, with... View Details

Keywords: Clear Channel; Clear Channel Outdoor; Radio; Outdoor Advertising; Concert Industry; Lowry Mays; Federal Communications Commission; Regulation; Regulations; Regulatory Environment; JCDecaux; Media; Growth Management; Consolidation; Competitive Strategy; Fair Value Accounting; Advertising; Acquisition; Mergers and Acquisitions; Business Growth and Maturation; For-Profit Firms; Entertainment; Music Entertainment; Television Entertainment; Public Equity; Profit; Revenue; Geographic Scope; Multinational Firms and Management; Government Legislation; Business History; Laws and Statutes; Business or Company Management; Growth and Development Strategy; Marketing Channels; Industry Structures; Public Ownership; Problems and Challenges; Sales; Opportunities; Strategy; Adaptation; Business Strategy; Commercialization; Competition; Competitive Advantage; Corporate Strategy; Diversification; Expansion; Wireless Technology; Valuation; Media and Broadcasting Industry; Media and Broadcasting Industry; Media and Broadcasting Industry; Media and Broadcasting Industry; United States; Texas

Ana Antolin is a doctoral candidate in the Strategy unit at Harvard Business School. She received her B.S. in Quantitative Economics and International Relations from Tufts University. Prior to joining Harvard, she worked as a full-time research assistant in... View Details

16 Nov 2020
Research & Ideas

Transitions of Power Are Difficult. What Joe Biden and Other Incoming Leaders Need to Know.

the author Sean Silverthorne is editor-in-chief of Harvard Business School Working Knowledge. [Image: iStock Photo] Related Reading Good Leadership Is an Act of Kindness How a New Leader Broke Through a... View Details

Keywords: by Sean Silverthorne

01 Oct 1998
News

Andresen Becomes First European and First Exec. Ed. Graduate to Endow HBS Professorship

business administration and sociology. A four-and-a-half-year battle with tuberculosis cut short his formal university training, however, and required Andresen to be... View Details

07 Jul 2008
Research & Ideas

Innovation Corrupted: How Managers Can Avoid Another Enron

Legacy of Enron's Collapse (Harvard University Press), the devastation of Enron was total—yet there is much that business today can gain from a postmortem of the once-triumphant company. Salter had access to an extensive library of public... View Details

Keywords: by Martha Lagace; Energy; Utilities

12 Apr 2022
News

What Does the Pandemic Have to Do With Inflation?

July 2011 (Revised September 2011)
Case

CEO Compensation at GE: A Decade with Jeff Immelt

By: V.G. Narayanan and Lisa Brem

When ISS, a large shareholder advisory group, recommended a "no" vote on Jeff Immelt's award of 2 million stock options in April 2011, GE's compensation committee had to decide whether to rescind or amend the award or ignore the ISS recommendation. Was Immelt's 2010... View Details

Keywords: Budgets and Budgeting; Stock Options; Stock Shares; Annual Reports; Executive Compensation; Compensation and Benefits; Business and Shareholder Relations; Performance Evaluation; Corporate Governance; Corporate Accountability; Energy Industry; Financial Services Industry

November 29, 2011
Article

The Role of The Board in Creating a Sustainable Strategy

By: Robert G. Eccles, Ioannis Ioannou and George Serafeim

While conceptually elegant, the belief that a corporation's role is to maximize value for shareholders is under increasing challenge as society's expectations for companies change. An equally elegant new concept that takes account of these dual pressures has yet to... View Details

Keywords: Value Creation; Business and Stakeholder Relations; Corporate Strategy; Business and Shareholder Relations; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Performance Expectations; Governing and Advisory Boards; Management Practices and Processes; Decisions; Risk and Uncertainty; Cost vs Benefits; Information