Publications

February 2012
Case

Henkel: Building a Winning Culture

By: Robert Simons and Natalie Kindred

This case illustrates a CEO-led organizational transformation driven by stretch goals, performance measurement, and accountability. When Kasper Rorsted became CEO of Henkel, a Germany-based producer of personal care, laundry, and adhesives products, in 2008, he was... View Details

Keywords: Performance Measurement; Performance Appraisals; Human Resource Management; Values; Organizational Transformations; Pay For Performance; Strategy Execution; Values and Beliefs; Work-Life Balance; Organizational Culture; Human Resources; Performance Evaluation; Compensation and Benefits

July 2007
Article

Earnings Announcement Premia and Limits to Arbitrage

By: Daniel Cohen, Aiyesha Dey, Thomas Lys and Shyam Sunder

We examine the factors underlying the presence of earnings announcement premia. We find that the premia persist beyond the sample period examined in prior studies (ending in 1988), although they decline in magnitude after 1988. Further, premia are lower on the expected... View Details

Keywords: Business Earnings; Announcements; Corporate Disclosure

Article

Enacting Rituals to Improve Self-control

By: D. A. Tian, J. Schroeder, G. Haubl, J. Risen, M. I. Norton and F. Gino

Rituals are predefined sequences of actions characterized by rigidity and repetition. We propose that enacting ritualized actions can enhance subjective feelings of self-discipline, such that rituals can be harnessed to improve behavioral self-control. We test this... View Details

Keywords: Behavior; Perception; Personal Characteristics; Health

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2019
Report

Prime Minister's Scientist Return to India (SRI) Program: Proposal

By: Prithwiraj Choudhury and Tarun Khanna

A Summary of a set of policies proposed to the Indian Government regarding return migration. View Details

Keywords: Return Migration; Policy; India

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September 2004 (Revised December 2005)
Case

Chardonnay Shortage at Mondavi Winery, The

Mondavi Winery is facing a shortage of its Chardonnay wine. This shortage will disrupt its positioning in wine outlets and impact earnings. Allows students to discuss how to communicate such temporary--but financially important--shocks to the capital markets and... View Details

Keywords: Plant-Based Agribusiness; Business Earnings; Production; System Shocks; Capital Markets; Agriculture and Agribusiness Industry

Guhan Subramanian is the Joseph Flom Professor of Law and Business at the Harvard Law School and the Douglas Weaver Professor of Business Law at the Harvard Business School. He is the first person in the history of Harvard... View Details

2024
Working Paper

Open Devices and Slices: Evidence from Wi-Fi Equipment

By: Do Yoon Kim, Roberto Fontana and Shane Greenstein

Prior studies suggest that openness shapes the introduction of new products. This study collects novel data on all routers and subcomponents introduced between 2000 and 2018. We characterize each firm's position in a supply chain as upstream component providers... View Details

Keywords: Open Source Distribution; Product Development; Supply Chain

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April 2016
Supplement

Canadian Pacific's Bid for Norfolk Southern Spreadsheet Supplement

By: Benjamin C. Esty and Scott Mayfield

In December 2015, Canadian Pacific Railroad (CPR) has just made its third bid to acquire Norfolk Southern Corporation (NSC), one of the largest railroads in the United States. Having rejected the prior offers, NSC’s CEO James Squires and the NSC board must now value... View Details

Keywords: Capital Structure; Cash Flow; Cost of Capital; Financial Strategy; Investment Activism; Bids and Bidding; Negotiation Offer; Corporate Strategy; Rail Transportation; Mergers and Acquisitions; Transformation; United States; Canada

May 14 2014
Testimonial

Expanding Skills, Expanding Value

February 2011 (Revised December 2012)
Case

The Ford Fiesta

By: John Deighton and Leora Kornfeld

Executives at Ford wondered if social media could be the marketing solution for the launch of the youth-oriented 2010 Fiesta. But with social media came a ceding of control. Some at the company believed that if Ford was going to move beyond its conservative brand image... View Details

Keywords: Advertising Campaigns; Digital Marketing; Leadership; Goals and Objectives; Brands and Branding; Marketing Strategy; Product Launch; Market Entry and Exit; Standards; Auto Industry

04 Apr 2016
Working Paper Summaries

Preparing the Self for Team Entry: How Relational Affirmation Improves Team Performance

Keywords: by Julia J. Lee, Francesca Gino, Daniel M. Cable, and Bradley R. Staats

January 2009 (Revised July 2009)
Case

Alibaba's Taobao (A)

By: Felix Oberholzer-Gee and Julie M. Wulf

This case examines the decision of Alibaba Group to diversify from an international business-to-business (B2B) exchange (Alibaba.com) into a B2C and C2C exchange (Taobao.com) for Chinese retailers and consumers. In China, Taobao had managed to displace the once... View Details

Keywords: Business Model; Demand and Consumers; Market Transactions; Service Operations; Diversification; Internet and the Web; China

09 Jan 2023
Blog Post

How I Spent My HBS 2+2 Deferral: Sam Perez Diarte

telenovelas with my mom. I looked beyond the drama and strove to have this luxurious life of executives in the shows. I set my mind on becoming one of these executives. While... View Details

August 2002
Exercise

Career Choice-Making Case Assignment, The

By: Monica C. Higgins, David A. Thomas and Shoshana Zuboff

Sets the stage for self-assessment as an integral component in the process of career development. View Details

Keywords: Decision Choices and Conditions; Management Practices and Processes; Personal Development and Career

22 Oct 2008
Working Paper Summaries

Variation in Experience and Team Familiarity: Addressing the Knowledge Acquisition-Application Problem

Keywords: by Robert S. Huckman & Bradley R. Staats; Video Game; Web Services

Dec 2019
Survey

A Recovery Squandered

Despite a decade of steady economic growth since the Great Recession, America has done remarkably little to address underlying structural weaknesses in the country’s economy and society. Surveys of HBS... View Details

11 May 2016
News

Harvard researchers uncover what happens with US gun laws after mass shootings

Katherine Wang

Katherine is a doctoral student in the Business Economics program. She is interested in labor, public, and development economics with a focus on issues of gender and gender-based violence. Prior to joining HBS, Katherine led field experiments as a data scientist on the... View Details

March–April 2024
Article

How Fast Should Your Company Really Grow?

By: Gary P. Pisano

Growth—in revenues and profits—is the yardstick by which the competitive fitness and health of organizations is measured. Consistent profitable growth is thus a near universal goal for leaders—and an elusive one.

To achieve that goal, companies need a growth... View Details

Keywords: Growth and Development Strategy; Growth Management; Business Growth and Maturation; Business Strategy; Organizational Culture