Publications

07 May 2016
News

Harvard’s Anita Elberse Teaches Entertainment Ropes To Execs (And Celebrities)

February 1999
Case

Sports Agents: Is There a Firm Advantage?

By: Stephen A. Greyser and Brian R. Harris

Focuses on the decision of a young tennis player on what kind of agent to have as his representative. The choice is between someone in a large sports management/marketing firm and an independent agent representing a small number of individual athletes. Outlines the... View Details

Keywords: Decision Choices and Conditions; Knowledge Management; Marketing Communications; Marketing Strategy; Organizational Structure

03 Oct 2013
News

Study: Rankings Affect Student Applications

March 2003 (Revised November 2009)
Case

Hudson Manufacturing Company

By: Paul A. Gompers and Vanessa del Valle Broussard

Concerns the decision by Brett Keith and Owen Colligan to purchase Hudson Manufacturing, a maker of heaters and air filtration units for the military. Keith and Colligan have organized a search fund and identified Hudson as a potential buyout. The decline in the... View Details

Keywords: Mergers and Acquisitions; Decision Choices and Conditions; Investment; Pollutants; Industrial Products Industry; Manufacturing Industry

2015
Article

Approach, Ability, Aftermath: A Psychological Framework of Unethical Behavior at Work

By: C. Moore and F. Gino

Many of the scandalous organizational practices that have come to light in the last decade—rigging LIBOR, misselling payment protection insurance, rampant Wall Street insider trading, large-scale bribery of foreign officials, and the packaging and sale of toxic... View Details

Keywords: Working Conditions; Ethics; Decision Making

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15 Aug 2017
First Look

First Look at New Research and Ideas, August 15, 2017

Case 317-011 AEEC: Becoming an Innovation Catalyst No abstract available. Purchase this case:https://cb.hbsp.harvard.edu/cbmp/product/317011-PDF-ENG Harvard Business School Case 317-116 Helena Rubinstein: Making Up the Modern Woman This... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

March 2009 (Revised May 2011)
Case

Risk Management at Wellfleet Bank: Deciding about "Megadeals"

By: Anette Mikes

Inspired by one of the few banks that successfully weathered the 2007-2009 credit crisis, the case illustrates risk management in a corporate finance business. Chief executive Alastair Dowes has to decide if the risk governance process is adequate to uncover mega-risks... View Details

Keywords: Risk Management; Decision Making; Performance Evaluation; Credit; Balance and Stability; Integrated Corporate Reporting; Decision Choices and Conditions; Negotiation Offer; Performance Effectiveness; Corporate Finance; Banking Industry

February 2016 (Revised May 2016)
Case

Blue Origin, NASA, and New Space (A)

By: Matthew Weinzierl and Angela Acocella

Jeff Bezos, six years after starting a revolution in retailing with Amazon.com, turned his life-long passion for space into a start-up, Blue Origin. Blue (as it was called) was a part of the New Space industry, a collection of startup aerospace engineering companies... View Details

Keywords: Cost vs Benefits; Partners and Partnerships; Transportation; Business Startups; Government and Politics; Business and Government Relations; Aerospace Industry

Earl Sasser is a Baker Foundation Professor at Harvard Business School and has been a member of the faculty there since 1969. He received a B.A. in Mathematics from Duke University in 1965, an MBA from the University of North Carolina in 1967, and a Ph.D. in... View Details

Article

Bringing Probability Judgments into Policy Debates via Forecasting Tournaments

By: Philip E. Tetlock, Barbara A. Mellers and J. Peter Scoblic

Political debates often suffer from vague-verbiage predictions that make it difficult to assess accuracy and improve policy. A tournament sponsored by the U.S. intelligence community revealed ways in which forecasters can better use probability estimates to make... View Details

Keywords: Tournaments; Politics; Depolarization; Knowledge Creation; Forecasting and Prediction; Government and Politics

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January 2009 (Revised June 2010)
Case

Cisco Business Councils (2007): Unifying a Functional Enterprise with an Internal Governance System

By: Ranjay Gulati

In response to the 2001 market downturn, Cisco Systems implemented a major restructuring that transformed the company from a decentralized to centralized organization. While recognizing that a centralized, functional structure was necessary to avoid product and... View Details

Keywords: Restructuring; Customer Focus and Relationships; Governing and Advisory Boards; Resource Allocation; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Organizational Structure; Corporate Strategy; Technology Industry

31 Aug 2009
Research & Ideas

Why Competition May Not Improve Credit Rating Agencies

and industries. Competition will make ratings better to at least some of these interested parties, but not necessarily to all. Our results imply that competition in credit ratings forces raters to favor issuers. This is contrary to the... View Details

Keywords: by Martha Lagace; Financial Services

20 Jan 2016
Cold Call Podcast

The Power of Presence at the Podium

November 2006
Case

Tickle

By: William A. Sahlman and Dan Heath

Describes a set of decisions confronting the management team of a rapidly growing online psychological testing and social networking company. They can either sell the company to a large public company, raise another round of capital from a preeminent venture capital... View Details

Keywords: Decisions; Internet and the Web; Growth Management; Internet and the Web; Business Strategy; Corporate Finance

11 Sep 2017
Research & Ideas

Why Employers Favor Men

likely to advance to the top of their fields. Women make up just 4.2 percent of CEOs at S&P 500 firms and 19.2 percent of board members. "This discrimination does not appear to be driven by gender-specific stereotypes or animus" The... View Details

Keywords: by Dina Gerdeman

21 Apr 2016
Cold Call Podcast

Walmart: Changing the World for Better or Worse?

Keywords: Re: Rebecca M. Henderson

September 2015 (Revised February 2016)
Supplement

Novell (B): Board of Directors Aftermath of Hedge Fund Attack

By: Richard L. Nolan

No corporation and its board of directors is immune to a disruptive shareholder activist attack. The Novell (A) and (B) cases take students through a shareholder activist attack and its aftermath—a saga that spanned 5 years. The cases outline the activist playbook in... View Details

Keywords: Investment Activism; Governing and Advisory Boards; Decision Making

March 1993 (Revised September 1993)
Case

Praxair: Creating a Board (A)

By: Jay W. Lorsch

Discusses the process a CEO/chairman goes through in creating a new board. Specifically, follows a CEO's decision-making process in selecting board members. Also includes decisions about the selection process for board members and the structure and process of board... View Details

Keywords: Governing and Advisory Boards; Decision Making; Corporate Governance; Conferences; Business or Company Management; Selection and Staffing