Publications

Article

The Effects of Media Slant on Firm Behavior

By: Vishal P. Baloria and Jonas Heese

The media can impose reputational costs on firms because of its important role as an information intermediary and its ability to negatively slant coverage. We exploit a quasi-natural experiment that holds constant the information event across firms, but varies the... View Details

Keywords: Media Slant; Reputational Capital; Strategic Corporate Decisions; Media; News; Communication Strategy; Reputation

SSRN

Find at Harvard

April 2010 (Revised September 2011)
Case

Malaysia: People First?

By: Diego A. Comin and John Abraham

On March 30, 2010, Prime Minister Najib Razak presented his new economic model (NEM) for Malaysia. With the goal of raising per capita income to over $15,000 by 2020 from the current level of $6,634, the plan included measures to improve human capital, reduce migration... View Details

Keywords: Globalized Economies and Regions; Problems and Challenges; Crime and Corruption; Developing Countries and Economies; Development Economics; Emerging Markets; Transformation; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Wealth and Poverty; Equality and Inequality; Malaysia

October 2009 (Revised February 2010)
Supplement

Merger of Equals: The Integration of Mellon Financial and The Bank of New York (B)

By: Ryan D. Taliaferro, Clayton S. Rose and David Lane

[Continuation of "A" case.] Less than a month after the close of the merger between The Bank of New York and Mellon Financial, managers at the two firms realized that plans for combining their asset servicing businesses – and realizing the $180 million of annual cost... View Details

Keywords: Mergers and Acquisitions; Integration; Banks and Banking; Banking Industry

2009
Case

Mercury Athletic Footwear, Inc.: Valuing the Opportunity: Brief Case No. 4050.

By: Timothy A. Luehrman and Joel L. Heilprin

In January 2007, West Coast Fashions, Inc., a large designer and marketer of branded apparel, announced a strategic reorganization that would result in the divestiture of their wholly owned footwear subsidiary, Mercury Athletic. John Liedtke, the head of business... View Details

Keywords: Mergers and Acquisitions; Restructuring; Valuation; Apparel and Accessories Industry

2005
Working Paper

Aggregate Corporate Liquidity and Stock Returns

By: Robin Greenwood

Aggregate investment in cash and liquid assets as a share of total corporate investment is negatively related to subsequent U.S. stock market returns between 1947 and 2003. The share of cash in total investment is a more stable predictor of returns than scaled price... View Details

Keywords: Stocks; Financial Liquidity; Cash; Investment Return; Corporate Finance

February 1981 (Revised May 1988)
Case

Marriott's Rancho Las Palmas Resort

Management of a resort hotel near Palm Springs is reviewing the hotel's performance nine months after opening and planning a marketing strategy for 1980. Of particular concern is the strategy to adopt during the shoulder and off-seasons when demand for the product is... View Details

Keywords: Marketing Strategy; Accommodations Industry

12 May 2015
News

After Words with Rosabeth Moss Kanter

26 Mar 2014
News

Revisiting how Christensen’s “disruption innovation” in healthcare means decentralization

May 2023 (Revised November 2023)
Case

Arcos Dorados: Decarbonizing McDonald’s in Latin America

By: George Serafeim, Michael W. Toffel, Jenyfeer Martinez Buitrago and Mariana Cal

This case describes the decarbonization strategy of Arcos Dorados—McDonald’s largest independent franchisee, operating in 20 countries and territories in Latin America and the Caribbean—and how the company measured its greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, including those... View Details

Keywords: Environmental Accounting; Animal-Based Agribusiness; Plant-Based Agribusiness; Change Management; Forecasting and Prediction; Environmental Sustainability; Food; Growth Management; Supply Chain; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Strategy; Agriculture and Agribusiness Industry; Food and Beverage Industry; Green Technology Industry; Consumer Products Industry; Latin America; North and Central America; South America

Web

Strategy - Faculty & Research

their industries. But given the steep cost of failure, is a relentless pursuit of innovation always advisable? Or might there be some instances when imitation may be a better strategy to drive performance gains? This research-backed... View Details

March 2009 (Revised September 2011)
Case

UBS and Auction Rate Securities (A)

By: Daniel Baird Bergstresser, Shawn A. Cole and Siddharth Bhaskar Shenai

UBS, a global financial services company, must decide whether to continue to support the market for Auction Rate Securities in the face of a growing financial crisis. These instruments, underwritten by UBS, were marketed to clients as highly liquid and safe... View Details

Keywords: Cost vs Benefits; Financial Crisis; Asset Pricing; Financial Liquidity; Financial Instruments; Government Legislation; Risk and Uncertainty; Financial Services Industry

2011
Working Paper

Do Not Trash the Incentive! Monetary Incentives and Waste Sorting

By: Alessandro Bucciol, Natalia Montinari and Marco Piovesan

This paper examines whether monetary incentives are an effective tool for increasing domestic waste sorting. We exploit the exogenous variation in the pricing systems experienced during the 1999-2008 decade by the 95 municipalities in the district of Treviso (Italy).... View Details

Keywords: Household; Cost Management; Consumer Behavior; Wastes and Waste Processing; Motivation and Incentives; Public Administration Industry; Italy

Read Now

12 Apr 2017
Research & Ideas

Why Productivity Suffers When Employees Are Allowed to Schedule Their Own Tasks

very important to their patients.” Here’s what happened when the doctors chose not to follow the standard scheduling policy: In total, the time it took to read an image increased by 13 percent. That lost time cost the firm a lot of... View Details

Keywords: by Carmen Nobel; Health

January 2008 (Revised May 2011)
Case

Cognizant Technology Solutions

By: Robert G. Eccles, David Lane and Prabakar 'PK' Kothandaraman

In the highly competitive information technology outsourcing industry, Cognizant Technology Solutions has developed a strategy to differentiate itself by emphasizing building very close client relationships through its "Two-in-a-box" (TIB) model. This model is based on... View Details

Keywords: Customer Relationship Management; Knowledge Sharing; Resource Allocation; Competitive Advantage; Information Technology; Information Technology Industry

16 May 2023
HBS Case

How KKR Got More by Giving Ownership to the Factory Floor: ‘My Kids Are Going to College!’

variable that would make a big difference to costs that they needed shop workers vested in controlling. They tied its reduction to dividends, but that “didn’t move the needle one bit,” Bangert recalls in the case. Employees “still felt... View Details

Keywords: by Avery Forman

Web

Podcast - Business & Environment

Pasi Miettinen, CEO of Sagewell, a company that uses AI to help utilities and their customers manage energy demand efficiently. Pasi explains how Sagewell’s technology helps reduce peak electricity usage, which in turn lowers energy costs... View Details

Article

Discouraging Opportunistic Behavior in Collaborative R&D: A New Role for Government

The traditional role attributed to government in collaborative R&D has been one of funding. This paper explores a new role for government in facilitating collaborative R&D, one of discouraging opportunistic behavior. Given the nature of R&D, concerns about... View Details

Keywords: Behavior; Government and Politics; Managerial Roles; Research and Development; Framework; Collaborative Innovation and Invention; Opportunities; Italy

Find at Harvard

Read Now

July–August 2023
Article

Case Study: How Should a Start-Up Cut Its Burn Rate?

By: Nitin Nohria, Katie Josephson, Sophia Wronsky and Elizabeth Rha

Tyler Smith, the founder and CEO of the enterprise software firm Puck.io, is facing a hard decision. Just three months earlier the company laid off 20% of its employees to reduce its burn rate amid growing economic uncertainty and a suddenly unattractive funding... View Details

Keywords: Employees; Job Cuts and Outsourcing; Governing and Advisory Boards; Business and Shareholder Relations; Business or Company Management; Business Startups

Find at Harvard

Register to Read

October 2009
Supplement

Merger of Equals: The Integration of Mellon Financial and The Bank of New York (C)

By: Ryan D. Taliaferro, Clayton S. Rose and David Lane

[Continuation of "A" and "B" cases.] Less than a month after the close of the merger between The Bank of New York and Mellon Financial, managers at the two firms realized that plans for combining their asset servicing businesses – and realizing the $180 million of... View Details

Keywords: Mergers and Acquisitions; Horizontal Integration; Financial Institutions; Business Processes; Risk Management; Strategy; Market Transactions; Assets; System; Saving; Banking Industry; New York (state, US)