Publications

04 Oct 2016
Blog Post

Why We Recruit: CVS Health

of health. Through its approximately 9,600 retail pharmacies under the CVS, Navarro and Longs Drugs brand names, more than 1,135 walk-in MinuteClinc locations, a leading pharmacy benefits manager with more than 75 million plan members, a... View Details

Keywords: Health Care

01 Dec 2019
News

Accelerating a Gas-on-demand Startup

Model T owners—and it was basically the last major innovation in gasoline retailing for more than 100 years, says Bryan Frist (MBA 2015). “The gas station was stuck in the 20th century.” That revelation led to a question: If you can get... View Details

Keywords: April White; startups; on-demand economy; entrepreneurship; Personal Services

October 2019
Case

Agility Africa

By: Juan Alcacer, Caroline M. Elkins and Esel Çekin

This case illustrates the challenge and opportunities that firms face when developing and executing new business models in high-risk, low-infrastructure, low-trust countries. It features a global logistics group, Agility, that aimed to become the leader in supplying... View Details

Keywords: Strategy; Business Model; Innovation and Invention; Expansion; Emerging Markets; Decision Choices and Conditions; Real Estate Industry; Distribution Industry; Africa

November 2008 (Revised April 2010)
Case

Youth Villages

By: Allen S. Grossman, Cathy Ross and William Foster

Tennessee-based nonprofit Youth Villages had an impressive record of serving emotionally and behaviorally troubled youth and their families, with higher success rates and lower costs than most child services providers. Yet expanding to offer its services on a broader... View Details

Keywords: Growth and Development Strategy; Service Operations; Business and Government Relations; Nonprofit Organizations; Expansion; Tennessee

01 Apr 1998
News

Going For The Summit

CANDICE CARPENTER has led some high-profile enterprises - Time Life Video and Television and the electronic retailing enterprise Q2 Inc. among them. But nothing, she says, has prepared her for the rocky terrain of online business better... View Details

Keywords: Caroline Chauncey

January 2018
Case

Viacom: Democratization of Data Science

By: Shane Greenstein and Christine Snively

In two short years, Viacom’s Data Science & Advanced Analytics team built a web platform called Science Central that allowed employees from Viacom’s 20+ cable networks to access television audience insights through three data science apps. In the past, employees would... View Details

Keywords: Data Science; Big Data; Digital Platforms; Analytics and Data Science; Expansion; Strategic Planning

01 Dec 2017
News

The Changing Nature of Research

School’s Bureau of Business Research—comprised a comparative examination of the costs of operating a retail shoe business. The resulting report helped companies devise strategies to manage inventories,... View Details

January 2025
Case

Jaipur Literature Festival 2024

By: Tarun Khanna and Kanika Jain

The Jaipur Literature Festival had evolved from a modest gathering in 2006 into one of the world’s most significant literary events. It was known for its principle of egalitarian access, allowing people from various social backgrounds to come together and engage with... View Details

Keywords: Arts; Cultural Entrepreneurship; Leadership; Business or Company Management; Media; Business Strategy; Expansion; Profit; Product Positioning; Asia; South Asia

February 1998 (Revised September 1998)
Case

Insteel Wire Products: ABM at Andrews

By: V.G. Narayanan and Ratna G. Sarkar

Insteel implements an activity-based costing (ABC) system in 1996. It finds pallet nails to be its most profitable product and decides to expand the number of cells making pallet nails from two to four. A repeat of the ABC study in 1997 shows pallet nails have become... View Details

Keywords: Cost Accounting; Expansion; Resource Allocation; Activity Based Costing and Management

December 2005 (Revised December 2008)
Case

SchoolNet: Pursuing Opportunity beyond Federal Mandates

Settling into his seat on the train bound for New York, CEO Jonathan Harber reflected on the evolution of SchoolNet's position in the educational technology market and its important relationship with Philadelphia. Specifically, how could it transition from a project to... View Details

Keywords: Customers; Education; Performance Improvement; Partners and Partnerships; Expansion; Technology Adoption; Philadelphia

Find at Harvard

February 2004
Case

Aspire Public Schools

Set in the fall of 2003, covers managerial challenges facing the CEO and COO of Aspire Public Schools, a nonprofit charter school management company. In operation since 1999 and funded by prominent national foundations and venture philanthropies, Aspire operates 10... View Details

Keywords: Business Model; Business or Company Management; Expansion; Social Entrepreneurship; Education; Education Industry; California

May 2025
Case

Community First! Village: Scaling Goodness?

By: Jan Rivkin and Coelin P. Scibetta

The nonprofit organization Mobile Loaves & Fishes has devised an innovative way to address chronic homelessness: their Community First! Village provides tiny homes, recreational vehicles, and facilities that bring community, housing, support, and work opportunities to... View Details

Keywords: Nonprofit Organizations; Business Model; Growth and Development Strategy; Expansion; Social Issues; Texas

June 2013 (Revised June 2015)
Case

Ibrahim Dabdoub at the National Bank of Kuwait

By: Linda A. Hill and Dana M. Teppert

Ibrahim Dabdoub, the Group chief executive of the National Bank of Kuwait (NBK), reflects on his past 30 years at the helm of the Bank. Under his leadership, NBK grew from a small local bank to one of the preeminent financial institutions in the region. However,... View Details

Keywords: Globalization; Middle East; Team Leadership; Leadership Style; Leadership; Leadership Development; Groups and Teams; Growth and Development Strategy; Expansion; Banking Industry; Kuwait; Middle East

20 Mar 2018
First Look

First Look at New Research and Ideas, March 20, 2018

March 2018 Review of Economics and Statistics Scraped Data and Sticky Prices By: Cavallo, Alberto Abstract—I use daily prices collected from online retailers in five countries to study the impact of measurement bias on three common price... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

20 Sep 2016
First Look

September 20, 2016

to Jewish organizational life. Inspired by 30 years of pioneering work by retail giant Leslie Wexner’s philanthropic focus on Jewish leadership, More Than Managing brings together diverse and remarkable thinkers to address challenges... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

28 Apr 2009
First Look

First Look: April 28, 2009

http://hbsp.harvard.edu/b01/en/common/item_detail.jhtml?id=809062 JWT China: Advertising for the New Chinese Consumer Harvard Business School Case 809-079 This case analyzes the business strategy and View Details

Keywords: Martha Lagace

20 Oct 2021
Blog Post

Mobilizing Private Sector Action For Racial Equity in Milwaukee: SE Summer Fellow Zach Komes (MBA 2022)

initiative, with over a hundred area corporations, from Fortune 500 companies to mid-sized businesses, pledging to expand Black and Brown talent in their management roles by 25% and overall staff by 15% by 2025. Over the course of the last three months, I led a View Details

22 Dec 2022
Blog Post

Climate Stories Episode #13: Democratizing Climate Returns - Nisha Desai (HBS 1997), Founder and CEO of Invest With Intention

don’t have enough capital to invest in the best deals. Why don’t we have the ability to get the same returns as infrastructure limited partnerships or banks or private equity firms?” Here’s the thesis: Nisha has found only two managed funds focused on climate specific... View Details

December 2013 (Revised March 2014)
Supplement

The LEGO Group: Envisioning Risks in Asia (B)

By: Anette Mikes and Amram Migdal

This brief follow-up complements the case on The LEGO Group: Stepping Up in Asia (9-113-054), and discusses the aftermath of the scenario planning session, in which LEGO managers contemplated the risks of their new Asian strategy. The scenario planning exercise played... View Details

Keywords: Risk Management; Global Strategy; Planning; Retail Industry; Asia