Publications

SSRN

Article

Learning by Thinking: The Role of Reflection in Individual Learning

By: Giada Di Stefano, Francesca Gino, Gary P. Pisano and Bradley R. Staats

It is common wisdom that practice makes perfect. And, in fact, we find evidence that when given a choice between practicing a task and reflecting on their previously accumulated practice, most people opt for the former. We argue in this paper that this preference is... View Details

Keywords: Learning; Cognition and Thinking; Practice; Experience and Expertise

05 Jul 2006
Working Paper Summaries

Learning Tradeoffs in Organizations: Measuring Multiple Dimensions of Improvement to Investigate Learning-Curve Heterogeneity

Keywords: by Francesca Gino, Richard M.J. Bohmer, Amy C. Edmondson, Gary P. Pisano & Ann B. Winslow; Health

03 Oct 2023
What Do You Think?

Do Leaders Learn More From Success or Failure?

do you think? Share your thoughts in the comments below. References: Amy Edmondson, Right Kind of Wrong: The Science of Failing Well (Atria Books, 2023) Amy C. Edmondson, “Psychological Safety and Learning Behavior in Work Teams,”... View Details

Keywords: by James Heskett

08 Oct 2008
Research & Ideas

Book Excerpt: A Sense of Urgency

an open-minded and approachable person in a more powerful position who can take the lead. Certainly we need to be prudent. But in a more rapidly changing world, finding opportunities in crises probably reduces your overall risk. To Learn... View Details

Keywords: by John P. Kotter

April 2011
Article

Why Leaders Don't Learn from Success

By: Francesca Gino and Gary P. Pisano

We argue that for a variety of psychological reasons, it is often much harder for leaders and organizations to learn from success than to learn from failure. Success creates three kinds of traps that often impede deep learning. The first is attribution error or the... View Details

Keywords: Learning; Innovation and Management; Leadership; Failure; Success; Performance Evaluation; Prejudice and Bias

October 2001
Article

Speeding Up Team Learning

By: Amy C. Edmondson, Richard Bohmer and Gary P. Pisano

Keywords: Learning

Purchase

2023
Working Paper

Evaluation and Learning in R&D Investment

By: Alexander P. Frankel, Joshua L. Krieger, Danielle Li and Dimitris Papanikolaou

We examine the role of spillover learning in shaping the value of exploratory versus incremental R&D. Using data from drug development, we show that novel drug candidates generate more knowledge spillovers than incremental ones. Despite being less likely to reach... View Details

Keywords: Research and Development; Forecasting and Prediction; Valuation; Pharmaceutical Industry

Purchase

July 2022
Article

A Strategic View of Team Learning in Organizations

By: Jean-François Harvey, Henrik Bresman, Amy C. Edmondson and Gary P. Pisano

Research in strategic management and organizational behavior has increasingly focused on understanding how organizations achieve and sustain performance in fast-changing environments. Strategy research suggests that senior managers, through their decisions, influence... View Details

Keywords: Strategic Management; Organization Behavior; Teams; Organizational Capabilities; Groups and Teams; Learning; Management; Decision Making; Performance; Organizational Design

Purchase

17 Oct 2012
Research & Ideas

America Needs a Manufacturing Renaissance

Editor's note: In their new book, Producing Prosperity: Why America Needs a Manufacturing Renaissance, Harvard Business School professors Gary P. Pisano and Willy C. Shih argue that reinvesting in America's manufacturing prowess is... View Details

Keywords: by Gary P. Pisano & Willy C. Shih; Manufacturing

24 Apr 2006
Research & Ideas

Managing Alignment as a Process

fulfillment). Finally, learning and growth synergies would be achieved by rotating experienced professionals to key jobs in the new companies (key staff rotation), by sharing computer systems (common systems versus plan) and knowledge... View Details

Keywords: by Robert S. Kaplan & David P. Norton; Apparel & Accessories; Fashion; Consumer Products; Retail

23 Dec 2002
Research & Ideas

Partnering and the Balanced Scorecard

financial and non-financial measurements in four perspectives: financial, customer, internal process, and learning and growth. The approach quickly evolved into a new system for describing and managing strategy.2 Many of the organizations... View Details

Keywords: by Robert S. Kaplan & David P. Norton

09 Jul 2001
Research & Ideas

Does Misery Love Companies? How Social Performance Pays Off

Africa. Even more broadly, one is left with aggregate statistics that both inform and numb. . . . Living in the United States, we may be shocked to learn that so many people in the world live on less than $2.00 per day, or that a quarter... View Details

Keywords: by Joshua D. Margolis & James P. Walsh

spring 2003
Article

Learning How and Learning What: Effects of Tacit and Codified Knowledge on Performance Improvement Following Technology Adoption

By: Amy Edmondson, Gary P. Pisano, Richard Bohmer and Ann Winslow

Keywords: Learning; Knowledge; Performance; Technology

06 Feb 2020
Research & Ideas

What We Learned from Reading Jeff Bezos’ Patents

patent activities at Amazon. To do so, we began by looking at Amazon’s patent history using the Derwent Innovation database for the years 1998-2018, which included more than 11,000 published patents in the United States. We learned four... View Details

Keywords: by Tricia Gregg and Boris Groysberg; Retail

2023
Working Paper

Learning to Use: Stack Overflow and Technology Adoption

By: Daniel Jay Brown and Maria P. Roche

In this paper, we examine the potential impact of Q&A websites on the adoption of technologies. Using data from Stack Overflow – one of the most popular Q&A websites worldwide – and implementing an instrumental-variable approach, we find that users whose questions... View Details

Keywords: Technology Adoption; Knowledge Sharing