Leadership
Leadership
As our world grows increasingly global, intricate, and ever-changing, the role of leaders is becoming more and more complex and critical to business success. In the 1950s and 1960s, Fritz Roethlisberger and Elton Mayo's contributions to the "Hawthorne effect," and work by Paul Lawrence and Jay Lorsch on organizational integration, sparked the field of Organizational Behavior. Early work by Michael Beer on leading organizational change, Rosabeth Kanter on innovation for productivity, John Kotter on power and influence, and Michael Tushman on innovation management helped shape today's understanding of organizational transformation. With an interest in Leadership that spans our academic units, our approach to research is collaborative and multi-disciplinary. We leverage a wide range of research methodologies – from onsite field research to surveys, experiments, and extensive longitudinal studies.
Leadership Initiative
The Leadership Initiative undertakes cutting-edge research and course development projects about leadership and leadership development, both within HBS and through collaborations with other organizations.
LeadershipRecent Publications
Layoff Letters: The Art of Delivering Bad News
- August 2025 |
- Case |
- Faculty Research
How to Keep Your Team's Spirits Up in Anxious Times
- September 8, 2025 |
- Article |
- Harvard Business Review (website)
Oriental Weavers: Handing Over the Loom
- September 2025 |
- Case |
- Faculty Research
BairesDev: Culture and Growth
- September 2025 |
- Case |
- Faculty Research
Cristina Ventura at White Star Capital
- September 2025 |
- Case |
- Faculty Research
How to Lead in the Stakeholder Era: Focus on Purpose and People. The Profits Will Follow
- 2025 |
- Chapter |
- Faculty Research
Are You a Good Boss—or a Great One?
- 2025 |
- Chapter |
- Faculty Research
Now Is the Time for Courage: Five Strategies to Drive Bold Action amid Uncertainty.
- September–October 2025 |
- Article |
- Harvard Business Review
Beko: Leveraging Sustainability for Growth
- August 2025 |
- Case |
- Faculty Research
When to Innovate and When to Imitate
- August 1, 2025 |
- Article |
- Harvard Business Review Digital Articles