Accounting & Management

- July 2025
- Case
Microsoft’s Performance Across Three CEOs

By: George Serafeim

This case traces Microsoft’s evolution from its founding through 2024. Students analyze how changes in operating segments both reflected and shaped Microsoft’s strategy, culture, and financial communication. The case provides rich quantitative exhibits (segment revenue, operating income, margins, cloud KPIs) and qualitative material (CEO commentary, analyst commentary) to let students practice financial‐statement analysis, link segment data to strategic inflection points, and evaluate leadership communication.
- July 2025
- Case
Microsoft’s Performance Across Three CEOs

By: George Serafeim

This case traces Microsoft’s evolution from its founding through 2024. Students analyze how changes in operating segments both reflected and shaped Microsoft’s strategy, culture, and financial communication. The case provides rich quantitative exhibits (segment revenue, operating income, margins, cloud KPIs) and qualitative material (CEO...
- July 3, 2025
- Article
A New Framework for Reducing Healthcare Disparities

By: Susanna Gallani, Mary Lynch Witkowski, Lidia M. V. R. Moura and Katie Sonnefeldt

Despite decades of initiatives to address healthcare inequities in the U.S., disparities across race, gender, geography, and income remain stubbornly persistent. This article introduces the Strategic Fingerprint Framework for Health Equity, a practical, principle-based tool designed to help healthcare organizations tailor equity initiatives to the specific needs of their communities and capabilities. Developed through in-depth study of Boston Medical Center’s Health Equity Accelerator, the framework emphasizes four foundational principles—hyper-locality, community co-creation, condition-specificity, and internal consistency—and two operational pillars: data-driven decision-making and prioritization. Using BMC’s experience as an illustrative case, the article outlines six strategic choices healthcare leaders must make to translate intention into impact. Early results from BMC include eliminating racial disparities in urgent cesarean section response times and cutting diabetes-related inequities in half—demonstrating the framework’s promise as a guide to targeted, measurable, and sustainable equity improvement.
- July 3, 2025
- Article
A New Framework for Reducing Healthcare Disparities

By: Susanna Gallani, Mary Lynch Witkowski, Lidia M. V. R. Moura and Katie Sonnefeldt

Despite decades of initiatives to address healthcare inequities in the U.S., disparities across race, gender, geography, and income remain stubbornly persistent. This article introduces the Strategic Fingerprint Framework for Health Equity, a practical, principle-based tool designed to help healthcare organizations tailor equity initiatives to the...
- July 2025
- Article
Digital Lending and Financial Well-Being: Through the Lens of Mobile Phone Data

By: AJ Chen, Omri Even-Tov, Jung Koo Kang and Regina Wittenberg-Moerman

To mitigate information asymmetry about borrowers in developing economies, digital lenders use machine-learning algorithms and nontraditional data from borrowers’ mobile devices. Consequently, digital lenders have managed to expand access to credit for millions of individuals lacking a prior credit history. However, short-term, high-interest digital loans have raised concerns about predatory lending practices. To examine how digital credit influences borrowers’ financial well-being, we use proprietary data from a digital lender in Kenya that randomly approves loan applications that would have otherwise been rejected based on the borrower’s credit profile. We find that access to digital credit improves borrowers’ financial well-being across various mobile-phone-based well-being measures, including monetary transactions and balances, mobility, and social networks as well as borrowers’ self-reported income and employment. We further show that this positive impact is more pronounced when borrowers have limited access to credit, take loans for business purposes, and obtain more credit.
- July 2025
- Article
Digital Lending and Financial Well-Being: Through the Lens of Mobile Phone Data

By: AJ Chen, Omri Even-Tov, Jung Koo Kang and Regina Wittenberg-Moerman

To mitigate information asymmetry about borrowers in developing economies, digital lenders use machine-learning algorithms and nontraditional data from borrowers’ mobile devices. Consequently, digital lenders have managed to expand access to credit for millions of individuals lacking a prior credit history. However, short-term, high-interest...

About the Unit

The Accounting & Management unit at Harvard Business School strives to be the worldwide leader in research, course development, and teaching on top managements' use of performance measurement systems to:

Communicate with external investors to ensure that their firms' securities are fairly priced and that they are able to access capital,
Measure and evaluate their firms' economic performance,
Improve resource allocation and strategy implementation within their firms, and
Build accountability for performance through effective external and internal governance.

Unit research, course development, and teaching fall into two broad areas: Financial Reporting and Analysis and Management Accounting. Our research helps scholars and educators understand current best practices for the design and use of performance measurement systems that help managers to build more effective, value-creating organizations. Our teaching materials enable us to bring the results of this research into the classroom, and to practice.

Recent Publications

Microsoft’s Performance Across Three CEOs

By: George Serafeim

July 2025 |
Case |
Faculty Research

This case traces Microsoft’s evolution from its founding through 2024. Students analyze how changes in operating segments both reflected and shaped Microsoft’s strategy, culture, and financial communication. The case provides rich quantitative exhibits (segment revenue, operating income, margins, cloud KPIs) and qualitative material (CEO commentary, analyst commentary) to let students practice financial‐statement analysis, link segment data to strategic inflection points, and evaluate leadership communication.

Keywords: Financial Accounting; Financial Statement Analysis; Disclosure; Disclosure Strategy; Disclosure Tone; Organizational Transformations; Transformation; AI; Digital; Organizational Change; Accounting; Financial Statements; Strategy; Organizational Structure; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Technology Industry; Information Technology Industry; United States

Citation

Educators

Silicon Valley Bank: Gone in 36 Hours

By: Jung Koo Kang, Krishna G. Palepu and Charles C.Y. Wang

July 2025 |
Teaching Note |
Faculty Research

Teaching Note for HBS Case No. 125-094.

Keywords: Accounting Standards; Bank Runs; Financial Accounting; Financial Reporting; Social Media; Banks and Banking; Financing and Loans; Investment Portfolio; Interest Rates; Debt Securities; Risk and Uncertainty; Financial Statements; Risk Management; Financial Services Industry; United States

Citation

Purchase

A New Framework for Reducing Healthcare Disparities

By: Susanna Gallani, Mary Lynch Witkowski, Lidia M. V. R. Moura and Katie Sonnefeldt

July 3, 2025 |
Article |
Harvard Business Review Digital Articles

Despite decades of initiatives to address healthcare inequities in the U.S., disparities across race, gender, geography, and income remain stubbornly persistent. This article introduces the Strategic Fingerprint Framework for Health Equity, a practical, principle-based tool designed to help healthcare organizations tailor equity initiatives to the specific needs of their communities and capabilities. Developed through in-depth study of Boston Medical Center’s Health Equity Accelerator, the framework emphasizes four foundational principles—hyper-locality, community co-creation, condition-specificity, and internal consistency—and two operational pillars: data-driven decision-making and prioritization. Using BMC’s experience as an illustrative case, the article outlines six strategic choices healthcare leaders must make to translate intention into impact. Early results from BMC include eliminating racial disparities in urgent cesarean section response times and cutting diabetes-related inequities in half—demonstrating the framework’s promise as a guide to targeted, measurable, and sustainable equity improvement.

Keywords: Equality and Inequality; Demographics; Outcome or Result; Health Care and Treatment; Framework; Health Industry

Citation

Purchase

Digital Lending and Financial Well-Being: Through the Lens of Mobile Phone Data

By: AJ Chen, Omri Even-Tov, Jung Koo Kang and Regina Wittenberg-Moerman

July 2025 |
Article |
Accounting Review

To mitigate information asymmetry about borrowers in developing economies, digital lenders use machine-learning algorithms and nontraditional data from borrowers’ mobile devices. Consequently, digital lenders have managed to expand access to credit for millions of individuals lacking a prior credit history. However, short-term, high-interest digital loans have raised concerns about predatory lending practices. To examine how digital credit influences borrowers’ financial well-being, we use proprietary data from a digital lender in Kenya that randomly approves loan applications that would have otherwise been rejected based on the borrower’s credit profile. We find that access to digital credit improves borrowers’ financial well-being across various mobile-phone-based well-being measures, including monetary transactions and balances, mobility, and social networks as well as borrowers’ self-reported income and employment. We further show that this positive impact is more pronounced when borrowers have limited access to credit, take loans for business purposes, and obtain more credit.

Keywords: Informal Economy; Digital Banking; Mobile Phones; Developing Countries and Economies; Mobile and Wireless Technology; AI and Machine Learning; Analytics and Data Science; Credit; Borrowing and Debt; Well-being; Banking Industry; Kenya

Citation

Read Now

Redefining the Edge: Jahez’s Strategic Pivot in Saudi Arabia’s Food Delivery Battle

By: Krishna G. Palepu and Ahmed Dahawy

June 2025 |
Case |
Faculty Research

Jahez made its mark in Saudi Arabia’s food delivery market by serving customers willing to pay more for reliable, high-quality service—a segment largely overlooked by other platforms. As the company grew, it expanded into the mass market and developed a network of subsidiaries to support its core focus on food delivery. The most prominent of these was Logi, its in-house logistics arm, which gave Jahez greater control over delivery speed and service quality compared to competitors that relied on third-party drivers. By late 2024, however, the competitive landscape was shifting. Rivals were closing the quality gap, and deep-pocketed international player Meituan had entered the Saudi market. In response, Jahez leaned more heavily on Logi to stay ahead. But at the same time, Logi had begun providing deliveries for external courier companies—creating new opportunities for the logistics arm, but also raising difficult questions about Jahez’s priorities and long-term direction. Should Logi remain focused on supporting the company’s core food delivery operations, or be allowed to grow by serving external clients? And more broadly, should Jahez continue to define itself around food delivery—or was it time to evolve into a multi-vertical platform, leveraging the broader ecosystem it had built?

Keywords: Acquisition; Business Conglomerates; Corporate Entrepreneurship; Innovation Strategy; Digital Platforms; Logistics; Business Strategy; Competition; Competitive Strategy; Competitive Advantage; Expansion; Food and Beverage Industry; Saudi Arabia

Citation

Educators

Transforming a Titan (C)

By: George Serafeim and Lena Duchene

June 2025 |
Supplement |
Faculty Research

Three years in his tenure as CEO, Cobuz must decide whether to launch a more than 500 million carbon-capture-and-storage facility. The project—Europe’s largest planned CCS installation—would cut almost 20 % of group emissions and unlock a 234 million EU Innovation Fund grant. Economic viability, however, hinges on EU-ETS carbon prices staying high, Greece adopting Carbon Contracts for Difference, and rapid build-out of transport-and-storage infrastructure. Internally, supporters laud the strategic leap and capacity upside; critics fear concentration of risk, capital lock-up, and uncertain post-2030 regulation. Cobuz has until year-end to decide whether a bold bet early in his tenure will cement TITAN’s leadership—or overextend the balance sheet.

Keywords: CEO; Family

Citation

Transforming a Titan (B)

By: George Serafeim and Lena Duchene

June 2025 |
Supplement |
Faculty Research

After a global search the board appoints Marcel Cobuz—ex-LafargeHolcim executive with deep innovation experience—as TITAN’s first non-family CEO. Cobuz co-creates a four-pillar roadmap: sharpen the core cement portfolio, accelerate low-carbon products and aggregates, build a tech-driven innovation engine and empower country units while tightening performance accountability. Two years on, TITAN posts record revenues and profitability, green products reach 30% of output and a minority stake in TITAN America lists on the NYSE. Yet initiative overload strains the organization, raising the question: is Cobuz’s stretch agenda visionary or too much, too fast?

Keywords: AI; Artificial Intelligence; CEO Succession; CEO Role; Family Business

Citation

Transforming a Titan (A)

By: George Serafeim and Lena Duchene

June 2025 |
Case |
Faculty Research

Dimitri Papalexopoulos, fourth-generation CEO of TITAN Cement, must decide whether to keep leading the 120-year-old, family-controlled firm or hand the reins to new management. Over 26 years he has turned TITAN from a domestic player into an internationally diversified group and championed an AI-driven productivity leap, even while steering the company through multiple economic crises. As TITAN prepared for its next phase of growth, Papalexopoulos faced the most consequential decision of his tenure: should he continue at the helm, promote a trusted insider, or become the first in the company’s history to recommend to the board appoint a non-family CEO?