Strategy
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- 2024
- Working Paper
Business Experiments As Persuasion
By: Orie Shelef, Rebecca Karp and Robert WuebkerMuch of the prior work on experimentation rests upon the assumption that entrepreneurs and managers use—or should optimally adopt—a "scientific approach" to test possible decisions before making them. This paper offers an alternative view of experimental strategy, introducing the possibility that at least some business experiments privilege persuasion over generating unbiased information. In this view, actors may craft experiments designed to gain support for their ideas, even if doing so reduces the informativeness of the experiment. However, decision-makers are not naïve— they are aware that the results they are reviewing may be the product of a curated information environment. Using a formal model, this paper shows that under a wide range of conditions, actors prefer to enact a less than fully informative experiment designed to persuade—even when a fullyinformative experiment is feasible at the same cost.
- 2024
- Working Paper
Business Experiments As Persuasion
By: Orie Shelef, Rebecca Karp and Robert WuebkerMuch of the prior work on experimentation rests upon the assumption that entrepreneurs and managers use—or should optimally adopt—a "scientific approach" to test possible decisions before making them. This paper offers an alternative view of experimental strategy, introducing the possibility that at least some business experiments privilege...
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- March–April 2024
- Article
Case Study: Navigating Labor Unrest
By: Jorge TamayoPaulo Ferreira, the president of Luna Brazil, has an ambitious plan to turn around the dismal performance of the plant he oversees in Campinas. The wrinkle is, he needs the buy-in of the powerful local union, which is still smarting from a 10-year-old labor conflict and lately has begun to step up its demands and picket outside the factory. Headquarters, running out of patience with the dispute, wants Paulo to consider converting the plant to a distribution center. But that would mean hundreds of layoffs, which would decimate the local community that Paolo loves.
- March–April 2024
- Article
Case Study: Navigating Labor Unrest
By: Jorge TamayoPaulo Ferreira, the president of Luna Brazil, has an ambitious plan to turn around the dismal performance of the plant he oversees in Campinas. The wrinkle is, he needs the buy-in of the powerful local union, which is still smarting from a 10-year-old labor conflict and lately has begun to step up its demands and picket outside the factory....
About the Unit
The Strategy unit studies firms as competitors in an economic landscape. Key issues include: the development and effectiveness of firm strategy at both a business and corporate level; the analysis of the competitive environment; and the sustainability of strategy over time.
Our research, course development, and teaching draws on multiple disciplines, including economics, sociology, and political science, and focuses on both domestic and global competition. The objective of the work is to generate findings and develop concepts that will help managers improve their strategic decisions while advancing the state of knowledge in the academic study of strategy and related disciplines.
Recent Publications
Business Experiments As Persuasion
- 2024 |
- Working Paper |
- Faculty Research
ChatGPT Enters the Voice Wars 2024
- April 2024 |
- Case |
- Faculty Research
RHI Magnesita (A-B): Brick by Brick
- April 2024 |
- Supplement |
- Faculty Research
RHI Magnesita (A-B): Brick by Brick
- April 2024 |
- Supplement |
- Faculty Research
Case Study: Navigating Labor Unrest
- March–April 2024 |
- Article |
- Harvard Business Review
RHI Magnesita (A-B): Brick by Brick
- April 2024 |
- Teaching Note |
- Faculty Research
RHI Magnesita (B): Brick by Brick - Diversification?
- April 2024 |
- Supplement |
- Faculty Research
eBee: Affordable Mobility for Africa
- April 2024 |
- Teaching Note |
- Faculty Research
Harvard Business Publishing
Seminars & Conferences
There are no upcoming events.