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• Background Note | HBS Case Collection | October 2018

  Note on Managing Workforce Reductions

  Ethan Bernstein and Carin-Isabel Knoop

  Each individual who enters an organization will, at some point, leave. And yet most future leaders spend significantly more effort learning about recruiting than departures, despite the sensitivity and challenges associated with the latter. This note is intended to help address that imbalance. This note provides a roadmap for managers and employees to follow when instituting or facing layoffs. It aims to help managers consider the broader implications that should be taken into account when conducting layoffs, including how to structure and execute them effectively; how to minimize the negative impact on laid-off employees, “surviving” employees, the firm’s reputation, and the community; and what alternatives any firm contemplating layoffs should consider.

  Keywords: layoffs; downsizing; workforce; workforce reductions; delayering; Human Resources; Employees; Resignation and Termination; Management; Organizations;

  Citation:

  Bernstein, Ethan, and Carin-Isabel Knoop. "Note on Managing Workforce Reductions." Harvard Business School Background Note 419-039, October 2018.  View Details

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• Case | HBS Case Collection | August 2018 (Revised September 2018)

  Facebook—Can Ethics Scale in the Digital Age?

  George A. Riedel and Carin-Isabel Knoop

  Since its founding in 2004, Facebook has built a phenomenally successful business at global scale to become the fifth most valuable public company in the world. The revelation of Cambridge Analytica events in March 2018, where 78 million users' information was leaked in a 2016 U.S. election cycle, exposed a breach of trust/privacy among its user community. In the past, growth at any costs appeared to be the de facto strategy. Now many voices such as regulators, advertisers, ethicists, shareholders and users argued for a more responsible approach to addressing their concerns. Mark Zuckerberg (CEO/Chair/Founder) and Sheryl Sandberg (COO) mapped out their six-point plan to address this existential threat. Could they continue to grow and rectify the breach of trust/privacy? Did other stakeholders have some greater responsibility too? In addition to issues of privacy and trust, there is a growing chorus of concern about “content moderation”—not for the easy topics like spam or copyright material—but for the hard things revolving around political points of view, hate speech, polarizing perspectives, etc. How will Facebook strike the balance between free speech and corrosive content across billions of users and dozens of languages? Are they the arbiters of truth/censorship in the digital world?

  Keywords: Ethics; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Business and Stakeholder Relations; Trust; Business Model; Corporate Accountability;

  Citation:

  Riedel, George A., and Carin-Isabel Knoop. "Facebook—Can Ethics Scale in the Digital Age?" Harvard Business School Case 319-030, August 2018. (Revised September 2018.)  View Details

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• Case | HBS Case Collection | August 2018

  Christine Lagarde

  Julie Battilana, Carin-Isabel Knoop, Vanessa Ampelas and Noemie Assenat

  For a modular presentation of the same material, please see “Christine Lagarde (A): A French Prime Minister Calls” (HBS No. 419-017), “Christine Lagarde (B): Being a Public Servant” (HBS No. 419-018), and “Christine Lagarde (C): Managing the IMF” (HBS No. 419-019). These full-length cases describe various stages of Christine Lagarde's career. They are stand-alone cases that can also be used over several classes. The entire series, including its video products, was designed to be modular. The case covers the youth and career trajectory of Christine Lagarde across her time at Baker & McKenzie, as a minister in the government of France, and as the head of the International Monetary Fund (IMF). The case highlights the challenges and opportunities she faced during each phase of her career and how she managed them. Lagarde started her career in 1981 as a lawyer at the global law firm Baker & McKenzie, which employed approximately 2,500 lawyers across 35 countries by 1999, when she became the firm's first non-American and female chairman. In 2005, she became France's Minister for Foreign Trade in President Jacques Chirac's administration and was the EU's de facto finance minister when the financial crisis was most acute. In 2011, she was selected to head the IMF. Since 2011, Lagarde worked to build the foundation for the IMF's adaptation to the realities of the 21st century. By 2017, shortly after Lagarde began her second term as the managing director of the IMF, the world faced both opportunities and challenges as a result of the rapidly evolving, hyper-connected global economy, including deeper cross-border integration, the rise of emerging economies, technological change, and growing wealth and income inequality within countries. These interrelated dynamics were playing out alongside heightened anxiety within the populations of some major advanced economies about what these changes meant for them. The concerns manifested themselves in an inward focus, rumblings of protectionism, and questions about the worth of international cooperation and the multilateral system itself. Lagarde believed that the challenges facing the world economy warranted not less but more global cooperation. In this context, she had to determine how the IMF—as the leading advocate of global economic cooperation since its creation—could better demonstrate its effectiveness. She knew that it was a critical moment.

  Keywords: power and influence; leadership; gender; Change; Personal Development and Career; Power and Influence; Leadership; Gender; Leading Change;

  Citation:

  Battilana, Julie, Carin-Isabel Knoop, Vanessa Ampelas, and Noemie Assenat. "Christine Lagarde." Harvard Business School Case 419-016, August 2018.  View Details

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