More from these Authors

• Book | 2020

  Capitalism at Risk: How Companies Can Lead

  Joseph L. Bower, Dutch Leonard and Lynn S. Paine

  Citation:

  Bower, Joseph L., Dutch Leonard, and Lynn S. Paine. Capitalism at Risk: How Companies Can Lead. 2nd ed. Boston: Harvard Business Review Press, 2020.  View Details

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• Working Paper | HBS Working Paper Series | 2020

  Novel Risks

  Robert S. Kaplan, Herman B. "Dutch" Leonard and Anette Mikes

  All organizations practice some form of risk management to identify and assess routine risks in their operations, supply chains, strategy, and external environment. These risk management policies, however, fail in the presence of novelty. Novel risks arise from unforeseen events, from complex combinations of apparently routine events, and from apparently familiar events occurring at unprecedented scale and speed. Mobilizing routine risk management to novel events will be ineffective, and, more seriously, delude management into thinking that risks have been mitigated when they may already have escalated to serious consequences. Based on best practices from the private and public sector, the paper describes structures and processes to identify and respond to novel risks. A critical incident management team makes assessments and develops options in the event’s uncertain and volatile environment. The team’s decision-making process has to be rapid, improvisational, iterative, and humble since not every action taken will work as intended.

  Keywords: Risk Management; Policy; Failure; Organizational Change and Adaptation;

  Citation:

  Kaplan, Robert S., Herman B. "Dutch" Leonard, and Anette Mikes. "Novel Risks." Harvard Business School Working Paper, No. 20-094, March 2020. (Revised May 2020.)  View Details

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• Case | HBS Case Collection | February 1992 (Revised September 2019)

  The House of Tata

  James E. Austin and Ashish Nanda

  The case traces the evolution of the Tata group, one of the largest and highly respected Indian business houses, from its 19th century founding and early growth in diverse industries, to its response to changes in government regulation in independent India, up to its 1991 leadership transition from longtime chairman J.R.D. Tata to his successor, Ratan Tata. The case first describes how Tata group founder Jamsetji Tata and his sons entered into the steel, hotel, hydroelectric, cement, air travel, and insurance industries (among others). It then explores how the evolving role of government in business in post-Independence India impacted the Tata group. The case also outlines the acceleration in the Tata group’s growth during the 1980s, following government liberalization. In addition to discussing how the group’s leadership navigated through the external pressures of policy and economics, the case also examines how they managed internal pressures – reduced synergy between the diverse and legally-independent companies under Tata’s umbrella, and, at times, reluctant adjustments in company culture that corresponded to Tata’s generational leadership transitions. The case invites comparison between J.R.D. Tata’s compassionate management style and his successor Ratan Tata’s no-nonsense, analytical approach. The case closes by outlining some of the challenges facing the Tata group amidst the changing political and regulatory environment of the 1990s.

  Keywords: Indian economy; international business; government and business; Government Regulation; Synergy; conglomerates; Business Conglomerates; Developing Countries and Economies; Business and Government Relations; Business History; Steel Industry; Electronics Industry; Chemical Industry; Insurance Industry; Air Transportation Industry; India;

  Citation:

  Austin, James E., and Ashish Nanda. "The House of Tata." Harvard Business School Case 792-065, February 1992. (Revised September 2019.)  View Details

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