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Strategy

Strategy

  • Faculty
  • Curriculum
  • Seminars & Conferences
  • Awards & Honors
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Overview Faculty Curriculum Seminars & Conferences Awards & Honors Doctoral Students
    • Article

    Multitasking While Driving: A Time Use Study of Commuting Knowledge Workers to Assess Current and Future Uses

    By: Thomaz Teodorovicz, Andrew L. Kun, Raffaella Sadun and Orit Shaer

    Commuting has enormous impact on individuals, families, organizations, and society. Advances in vehicle automation may help workers employ the time spent commuting in productive work-tasks or wellbeing activities. To achieve this goal, however, we need to develop a deeper understanding of which work and personal activities are of value for commuting workers. In this paper we present results from an online time-use study of 400 knowledge workers who commute-by-driving. The data allow us to study multitasking-while-driving behavior of commuting knowledge workers, identify which non-driving tasks knowledge workers currently engage in while driving, and the non-driving tasks individuals would like to engage in when using a safe highly automated vehicle in the future. We discuss the implications of our findings for the design of technology that supports work and wellbeing activities in automated cars.

    • Article

    Multitasking While Driving: A Time Use Study of Commuting Knowledge Workers to Assess Current and Future Uses

    By: Thomaz Teodorovicz, Andrew L. Kun, Raffaella Sadun and Orit Shaer

    Commuting has enormous impact on individuals, families, organizations, and society. Advances in vehicle automation may help workers employ the time spent commuting in productive work-tasks or wellbeing activities. To achieve this goal, however, we need to develop a deeper understanding of which work and personal activities are of value for...

    • May 2022
    • Article

    When Does Product Liability Risk Chill Innovation? Evidence from Medical Implants

    By: Alberto Galasso and Hong Luo

    Liability laws designed to compensate for harms caused by defective products may also affect innovation. We examine this issue by exploiting a major quasi-exogenous increase in liability risk faced by U.S. suppliers of polymers used to manufacture medical implants. Difference-in-differences analyses show that this surge in suppliers' liability risk had a large and negative impact on downstream innovation in medical implants, but it had no significant effect on upstream polymer patenting. Our findings suggest that liability risk can percolate throughout a vertical chain and may have a significant chilling effect on downstream innovation.

    • May 2022
    • Article

    When Does Product Liability Risk Chill Innovation? Evidence from Medical Implants

    By: Alberto Galasso and Hong Luo

    Liability laws designed to compensate for harms caused by defective products may also affect innovation. We examine this issue by exploiting a major quasi-exogenous increase in liability risk faced by U.S. suppliers of polymers used to manufacture medical implants. Difference-in-differences analyses show that this surge in suppliers' liability...

    • 2022
    • Working Paper

    An Anatomy of Performance Monitoring

    By: Achyuta Adhvaryu, Anant Nyshadham and Jorge Tamayo

    Performance monitoring is a mainstay management tool in most organizations. Yet we still know little about whether—and why—better monitoring yields better performance in practice. To shed light on these questions, we study the introduction of a performance monitoring technology that enabled managers to track the progress of drive-thru orders in real time in a large quick-service restaurant chain in Puerto Rico. Sales increased by nearly 5%, but this rise was on average short-lived: impacts diminished to roughly half their initial magnitude within two months. Investment in and depreciation of worker skills play an important role in explaining this pattern. Managers responded to the availability of real-time data on bottlenecks by providing greater training inputs to workers at key workstations, particularly in the kitchen. But only a subset of managers provided “refresher” training to counteract skill depreciation over time. Conditional on baseline store productivity-by-time interactions to account for dynamic effects of general managerial quality, stores in which managers utilized refresher training intensively prior to the technology implementation had more persistent gains in sales, suggesting that managers’ attention and responses to worker skill dynamics matter for productivity. These results provide a look inside the “black box” of the management-productivity relationship, and highlight the critical role of on-the-job human capital investment in realizing and sustaining productivity gains from better performance monitoring.

    • 2022
    • Working Paper

    An Anatomy of Performance Monitoring

    By: Achyuta Adhvaryu, Anant Nyshadham and Jorge Tamayo

    Performance monitoring is a mainstay management tool in most organizations. Yet we still know little about whether—and why—better monitoring yields better performance in practice. To shed light on these questions, we study the introduction of a performance monitoring technology that enabled managers to track the progress of drive-thru orders in...

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

Multitasking While Driving: A Time Use Study of Commuting Knowledge Workers to Assess Current and Future Uses

By: Thomaz Teodorovicz, Andrew L. Kun, Raffaella Sadun and Orit Shaer
  • Article |
  • International Journal of Human-Computer Studies
Commuting has enormous impact on individuals, families, organizations, and society. Advances in vehicle automation may help workers employ the time spent commuting in productive work-tasks or wellbeing activities. To achieve this goal, however, we need to develop a deeper understanding of which work and personal activities are of value for commuting workers. In this paper we present results from an online time-use study of 400 knowledge workers who commute-by-driving. The data allow us to study multitasking-while-driving behavior of commuting knowledge workers, identify which non-driving tasks knowledge workers currently engage in while driving, and the non-driving tasks individuals would like to engage in when using a safe highly automated vehicle in the future. We discuss the implications of our findings for the design of technology that supports work and wellbeing activities in automated cars.
Keywords: In-vehicle User Interfaces; Time-use Study; Automated Vehicles; Knowledge Workers; Commuting
Citation
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Related
Teodorovicz, Thomaz, Andrew L. Kun, Raffaella Sadun, and Orit Shaer. "Multitasking While Driving: A Time Use Study of Commuting Knowledge Workers to Assess Current and Future Uses." International Journal of Human-Computer Studies 162 (June 2022).

When Does Product Liability Risk Chill Innovation? Evidence from Medical Implants

By: Alberto Galasso and Hong Luo
  • May 2022 |
  • Article |
  • American Economic Journal: Economic Policy
Liability laws designed to compensate for harms caused by defective products may also affect innovation. We examine this issue by exploiting a major quasi-exogenous increase in liability risk faced by U.S. suppliers of polymers used to manufacture medical implants. Difference-in-differences analyses show that this surge in suppliers' liability risk had a large and negative impact on downstream innovation in medical implants, but it had no significant effect on upstream polymer patenting. Our findings suggest that liability risk can percolate throughout a vertical chain and may have a significant chilling effect on downstream innovation.
Keywords: Product Liability; Innovation; Tort; Medical Devices; Vertical Foreclosure; Product; Innovation and Invention; Legal Liability; Laws and Statutes; Medical Devices and Supplies Industry
Citation
Find at Harvard
Read Now
Related
Galasso, Alberto, and Hong Luo. "When Does Product Liability Risk Chill Innovation? Evidence from Medical Implants." American Economic Journal: Economic Policy 14, no. 2 (May 2022): 366–401.

An Anatomy of Performance Monitoring

By: Achyuta Adhvaryu, Anant Nyshadham and Jorge Tamayo
  • 2022 |
  • Working Paper |
  • Faculty Research
Performance monitoring is a mainstay management tool in most organizations. Yet we still know little about whether—and why—better monitoring yields better performance in practice. To shed light on these questions, we study the introduction of a performance monitoring technology that enabled managers to track the progress of drive-thru orders in real time in a large quick-service restaurant chain in Puerto Rico. Sales increased by nearly 5%, but this rise was on average short-lived: impacts diminished to roughly half their initial magnitude within two months. Investment in and depreciation of worker skills play an important role in explaining this pattern. Managers responded to the availability of real-time data on bottlenecks by providing greater training inputs to workers at key workstations, particularly in the kitchen. But only a subset of managers provided “refresher” training to counteract skill depreciation over time. Conditional on baseline store productivity-by-time interactions to account for dynamic effects of general managerial quality, stores in which managers utilized refresher training intensively prior to the technology implementation had more persistent gains in sales, suggesting that managers’ attention and responses to worker skill dynamics matter for productivity. These results provide a look inside the “black box” of the management-productivity relationship, and highlight the critical role of on-the-job human capital investment in realizing and sustaining productivity gains from better performance monitoring.
Keywords: Performance Monitoring; Worker Skills; Skill Depreciation; Managerial Inattention; On-the-job Training; Productivity; Multitasking; Quick Serve Restaurants; Performance Evaluation; Employees; Competency and Skills; Training; Performance Productivity; Management; Information Technology; Food and Beverage Industry; Puerto Rico
Citation
Read Now
Related
Adhvaryu, Achyuta, Anant Nyshadham, and Jorge Tamayo. "An Anatomy of Performance Monitoring." Harvard Business School Working Paper, No. 22-066, March 2022.

Connecting Students in Chattanooga (B)

By: Jan W. Rivkin and Manjari Raman
  • April 2022 |
  • Supplement |
  • Faculty Research
Keywords: K-12 Education; Pandemic; COVID-19; Accessibility; Education; Urban Development; Wealth and Poverty; Education Industry; Tennessee
Citation
Purchase
Related
Rivkin, Jan W., and Manjari Raman. "Connecting Students in Chattanooga (B)." Harvard Business School Supplement 722-451, April 2022.

Connecting Students in Chattanooga (A)

By: Jan W. Rivkin and Manjari Raman
  • April 2022 |
  • Case |
  • Faculty Research
As COVID-19 hit and school buildings closed across America in the spring of 2020, tens of thousands of K-12 students in Chattanooga’s Hamilton County lacked the high-quality Internet service required to connect them to remote education. Bryan Johnson, superintendent of the Hamilton County school system, scrambled alongside leaders in nonprofits, local governments, philanthropies, and public utilities to weigh three very different ways they might handle the crisis. Could the leaders come together to address both immediate needs and longstanding digital inequities?
Keywords: K-12 Education; Pandemic; COVID-19; Accessibility; Education; Urban Development; Wealth and Poverty; Online Technology; Education Industry; Tennessee
Citation
Educators
Purchase
Related
Rivkin, Jan W., and Manjari Raman. "Connecting Students in Chattanooga (A)." Harvard Business School Case 722-449, April 2022.

Is Hybrid Work the Best of Both Worlds? Evidence from a Field Experiment

By: Prithwiraj Choudhury, Tarun Khanna, Christos A. Makridis and Kyle Schirmann
  • 2022 |
  • Working Paper |
  • Faculty Research
Hybrid work is emerging as a novel form of organizing work globally. This paper reports causal evidence on how the extent of hybrid work—the number of days worked from home relative to days worked from the office—affects work outcomes. Collaborating with an organization in Bangladesh, we randomized the number of days that individual employees worked from the office for nine weeks in the summer of 2020. Our results indicate that an intermediate number of days in the office results in more emails sent, a higher number of email recipients, and increased novelty of work products. Our test for underlying mechanisms suggests that hybrid work might represent the “best of both worlds,” offering workers greater work-life balance, without the concern of being isolated from colleagues.
Keywords: Hybrid Work; Remote Work; Work-from-home; Field Experiment; Employees; Geographic Location; Performance; Work-Life Balance
Citation
Read Now
Related
Choudhury, Prithwiraj, Tarun Khanna, Christos A. Makridis, and Kyle Schirmann. "Is Hybrid Work the Best of Both Worlds? Evidence from a Field Experiment." Harvard Business School Working Paper, No. 22-063, March 2022.

Emeritus: Achieving Impact, Providing Access (A)

By: Ashish Nanda and Zack Kurtovich
  • March 2022 |
  • Case |
  • Faculty Research
In June 2019, Emeritus cofounders Ashwin Damera (HBS MBA 2005) and Chaitanya (Chait) Kalipatnapu were thrilled with the growth of their start-up. Eruditus, formed in October 2010 to provide in-person executive education, had established itself in the market and was growing steadily. Emeritus, an Eruditus subsidiary established in July 2015 to offer online executive education, had grown like a rocket. Damera and Kalipatnapu believed that their firm was only in the very early stages of an exciting journey. The opportunity for further growth and success was immense. Yet, the co-founders were acutely conscious that “what got us here will not get us there.” They faced some strategic choices in the near future. Among these was a decision on whether to grow its university-branded offerings aggressively or to promote the Emeritus brand more assiduously.
Keywords: Technology; Education Technology; Professional Service Firm; Strategy; Entrepreneurship And Strategy; Entrepreneurship; Executive Education; Startup; Digital Brand; Marketing; Global Business; Global Firm; Business Startups; Growth and Development; Growth and Development Strategy
Citation
Educators
Related
Nanda, Ashish, and Zack Kurtovich. "Emeritus: Achieving Impact, Providing Access (A)." Harvard Business School Case 722-429, March 2022.

EbonyLife Media (B)

By: Andy Wu
  • March 2022 |
  • Supplement |
  • Faculty Research
Citation
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Related
Wu, Andy. "EbonyLife Media (B)." Harvard Business School Multimedia/Video Supplement 722-857, March 2022.
More Publications

In the News

    • 05 May 2022
    • HBS Working Knowledge

    Why Companies Raise Their Prices: Because They Can

    Re: Alexander MacKay
    • 29 Apr 2022
    • Harvard Business School

    Professor Cynthia Montgomery: Pivots

    Re: Cynthia Montgomery
    • 29 Apr 2022

    A Political Economy of Justice

    By: Rebecca Henderson
→More Faculty News

HBS Working Knowledge

    • 05 May 2022

    Why Companies Raise Their Prices: Because They Can

    Re: Alexander J. MacKay
    • 31 Mar 2022

    Navigating the ‘Bermuda Triangle’ in Professional Services

    Re: Ashish Nanda
    • 29 Mar 2022

    5 Qualities That Help Companies Thrive for Decades—Even Centuries

    Re: Geoffrey G. JonesRe: Tarun Khanna
→More Working Knowledge Articles

Harvard Business Publishing

    • October 12, 2017
    • Article

    A Survey of How 1,000 CEOs Spend Their Day Reveals What Makes Leaders Successful

    By: Oriana Bandiera, Raffaella Sadun, Andrea Prat and Stephen Hansen
    • April 2022
    • Case

    Connecting Students in Chattanooga (A)

    By: Jan W. Rivkin and Manjari Raman
    • 2008
    • Book

    On Competition

    By: M. E. Porter
→More Harvard Business Publishing

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Harvard Business School seeks candidates in all fields for full time positions. Candidates with outstanding records in PhD or DBA programs are encouraged to apply.
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Contact Information

Strategy Unit
Harvard Business School
Morgan Hall
Soldiers Field
Boston, MA 02163
Strategy@hbs.edu

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