Published:December 17, 2009Paper Released:November 2009Author:Michael C. Jensen Executive Summary: "An individual is whole and complete when their word is whole and complete, and their word is whole and complete when they honour their word," says HBS professor Michael C. Jensen

Published:December 16, 2009Paper Released:November 2009Authors:Niall Ferguson and Moritz Schularick Executive Summary: For the better part of the past decade, the world economy has been dominated by a unique geoeconomic constellation that the authors call "Chimerica": a world economic order that

In recent decades we have seen an explosion in the activities of multinational corporations: Just think of Silicon Valley subsidiaries residing in Bangalore ("the Silicon Valley of India") as well as Detroit firm subsidiaries based in Slovakia ("the Detroit of

Q&A with:Benjamin G. EdelmanPublished:December 14, 2009Author:Martha LagaceImagine you've arrived for a meeting at a corporate campus. But now you discover that the conference room is in another building a quarter mile away. Sure, you could walk there but in the

Published:December 10, 2009Paper Released:July 2009Authors:Prithwiraj Choudhury and Tarun Khanna Executive Summary: Is privatization necessary? In India and across emerging markets, state-owned entities (SOEs) continue to make up a large proportion of industrial sales, yet they lag behind private counterparts on

Published:December 9, 2009Paper Released:November 2009Authors:Quy-Toan Do and Lakshmi Iyer Executive Summary: Wars are detrimental to the populations and the economy of affected countries. Over and above the human cost caused by deaths and suffering during a time of conflict, survivors

Integrity and identity are the topics of two different working papers this week. Integrity, says HBS professor emeritus Michael C. Jensen, means "a state or condition of being whole, complete, unbroken, unimpaired, sound, in perfect condition." It does not mean

Q&A with:Josh LernerPublished:December 7, 2009Author:Sean SilverthorneSilicon Valley is the poster child for capitalism, the synergistic geography where smart private money supports cool ideas, creates jobs, boosts national productivity, and provides a handsome return for investors.Less well understood about the area's

Published:December 3, 2009Paper Released:November 2009Authors:Kathleen L. McGinn, Katherine L. Milkman, and Markus Nöth Executive Summary: Talk can unite, but it can also divide. In multiparty bargaining, communication can focus parties on a fair distribution of resources, but it can also

Published:December 2, 2009Author:Jim HeskettIn spite of, or perhaps because of, the world's economic woes, debates regarding immigration policies continue. It has been nearly ten years since the topic of immigration was last addressed in this column. At that time booming

Published:December 1, 2009Paper Released:November 2009Authors:Carliss Y. Baldwin and Eric von Hippel Executive Summary: We are in the midst of a major paradigm shift: technological trends are causing a change in the way innovation gets done in advanced market economies. In

Q&A with:Anita ElbersePublished:November 30, 2009Author:Sean SilverthorneAt the dawn of the digital music era, record labels went along with a pricing scheme devised by Apple that they are still paying for today. The idea to "unbundle" albums into separate tracks sold

Published:November 25, 2009Paper Released:November 2009Authors:Roy Y.J. Chua and Xi Zou Executive Summary: Gandhi once wrote that "a certain degree of physical harmony and comfort is necessary, but above a certain level it becomes a hindrance instead of a help." This

Loans aren't enough. In microenterprise settings as diverse as Nicaragua and Ghana, small business owners often share something in common besides grit and ingenuity: a lack of basic knowledge about accounting and control. Common mistakes—such as mis-estimating their amount of

Published:November 24, 2009Paper Released:November 2009Authors:Ramon Casadesus-Masanell and Joan Enric Ricart Executive Summary: Drivers such as globalization, deregulation, or technological change, just to mention a few, are profoundly changing the competitive game. Scholars and practitioners agree that the fastest-growing firms in

Q&A with:Richard M.J. BohmerPublished:November 23, 2009Author:Martha LagaceDespite the urgency of debate on the U.S. national stage about health-care reform, an issue now before the U.S. Senate, one crucial element of change has been less visible: advances in the delivery of

Published:November 19, 2009Paper Released:October 2009Author:William A. Sahlman Executive Summary: We have spent the past year mired in a global financial crisis that few saw coming and that will plague us for years to come. Such crises are gut-wrenching. Collectively and

Published:November 18, 2009Paper Released:October 2009Authors:Laura Alfaro and Anusha Chari Executive Summary: Between 1986 and 2005, Indian growth put to rest the concern that there was something about the "nature of India" that made rapid growth difficult. Following broad-ranging reforms in

Published:November 18, 2009Author:Julia HannaHe's been called "the Salvador Dalí of the kitchen" for creations ranging from beetroot and yogurt ice-cream lollipops to a deconstructed Spanish omelet served in a parfait glass. Each year, some 2 million hopeful diners vie to

In the wake of the global financial crisis, HBS professor Bill Sahlman analyzes the fallout and suggests a new player to monitor management excess. What he envisions is a monitor that would "take an objective, hard-nosed look at major financial