- 25 Jun 2019
- Cold Call Podcast
In the Platform Economy, Upwork Searches for Better Matches in the Cloud
Welcome to the Platform Economy, where business strategists must learn a new form of competition. David Yoffie and Michael Cusumano explain choices facing Upwork, which matches jobs with job hunters in the cloud. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.
- 12 Nov 2018
- Working Paper Summaries
Product Quality and Entering Through Tying: Experimental Evidence
This study empirically explores Google’s decision to tie its new reviews product to the top of its search results, excluding competitors. Results suggest that such "tying" can facilitate dominant platforms’ entry into adjacent markets, even when the tied product is of worse quality compared to existing options.
- 30 Mar 2018
- What Do You Think?
What Should Mark Zuckerberg Do?
SUMMING UP: Facebook doesn't necessarily need a better data-privacy policy, James Heskett's readers suggest. Instead, Mark Zuckerberg needs a new business model. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.
- 06 Dec 2017
- What Do You Think?
Is It Time To Break Up Amazon, Apple, Facebook, or Google?
SUMMING UP Would breaking up tech giants like Facebook and Google be good antitrust policy or bad for capitalism? James Heskett's readers join the conversation. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.
- 14 Sep 2016
- Research & Ideas
Web Surfers Have a Schedule and Stick to It
Note to web marketers: Consumers won't carve out more time to visit your site. So how do you attract them? Start by understanding their online habits, reports new research by Shane Greenstein and colleagues. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.
- 14 Dec 2015
- Research & Ideas
Airbnb Hosts Discriminate Against African-American Guests
Experimental research by Ben Edelman, Michael Luca, and Daniel Svirsky revealed widespread discrimination against African-American guests on Airbnb. Now the researchers have created an online tool to mitigate it. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.
- 09 Dec 2015
- Research Event
When Hosts Attack: The Competitive Threat of Online Platforms
Online retail platforms like Amazon are great for the third-party businesses that use them—until the platform’s owner decides to start competing with them. Feng Zhu looks at the factors that turn hosts into predators. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.
- 01 Oct 2015
- Working Paper Summaries
Efficiencies and Regulatory Shortcuts: How Should We Regulate Companies like Airbnb and Uber?
With the rise of service technology platforms such as Uber, a new regulatory approach is needed providing more flexibility that ensures service providers, users and third parties are adequately protected.
- 29 Sep 2015
- Research & Ideas
Work 3.0: Redefining Jobs and Companies in the Uber Age
Companies like HourlyNerd and Lyft are redefining the job marketplace—but government has not caught up to the shift. Mess this up and we’ll stifle a major driver of innovation, business creation, and jobs, argues Andrei Hagiu. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.
- 02 Sep 2015
- What Do You Think?
What's Wrong With Amazon’s Low-Retention HR Strategy?
SUMMING UP Does Amazon's "only the strongest survive" employee-retention policy make for a better company or improved customer relationships? Jim Heskett's readers chime in. Open for comment; 0 Comment(s) posted.
- 04 May 2015
- Research & Ideas
Need to Solve a Problem? Take a Break From Collaborating
Organizations spend a lot of money enabling employees to solve problems collectively. But inducing more collaboration may actually hinder the most important part of problem-solving: actually solving the problem. Research by Jesse Shore, Ethan Bernstein, and David Lazer. Open for comment; 11 Comment(s) posted.
- 09 Apr 2014
- Working Paper Summaries
Visualizing and Measuring Software Portfolio Architectures: A Flexibility Analysis
Contemporary business environments are constantly evolving, requiring continual changes to the software applications that support a business. Moreover, during recent decades, the sheer number of applications has grown significantly, and they have become increasingly interdependent. Many companies find that managing applications and implementing changes to their application portfolio architecture is increasingly difficult and expensive. Firms need a way to visualize and analyze the modularity of their software portfolio architectures and the degree of coupling between components. In this paper, the authors test a method for visualizing and measuring software portfolio architectures using data of a biopharmaceutical firm's enterprise architecture. The authors also use the measures to predict the costs of architectural change. Findings show, first, that the biopharmaceutical firm's enterprise architecture can be classified as core-periphery. This means that 1) there is one cyclic group (the "Core") of components that is substantially larger than the second largest cyclic group, and 2) this group comprises a substantial portion of the entire architecture. In addition, the classification of applications in the architecture (as being in the Core or the Periphery) is significantly correlated with architectural flexibility. In this case the architecture has a propagation cost of 23 percent, meaning almost one-quarter of the system may be affected when a change is made to a randomly selected component. Overall, results suggest that the hidden structure method can reveal new facts about an enterprise architecture. This method can aid the analysis of change costs at the software application portfolio level. Key concepts include: This method for architectural visualization could provide valuable input when planning architectural change projects (in terms of, for example, risk analysis and resource planning). The method reveals a "hidden" core-periphery structure, uncovering new facts about the architecture that could not be gained from other visualization procedures or standard metrics. Compared to other measures of complexity, coupling, and modularity, this method considers not only the direct dependencies between components but also the indirect dependencies. These indirect dependencies provide important input for management decisions. Closed for comment; 0 Comment(s) posted.
- 01 Apr 2013
- Research & Ideas
First Minutes are Critical in New-Employee Orientation
Employee orientation programs ought to be less about the company and more about the employee, according to new research by Daniel M. Cable, Francesca Gino, and Bradley R. Staats. Closed for comment; 16 Comment(s) posted.
- 11 Mar 2013
- Research & Ideas
Marissa Mayer Should Bridge Distance Gap with Remote Workers
Marissa Mayer's decision to bring work-at-home Yahoo! employees back to the office has set off a firestorm. Lakshmi Ramarajan writes on how to mitigate the problem. Closed for comment; 13 Comment(s) posted.
- 06 Oct 2010
- Working Paper Summaries
Using What We Know: Turning Organizational Knowledge into Team Performance
An organization's captured (and codified) knowledge--white papers, case studies, documented processes--should help project teams perform better, but does it? Existing research has not answered the question, even as U.S. companies alone spend billions annually on knowledge management programs. Looking at large-scale, objective data from Indian software developer Wipro, researchers Bradley R. Staats, Melissa A. Valentine, and Amy C. Edmondson found that team use of an organization's captured knowledge enhanced productivity, especially for teams that were geographically diverse, relatively low in e
Time and the Value of Data
This paper studies the impact of time-dependency and data perishability on a dataset's effectiveness in creating value for a business, and shows the value of data in the search engine and advertisement businesses perishes quickly.