Labor

Research reveals how activist investors help and hurt.

Protections and benefits shouldn’t be based on employment status alone.

It’s a resurgence other countries should understand before copying.

Keeping your game face on is exhausting.

Employees are constantly in motion—making sales calls or taking service trips; visiting an international office for a few days or relocating there for a few years; soaring across oceans in the corporate jet or heading across town in the company car. Typically, these activities are administered by an assortment of departments and vendors. But we […]

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New takes on the class divide

An experiment in automation.

“Failure to communicate strategy causes frontline workers to invent their own strategy.” —Survey respondent In March, we surveyed members of the HBR Advisory Council (a representative group of readers we periodically turn to for insights) about strategy and execution in their organizations. We asked how well they think strategy is developed, which obstacles prevent implementation, […]

Even if you don't plan to change jobs, your job is going to change on you.

For most of the 20th century, a symbiotic link existed between value creation and job creation. When businesses prospered, employment expanded and communities thrived. This virtuous circle was good for business and good for society. But now the relationship between value creation and job creation is more tenuous. In the United States, for example, the […]

To maintain worldwide competitiveness, the West must adopt strategies achieve a balance between productivity and welfare goals

The former chairman and CEO of PepsiCo has ideas for how the corporate world needs to evolve.

We spend a disproportionate share of our money on housing, health care, and education.

What percent of tasks in your country could be done by machines?

Performing well as a first-level supervisor is like walking the circus high wire. In both positions, the ability to maintain one’s balance when shifting forces pull in opposite directions is a measure of one’s success. First-level supervisors must be able to harmonize the demands of management, the demands of the collective work force (often represented […]

Hilltop Stores 100 Bloomfield Avenue, Hartford, Connecticut 06105 Serving Greater Hartford Since 1926 Date: February 16, 1989 To: Margaret Flynn, CEO Hilltop From: Ed Boyer, VP for store operations Our contract with Local 413 expires June 18, so we need to start preparing for negotiations (they’re scheduled to begin in eight weeks). Now is a […]

Today, most multinationals have a conspicuous social conscience. They publicize their internal codes of conduct, monitor labor conditions in their global supply chains, and require suppliers to meet basic labor practice standards. But despite efforts to be better global citizens, companies by themselves are unable to eliminate abuses in their supply chains. In fact, so […]

An analysis of hotels and taxi drivers in San Francisco.