Customer Reviews

Harvard Business Review

5 star:		(13)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

I'm quite a fan of HBR - it was an invaluable tool during my MBA and still seems to consistently be able to provide stories which align to the concerns which are top of mind for me on any given day...

However, i must say that for a business which constistently expounds best practice and business leadership, HBR itself is lagging sadly behond the times. I have never experienced such poor service from any magazine i have subscribed to - customer service is slow and unhelpful, systems are completely disparate across geographies and online vs print subscriptions, and the staff I have spoken to have been unwilling/unable to help me any time I have called.

The policy of replying to customer queries within 2-3 days is simply archaic!!! HBR - you of all organisations should be aware that times are changing, and 72 hours is simply too long to wait for a response on the status of my subscription (which, incidentally, you have charged me for and then "lost" all record of).

Similarly, having your corporate clients sit on hold for 20 mins to speak with a customer service representative, only to be told the phone number provided by the online chat consultant was for a US online subscription help only is too long. To add insult to injury, the representative in your Florida call centre then advised that i needed to call a phone number in the Netherlands - you can imagine I was thrilled by the prospect of spending another 20 min on hold at international call rates... luckily i was saved the hassle, because the number i was provided was incorrect and i wasn't able to get through anyway.

So here I stand... I can't get online help because, having not received a publication in 6 months i don't have the cover sheet with my subscription number, and the call centre won't provide it for me. I can spend another 20 min on hold to try and get the CORRECT phone number for the netherlands office - but that hardly seems like a productive use of my workday.

I'm afraid you've lost me HBR - There is no way i can justify renewing my subscription (i notice you're well on top of sending me renewal specials 6 months before my subscription expires - good to see where your priorities lay). You're a great magazine, but i am afraid i am cmpletely turned off by your total inability to practice what you preach. Maybe it's time to get your own house in order?

Not every publication gets to use the name 'Harvard' in their masthead. It's a perk that comes with the territory and banks on the accumulated legacy of many generations of excellence.

Satisfaction is when the product lives up to the label, the brilliant father's son turns out well, the apple falls deliciously close to the tree. The HARVARD BUSINESS REVIEW does the Harvard moniker proud.

HBR puts cutting-edge, high-quality research into the hands of both scholars and business practitioners in way that starts with solid research and then cuts to the chase. It's a credit to the recently deceased Theodore Levitt's editorial genius that HBR comes out accessible rather than obfuscatory. Good editing is a precious thing.

The September 2006 issue before me is not as tightly themed as some, yet its diverse offering is as rich as ever. Articles include

* Ten Ways to Create Shareholder Value
* Rethinking Political Correctness
* With Friends Like These: The Art of Managing Complementors
* How to Keep A Players Productive
* Curveball: Strategies to Fool the Competition

Then there are the regular departments:

* HBR Case Study: Indispensable
* Managing Yourself: the Decision to Trust
* Tool Kit: The New Science of Sales Force Productivity
* Best Practice: When Your Contract Manufacturer Becomes Your Competitor

Each month's articles are treated to an executive summary at the back of the Review.

HBR gives its readers a mix of sociological, economic, psychological, and statistical takes on business at a level that can reasonably be called authoritative.

People argue whether HBR is as good as it used to be. Maybe. Maybe not. The bottom line is, savvy business thinkers couldn't get by without it twenty years ago and they're at the same disadvantage if they don't take HBR today. It's hard to argue with indispensability.

When I subscribed to this publication I received an e-mail saying that they couldn't give me my user-name yet because of "computer problems". So they gave me a temporary user name (HBROCT) and password. Now a week later I can't get in, and customer service is demanding that I re-subscribe for a more expensive "upgrade". What a crock!

I can do without the hassle, and they can do without my $$ apparently.

You would think that the people that run this org would be way above this kind of cr#p. TWO days for a response? WTH?

I hope others enjoy the subscription they wanted, and that they never have to deal with this places' "customer service".

It is very difficult to review a product or in this case a publication that has never arrived.

Little help!!

Where is it? And when can we accept it to arrive?

Linda Drake

HBR is the most intelligently written executive-grade business magazine available. Forbes and Fortune would be the next runners up, but way in the distance. It takes a mag directed to people with chief positions and the aspiring chiefs to have an executive summary at the end of every magazine!

If you think the subscription price is nearing outrageous, the cover price is much worse! Barnes 'n' Noble said it was their most expensive standard-size magazine. Despite that, I purchased two issues, I am now going to subscribe. It cost far less than a Harvard MBA, a bunch (perhaps all) of the articles are written by Harvard professors and it is apparent in their writing that they make every word count. It is worth every penny.

I have been a subscription member of HBR for over 2 years now and am a fully subscribed member (Online + Print). The quality of articles and case studies are excellent and definitely worth the reading time. I try not to miss any article in the print issue.
However, on the online front they can do better. For a fully subscribed user, it is a struggle that each time I do a search for any topic, I get a list 80-85 % online articles which I need to "Buy PDF" and just 15 -20 % articles which I can read online. Then why do they charge separate fee for an online subscription in fully paid membership? When I am in travel, I don't want to pull ou my credit card each time to a read an article on a topic of my choice.

I've been subscribing to The Harvard Business Review for most of my career, and have been very pleased. Staying current with new ideas and new concepts is such an important part of being an effective leader in today's dynamic organization.

The Harvard Business Review has done a fantastic job of providing a catalyst for infusing new thoughts into an organization that is striving to improve performance and drive innovative change.

My husband had heard such great things about this magazine, so I gave it to him for Christmas last year. I just asked him if he would like me to renew it. He said that, unfortunately, it only has one great article per issue in it. The rest is no different from any other magazine, and that one article is not worth it to him for us to pay so much for the subscription.

The Harvard Business Review is a very well written publication that has served me well over the last few years of graduate school. I feel the subscription falls short because it does not offer any additional features such as reviewing past editions on-line or down loading the articles. When I wrote to them, this was their (HBR) response:

"We offer an online subscription to hbr.org which includes the following, but would cost an additional subscription price.

What comes with an HBR online subscription?

An online subscription to HBR includes online access to individual full-text HBR articles, but only individual HBR articles and HBR case studies. You may read the articles online but you cannot download the articles.
The subscription does not include access to HBS cases or cases from other academic institutions. Those can only be purchased individually.
HBR case studies differ from other case studies in that the HBR case studies are fictional.
An HBR online subscription does not include access to the PDF reprints, just to the full-text online versions.
The PDF files are reprinted versions. All the past editions of the HBR until about 1960 are available as a part of the online subscription."

This tells me that everything for this publication is an additional charge.

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