- 18 Aug 2011
- Lessons from the Classroom
Business Plan Contest: 15 Years of Building Better Entrepreneurs
Since 1997, Hundreds of student-entrepreneurs have tested their ideas at Harvard Business School's annual Business Plan Contest. Here is what they have learned about success, failure, and themselves. From the HBS Alumni Bulletin. Open for comment; 0 Comments.
- 25 Jul 2011
- Research & Ideas
How Disruptive Innovation is Remaking the University
In The Innovative University, authors Clayton M. Christensen and Henry J. Eyring take Christensen's theory of disruptive innovation to the field of higher education, where new online institutions and learning tools are challenging the future of traditional colleges and universities. Key concepts include: A disruptive innovation brings to market a product or service that isn't as good as the best traditional offerings, but is less expensive and easier to use. Online learning is a disruptive technology that is making colleges and universities reconsider their higher education models. Closed for comment; 0 Comments.
- 09 Mar 2011
- Working Paper Summaries
Accounting Scholarship That Advances Professional Knowledge and Practice
Accounting scholars generally do a fine job of analyzing how we process accounting data, but they ought to spend more time looking at how that data is produced, says Harvard Business School professor Robert S. Kaplan. In this paper—in response to a newly minted professor who sought his advice—Kaplan reminds young scholars that accounting is more of a professional discipline than an academic subject. To that end, he advises them not just to teach their students the common body of accounting knowledge, but also to advance that body of knowledge by bridging the gap between scholarship and practice. Key concepts include: Accounting professors have a responsibility not just to dispense knowledge but also to advance it, especially in a time when the profession is changing rapidly. Risk management is a great issue for accounting academics to tackle. One, it is clearly relevant, due to the massive bank failures in the past few years. Two, it encompasses issues important to both academic study and professional practice-including reporting, disclosure, management control, and auditing. Young accounting professors should spend time teaching in executive education programs, which will give them an opportunity to get feedback from experienced professionals. Closed for comment; 0 Comments.
- 04 Mar 2011
- Working Paper Summaries
From Social Control to Financial Economics: The Linked Ecologies of Economics and Business in Twentieth Century America
No transformation looks more consequential for the history of American higher education than the extraordinary rise of business schools and business degrees in the twentieth century. Marion Fourcade (UC Berkeley) and Rakesh Khurana (HBS) analyze the changing place of economics in American business education as reflected in the teaching of three elite business schools over the course of the twentieth century: the Wharton School (1900-1930), the Carnegie Tech Graduate School of Industrial Administration (post World War II), and the Graduate School of Business at the University of Chicago (1960s-present). Key concepts include: Wharton is an illustration of the earliest trends and dilemmas, when business schools found themselves caught between their business connections and their striving for moral legitimacy in higher education. The Carnegie Tech Graduate School of Industrial Administration reflects a new vision, starting in the 1950s, of the contribution of business to society with the rise of "management science"-a new formation that broke from the existing disciplinary system and sought to legitimatize itself through its hard-core technical capabilities. The University of Chicago's Graduate School of Business marks the decisive ascendancy of economics, and particularly financial economics, in business education over the other behavioral disciplines. This transformation helped produce and sustain new understandings of the nature of the firm, with far-reaching consequences for business practices and economic relations in society. Theories from each period provided a new language, and new categories of understanding and action, that not only became naturalized in the teachings of American business schools but also came to sustain and even instigate profound alterations in the nature of American corporations and markets-at least until the next series of tools, concepts, and business recipes came along. Closed for comment; 0 Comments.
- 01 Mar 2011
- Working Paper Summaries
How Foundations Think: The Ford Foundation as a Dominating Institution in the Field of American Business Schools
What causes institutions to change? This paper adds organizational and exogenous perspective to existing theories by looking at the idea of "dominating institutions"—a class of formal organizations purposively designed to change other institutions. HBS professor Rakesh Khurana and colleagues look at the Ford Foundation and its work reshaping America's graduate schools of management between 1952 and 1965 through funding of "centers of excellence" at a number of schools, including Harvard Business School. Key concepts include: The goal of this paper is to describe the structural characteristics and associated behaviors of dominating institutions, specifically the Ford Foundation, as they incite change within other institutions. Through its analysis and recommendations, the Ford Foundation reshaped America's graduate schools of management between 1952 and 1965 from a vocationally disparate, but "successful" field to a more academically and discipline-based orientation. The researchers anchor their work around two questions: What are the structural characteristics of a dominant institution? What key behaviors do dominant institutions use to allow them to significantly reshape an existing institution? The power of these institutions to change other institutions resided in their ability to broker personnel and practices across institutional sectors, elevating and legitimating particular practices, and providing resources in ways that increase the interdependence between the foundations and their beneficiaries. Large-scale institutional change does not occur in isolation, the findings suggest, but rather has to be understood in relation to what is happening in other institutional fields. Scholars studying institutional change should make an analytical distinction between the structure of the position of organizational actors in an institutional field and the interactions among the organizations in that field. Both are important in understanding the processes of institutional change. Closed for comment; 0 Comments.
- 07 Feb 2011
- Lessons from the Classroom
Creating the Founders’ Dilemmas Course
In HBS professor Noam Wasserman's second-year MBA course, Founders' Dilemmas, students study quandaries that virtually all entrepreneurs face when trying to realize the dream of launching a startup—from deciding when to start the company to learning how to make a graceful exit. Guest speakers discussing their experiences include All-Star pitcher-turned-entrepreneur Curt Schilling and Tom & Tom, the Nantucket Nectars guys. Closed for comment; 0 Comments.
- 20 Dec 2010
- Research & Ideas
New Dean Sets Five Priorities for HBS
Harvard Business School's new Dean Nitin Nohria outlines five priorities that will shape the agenda for the School during his tenure: curriculum innovation, intellectual ambition, internationalization, inclusion, and closer ties to the University. Closed for comment; 0 Comments.
- 22 Oct 2010
- Research & Ideas
Panel on Pedagogical Innovations in MBA Courses
Faculty Research Symposium 2010: Multiple pedagogical innovations are taking place at HBS that are fundamentally changing students' learning experiences. Key concepts include: The Global Leader Initiative seeks to make the educational experience more powerful by forging greater integration between courses. The Building Green Businesses Seminar was created to accelerate the rate at which green business issues enter the mainstream curriculum. Weekly one-page papers are used by professor Youngme Moon to force students to distill their thinking, take a point of view, and reflect on lessons learned, while raising the overall quality of discussion in the classroom. The Authentic Leadership Development course encourages students to understand themselves before leading others. Closed for comment; 0 Comments.
- 10 May 2010
- Research & Ideas
What Top Scholars Say About Leadership
As a subject of scholarly inquiry, leadership—and who leaders are, what makes them tick, how they affect others—has been neglected for decades. The Handbook of Leadership Theory and Practice, edited by Harvard Business School's Nitin Nohria and Rakesh Khurana, brings together some of the best minds on this important subject. Q&A with Khurana, plus book excerpt. Key concepts include: Leadership as a phenomenon for research is experiencing a rebirth due to developments in the academy and the urgency of improving leadership globally. At the turn of the 20th century, leadership was studied intensely. It then fell off the academic grid. Given the number of schools asserting leadership development as part of their mission statement, it is critical for scholars to understand and explain how leaders succeed and fail based on opportunities and constraints. Leadership should be examined through a variety of lenses, including psychology, sociology, economics, and history. Closed for comment; 0 Comments.
- 06 May 2010
- Working Paper Summaries
Introductory Reading For Being a Leader and The Effective Exercise of Leadership: An Ontological Model
Effective leadership does not come from mere knowledge about what successful leaders do; or from trying to emulate the characteristics or styles of noteworthy leaders; or from trying to remember and follow the steps, tips, or techniques from books or coaching on leadership. And it certainly does not come from merely being in a leadership position or in a position of authority or having decision rights. This paper, the sixth of six pre-course reading assignments for an experimental leadership course developed by HBS professor emeritus Michael C. Jensen and coauthors, accompanies a course specifically designed to provide actionable access to being a leader and the effective exercise of leadership as one's natural self-expression. Key concepts include: One of the conditions for realizing the promise of the leadership course is that students must be open to examine, question, and then transform their worldviews (models of reality) and frames of reference (mindsets). Students create for themselves a powerful 4-part contextual framework that calls them into being as a leader. Having done this what remains is to confront one's own Ontological Perceptual and Functional constraints so as: 1) to relax their ability to restrict one's perceptions of what must be dealt with in any leadership situation, and 2) to relax their ability to restrict one's freedom of choice for action in any leadership situation. Students cannot master that which they do not create for themselves. This is especially true of anything that is at first counterintuitive. Closed for comment; 0 Comments.
- 03 May 2010
- Research & Ideas
What Is the Future of MBA Education?
Why get an MBA degree? Transformations in business and society make this question increasingly urgent for executives, business school deans, students, faculty, and the public. In a new book, Rethinking the MBA: Business Education at a Crossroads, Harvard Business School's Srikant M. Datar, David A. Garvin, and Patrick G. Cullen suggest opportunities for innovation. Q&A with Datar and Garvin plus book excerpt. Key concepts include: Executives and business school deans raised multiple concerns about the MBA landscape when the authors interviewed them for an HBS Centennial colloquium in 2008 on the future of MBA education. The challenges: Stakeholders question the value-added of MBA degrees. And MBAs lack sufficient leadership development, a "global mindset," and skill in navigating organizational realities. Rethinking the MBA examines each challenge in turn, and provides six case studies of schools that demonstrate flexibility and innovation in MBA education. Closed for comment; 0 Comments.
- 29 Apr 2010
- Working Paper Summaries
The Great Leap Forward: The Political Economy of Education in Brazil, 1889-1930
In 1890, with only 15 percent of the population literate, Brazil had the lowest literacy rate among the large economies in the Americas. Yet between 1890 and 1940, Brazil had the most rapid increase in literacy rates in the Americas, catching up with and even surpassing some of its more educated peers such as Mexico, Colombia, and Venezuela. This jump in literacy was simultaneously accompanied by a brisk increase in the number of teachers, number of public schools, and enrollment rates. Why were political elites in Brazil willing to finance this expansion of public education for all? André Martínez-Fritscher of Banco de México, Aldo Musacchio of HBS, and Martina Viarengo of the London School of Economics explain how state governments secured funds to pay for education and examine the incentives of politicians to spend on education. They conclude that the progress made in education during these decades had mixed results in the long run. Key concepts include: Competition in national elections and a literacy requirement may have provided the right incentives for state political parties and state politicians to spend on education in a way that increased literacy rates in a significant way over the period studied. Brazil started from an extremely low base and ended in what today would be considered a low level of literacy as well (around 40 percent of the population). Between 1889 and 1930 there was significant progress in the provision of elementary education in Brazil. It was to a large extent a consequence of the fact that some states got more taxation powers and had the obligation to spend on public education. Positive trade shocks can be converted into long-term development if there is electoral competition, and economic assets are not concentrated in a few hands. Expenditures on education between 1889 and 1930 altered the development path of some states and changed their relative rankings compared to other states in a somewhat permanent way. Closed for comment; 0 Comments.
- 10 Feb 2010
- Working Paper Summaries
Investing in Improvement: Strategy and Resource Allocation in Public School Districts
The operating environments of public school districts are largely void of the market forces that reward a company's success with more capital and exert pressure on it to eventually abandon unproductive activities. Stacey Childress describes the strategic resource decisions in 3 of the 20 public school districts that she and colleagues have studied through the Public Education Leadership Project at Harvard. The stories in San Francisco, New York City, and Maryland's Montgomery County occurred largely before the districts faced dramatic decreases in revenues, though they show the superintendents facing budget concerns near the end of the narratives. Even so, the situations share common principles that superintendents and their leadership teams can use to make differentiated resource decisions—reducing spending in some areas and increasing it in others with a clear rationale for why these decisions will produce results for students. Key concepts include: Given the rarity of strategic approaches to resource allocation described in the examples, it is clear that district leaders need more guidance and tools to help them make better decisions and manage the consequences, particularly when they are under enormous fiscal pressure. Back your strategy with a resource plan—otherwise it is not a strategy. Don't get trapped by the dogma of decentralization. If leaders alienate influential stakeholders when budgets are flush, it will be even more difficult to preserve key strategic investments during financial crises. Closed for comment; 0 Comments.
- 28 Oct 2009
- Lessons from the Classroom
HBS Begins Teaching Consumer Finance
Last spring HBS became the first top-ranked U.S. business school to offer a course in consumer finance. Professor Peter Tufano talks about the course and his determination to make consumer finance a broadly accepted academic pursuit. From the HBS Alumni Bulletin. Key concepts include: The household sector in America represents approximately $61 trillion of assets. The course helps students understand consumers and the financial service firms that serve them. Four functions are studied: payments, movements of money from today to tomorrow (savings and investing), movements of money from tomorrow back to today (borrowing), and managing risk. Closed for comment; 0 Comments.
- 07 Oct 2009
- Research Event
HBS Past and Present
Eight enduring themes have characterized Harvard Business School from its earliest years, and remain as integral as ever to the way the School thinks and operates. Closed for comment; 0 Comments.
- 30 Sep 2009
- Research & Ideas
Harvard and HBS: The Next 100 Years
Harvard President Drew Gilpin Faust reflected on Harvard Business School's past 100 years and shared her vision of the future, while HBS Dean Jay Light discussed the School's history and highlighted key focus areas for the future. Closed for comment; 0 Comments.
- 24 Jul 2009
- Research & Ideas
Business Summit: Business Education in the 21st Century
Business schools are innovating and experimenting to change the MBA experience, and to help business education regain its relevance and value. Along with a changing curricula, programs are attempting to make the learning experience more interactive, engaging, global, and experiential. Closed for comment; 0 Comments.
- 02 Jul 2009
- Research Event
Business Summit: The Role of Social Entrepreneurship in Transforming American Public Education
Amid formidable barriers, a set of passionate social entrepreneurs are disrupting the status quo in education with innovative and effective approaches that are producing measurable results. The challenge now is to build support so these solutions can be applied elsewhere. Closed for comment; 0 Comments.
- 25 Mar 2009
- Working Paper Summaries
Demographics, Career Concerns or Social Comparison: Who Games SSRN Download Counts?
Why do certain individuals commit fraudulent acts—in this case repeatedly downloading their own working papers from the Social Science Research Network (SSRN) repository to increase the papers' reported download counts? HBS professors Benjamin G. Edelman and Ian I. Larkin study the relative importance of demographic, economic, and psychological factors leading individuals to commit this kind of gaming. Authors engage in deceptive self-downloading to improve a paper's visibility on SSRN, to obtain more favorable assessments of paper quality, and to obtain possible benefits for promotion and tenure decisions at those schools that consider download counts in tenure decisions. Data indicates that authors are more likely to inflate their papers' download counts when a higher count greatly improves the visibility of a paper on the SSRN network. Authors are also more likely to inflate their papers' download counts when their peers recently had successful papers—suggesting an "envy" effect in download gaming. Download inflations are also affected somewhat by career concerns (e.g. just before changing jobs) and by demographic factors, though these effects are smaller. On the whole, analysis suggests a heightened risk of fraudulent acts not only where economic returns are high, but also where prestige, status, or reputation are important. Key concepts include: Envy and social comparisons play a strong role in predicting deceptive downloads. Discontinuities and other incentive anomalies invite gaming. At SSRN, gaming increases when it will increase a paper's visibility on SSRN by putting the paper (or keeping it) on a "Top 10 list." Some groups seem to be less likely to engage in download gaming. Females and researchers at low-ranked institutions seem to be somewhat less likely to engage in gaming. Closed for comment; 0 Comments.
Salience in Quality Disclosure: Evidence from the U.S. News College Rankings
Why are the U.S. News and World Report College Rankings so influential? According to this paper by Michael Luca and Jonathan Smith, it's at least in part because U.S. News makes the information so simple. While earlier college guides had already provided useful information about schools, U.S. News did the work of aggregating the information into an easy-to-use ranking, making it more salient for prospective students. The authors show that these rankings matter in a big way: a one-rank improvement leads to a 0.9 percent increase in applicants. However, students tend to ignore the underlying details even though these details carry more information than the overall rank. Key concepts include: College applicants pay attention to a school's overall rank, rather than the more informative (but more complicated) underlying information. When U.S. News and World Report chooses how much weight to apply to different categories (such as faculty/student ratio and alumni giving rate), they are exerting a large amount of influence over students' application decisions. U.S. News presents many of these details, but it's the bottom line (i.e., the weights chosen by U.S. News) that matters. When deciding how to present information, managers should keep in mind that simple metrics are most effective. Providing detailed information to consumers may seem useful, but aggregate statistics (such as a ranking or grade) tend to have a larger impact on decision making. Closed for comment; 0 Comments.