Faculty and doctoral students

A diverse faculty is critical to scholarship, teaching, and connections with practice. Diversity enhances creativity and unlocks opportunities for new learning. Simultaneously, the study of race, diversity, inclusion, and inequality increases HBS’s capabilities to contribute to racial equity in organizations and society. We start by acknowledging that throughout our history, Black scholars have been severely underrepresented among HBS faculty and doctoral students. We are committed to overcoming that history by increasing the diversity of our faculty; becoming a home for scholars of race, diversity, inclusion, and inequality; developing and supporting diverse students in doctoral programs at and beyond HBS; and actively creating an equitable and inclusive culture for all faculty and doctoral students at HBS.

Toward these commitments, HBS has asked every faculty unit to redouble efforts to recruit outstanding Black and other underrepresented minority (URM)[2] faculty with a broad range of research interests. HBS also has encouraged faculty units to expand the breadth of their offerings by hiring scholars who study race, diversity, inclusion, and inequality—by assuring each unit that it can hire such individuals without diminishing its capacity to hire other candidates. The encouragement applies to candidates at the senior and junior levels and from practice. We know, however, that providing resources for hiring is only a first step. Thus, HBS’s Division of Research and Faculty Development, the Senior Associate Dean for Faculty Strategy and Recruiting, and the Chair for Term Faculty commit to partnering and actively working with each faculty unit and Unit Head to identify, recruit, hire, and support a diverse faculty as well as candidates studying race, diversity, inclusion, and inequality.

We want to emphasize the particular importance of tenured Black and URM faculty, whether developed internally or hired from outside HBS. Tenured faculty play a central role in mentoring young scholars, hiring and promoting junior faculty, influencing HBS’s academic and strategic choices, and shaping and fostering our culture. To diversify our tenured ranks, we commit to investing deeply in the success of our untenured Black and URM faculty; searching comprehensively beyond HBS for outstanding senior Black and URM faculty and scholars of race, diversity, inclusion, and inequality; and making HBS a particularly attractive place for diverse faculty to do their best work.

Toward these ends, we will create, fund, and staff a set of visiting positions for scholars of race, diversity, inclusion, and inequality. We will invite visiting scholars, annually and potentially for multi-year stays, at each of four levels: doctoral students, post-doctoral fellows, junior faculty, and senior faculty. In steady state we aim to have eight to ten visiting scholars in residence. Outreach for these positions will emphasize scholars from schools outside our usual peer schools and a requirement that the search include underrepresented minority scholars. The Initiative described above will serve as a hub for these visitors.

Independently and in collaboration with other business schools, we will identify, support, and advise organizations with missions to increase racial and ethnic diversity in pre-doctoral and doctoral programs. For example, The PhD Project is an organization devoted to diversifying the pipeline of talent into business academia. We will increase our support for The PhD Project and ensure that HBS faculty members participate actively in its efforts.

In addition, the HBS Doctoral Programs will continue to invest in and expand the Program for Research in Markets and Organizations (PRIMO), a summer program that aims to expose talented undergraduates, many of whom are underrepresented minorities, to business research and an academic career. PRIMO aims to foster greater diversity in the doctoral applicant pool and, eventually, the faculty pool.

Building a diverse faculty will require ongoing, sustained creation of a more inclusive culture and more inclusive practices around faculty recruiting, mentoring, staffing, promotions, and retention. To begin, we will carry out facilitated discussions within each unit and as a larger faculty, to identify the practices and behaviors that hinder and help progress toward faculty diversity. The entire faculty will engage in these discussions, which will develop and build upon the interpersonal skills mentioned in section 2, and we will identify appropriate facilitators from outside or within our community to support these discussions as needed.

Students and participants

We will continue and expand our efforts to increase opportunities for Black students and participants in all of our educational programs.

• In our MBA Program, the Admissions & Financial Aid team is reinforcing and extending efforts to reach the full range of human talent. The team’s focus will continue to be on increasing the pool of talented Black applicants to the MBA Program, as well as other underrepresented minority groups, through trusted partnerships with the HBS African American Alumni Association and organizations such as Management Leadership for Tomorrow, outreach to Historically Black Colleges and Universities and other Minority Serving Institutions, and HBS programs like the Summer Venture in Management Program.
• Our research with potential MBA applicants suggests that financial constraints often prevent students across demographic groups from applying to and attending HBS. To reduce financial barriers, we have committed to three new efforts:
• We will launch a need-based waiver of the application fee for all prospective students in all admissions rounds.
• We will evaluate and revise our current need-based formula for financial aid to account for parental income and assets in addition to student income and assets. This change is intended to offset societal racist policies and practices that have historically prevented Black and other Americans from accumulating wealth across generations and have left such families disproportionately unable to afford graduate education for their children. The change will apply to all students and will therefore also benefit all entering students from lower socioeconomic backgrounds.
• We will create a new complementary fellowship to support students who have demonstrated exemplary commitment to serving Black / African American, Hispanic / Latinx, and other marginalized communities of color prior to enrolling at HBS. The Recognizing Individuals Seeking Equity (RISE) Fellowships—each totaling $20K over two years—will be awarded on top of need-based tuition scholarships. The RISE Fellowship will be modeled after existing HBS complementary fellowships for students with outstanding impact in the nonprofit and healthcare sectors before enrolling at HBS.
• As another way to grow the pool of Black talent interacting with HBS and with business more broadly, HBS Online has committed to create highly affordable courses that reach Black and other underrepresented minority students in late high school and early college. The courses will aim to introduce the students to, and prepare them for, careers in business and leadership—thereby expanding the future pool of talent that considers graduate business school, including HBS. We will also look to expand our partnerships with Historically Black Colleges and Universities that allow students with financial need to take core HBS Online courses at a significantly reduced price and continue a mentorship program launched in summer 2020 for HBCU students enrolled in those courses.
• In our Executive Education programs, we will launch efforts to meet with Human Resources leaders and sponsoring C-suite members of major client companies, review the diversity of past participants that each company has sent us for professional development, and strongly encourage companies to invest more deeply in emerging Black leaders and leaders from other underrepresented groups. To seed these discussions, we will partner with members of our global alumni network who hold key positions in these firms.
• Also in Executive Education, we will pursue programs that meet the professional needs of Black talent. For example, planning is already underway for an executive education program designed to examine the unique challenges and opportunities of senior Black female leaders. We are also exploring opportunities to develop educational programs in partnership with organizations that convene Black executives, like the Executive Leadership Council.

Our review of efforts to attract more Black students and participants revealed that data on race and other dimensions of identity are gathered inconsistently across our educational programs. Going forward, each and every HBS educational program has committed to collect reliable annual data on the mix of students by program in terms of race, gender, and other dimensions of identity. We have launched this data collection effort and expect the future Chief DEI Officer to steer this process on an ongoing basis.

Staff

HBS’s Human Resources team will undertake new efforts to better attract, develop, engage, and retain Black talent on our professional staff.

To attract Black talent more effectively, we will conduct a systematic review of our recruitment and hiring processes to identify and implement improvements that promote racial equity, and we will expand formal partnership, internship, and outreach programs that have proven successful in increasing the number of Black candidates, contractors, and interns.

To develop Black and non-Black staff members alike, we will include development opportunities in diversity and inclusion, racism, anti-racism, bias, and cultural competency as part of a holistic talent management and performance measurement program for all staff. The opportunities will include specialized programming for managers, who play a critical role in creating a culture where everyone can thrive.

To engage and retain Black staff members, we will create – in partnership with a Black staff Advisory Council – programs that examine the unique challenges and opportunities for Black staff. These programs may include, but are not be limited to, rotational experiences, mentorships, employee resource groups, affinity or ally spaces, and related supporting structures.

Alumni

Growth in the number of Black HBS alumni will ultimately come from growth in the number of students and participants. A vital concern is the engagement of Black alumni. Sadly, many of our Black alumni feel weak connections to HBS, partly because HBS has not done all it can to advance racial equity. We hope that implementation of this action plan will rebuild the interest and faith of Black alumni in HBS. As described here, this action plan benefited greatly from the generous input of Black alumni. We aim to find additional ways to engage our Black alumni—for instance, in HBS’s convening activities, research, case studies, and advisory boards.