‘The real problem of humanity is that we have Paleolithic emotions, medieval institutions and godlike technology.’
E.O. Wilson

This course examines 3 recently developed ‘godlike technologies’ - artificial intelligence (AI), blockchain and synthetic biology- that have passed commercial viability and are on-track to change the foundations of business and society by 2035.

These technologies predict behavior and increasingly create behavior. They learn and improve relentlessly. They make better decisions than humans in an increasing number of contexts. They are unconstrained by moral boundaries. Are these technologies different from other ground-breaking technologies such as electricity, nuclear power and computing? What commercial opportunities and risks will they create for business leaders? What ethical choices will they force business leaders to confront?

In November 2022, the introduction of ChatGPT brought the potential and power of Generative AI into public consciousness. It was downloaded by over 100 million people globally over the next 6 weeks. Business leaders, regulators, and professionals wonder how this magical technology would affect their business models. Workers in both creative and other professional career wonder how it will affect their livelihoods. Governments around the world, are waking up to the power of the technology to disrupt the established order. Venture Capitalists have lined up to fund over 500 startups that use Generative AI. CEO’s of some of the leading AI companies have gone on record to say that this generation of AI could destroy human society. Others have said that it could create a global utopia by solving intractable problems like climate change, ending the need for humans to work for a living and bringing the cost of energy to zero. Why are normally balanced leaders taking such extreme and opposite positions?

At about the same time that ChatGPT was growing explosively the Web 3 and crypto markets, that had been seen as the big disruptive force for society a year earlier, were limping through a crypto winter. Companies that had been slated to restructure financial market declared bankruptcy. Leaders like Sam Bankman-Fried who declared the birth of a new distributed era where our notions of ‘value’ and money itself would be redefined, were under house arrest for fraud.

Further in the background, a quiet revolution has been taking place in reengineering life itself. Several companies have been using CRISPR-based technologies to reprogram living organisms, promising a new, unimaginable future where humans capabilities could be enhanced, aging could be reversed, new forms of life created, and new custom designed materials could be grown rather than manufactured. Companies like Verve Therapeutics announced the first human trials of a single shot cure for all heart attacks through a one-time change in a single gene. In most of these cases, business choices like market selection, financing strategy and pricing are critical determinants of the value of the technology to humanity.

The course will give students an understanding of these three 3 emerging technologies from the perspective of a business leader, preparing students for a world where technology creates exponential increases in capabilities, forcing business leaders to rethink business models and reassess the commercial and ethical choices they make.

We will explore:

• Artificial Intelligence (AI) – Bringing the cost of cognition to zero (approximately 50 percent of class sessions): We cover the application of AI to a number of early and late stage companies and look at the ways in which AI can be used and misused. We look at foundational companies like DeepMind, Open AI and Anthropic as well as specialized companies like Videa Health, Metaphysic and Instadeep that are applying AI to more specific problems (Dentistry, Movie/TV production, Route optimization etc.) We also look at the power of algorithms to shape consumer behavior (TikTok), the misuse of AI in social contexts such as in the justice system and the industrialization of misinformation and hacking of elections. How can business leaders create great companies that enhance the value to society while earning a return for shareholders?
• Blockchain – Changing mechanisms for coordination and trust (approximately 20 percent of class session): We cover the under revolutionary promise of blockchain technologies to lower the cost of transactions and create new markets and new communities. Companies are issuing their own currencies, enabling distributed autonomous governance processes, enabling self-enforcing contracts, creating new forms of value capture (NFT’s for example) and, most of all, moving the provision of trust from institutions and governments to network protocols that have no central authority. They challenge the core notions of brand value, scale, regulatory guardrails, hierarchy, incentives etc. The classes cover companies like Polygon, Ava Labs that provide the platform for others to build new platforms for cooperation, companies like Uniswap that have the potential to restructure financial exchanges, Circle Financial , a company that is reimagining what digital money could be and Art Blocks a company that is redefining digital art and creating a way for artists to capture value from their art.
• Synthetic Biology – Enabling us to reprogram DNA and rewrite the code of life (25% of sessions): We examine the potential for gene editing and other forms of computational biology to change healthcare and manufacturing. By making DNA programable, these companies are creating a foundation layer for creating new materials, new therapeutic approaches and new forms of life that can be designed to solve particular problems (tiles that absorb CO2, bacteria that eat the microplastics in the ocean etc.) We look at companies like Twist Bioscience, that will design and manufacture DNA to order, Moderna that can use AI and digital technologies to create new therapeutics rapidly, and companies from Prof. George Church’s Labs that are pushing the frontiers of biology (recreating the Woolly mammoth from ancient DNA), extending health lifespans – ‘curing the disease of aging’.

We also look at feeder technologies that act as accelerants to the core technologies. These include ubiquitous networks that collect data on everything including what happens inside our bodies and brains, new models of computing that can be orders of magnitude faster than today’s fastest computers in certain calculations, Brain Computer Interfaces that enable us to augment our brains. On the negative side we examine and the business models of companies that are using these technologies to disrupt society through applications like Ransomware.

Approximately 60% of class sessions are case-based, and 60% of sessions feature industry experts and case protagonists. There are a few lecture / Q&A sessions to explain the core concepts and mechanics of the three technologies. There is a final paper in lieu of an exam.

Copyright © 2023 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Requirements: active, insightful class and negotiation exercise participation; paper or take-home final exam.

Revised: This course serves both as a sophisticated follow-on to basic negotiation courses and/or as a self-contained negotiation course taught at an advanced level with a heavy emphasis on handling challenging real-world cases. Unlike past versions of this course, there is no formal pre- or co-requisite, although an introductory negotiation course at one of Harvard’s professional schools or equivalent elsewhere will be beneficial and will offer more basic skill-building exercises. Those without prior negotiation coursework should read 3D Negotiation by Lax and Sebenius in its entirety before class begins to become familiar with key concepts and terminology that others who have taken an earlier negotiation course will already bring to the course.

Purpose: Take your negotiating ability to the next level by matching wits with some of the world’s greatest dealmakers and diplomats as they work through their toughest deals. Examples:

• In business and finance: Steve Schwarzman on several early make-or-break deals for Blackstone; Sarah Frey negotiates advantageous supplier deals for her tiny farm with a vindictive Walmart enroute to building an agricultural empire; Bruce Wasserstein negotiates to take Lazard public, etc.

• In diplomacy: Christiana Figueres guides the Paris climate talks to a near-unanimous agreement in 2015; Colombian President Juan Santos ends a 50-year civil war with the FARC guerillas; US Trade Negotiator Charlene Barshefsky takes on IP negotiations with China; former US Secretaries of State Colin Powell, Condoleezza Rice, and Hillary Clinton describe critical moments in their negotiations with Vladimir Putin, etc.
  
  
• In the arts and sports: Music industry lawyer John Branca negotiates the purchase of the Beatles catalog; Artists Christo and Jeanne-Claude negotiate with endless opponents to build “Running Fence,” The Gates in Central Park, and to wrap Paris’s Pont Neuf in golden fabric; Proponents of a “European Super League” try to form a breakaway football/soccer league, etc. etc.
  
  

A typical case challenges you to address its critical deal moments. For most cases in the course, we watch excerpts from stop action video interviews, mostly that I’ve conducted with the protagonist(s) describing how they handled a series of key decisions. After discussion of each such decision, we move to the next critical moment, and so on . . . after which we draw broader lessons. We often find that insights from private sector dealmaking inform public and not-for-profit sector negotiations and vice versa.

The objective of this approach is to extract highly practical lessons from studying the world’s greatest negotiators at work on their most challenging deals—in business, finance, diplomacy, the not-for-profit world, and across sectors. Since 2001, the Program on Negotiation—an interuniversity consortium involving Harvard, MIT, and Tufts—has regularly bestowed the “Great Negotiator Award” on men and women from around the world who have consistently overcome formidable barriers to achieve truly worthwhile purposes. In a closely related project at Harvard, faculty have conducted detailed interviews with former American Secretaries of State—Henry Kissinger, George Shultz James A. Baker, III, Madeleine Albright, Colin Powell, Condoleezza Rice, Hillary Clinton, John Kerry, and Rex Tillerson—about their most difficult negotiations. As chair of the Great Negotiators Award program and co-chair of the American Secretaries of State initiative, I am deeply involved in a multi-year project to systematically distill the strategies and tactics of this distinguished group (along with several other remarkable negotiators). The emerging findings of this ongoing project will heavily inform this course. By way of highly interactive case discussions, frequently interspersed with video clips of the protagonists, and a few negotiation exercises—although considerably fewer such simulations relative to many introductory negotiation courses—Advanced Negotiation will develop valuable lessons and skills for dealmaking and dispute resolution that go well beyond those offered in basic courses.

Career Focus

This course is designed for students who expect to analyze and participate effectively in challenging business, financial, diplomatic, and not-for-profit negotiations, often with public-private and cross-border aspects. Of the cases, exercises, videos, and significant examples in the course, roughly a third could be classified in a mainly business/financial/entrepreneurial category, a third could be classified in a mainly public/diplomatic/not-for-profit category, and a third would involve a mixture of private, public and/or not-for-profit parties that played meaningful roles.

Course Content and Organization

Throughout this course, a central theme is how to deal with difficult negotiators and genuinely hard negotiations in many different settings. Different aspects of meeting this challenge will be developed. One focus will be on "at-the-table" tactics for handling hardball moves, incompatible positions, adversarial relationships, ideological differences, the lack of vital information, and cross-cultural frictions. A second thread explores how sophisticated deal design moves can overcome impasses in order to create maximum value on a sustainable basis. A third consistent emphasis develops advanced concepts and skills for making effective "away-from-the-table" setup moves, especially to meet the challenges of cross-border negotiations and those that play out over time. Such challenges typically occur both "across the table" in negotiating "externally" with the other side(s) as well as "internally" within each side. Beyond doing individual deals, the course will explore how great negotiators often envision and carry out effective multi-front, sequential “negotiation campaigns” that culminate in achieving a target deal or deals with sufficient support for implementation and sustainability. Specific course modules that develop the above concepts include 1) introduction and course themes, 2) creating and claiming value, 3) preparing for tough negotiations, 4) dealing effectively with hard bargainers, 5) Two-level games/internal and external negotiations, and 6) Multiparty negotiations across borders and over times.

Course Requirements

Beyond constructive participation in class and faithfully preparing for and carrying out negotiation exercises, most students will opt for a self-scheduled written exam. Instead of taking a final exam, some students may prefer to write a paper on the kind of negotiation about which you care intensely or about a “great negotiator” whom you wish to study in depth. Since, inevitably, the class sessions won’t cover your specific areas of greatest interest in the kind of depth you might wish, the paper option provides the chance to do so for yourself and to build personally relevant intellectual capital. The major criterion for the paper is that it treats your topic in a sophisticated manner from a negotiation-analytic standpoint, and that it teaches you and me something significant about effective dealmaking.

Important: If you are interested in cross-registering for this course, it is imperative that you follow the HBS process, especially its timetable, which can be found here.

Copyright © 2024 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Educational Objective

We are in the golden age of fraud. Learning how to detect and prevent fraud, and make better investment decisions, has broad applicability for people joining or running companies, as well as private and public market investors.

This course examines the most sensational global frauds of this millennium, such as Enron, FTX, and Lehman Brothers, with the following goals in mind:

• To learn the strategies used in executing the fraud;
• To understand how the fraud unraveled;
• To spot financial and non-financial “red flags” that should have alerted investors;

The course features prominent speakers involved in the frauds, including executives, short sellers, and whistleblowers.

Career Focus

The course is relevant for future leaders, as they develop expertise to understand financial reporting implications of business decisions and identify key control fault-lines in companies that can lead to fraud. The course is also relevant for students seeking to develop sophisticated financial analysis skills to spot red flags in their investment portfolios, and better prepare for careers in hedge funds, investment banking, or private equity.

Course Administration

Course grades will be based on class participation (50%) and a final project (50%).

Copyright © 2024 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Purpose - Who Should Take this Course?

The purpose of ALD is to help you become more effective, authentic individuals, and leaders. We do this by carving out some sacred time and space in your busy lives to engage in a rigorous, theoretically-supported, meaningful conversation about who you are and the purpose of your leadership. This is a different kind of work. You cannot do it alone. Do not take this course unless you are open to sharing personal insights, experiences, ambitions, and fears both in class and in your Leader Development Groups (LDGs).

ALD requires an unusually high degree of curiosity, reflection, and interpersonal openness. You will be asked to think differently and explore new behaviors. We expect you to be absolutely honest with yourself and others. While few of our students are completely comfortable or sure about this type of work coming in, you must be at least open to experimenting with a different kind of learning. This is the bare minimum for joining ALD. Those who are not fully committed to investing in this course end up wasting their time. More importantly, they waste the valuable time and effort of others. We invite you to be “all in.”

Why Should You Take this Course?

If you spend time reflecting on some of the following challenges, you might consider taking ALD:

• I am 26 years old; I have lived for my resume. I am proud of what I have accomplished, but is that really all there is to it? What do I live for now?
• I seek public success and approval; my achievement masks deeper insecurities.
• I need to appear “strong” and “perfect.” I rarely open up or ask for help. These actions are signs of weakness to me.
• Why do I obsess about my image? Why do I care so much about what others think of me?
• Why am I afraid to tell you who I really am?
• I obsess about status and money, but don’t have the courage to pursue my personal passions. I’m not even sure anymore what they are.

Requirements

• Attend one 80-minute class each week for thirteen weeks in assigned classrooms
• Attend one, two-hour-long meeting per week with a six-person Leader Development Group (LDG). LDGs are held the afternoon of class between 5:30 and 7:30 pm. Rotating facilitators are drawn from the group. LDGs will be assigned in advance by your professor with the intent of creating diverse groups.
• Submit a reflective essay each week via Canvass. Reflections are due NLT midnight on the day following your class. Your reflection should be no less than one paragraph and no more than 2 pages double-spaced (think blog). This reflection is due even if you are the group facilitator that week.
• In lieu of an exam, students will write a final paper on the purpose of their leadership, as well as complete and submit a Personal Leadership Development Plan (PLDP).

Grading

There are three graded requirements:

1. Class participation
2. Weekly reflections
3. Final Essay & Personal Leadership Development Plan (PLDP)

There is one simple overarching criterion for assessing performance in all three areas:

Are you “all in”? Are you deeply engaged in this different kind of work? Are you giving this your best shot?

Course Premise

In its simplest form, here is the theoretical premise for ALD:

To the extent that you have a clearer sense of:

who you are, your life story, your values & principles, your motivations and passions, your leadership purpose, your True North,

When it comes time to lead you will be more likely to:

• step up,
• lead effectively, and
• live a more integrated & meaningful life.

Course Goals:

Overarching: Increased CLARITY (self-awareness) & COMFORT (self-acceptance)

Detailed:

1. Increase your self-awareness by engaging the “big questions” in life, with the goal to live with greater mindfulness and intentionality.
2. Help you uncover personal patterns, decide which ones serve you well (accept and commit to them), and which ones don’t (commit to changing them).
3. Learn how to participate more fully in open, intimate small-group discussions. Learn how to “listen deeply” to others, to be “fully there” for them.
4. Gain some clarity about your leadership purpose, values, and motivations, and the role these play when leading others.
5. Become more honest (and comfortable) with yourself in all dimensions of life.
6. Learn how to empower, engage, and inspire others.
7. Be able to more fully imagine the reality of others.

Course Outline

Drawing broadly from the fields of positive psychology, sociology, adult development, and leadership, you will be exposed to a powerful collection of theoretical frameworks and concepts all selected to support your progress in line with ALD Course Goals. Additionally, you will learn a set of foundational skills essential to the practice of authentic leadership. Finally, you will engage in several rigorous processes designed to support your continued growth and development throughout your life. Here is the course outline for ALD:

Readings

• Brown, Brene. Daring Greatly: How the Courage to be Vulnerable Transforms the Way We Live, Love, Parent, and Lead. New York: Gotham, 2012.
• Craig, N., George, B.; & Snook, S. The Discover Your True North Fieldbook. New Jersey: Wiley, 2015.
• Stone, D., Patton, B. and Heen, S. Difficult Conversations: How to Discuss What Matters Most. New York: Penguin Books, 2010.

Students receive three texts. The first of them, The Discover Your True North Fieldbook, is the basic text for ALD. Assignments in this workbook are designed to personalize and deepen your understanding of each week’s topic. Students are expected to complete all assigned exercises in this workbook prior to attending class each week.

Selected chapters will be assigned from the books, Difficult Conversations and Daring Greatly.

Leader Development Groups (LDGs)

Prior to our second meeting, each student will be assigned to a six-person Leader Development Group (LDG). LDGs meet in designated classrooms from 5:30 – 7:30 pm each week on the same day as your class. LDG meetings are a central part of the course and as such are treated just like normal class time. Attendance is mandatory. Do not take ALD if you cannot commit to attending all 12 LDG sessions (there is no LDG meeting following Lesson 1).

The purpose of LDGs is to carve out an intimate and safe place to engage in a deeper discussion of that day’s topic with your peers. Each week, a different student will be assigned to facilitate that day’s session. Faculty will provide additional guidance in the form of suggested exercises and discussion questions to help facilitators prepare for and lead their groups.

Each student will have the opportunity to facilitate for two weeks during the course. Facilitators will meet briefly with their professor prior to the LDG to discuss that week’s meeting (typically just following each day’s class). An ALD “Facilitator’s Guide” will be posted on the course website and also sent out to you via email when it is your turn to facilitate. The Facilitator’s Guide will provide a helpful overview of your responsibilities as facilitator for the weeks that you are assigned to that role.

Following each LDG meeting, facilitators will submit a summary of the group’s discussion, including attendance records and open questions.

Copyright © 2025 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Career Focus

Avoiding Startup Failure will be of interest to students who:

1. Plan to start their own companies, immediately after graduation or in the future
2. Have experienced a startup failure--of their own or of a company they were a part of--and want to build a narrative toolkit for talking to future employers and investors about the experience
3. Want to join a startup and are looking for tools to evaluate companies and founding teams they are considering working with
4. Intend to invest in startups or serve as startup advisors and board members
5. Are interested in corporate innovation and applying the patterns of startup failure to innovation initiatives or incubator programs within traditional corporations

Educational Objectives

Most startups fail. Avoiding Startup Failure focuses on understanding why startups fail and what entrepreneurs can do to anticipate and avoid failure.

Additionally, the course prepares prospective entrepreneurs, those interested in joining startups, and those interested in investing in startups with a toolkit to rebound from startup failure, allowing them to maintain their reputations, relationships, and the opportunity to found again.

Course Content

Through a series of cases and discussions with founders, students will have the opportunity to build an understanding of the common causes of startup failure and how companies and founders can avoid, or rebound from, failure.

Over the arc of the course, we will explore:

• Common patterns that lead to startup failure
• Frameworks to identify these patterns in early-stage and late-stage ventures
• Rebuilding a venture after a near failure
• Avoiding ethical lapses as startups struggle
• Tactical steps for managing a venture’s shutdown to preserve relationships, reputations, and integrity
• How to learn from a venture’s failure and what to do with those learnings
• Addressing founder burnout & weighing tradeoffs when deciding if and when to found again
• Communicating key lessons from a venture’s failure when pitching a next venture to potential employees, investors, and strategic partners

Most class sessions will focus on venture capital-backed startups, but the course will also examine entrepreneurial failure in other contexts, for example: science-based “tough tech” ventures; startups that aim for social impact; new ventures launched by established corporations; and bootstrapped, “low tech” businesses. The case protagonist will join as a guest in most sessions.

Students can choose to take a final exam or complete a final paper (alone or in pairs). The final paper can either address a topic approved by the instructor or one of the following topics:

• Using course frameworks, analyze factors that contributed to the failure of a startup of their choosing.
• Write a “pre-mortem” for a going concern—or a startup that students might plan to launch—analyzing the factors behind that startup’s imagined future failure.
• Analyze distinctive factors behind startup failure in a specific context or industry sector, for example, biotech, social enterprise, or emerging markets.

Copyright © 2023 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Faculty Name(s)

Lou Shipley, Senior Lecturer

https://www.hbs.edu/faculty/Pages/profile.aspx?facId=936677

Dianne Ledingham HBS ’90 – Executive Fellow

https://www.linkedin.com/in/dianneledingham/

Ed Boyajian HBS ’90 – Executive Fellow

https://www.linkedin.com/in/edboyajian/

Overview:

B2B Sales and Distribution will focus on the primary components of managing a large company sales organizations and focus on B2B businesses.

Career Focus:

If you are going to manage or invest in large companies, you will need to understand how to manage your top line, your sales organization. This course draws heavily although not exclusively on technology companies and is essential if you plan to be a CEO, General Manager or Chief Operating Officer or Chief Revenue Officer.

Educational Objectives:

This course is designed for students who would like to gain an understanding of the complexity of managing large sales and go-to-market organizations. There are three main themes to the class – people, go-to-market strategy and operations and analytics. The people section will address how to hire and manage first line sales managers, define a sales culture and create scalable compensation systems. The go-to-market design module will address how to choose an appropriate sales model to achieve growth and profitability and compare and contrast direct, indirect and other sales models. The operations and analytics module will focus on how AI and a sales operations tool stack give visibility into sales activities and drive sales forecasting accuracy.

Course Content and Organization:

There are live cases and traditional cases to reinforce the three core themes of the class. We have six live cases where senior executives from SalesForce.com, Samsara, IBM, Infor, Workday and EnterpriseDB will join us to grapple with actual sales management challenges they are currently experiencing. Five classes will be HBS published case studies on Microsoft, Qualtrics, ABB and Optigen.

Grading / Course Administration:

Theer is no final paper for this class. Grading will be 70% on class participation and 30% on the two experiential assignments,

Experiential assignment one: Write and submit a paper: You will find a salesperson on your own, interview them about how they are compensated, and write a two-page summary of your conversation.

The second experiential assignment is an opportunity to experience real sales management issues and conduct a role play in class. Topics for the role play include changing a salesperson’s compensation plan, reducing a reseller’s gross margin, managing an unhappy major account and integrating your sales organization into an acquiring company’s sales organization. Each student will be required to submit their strategy for handling management issues ahead of class.

Copyright © 2024 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Overview

Trust is the foundation of every meaningful relationship—personal and professional. We see this play out dramatically in business: from Bud Light’s influencer controversy to Boeing’s horrific crashes and endless travails, trust breaches cost companies millions in lost revenues, spur dramatic declines in investor confidence and shareholder value, upend customer reliance, and unnerve employees. Yet the notion of trust is surprisingly hard to define in a business context. More is obviously better, but how as a business do you get to be trusted in the first place—and then after that? What can you do to recover when trust is lost? And what can individuals do, whether they are leaders of established firms, deal makers, early- or late-stage entrepreneurs, managers and project members, or soon-to-be-returned to the workplace MBAs to build trust in themselves?

Building Trusted Organizations is designed to answer these questions. You will learn about trust as a business asset. You will learn how to operationalize trust—how to turn it from a fuzzy, nice-to-have aspiration into a deep understanding of the actions that are required to build trust, recover it when lost, and use it as a hallmark for how you personally operate in business.

Career Focus

The course is meant to be useful now, in the near-term, and as graduates have pointed out, over the span of your entire career.

Educational Objectives

The course is designed to provide a practical, hands-on understanding of trust through cases, exercises, guests, and your written work, and to build a community of people who want to help each other understand trust and how it can be used in organizations and by individuals. We use role plays and simulations to make trust building real and focus on skills you can get better at.

The course is underpinned by a research-based, pragmatic framework that describes the bases on which people trust organizations and individuals: Competence, Motives, Means, and Impact. Competence in doing what they are supposed to do. Motives, meaning whose interests they take into account when they make decisions. Means in how they go about accomplishing their goals. And finally impact – the real impact that they have on people’s lives, whether they intended to have those impacts or not. The framework is described in my book, The Power of Trust: How Companies Build It, Lose It, Regain it; chapter assignments provide insights into the research behind trust building and trust recovery, which are actively discussed in class.

This is a course for people who want to continue to broaden their understanding of how different businesses succeed through the lens of a very particular asset—trust. The cases we study, most of which come from my own research, cover a lot of ground and a lot of functions, from investing and asset management to tech and AI innovation, to the media and publishing, to manufacturing, to consumer marketing and hospitality, to managing sustainability, to tabletop role playing. The case are domestic and global (half are from outside the US), and they feature a number of truly enviable leaders whose actions provide insights into what leading with trust looks like when it is practiced as a high art by people who know what they are doing.

Course Content and Organization

• 14, 80-minute in-class sessions, over 7 weeks.
• Module structure: Building Trust, Recovering Lost Trust, Leading with Trust
• Building Trust provides the foundation for why trust building matters. It introduces the trust framework used throughout the course and explores trust building in different contexts from building trust into daily operations and decisions, to building trust through innovation, when managing sustainability, and when exiting markets.
• Recovering Lost Trust focuses on the terrain of lost trust, delving into why and how companies lose trust, and how companies can respond to restore it. It examines the two ways that research finds that companies lose trust: through breaches of competence—when stakeholders lose faith in an organization’s ability to deliver products and services they can trust, or through breaches of integrity—when questions of motives, personal ethics, and a commitment to others’ wellbeing come into play. It explores losing and restoring trust in contexts ranging from manufacturing to AI and technology platform businesses, when restructuring, and in managing business ecosystems.
• Leading with Trust dives into personal trust building as a leader, from the skills necessary to build trust in individual interactions to how leaders build trust in their leadership of a business. It explores leading with trust in a turnaround, through generative AI and industry disruption, when navigating controversial issues, and during the Great Financial Crisis of 2008-2009. The module encourages looking inward to skills that can be developed intentionally, and outward to how they can be deployed.

Grading/Course Administration

• 50% class participation and engagement
• 15% on a 3-5 page personal trust case study to analyze a situation where earning the trust of others was critical to your success
• 35% on an 8-10 page course paper analyzing organizational trust in a situation where trust was built or lost (roughly three-quarters of the paper), and describing your own approach to building trust in yourself and your actions (roughly one quarter of the paper)

Copyright © 2025 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Overview:

The Building and Sustaining a Successful Enterprise (BSSE) course is a second-year elective that aspires to teach aspects of the management of innovation, strategy, and growth of a firm from the perspective of the general manager. The central puzzle in this course – and something we will see frequently in our cases - is why managers, acting in seemingly rational ways making logical business decisions, often find their firms in trouble. The course seeks to develop insights into why these things happened and how we should think about them in our future careers.

The original course design was by the late Professor Clayton Christensen. It starts with a grounding in the construction of business theories and bridging those theories to the world of practice. The hope is that we can then recognize well researched theories of causality as a basis for understanding why things happen the way that they do, and become discerning practitioners of theory in our careers.

We choose theories for the course based on their utility in answering some important questions for managers.

Educational Objectives:

The course aspires to teach students to be a better general manager. The objective is to help students apply well-researched academic theories to practical every-day business situations, understand why things happen the way they do, and exercise better decision-making when they encounter similar circumstances in their jobs and careers.

Course Content and Organization:

The course includes 28 class sessions, with a paper to be submitted at the end of the semester. We ask students to make the theory reading the focus of class preparation, and then use the associated case as a vehicle to practice using the theory. As the course progresses, students find that they can use multiple theories as lenses to get a comprehensive picture of what is going on. In each class, we ask students to prepare by understanding what is happening and why. What are the proximate and root causes of why this company is facing the situations articulated in the case? What signals are appearing that suggest the world in which this company has succeeded is about to change? Or, why does this constitute a viable growth opportunity for the company? Then we ask students to think about what needs to be done. What actions can management take that will predictably lead to success? What problems might one predict as management implements different alternatives?

Over the course of the semester, we develop a set of interconnected frameworks that will be a useful toolbox for the future general manager.

Grading / Course Administration:

The grade allocation for this class will be 50% for class participation and 50% for the paper. Students should work with a partner on the paper; teams of three are okay but will have higher expectations vis-a-vis grading. Students are permitted to use ChatGPT or other Generative AI tools but will be asked to declare any such usage.

For class discussions, we encourage inquiry and the exploration of ideas. Many of the theories have important nuances that are best explored widely in class.

Copyright © 2025 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Overview:

Building and Sustaining a Successful Enterprise - Intensive is a half-semester course that covers core parts of the full semester version. The content centers on the management of innovation, strategy, and growth of a firm from the perspective of the general manager. The central puzzle in this course – and something we will see frequently in our cases - is why managers, acting in seemingly rational ways making logical business decisions, often find their firms in trouble. The course seeks to develop insights into why these things happen and how we should think about them in our future careers.

The original course design was by the late Professor Clayton Christensen. It starts with a grounding in the construction of business theories and bridging those theories to the world of practice. The hope is that we can then recognize well researched theories of causality as a basis for understanding why things happen the way that they do, and become discerning practitioners of theory in our careers.

We choose theories for the course based on their utility in answering some important questions for managers.

Educational Objectives:

The course aspires to teach students to be a better general manager. The objective is to help students apply well-researched academic theories to practical every-day business situations, understand why things happen the way they do, and exercise better decision-making when they encounter similar circumstances in their jobs and careers.

Course Content and Objectives:

The course includes 13 class sessions, with two short written assignments to be submitted during the semester. We ask students to make the theory reading the focus of class preparation, and then use the associated case as a vehicle to practice using the theory. As the course progresses, students find that they can use multiple theories as lenses to get a comprehensive picture of what is going on. In each class, we ask students to prepare by understanding what is happening and why. What are the proximate and root causes of why this company is facing the situations articulated in the case? What signals are appearing that suggest the world in which this company has succeeded is about to change? Or why does this constitute a viable growth opportunity for the company?

Then we ask students to think about what needs to be done. What actions can management take that will predictably lead to success? What problems might one predict as management implements different alternatives? Over the course of the semester, we develop a set of interconnected frameworks that will be a useful toolbox for the future general manager.

Grading / Course Administration:

The grade allocation for this class will be 50% for class participation and 50% for the two written assignments. If you use Generative AI for the written assignments, you will be asked to declare which tool(s) you used.

For class discussions, we encourage inquiry and the exploration of ideas. Many of the theories have important nuances that are best explored widely in class.

Career Focus

This course provides a comprehensive framework for using financial statements to evaluate a company’s strategy execution, performance, financial prospects, and value. The primary emphasis is on the analysis of public companies, but the framework and tools are also relevant to private enterprises. This course is particularly valuable to students seeking a career in consulting, corporate finance, hedge funds, venture capital, private equity, or investment banking.

Educational Objectives

The objective of the course is to provide hands-on experience in financial statement analysis and valuation that enhances investment decisions. By the end of the course, students are comfortable with analyzing complex financial statements to gain a richer understanding of firm performance and value. The course is a capstone course for the MBA program as it integrates and extends topics covered in various RC courses, including strategy, finance, and accounting.

Course Content and Organization

The course uses case-based discussions to develop a comprehensive framework that integrates strategy and financial analysis, and applies this framework to fundamental analysis and valuation. The first half of the course develops the framework through two main topics:

• Reporting strategy analysis: assessing a firm's value proposition and identifying its key value drivers and risks; evaluating the degree to which accounting policies and standards capture underlying economics; assessing earnings quality; and making adjustments to eliminate accounting distortions.
• Performance analysis and valuation: assessing current performance and its future sustainability; making forecasts of future profitability and risk; and valuing businesses using earnings and book value data.

The second half of the course applies the above framework to various contexts including equity-investment analysis, IPOs, mergers, short selling opportunities, and hedge fund activist investing strategies. Over the course of the semester, several high-profile guest speakers, such as renowned CEOs and CFOs, short sellers, hedge fund managers, activist investors, and research analysts will share their experiences with students.

To deepen students' ability to apply the course skills in a practical context, they also work on a group project. The project involves a comprehensive analysis using the course framework and a stock pitch to a panel of investors. In the past, students’ stock recommendations have outperformed the market.

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Overview

Customers at higher levels of the socioeconomic pyramid are usually served by businesses who synchronize value creation for customers with profits for shareholders. That is not the case for customers who are in the bottom quarter of the socio-economic pyramid who cannot afford to pay for services to yield profits for shareholders. It is often the case that governments and nonprofits/aid agencies step in to serve such customers’ needs. It has become increasingly clear that business approaches have an important role to play in the mix. The course will explore business opportunities, challenges and limitations. We will also consider how new philanthropy attempts to serve that segment. The backdrop for class discussions will be sectors such as youth development, housing, hunger, and healthcare, both domestic as well as international. One of the main goals of the course will be to develop an understanding regarding when and how businesses and nonprofits should participate in serving the poor; throughout we will discuss the role of government. A secondary goal of the course is to stoke your own leadership style towards making a positive difference in the world.

Target Audience

This is a General Management course offered jointly with the Marketing Unit because of its focus on poor customers. The course is intended to bring a social context to the many careers that students wish to aim for. Thus, it should have broad appeal to private sector and public sector entrepreneurs and managers. However, students taking this course should be forewarned that the course materials are not intended to address students’ career needs, including those who wish to go into the nonprofit sector.

Syllabus

Through a mix of cases, readings/book chapters and guest speakers the course will attempt to identify the principal opportunities, challenges, and limitations of businesses and nonprofits in serving the poor. It is a short course, so we cannot reasonably cover the vast array of topics that are relevant. The course will alternate between U.S. poverty and Global Poverty and examine the multiple ways in which business approaches could and should participate in serving the poor. Throughout the course, we will explore the intersection and overlaps of business with civil society and government, all three of whom have key roles to play. A complementary goal of the course will be to develop a manifesto for personal development as you all go out to stake a successful career in business, government or civil society.

Course Evaluation and Grading

50% of the grade will be based on class participation, 25% for the short final paper, and the rest of the 25% for the four short response write ups.

Educational Objectives

The goal of the course is to examine the ways in which firms not only react to the geopolitical environment, but actually shape it, including how they impact bilateral relationships, contribute to power shifts, and act as vectors for the promotion of values and ideologies. The course will consist of three modules. The first will look at historical examples of firms impacting geopolitics, especially relations between developed and developing countries. The second module will look at recent and contemporary instances of business and investment decisions that have geopolitical effects. The final module will focus on the US-China relationship, and look at how business is both impacting and being impacted by the struggle for hegemony currently underway.

Grading

Grading will be based on class participation (50%) and a 10-page research project to be completed by teams of four on a firm that faces a problem with geopolitical consequences.

Copyright © 2024 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Overview

Between a well-served top of the socio-economic pyramid and an almost indigent bottom, lies the majority of humanity, accessing goods and services, not through government or civil society, but through markets. Yet this remains largely unstudied. Through 24 cases, module summaries and guest protagonists, this course seeks to fill the gap. Composed of the emerging middle class and low-income sectors, the base of the pyramid encompasses 5.0 of the 7.5 billion people in the world. In most nations, it accounts for the largest aggregate expenditure of the economy, yet continues to be significantly underserved. This makes possible innovative, disruptive models that dramatically expand access while generating commercial returns equal to or greater than conventional businesses. This success has drawn the attention of large multinational corporations, looking at the base of the pyramid for the growth that has become ever more challenging in their saturated, intensely competitive traditional markets.

But why do some businesses at the base of the pyramid succeed while others fail? The course examines the opportunities and the challenges of the base of the pyramid markets and seeks to identify the key factors behind commercial success and failure. How is technology and the digital age changing this space? And when businesses generate strong financial returns, does it come at the expense of social impact --- can business play a significant role in addressing social issues? When is an enterprise generating high social value or destroying it? In the process, the course delves into the intersection of business, government, and civil society.

Cases are drawn from around the world, including some from the developed economies, where 40-50% of lower-income citizens access goods and services differently than those at the top of the pyramid.

Target Audience

This is a General Management course for operating managers, entrepreneurs, investors and consultants who are interested in the opportunities of fulfilling the largely unmet needs of the growing middle class and lower-income segments. In emerging markets, this often represents a majority of people and total spending; in developed economies it comprises the lowest two quintiles of the population. The course focuses on business at the base of the pyramid as a core commercial activity of the enterprise. Accordingly, it is not for those primarily interested in corporate social responsibility or in serving the ~10% lowest-income population of the world that is near indigence and for whom market solutions are less relevant.

Course Evaluation and Grading

50% of the grade will be based on class participation, 10% on an original posting and two responses on the course blog, and 40% on a take-home final exam.

This course is offered in conjunction with Finance. It is also part of a portfolio of courses relevant to Social Enterprise. For a full listing, see the Social Enterprise Initiative website.

Copyright © 2024 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Career Focus

This course is primarily designed for students who are pursuing a career in film, television, music, publishing, performing arts, sports, or other sectors that supply goods that are commonly associated with artistic, athletic, cultural, or entertainment value.

The course is also useful for students who are planning to work in companies that advise or support those sectors. It may further be interesting for students seeking to advance their knowledge of general management, strategy, and marketing in the context of a challenging, rapidly changing, and fun environment.

Educational Objectives

The course starts with an examination of the properties that define the entertainment, media, and sports industries, and how those properties together introduce a unique set of challenges and opportunities for managers. Subsequent modules explore:

1. How can entertainment businesses best allocate resources across a portfolio of projects and for one project over time? For example, does it pay to pursue a "blockbuster" strategy?
2. How can entertainment businesses best approach the management and marketing of creative talent? In particular, how should companies invest in and capture value from "superstars" and the teams to which they belong?
3. How are digital technologies changing the entertainment industries? For instance, how are creative businesses affected by - and how can they benefit from - the rise of online channels?

The course ends with an examination of firms that fall outside the core entertainment industries but that seemingly face similar challenges or opportunities.

Cases focus on established and emerging firms, products, and personalities in media, sports, and other entertainment industries. Examples include The Walt Disney Studios, Live Nation, FC Barcelona, Paris Saint-Germain, American Ballet Theatre, Jay-Z, Beyoncé, LeBron James, Dwyane Wade, Roger Federer, Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson, Shonda Rhimes, Ninja, Spotify, the NFL, MRC’s House of Cards, Disney versus Netflix, Nike sneakers, and Magnolia Network.

Grading

Grading is based on class participation (50%) and the final project (50%).

Copyright © 2023 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Course Overview:

Today, ideas matter more than ever. Idea generators – from opinion columnists and non-fiction writers to podcast hosts and those delivering TED Talks – shape how we think about the world, and ourselves. They help drive consumption patterns, offer new insights and question old ones, and make communication feel provocative, inspirational, or sometimes just fun. And they’re big business: book publishing, the news industry, and other, emerging mediums generate hundreds of billions of dollars globally each year.

We are living in a moment of historical acceleration, one where ideas and their dissemination are rapidly shifting, dramatically altering the landscape in which we live and conduct business. We stand at a crucial inflection point and, perhaps more than any time in recent memory, future business leaders must understand how ideas shape individual and public perceptions of the world. This course will introduce students to the creation, monetization, and distribution of ideas, how individuals consume these ideas, and the evolving ways in which experts and expertise are cultivated and understood. It will interrogate how and why ideas rise and fall, and how this process is linked to broader sociopolitical trends like populism, the rise of a “new oligarchy,” the democratization of idea production, and the ways in which idea consumption are (and are not) changing. Discussion topics will include The New York Times, TED, Jeff Bezos and his acquisition of The Washington Post, “new media” figures like Joe Rogan, and the impact of AI on the ideas landscape and algorithms in distribution models.

At its core, Business of Ideas is a course about two things: “ideas” and how they shape the world in which we operate; and the big businesses that nurture, launch, and sustain idea creators as well as the supply chains that create value from them. Several questions will animate the course. Which businesses and business leaders have the power to control ideas? How do idea generators and the businesses surrounding them create and capture value? How do different distribution models impact perception? This course complements RC BGIE, offering students a social and cultural macro-lens for understanding society. Indeed, careful attention will be paid to larger social, cultural, and political trends, examining how the business of ideas has changed over time, and how and why it has influenced the ways in which individuals and societies today imagine themselves and the world they aspire to inhabit.

Grading / Course Administration:

The course will be graded 50% class participation and 50% final paper.

Enrollment by application only.

This course seeks to explore the theory, history, and state structures of capitalism; examine its manifestations in several national contexts; and understand the ways in which systemic changes to market capitalism are likely to both demand and cause systemic political change as well.

Course Content and Objectives

Capitalism today is under attack, criticized from many quarters as being the source of societal ills that range from inequality and systemic racism to climate change and labor market disruption. The goal of CATS is both to examine these criticisms and, more importantly, interrogate the deep and fundamental connections between the market structures of capitalism and the political structures of the states that seek to support and nourish this system. What are the political prerequisites of a working capitalist system, the course will ask. What are the political risks inherent in a market economy, and what kinds of solutions, both economic and political, are best suited to address the current slate of concerns?

CATS is considerably more theoretical than most courses at HBS. The materials are non-case based, and draw from a combination of book chapters, academic articles, journalistic essays, videos, and podcasts. The reading load is relatively heavy (particularly for the first several sessions of the course), and students should be prepared to engage in conversations that are both philosophical and practical. After an introductory class that highlights several contemporary critiques of our market system, the course dives deep into some of the foundational theories of capitalism (John Locke’s Second Treatise; Adam Smith’s Wealth of Nations, and Karl Marx’s Communist Manifesto) and the capitalist state (F.A. Hayek’s Road to Serfdom, Milton Friedman’s Capitalism and Freedom, and Karl Polanyi’s Great Transformation). We will then examine several critical tenets of market economies – including property rights and competition – and several of the most pressing problems that are allegedly inherent in their development. After reviewing some of capitalism’s most important international variants, the course will conclude by examining a range of solutions currently being offered to address capitalism’s ills, and discuss their feasibility within various political structures.

Course Administration and Grading

Students will be asked to write three short analyses of weekly course materials and a 1,000-word final paper (together worth 50% of their grade). The remainder of their grade (50%) will be based on class participation.

Copyright © 2025 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Few forces have shaped the world over the past millennium more than capitalism has, yet few terms remain more elusive and more divisive. Today, less than half of young Americans view capitalism positively, and calls for alternatives are becoming ever more frequent. Why? And why have different forms of capitalism led to such unequal outcomes around the world? What is capitalism, really; what has it been, and what might it be? This course takes students on a journey to explore the past, present, and future of various forms of capitalisms, globally and beyond, introducing them to theories and frameworks to help make sense of the world in which they live, and where it might be headed.

The world economy is experiencing a rare confluence of inflection points, and this course uses a variety of both country and company cases to give students a deeper understanding of why, how, and with what consequences economic life on the planet will change in their lifetimes, and the unique roles played by businesses in this process. In so doing, it challenges students to think critically about the future and how they might contribute to shaping a more equitable and sustainable economic system.

Note: Andy Pforzheimer (Harvard College ’84) is the co-founder and former CEO of Barteca (Barcelona Wine Bar and bartaco). He is currently a board member of US Foods and multiple privately-owned restaurant groups.

Click here for a sample syllabus for this course

Course Overview

Uniquely within the HBS EC curriculum, this course is industry specific. Despite its pervasiveness and intimate consumer interaction, the restaurant industry has been lightly studied academically. And yet its entrepreneurial and management learnings have broad application beyond restaurants. Sited within General Management, this course explores exactly that.

We will run the gamut from planning for the first restaurant to scaling to leadership of multinational chains, and evaluate opportunities inherent in typical restaurant business models as well as those created by disruptive changes affecting and shaping the industry.

Michael and Andy will co-teach the course using written cases, as well as “live” cases with protagonists facing real-time challenges. We will draw on industry executives, HBS alumni active in the industry, industry investors, and well-known chefs and restaurateurs.

Background. 9 in 10 consumers say they enjoy going to restaurants and half of consumers consider restaurants to be an essential part of their lifestyle. Restaurants are an important source of employment: the industry is the 2nd largest private employer in the US, employing over 15 million people in 2024, with over 60% of adults and 70% of millennials in the US having worked in the restaurant industry at some point in their life and 1 in 3 Americans having their first job experience in a restaurant.

Restaurants have provided significant management and ownership opportunities for women and minorities. Restaurants are also big business. In 2024, US restaurant industry sales exceeded $1 trillion representing a $3 trillion economic impact and approximately 10% of the US gross domestic product. While scaled restaurant operations are frequently featured, interestingly approximately 70% of restaurants are single unit operations. Restaurants have also attracted significant interest from venture capital and private equity and the industry has spawned a number of “unicorns.”

We hope to engage not only with students interested in the restaurant industry, but also those interested in food and sustainability, applications of technology and, given the labor-intense characteristic of restaurants, the complex interaction of food and labor costs with consumer value. The course may also appeal to future consultants, investment bankers and venture capital/private equity professionals, as well as to students interested in general management, particularly regarding an industry subject to hugely disruptive forces and spawning compelling investment opportunities.

Course Content

Restaurant Economics. We will do a deep dive into the levers of financial management of restaurants – examining both revenue and cost strategies.

Compensation and Workforce Management. The execution of restaurant/dining experiences requires a focus on both hospitality and profitability – how can cultures be developed to deliver both consistently? Among the most significant challenges facing the industry are the decreasing availability, increasing cost, and high turnover in the labor force. We will examine the responses of the industry to these issues, especially in light of increasing concerns about how to bridge the gap between consumer willingness to pay/perception of value and the hurdles restaurants face in trying to pay living wages.

Brand Positioning. How elastic is a restaurant’s brand? What if a brand seeks greater menu appeal at the expense of its founding mission?

Menu Management. Chefs and restaurateurs often say they offer what their guests want to eat but many are also interested in the healthiness and sustainability of their offerings. We will examine whether and how chefs lead or follow trends, how they distinguish trends from fads, what drives their selection of menu items and how they manage their supply chain.

Crisis Management. We’ll consider the critical issue of food safety and the crisis management implications when a foodborne illness strikes.

Disruption/Technology. We will examine how restaurants are assessing, adopting, affording and maximizing the utility of technological changes such as mobile ordering, delivery and advanced loyalty programs. We’ll also consider how restaurateurs are developing asset light models providing consumers with increasing choices among brick-and-mortar restaurants and delivered meals.

Growth and Scale. This module will examine the factors that have traditionally determined profitability and valuation. It will consider growth potential and exit strategies for successful restaurants and emerging chains, including the advantages and disadvantages of franchising, institutional investment and leverage. We will consider the challenge of scale – how to achieve it and how to manage it once achieved. In addition, how founders consider a partial or complete exit and the criteria they established for a possible sale, as well as how the markets evaluate a public restaurant company and the factors that drive valuation.

Franchising. How does it work? When does it make sense from both investment and brand perspectives? Recent HBS alums have pursued franchising of quick-service restaurant brands – we’ll study both the challenges and opportunities they encountered. We’ll also view franchising from the franchisor perspective, including when a franchised brand faces unexpected challenges.

Grading will be based on class participation (40%) and a final exam (60%). Cross registrants will be accepted.

Copyright © 2025 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

This course will teach you the principles and practices needed to make a difference in the world. Each week, we will analyze case-length biographies of remarkable individuals who created a lasting, world-changing legacy (see list of protagonists below) to understand the life choices they made and the paths they followed.

In the first part of the course, we will use these case studies to uncover the personality traits that must be acquired. Next, we will introduce the Building Blocks used by these prominent people to achieve success and learn how they navigated life’s forks-in-the-road decisions. Then, we consider how and when our protagonists found purpose in their life.

You will learn how to apply these principles to develop a personal strategy that works for you, and how to increase your odds of success in making a difference in the world.

In the final part of the course, we will consider what lessons to draw from the lives of the exceptional people we have studied.

Grading: class participation (40%), polls and short hand-ins (30%), and a final paper that will ask you to apply course concepts to analyze an HBS case study (30%).

If you want to be inspired by the lives of exceptional individuals who changed the world, and think deeply about the choices you will confront in your own life, you will find this course interesting, unique, and invaluable.

Individuals We Will Study:

Business: Mary Kay Ash, P.T. Barnum, Sarah Breedlove (Madam C.J. Walker), Walt Disney, Henry Ford, Katharine Graham, Steve Jobs

Government: Dwight Eisenhower, John F. Kennedy, Robert McNamara, Ronald Reagan, Margaret Thatcher

Humanitarian: Mahatma Gandhi, Helen Keller, Nelson Mandela, Bill Wilson

Science: Marie Curie, Albert Einstein

Sports: Muhammad Ali, Jackie Robinson

Writers: Ayn Rand

Entertainment: Leonard Bernstein

Education: James Conant

Copyright © 2025 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Career Focus

For MBAs who want to study the past and present to help guide their thinking about the future.

Educational Objectives

To provide an understanding of the development of entrepreneurship, modern management, business, technology and finance; to examine other institutions that have affected these areas such as governments, unions, and intellectual property rights; and to analyze the evolution of changing attitudes toward American capitalism as defined by how business leaders and other stakeholders operate.

Course Content and Organization

This course offers students an opportunity to explore the historical development of the United States as the country became increasingly industrial, urban, and technologically and financially advanced. The course covers the founding of the new nation, early entrepreneurial venturing, changes in the strategy and structure of business, the winners and losers from capitalist expansion and the impact of technology and finance.

The course's perspective provides a broad understanding of the long-term impact of technological change, entrepreneurship, and market evolution on U.S. business, managers, the work force, and government. The history of capitalism in the United States offers students a comparative point of reference for considering capitalistic development more generally and its long-term impact on material prosperity.

Students will encounter several different units of analysis: much of the focus of the course is on the individual business leader and entrepreneur, but the worker, the company, the industry, and the country are also covered. The main idea behind the course is to understand historical events, determine why certain pathways were chosen, and to use history as a guide to the present and the future.

The course is divided into four main (largely chronological) modules with a concluding session on the American Dream which covers the arc of the course:

1. The Creative and Destructive Sides of Early U.S. Capitalism (c. 1790-1870)
2. Scale and the Emergence of Organization (c. 1870-1920)
3. Prosperity, Depression and War (c. 1920-1945)
4. Innovation, Finance and Regulation (c. 1950-2008)
5. The American Dream (c. 1790 to the present)

Grading and Exam

Grading is based 50% on class participation and 50% on the exam. The exam is self-scheduled and will require a written response to an essay question (or questions) centered on the course.

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NOTE: Because there is considerable overlap between the fall course, Corporate Finance: Corporate Financial Operations (CFO) 1416, and the spring course, Strategies for Value Creation - Abridged (SVC-S) 1418, students cannot take both of them.

Career Focus

This course provides a general management perspective on corporate finance and is designed to improve your ability to make strategic and operating decisions that create value. It should appeal to students who want to work as part of senior leadership teams, particularly finance executives; as strategy consultants or investment bankers who advise organizations; or as private equity, public equity, venture capital, or hedge fund investors. The course should also appeal to students who simply want to deepen their understanding of corporate finance and how finance concepts can be effectively applied within a wide range of organizations.

Educational Objectives

The goal of the course is to provide students with the knowledge, skills, and judgment required to make good strategic, operating, investment, and financing decisions. The course emphasizes the development of practical insights rather than formal theories. We will cover the shortcomings of the frameworks developed in RC Finance 1 and 2. We will discuss how the analytical tools developed in those courses relate to ideas in other courses and how they can be applied to address a broad set of business decisions. We will study the optimal design of processes that are key to an organization’s success, including strategic planning, forecasting, capital allocation, budgeting, risk management, and investor relations.

Course Content and Organization

As a consequence of differences in perspectives, finance leaders and other operators often fail to collaborate effectively. Finance teams focus on the value implications of core business decisions. However, many fail to recognize considerations that lie beyond financial ones. Furthermore, many do a poor job applying finance frameworks and reach incorrect conclusions. Other leaders often focus on different issues like delighting customers, developing talent, or innovating. These other leaders frequently have limits in their understanding of finance which prevent them from effectively engaging the finance function.

The finance divide between the finance team and other operators can generate a number of problems. For example, if finance teams are not sufficiently included in the strategic planning process, firms might embrace a strategy that is not tied to a reasonable set of assumptions and projections. More generally, raising and allocating capital effectively requires strong collaboration across many roles.

This course aims to prepare students to bridge the finance divide. It focuses on the core finance activities performed within organizations. These often are run by the CFO. This focus intends to expose you to what these activities are, to engage you in rich discussions about the key considerations behind fundamental choices, and to teach you financial decision-making frameworks and processes that firms often use. The key modules include:

• Measuring and Driving Performance
• Forecasting
• Managing Cash and Source of Funding
• Managing Risk
• Managing Investment, Divestitures, and Portfolios of Businesses

Nearly all class sessions will be case based. We will have numerous guests over the course of the semester, most of whom are HBS graduates. In addition to hearing from several case protagonists, we will be joined by subject matter experts on topics we will discuss. Many of the guests will have held the CFO role at some point in their career. In the past, guests have included Amrita Ahuja, COO and CFO of Block; Adam Aron, CEO of AMC; Amy Hood, CFO of Microsoft; Jonathan Mariner, former CFO of Major League Baseball; Peter Baldwin, CEO of birddogs; and numerous other senior executives. We will use part of our time with these guests to discuss their career paths and explore career options.

Copyright © 2024 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Click here for a sample syllabus for this course

Who should take the course?

This course should be of interest to most, if not all, students. Many of you will be entrepreneurs building and working with a board of directors as you create and grow your company. Others will join private equity or venture capital firms where you will serve on the boards of the firm’s portfolio companies. Still others will be consultants or advisors making presentations to boards, or investment professionals needing to assess the governance of companies you invest in. Over the longer term, many of you will serve in CEO or other senior executive roles working with your company’s board. And, of course, many of you will serve on one or more boards during your careers. The course seeks to prepare you for these roles.

What will you learn?

For many students, boards of directors are a “black box.” Little is known about their role and functions, let alone their internal workings. This course seeks to dispel the mystery. Through cases that put you in the shoes of executives, directors, shareholders, and other players in the corporate governance ecosystem, you will learn about

• the work boards do and the critical decisions they make;
• how boards select company leaders, shape strategy, and oversee performance;
• the complex dynamics among boards, executives, and shareholders;
• the changing rights and powers of shareholders;
• different theories of corporate governance and their practical implications;
• the legal, financial, managerial, and behavioral issues that directors must contend with;
• the classic dilemmas that boards confront;
• the costs and rewards of board service and the challenges faced by individual directors.

We will examine these issues in the context of both private and publicly-traded companies, and at different stages of company development—from startup to mature listed company. Our cases include private equity, venture-backed, and family-controlled companies, as well as companies with a large diversified shareholder base. Roughly two-thirds of the sessions concern the boards of US companies; the others are about companies based in other parts of the world, including Europe, the UK, the Middle East, South Africa, and Latin America.

Throughout the course, we will explore differing conceptions of “good governance” and what they mean in practice. We will consider, for instance, departures from the long-standing norm of “one-share, one-vote” as seen in many recent IPOs. We will also examine contemporary debates about shareholder activism, board diversity, board leadership structures, executive compensation, environmental and social factors in governance, hostile takeovers, and director liability. We will consider the role of stakeholders other than shareholders in corporate governance and examine new governance structures such as the public benefit corporation and the hybrid structure adopted by OpenAI.

How is the course structured?

The course has five main modules: (1) the purpose of governance, including the role of shareholders, management, and the board; (2) building an effective board, including director selection and board dynamics; (3) the board’s role in ensuring effective leadership, including hiring, firing, and compensating the CEO; (4) the board’s role in strategy and major transactions such as mergers, acquisitions, or sale of the company; (5) the board’s role in overseeing the company in areas such as accounting and financial reporting, compliance and culture, cybersecurity risk, and sustainability. The course concludes with a short module on preparing for board service. The class sessions will involve case discussions, role-playing exercises, and other activities. We expect to have guests in a number of sessions.

What are the course requirements?

The basic learning for the course takes place through preparation and participation in class discussion. Thus class participation quality as well as frequency will count for 50% of the grade. A final exam will account for the other 50%.

Copyright © 2025 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Class meets weekly on Tuesdays as a section.

Class meets weekly on Wednesday nights to enable unique interactions with HBS alumni and other guests. Usually these sessions are from 5:30-7:30pm, but there will be two Wednesday sessions that will be longer – 5:30-8:30pm – to accommodate special opportunities. The exact dates will be announced before the semester begins.

Educational Objectives

Crafting Your Life: The First 10 Years Post MBA (LIFE) is fundamentally a course about you. It is about preparing and equipping you to better handle the choices, tradeoffs, and surprises that you will inevitably face after graduating from HBS. Throughout the course, you will define what a life well-lived means to you, and discover and implement tactics and practices to enable you to live consistently with what matters most to you. In addition, you will consider how to adapt along the way when life inevitably does not go according to plan.

A unique feature of the course is the emphasis on community – with your fellow students as well as alumni. You will have access to alumni and their lived experiences. There are a multitude of interactions with both alumni 10+ years out reflecting on their lives to date as well as the over 400 former students of the course (known as LIFERs) who continue to be involved and share their current experiences. Alumni and LIFERs interact with students as part of the class in more traditional ways as case protagonists, and panelists, but also as part of small group discussions and one-on-one conversations. These interactions are meant to help inform you about others’ experiences and what they learned from them – and in turn to help you think more deeply about what you want out of your life and how you want to best equip yourself for what lies ahead.

The course strives to help you think deeply and intentionally about the following questions:

1. Defining Your Compass
• What are my values? Who am I at my best?
• How has my past shaped me? What assumptions do I have about my life – which do I want to keep and which do I want to revise?
• What does it mean to me to live a good life? What is important to me, and how will I prioritize my time and energy towards what matters most?
2. Owning Your Actions
• How do I approach decisions and tradeoffs across different areas of my life?
• How do I use my time on a daily and weekly basis? How do I create and change habits that enable me to continue making progress towards the life that I want?
• How do I think about my choice of geography?
• How do I create structures for navigating life, with all of its twists and turns, with a life partner?
• How do I think about career/family choices? What does it mean to be part of a dual-career couple? Would I ever consider opting out of the work force?
3. Equipping Yourself for What You Cannot Control
• How do I take care of myself, and especially take care of my mental health? How do I build my capacity for resilience?
• How do I develop relationships that will sustain me – both at work and in life?
• How do I think about making a “difference” in the world? In what ways can I craft my life and my job in ways that will enable me to achieve my goals?

With this in mind, LIFE is not your typical HBS class. When you sign up for LIFE, you sign up for:

• A Laboratory. We think of life as a laboratory, and crafting your life as an ongoing discovery process of experimenting, learning, and adapting over time. Similarly, the LIFE course is not and never will be a finished product. The first version of the course was developed in close partnership with EC students and we continue the process of co-creation with students every year—and expect you to play an active role in shaping the course for future generations. By getting comfortable with trying new and different ways of learning, providing feedback, and sharing ideas to improve the course, you will also practice a “test-and-learn” mindset and develop skills that you can apply in your own life laboratory.
• A Community for Life-Long Learning. When you join LIFE, you are joining a broader community of students and alumni invested in learning with and supporting each other in the pursuit of a life well-lived. Throughout the course, we will build shared language, skills, and norms about what it means to craft your life, thereby enabling you to engage with one another deeply on personal topics that might otherwise be undiscussed in an academic or professional setting. LIFERs (graduates of the course) will interact with you throughout the semester, and in the final class they will welcome you into the LIFER community.
• Intergenerational Learning. HBS has a tremendously broad and diverse alumni network with a wide array of professional and personal experiences. LIFE is a platform to unlock the potential of the alumni network by facilitating intergenerational learning. Throughout the course, you will engage with alumni in a variety of ways, including: one-on-one interviews, panel discussions on specific topics, and two unique events—a reception featuring small group conversations between students and alumni and a celebration at the end of the semester where LIFERs will welcome you into the LIFER community.

Course Structure and Requirements

LIFE has two sections of 40 students each. This class size is designed to foster deep connections through class discussion, small group conversations, and pair-and-shares.

Time

LIFE has a unique class structure designed to create the best possible learning environment for each topic and experience. Each section meets separately on Tuesdays during a regular X schedule block, and both sections will come together on Wednesday nights from 5:30-7:30 pm except on two Wednesday nights it will meet from 5:30-8:30pm (dates will be announced before the semester begins) to enable special opportunities. These evening sessions are classes, and you are required to attend all of them.

Assignments During Semester

Weekly Readings. Each week you will read cases and/or vignettes about alumni as you do in a traditional HBS class. However, the intent of these cases/vignettes is to help you understand what the person being described did, and for you to reflect on your own reactions and what you would do – not to judge what they did.

Weekly Exercises. Most weeks you will have exercises that accompany the readings to learn more about you, whether it’s looking back at your past, or tracking how you spend your time, or playing a life simulation to uncover the choices and tradeoffs you are inclined to make. The exercises will include LIFE Reflection & Activity workbook exercises and other online exercises.

Module Reflections. At the end of each of the three modules of the course you are asked to stop and reflect on what you have been learning about yourself. These reflections are required to be done on time, but are not graded, and rather are built in for you to pause and explore your insights. They will form the basis of your final paper so the more you invest during the semester the easier your task come the end of the term.

Interviews. Throughout the semester you are required to conduct 4 interviews. The first interview is with a former Crafting your Life student (LIFER) and the remaining 3 are with alumni five or more years out of HBS. You can choose your own alumni or use the LIFE Connect tool developed for this course to match you with alumni that are prepared to talk about the topics you are hoping to discuss. The LIFE Interview Guide and Notebook is where you will capture your preparation and interview notes before formally writing up your learnings as part of the final paper. You will submit your LIFE Interview Guide and Notebook as part of the final course submissions.

Final Paper

Your final paper is an opportunity to compile all that you have done throughout the semester. Essentially, you will be “writing” your final paper throughout the semester through the weekly exercises, module reflections, and alumni interview summaries. The purpose of the paper is to meaningfully reflect on all that you’ve learned about yourself, and to create something to which you can refer back throughout your life. The final paper integrates what you have learned, and you will also involve the creations of an artifact as a tangible companion piece to the paper to remind you in your daily life of what you have learned about yourself and wish to stay true to going forward.

Copyright © 2025 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Career Focus:

This course is designed for students who plan to create, unlock, or invest in value created through brands in the consumer and retail space. It is appropriate for:

• Marketing professionals charged with creating, nurturing, and managing brand value;
• Entrepreneurs looking to create their own brands in the consumer/retail space;
• Consumer/retail general managers and consultants engaged in stewarding brand strategy; and
• Venture capital or private equity investors seeking to identify brand asset potential.

Educational Objectives:

In the consumer/retail space, brands are often companies’ most valuable assets and sources of their sustainable competitive advantage. But, managing brands to achieve their full value potential has never been more difficult. Consumers are increasingly diverse, skeptical of marketing, and empowered by digital technologies that easily connect them to others who share their tastes. They co-create the meaning of the brands that shape their lives and play a participatory role in brand management that can make them allies or adversaries. The contemporary brandscape is crowded with new competitors vying to stake claims to rich, meaning-laden value propositions that reflect and leverage the zeitgeist. Iconic brands are toppled everyday by young upstarts telling new types of stories in authentic ways. Firms are aggressively buying consumers’ brand loyalty at the same time they are firing their customers. Customer relationship management (CRM) investments have failed to deliver on their promise and are often hurting rather than helping the development of strong consumer-brand relationships. Brand managers are losing control as consumers hijack brand meaning and engage in open-source branding. And, the next brand crisis is just around the corner in a 24/7 news cycle driven by social media.

This course takes a contemporary view of branding as a collective and collaborative meaning-making process among firms, consumers, and other cultural producers, and of brands as meaning-based, relational assets that must be carefully designed, curated, and negotiated to unlock their considerable value. As branding becomes more participatory, experiential, social, and experimental, the role of the brand manager requires cultural and relational prowess. Today’s managers must be able to author resonant stories that spark conversations that capture attention, generate engagement, and provide culturally-relevant meaning to consumers. Learnings will focus on how brands and the stories that define them can be crafted, communicated, and managed in ways that nurture relationships that create value for both consumers and firms.

Course Content and Organization:

The course is organized into four modules:

Module 1: The Value of Brands

Key questions will include:

• What, exactly, is a brand? What “jobs” do brands do for consumers?
• How do brands create value for consumers and for firms?
• How can brand be used as a competitive advantage?
• What is competitive brand positioning and how can firms big and small use it to their advantage?
• How relevant are brands in today’s marketplace and what are the forces that are making brands more or less relevant to consumers?
• Is AI-based automation diluting brand value?

Module 2: Brand Storytelling

Key questions will include:

• What is consumer-based brand equity (CBBE) and how is it built and maintained? How may it be measured?
• How can brand managers use consumer research to inform their brand strategy?
• How is brand meaning created and who are the multiple authors that narrate it? How can brand managers best manage brand meaning co-creation alongside consumers?
• What makes a good brand story?
• How can managers use cultural branding techniques to craft culturally resonant brand narratives?

Module 3: Brand Management

Key questions will include:

• How should brands be best managed over time for continued growth?
• How flexible are brands and how can this flexibility be leveraged for growth?
• What is the optimal way to manage investments behind brands for the short- and long-term?
• What are the opportunities and challenges associated with geographic, target market, product line, and brand extensions?
• How can brand portfolio strategy and brand architecture increase the value of a firm’s brands?
• What's the best way for brands to go global? How are global brands best managed?
• Under which conditions should a firm pursue a global branding strategy versus a portfolio of local brands?
• How can AI be leveraged to bring out the ‘art’ and ‘science’ in brand management?

Module 4: The Social Value of Brands

Key questions will include:

• What roles do brands play as relational partners? How do different relational roles contribute to differential costs and benefits to firms?
• How does a consumer-brand relationship form and evolve over time? Why do some relationships decline and dissolve while others intensify and endure?
• What is brand loyalty and how does it manifest itself? How is it best nurtured and negotiated?
• What is customer relationship management (CRM) and how do brands and their consumers enact their relationships?
• Who is responsible for an unprofitable relationship? Should firms “fire” their customers? Under which conditions?
• Why do consumers join brand communities? What types of value do they provide?
• How can brand communities be crowdsourced to help build brands?
• How are brand communities valuable to and dangerous for brands? How are they best managed?
• What is the role of influencer marketing in building brands?
• What happens when consumers hijack brand meaning? How can brand managers work with online and offline influencers and brand communities to create rather than destroy value?
• How do brand experiences deliver brand myths and bring customers closer to each other and to the brand?
• How can AI influence customer-brand relationships?

Grading:

Grades will be earned through the following activities:

• 50% Class Participation and in-class Exercises
• 50% Final Exam

Copyright © 2025 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Career Focus

This course provides students with skills and knowledge that will prepare them for a variety of careers including all types of investing (particularly in companies with debt), special situations investing, financial advisory, and general management.

Educational Objectives

Corporate restructuring is a common and significant event affecting not only lenders, shareholders, and employees but also the web of relationships between companies and their corporate customers, suppliers, and competitors. Restructuring is the process by which companies renegotiate the financial contracts and commitments they have entered into with their creditors and other stakeholders, usually in response to some financial challenge or crisis. This process of renegotiation and re-contracting - the “re-slicing of the corporate pie” - is the central focus of the course.

An additional objective in dissecting the complex finances and operating challenges that confront companies in financial distress is to deepen student understanding of corporate debt financing, including the rights of secured creditors, subordination agreements, and debt covenants. By understanding how to fix a “sick” capital structure, students will better understand how to optimally finance a business, and more effectively manage financial risk, when times are good.

Lastly, there are important lessons to be learned through studying companies and industries that have struggled. Through understanding a variety of reasons why “things go wrong”, students will be better able to identify the patterns of behavior that often lead to trouble.

Content and Organization

The course is organized around two modules. The first module focuses on the restructuring of debt – and provides a foundation to understand the fundamentals of corporate restructuring and then applies these tools to explore the many offensive and defensive strategies employed by debtors, creditors, and other constituents. The second module focuses on the restructuring of other sections of the balance sheet such as mass tort claims or employees’ claims.

The cases that students study in this course tend to focus on large companies, with complex capital structures, facing extremely challenging business situations (including threats to their survival). Restructurings are often extremely complicated, and involve multiple issues around valuation, bond indentures, subordination agreements, bankruptcy law, employment law, taxes, litigation, regulation, etc. In analyzing the cases in the course, emphasis will be placed on drilling down into the details and "fine print" of these and other issues.

Topics covered in this finance course include Chapter 11 bankruptcy, out-of-court workouts, distressed exchange offers, "Section 363" asset sales, prepackaged bankruptcy, debtor-in-possession (DIP) financing, mass tort clais, restructuring of retiree health care/pension plans, and corporate layoff/downsizing programs. While the course focuses on U.S. corporates, it also applies the core principles of U.S. restructuring to corporate restructurings in other countries as well as infrastructure, municipal, and sovereign restructuring.

Although CVCR is primarily a finance course, students will also often have to take an interdisciplinary approach to problem solving, drawing on their training in strategy, accounting, law, and negotiation. The primary pedagogical approach is case discussion. Cases will be supplemented with mini-lectures and outside readings. We will also be joined by a number of visitors who were involved in the cases.

Copyright © 2023 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Educational Objectives

This seminar will bring together students in Year 3 of the Harvard Business School / Harvard Kennedy School of Government joint degree program. Meetings will be held on ten Mondays in fall term, from 4:30-7:30 PM

This 3.0-credit course is open only to students in the HBS/HKS Joint Degree Program, and is a required course for all joint degree students in the fall semester of their third year. Its purpose is to integrate the perspectives and analytic tools provided by the HKS core curricula in the MPP or MPA/ID programs with the perspectives and analytic tools provided by the required HBS curriculum in the MBA program.

The course features a series of integrative modules on specific topics. In each of the modules, pairs of faculty members, one from HBS and one from HKS, teach as a team, bringing their distinctive perspectives and analytical approaches to bear on a specific subject area. These subject areas may be defined by: policy realms (for example, finance, tax, health, education, environment, or national defense); methods (for example, decision making under uncertainty, project evaluation, performance measurement, or negotiation); or other topics (for example, international trade, technological innovation, economic development, infrastructure, insurance, management styles and processes, or risk management).

Students will emerge from this course with an understanding of questions such as: how a regulation is developed and promulgated, and how business can seek to influence the outcome; how legislative battles are fought and how business organizes to shape provisions in legislation; and how business and government can work together to shape an international environment that is conducive to economic growth. The aim of the course is to cultivate in students the capacity to view problems comprehensively from multiple perspectives: how various business interests view an issue, and how government officials in a variety of agencies and institutions view the same problem.

Copyright © 2024 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Creating the Modern Financial System offers a vital perspective on finance and the financial system by exploring the historical development of key financial instruments and institutions worldwide. The premise of the course is that students will gain a richer and more intuitive understanding of modern financial markets and organizations by examining where these institutions came from and how they evolved. The course is ideal for students who want to deepen their understanding of real-world finance.

Course Organization and Objectives

The course content covers pivotal financial developments in a diverse set of countries – but with a special focus on the United States – from the 18th century to the present. Reaching across the chronological arc of the course are three broad topics: (1) financial markets and instruments, (2) financial intermediaries, and (3) financial behavior. Although nearly every case touches on all three topics, each case also has a primary focus. Whereas some cases highlight the introduction of new financial markets (such as the Dojima futures market in early modern Japan) or the creation of new instruments (such as mortgage-backed securities), others trace the emergence and maturation of critical financial institutions (including banks and insurance companies). Still others focus on the behavior of financial actors and groups, particularly in the context of financial bubbles and crashes. Because the course highlights the origins of financial markets and instruments as well as the fallout from numerous financial crises, government also looms large as an actor in many of the cases.

Throughout the course, the goal is to provide students with the broadest possible grounding in real-world finance by exposing them to some of the greatest (and, at times, most devastating) moments in modern financial history. Although the past is unlikely to repeat itself exactly, business managers who have a strong background in financial history are likely to be better prepared for the full diversity of financial innovations, shocks, and crises that they'll face in the future.

(For more details, please see Sample Entries from CMFS Syllabus, login required)

Course Administration

Course grades will be based on class participation (50%) and a final paper (50%).

Copyright © 2024 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Overview:

This course focuses on crisis leadership and how leaders, their teams, and organizations rise to the challenges of unexpected, high-stakes situations. More specifically, it examines how the exigencies of intense turbulence act as crucibles in which ordinary people (and their teams) make themselves capable of doing extraordinary things—first, internally, and then, in terms of what they achieve as they pursue larger, external objectives.

The class concentrates on different leaders and situations. Some of these people and contexts are from the past; others are much more recent. In each instance, the relevant people are enveloped by a profound crisis that they did not see coming and which was not of their making. But once each of these actors was in the middle of calamity, he or she recognized they could not falter and then fail to recover; they couldn’t give up (although each came close.) Instead, these men and women resolutely navigated through the storm and were transformed. Each became more resilient, stronger, braver, and more self-assured in the high waves and strong winds they confronted.

Understanding precisely how these people did this is the overarching objective of the course. We will pay particular attention to the larger “rules of the road” of crisis management and leadership. We will also concentrate on the more specific insights, tools, and behaviors that these leaders developed—often, on the fly—and then used to steer through the crisis and to accomplish their ambitious goals. In each instance, we will assess which of these resources are useful to leaders in today’s world of non-stop crises.

By the last session, each of us will have assembled a toolbox of concrete insights, actions, and personal behaviors to help us be consistently more focused, resilient, confident, and courageous in our anxious, uncertain time.

3 Traits of Effective Leadership

Why I Wrote Forged in Crisis

3 Times it is Best to do Nothing

Career Focus:

The course will be of particular interest to those who aspire to lead others toward a worthy, significant mission—either in an established organization or in an entrepreneurial endeavor. It is particularly well-suited to those interested in the non-stop crises of the present moment and what this broader context means for leading courageously.

Educational Objectives:

This course has three principal educational objectives.

First, to understand the principles of crisis leadership. We will concentrate on the general components of steering an organization through unexpected disaster, paying close attention to how these aspects of leadership differ from those relied on in more stable environments. We will examine the “rules of the road” or “dashboard” of crisis leadership with reference to several widespread emergencies, including the Covid pandemic, evaluating the successes and failures of different teams as they tried to navigate the large storms they faced.

The second objective is to understand how crises always contain the possibility of substantial innovation. Some of this innovation occurs at an organizational level as the time pressures and high-stakes nature of crisis situations (literally) force creativity in staffing, problem-solving, teamwork, collective purpose, and other features of performance. Some of the innovation unfolds at a deeper level as individuals realize—internally—they must raise the level of their respective games and begin leading themselves with new resilience, commitment, humanity, clarity, and courage. We will examine this process and its results in several leaders, distilling the relevant lessons for our respective paths forward.

Third, to analyze the insights, tools, and behaviors that the men and women we are studying developed in crisis situations. Many of these resources were created “on the fly,” in the crucible of a crisis, but most of these tools transcended the disaster in which they originated and became key elements of these individuals’ leadership playbooks. What were these tools and what function did they serve that proved so longstanding and significant? As we shall see, these resources were forged from the “inside out” in each of these people; consequently, they played important roles in fortifying each leader’s self-belief, wiping away anxiety, clarifying purpose, and stoking their bravery. We will pay focused attention to which of these insights, tools, and behaviors are useful to our leadership going forward.

Grading / Course Administration:

Grading is based on class participation (50%) and the final paper (50%).

Overview:

This advanced negotiation course examines complex corporate deals. Many of the class sessions will be structured around actual corporate deals, selected for the complex issues of law and business that they raise. Students will research and analyze these transactions in order to present their most important aspects and lessons to the class. The goal is to help students develop their transactional instincts, better prepare them to anticipate deal challenges, and equip them with the skills to creatively address those challenges through contract and deal design.

Career Focus:

This course is restricted to JD and MBA students and is geared towards preparing those students to face complex deals of many different natures. In the spring, there are often guest practitioners that join the course, and they hail from both legal and business backgrounds to offer their expertise. The class will be comprised of approximately an equal number of students from HBS and HLS. For HLS students, the basic course in Corporations, Corporations taken concurrently, or permission of the instructor is a prerequisite. A familiarity with basic business concepts will be assumed throughout the course. For HBS students, in addition to the first-year curriculum, a basic Negotiations course is recommended though not required.

Educational Objectives:

Topics developed throughout the course include: how negotiators create and claim value through the setup, design, and tactical implementation of agreements; complexities that can arise through agency, asymmetric information, moral hazard, and adverse selection; structural, psychological, and interpersonal barriers that can hinder agreement; and the particular challenges inherent in the roles of advisors as negotiators. The course will also explore the differences between deal-making and dispute resolution; single-issue and multiple-issue negotiations; and between two parties and multiple parties.

Course Content and Organization:

In previous iterations, this course has been split into four modules. Module 1 introduces the different perspectives that law and business training bring to transactions. Module 2 provides certain building blocks for transactional practice, through a series of focused caselets. Module 3 examines the particular tactical aspects of deal execution and deal drafting. This module will feature two complex negotiation exercises, each focusing on different aspects of dealmaking. Module 4 examines complex corporate deals, focusing in particular on multi-party deals and the lawyer/business interface.

Grading / Course Administration:

Evaluation will be on the basis of class participation and a final paper or project.

Copyright © 2024 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

This advanced negotiation course examines complex corporate deals. Many of the class sessions will be structured around actual corporate deals, selected for the complex issues of law and business that they raise. Students will research and analyze these transactions in order to present their most important aspects and lessons to the class. The goal is to help students develop their transactional instincts, better prepare them to anticipate deal challenges, and equip them with the skills to creatively address those challenges through contract and deal design.

Topics developed throughout the course include: how negotiators create and claim value through the setup, design, and tactical implementation of agreements; complexities that can arise through agency, asymmetric information, moral hazard, and adverse selection; structural, psychological, and interpersonal barriers that can hinder agreement; and the particular challenges inherent in the roles of advisors as negotiators. The course will also explore the differences between deal-making and dispute resolution; single-issue and multiple-issue negotiations; and between two parties and multiple parties.

The class will be comprised of approximately an equal number of students from HBS and HLS. For HLS students, the basic course in Corporations, Corporations taken concurrently, or permission of the instructor is a prerequisite. A familiarity with basic business concepts will be assumed throughout the course. For HBS students, in addition to the first-year curriculum, a basic Negotiations course is recommended though not required.

Evaluation will be on the basis of class participation and a final paper or project.

Students in this course may also be interested in Mark Gordon and Meng Lu’s Mergers and Acquisitions Workshop: Boardroom Strategies and Deal Tactics at Harvard Law School. Prof. Subramanian encourages students to register for both courses. The classes complement each other substantively and the timing works out in that the workshop takes place in the same time slot as Deals but during the first half of the semester, with no overlap.

Copyright © 2024 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Career Focus

This course is designed for students who are pursuing a career in businesses that are family owned - i.e. the majority shareholders are family, investment roles in family offices, or students that might invest in or wholly purchase a family-owned business through a private equity firm, search fund model or a public company that through dual class stock is still family controlled. It is also useful for everyone going into general management and / or want to be responsible owner investors.

90% of the global GDP is created through family enterprises. Family enterprises are frequently thought to be exclusively mom-and-pop, small businesses. Most fail to realize that Walmart, Fidelity, Cargill, Koch Industries, and Ford, to name a few, are all family-owned or controlled businesses. Family businesses can be private or public, sometimes with a dual-class stock structure. They can also be 100 percent family-owned or have outside investors; value is certainly affected not only by management quality, but also by the level of Family control and ownership. Family businesses come in all shapes and sizes, and they are here to stay globally, gaining power and influence by the day. Family offices and family foundations are also family businesses and growing in numbers faster than most other businesses.

The course is also useful for students who are planning to work in companies that advise or support family-owned businesses. It may further be interesting for students seeking to advance their knowledge of general management, strategy, succession, and governance issues in the context of a challenging and sometimes emotionally driven work environment.

Educational Objectives

Learning how to work in or run a family business, create and run a family office, invest in a family business and work within any of these structures. Course focuses on interpersonal dynamics of employees - both family and non-family professionals.

All three Family organizations, the Family, the Operating Company, and the Family Office should have (1) their own set of goals, (2) their own governance structures, and (3) their own contribution to supporting a Family’s legacy. There is great value that can be created through Family businesses. In fact, wealth creation in Families is becoming a powerful disruptor in all of the global markets as Families professionalize and deploy capital across a variety of industries and sectors.

Modules explore:

1. Module one focuses on the Family, the bedrock of the organizations that comprise the collective Family organization, specifically, the virtues that define the Family members’ rules of engagement and the Family governance structure necessary to support it.
2. Module two deep dives into the Operating Company and the Corporate governance structure necessary to support the Family Organization. In Module two, we also study non-Family minority partners of Operating Companies and non-Family acquisitions of Operating Companies.
3. Module three examines the Family Office and its role in managing not only the Family’s assets but also the wealth governance that accompanies it. In Module three, we examine different best practices of (a) when and how to set up a Family Office, (b) how to bring in professional management and (c) how to compensate these professionals.
4. Module four brings it all together by exploring what it takes to build an enduring Family legacy by creating excellent stewards of Family wealth and its impact on Society. The stewards struggle through both external and internal factors to achieve Family unity through (1) the Three Virtues and Family governance, (2) control through corporate governance, and (3) competence through wealth governance, to propel a Forever Legacy.

Cases focus on established and emerging companies, products, and personalities in family businesses and family offices both domestically and internationally. We will have many case protagonists and other guests that have been successful and failed.

Family Businesses are not only meaningful but can also be emotional-exciting and scary at the same time. This course will journey through many successes and failures within this space and examine best practices to help mitigate common pitfalls.

Families vary significantly in how they structure themselves, but the common link among Families that succeed in building multiple generations of wealth creation is that they all have policies and procedures that serve as a roadmap. Taking the time to create these documents-mission statements, shareholder agreements, succession plans, inheritance policies, distribution rules, outlaw / in-law procedures, hopefully lead to a more educated and cohesive group of Family members.

Course Content and Organization

The course consists of 28 sessions (very global content and many case protagonist participate in person) and includes the option of a final project or exam. Grading is based on class participation (50%) and the final project / exam (50%).

Office Hours: The instructor welcomes the opportunity to meet with students outside of class. Please contact her assistant, Mads Tolsdorf (mtolsdorf@hbs.edu) to arrange a meeting.

Goal of course – Create a community, learn from each other and have fun.

Copyright © 2024 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Course Description

Launching a successful startup requires a business model that defines the venture’s customer value proposition; plans for technology, operations, and marketing; and a formula for eventually earning profit. It also requires an organization that can execute that business model. Students will learn the attributes of effective tech venture business models and organizations—and how to design them. They will employ system dynamics modeling using simulation software to inform business model choices, and gain practice with organization design methods to diagnose misalignment and resolve tradeoffs (e.g. efficiency vs. effectiveness, decision speed vs. quality).

Enrollment is limited to second-year students in the MS/MBA: Engineering Sciences program.

Copyright © 2023 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Overview

This hands-on EC course covers the fundamentals of modern digital marketing, including driving traffic, earning conversions, and measuring campaign performance. We’ll explore topics such as SEO, paid and influencer marketing, social media (organic and paid), email/SMS, Amazon, and analytics. Through mini-cases on brands both large and small, we’ll apply industry-leading tools and GenAI workflows to assess market opportunities, design customer-centric campaigns, and analyze data.

Given the rapid evolution of this field, we’ll emphasize adaptable frameworks and timeless strategies alongside best-in-class tools. Guest speakers from companies such as Adobe, HubSpot, Klaviyo, SEMRush, and OpenAI will provide real-world insights to complement the workshop format.

Career Focus

Over the past 25 years, digital marketing and data have transformed how brands are built and scaled. This course equips students with practical, hands-on strategies for growing a digital presence, deploying analytics, and designing high-impact marketing campaigns. With a strong focus on AI-driven marketing efficiency, students will explore how emerging tools can accelerate customer acquisition and retention while optimizing costs.

Ideal for students pursuing careers in consumer marketing, startups, or digital transformation roles, this course provides a strategic and tactical foundation for those looking to drive brand growth—whether at an established company or with just a laptop and a bold vision in today’s AI-powered landscape.

Educational Objectives

This course fosters an experimental, customer-centric approach to digital marketing, equipping students with the skills to design, execute, and measure campaigns that drive financial impact. Students will learn to apply proven frameworks and emerging tools at different stages of a company’s lifecycle, focusing on acquisition, retention, and revenue growth. Core themes include tailoring marketing strategies to business context rather than relying on one-size-fits-all playbooks, effectively integrating paid, owned, and earned media, and leveraging AI for automation, personalization, and creative development. Students will also gain confidence in assessing marketing investments, communicating impact to finance and investor stakeholders, and managing agencies and in-house teams. The course balances strategic decision-making with hands-on execution, ensuring students leave with both high-level frameworks and practical skills to apply in real-world marketing environments.

Grading / Course Administration

Grades will be based on the following components:

• Final Case Analysis (50%)

• Class Participation (30%)

• Mid-Term Exam (20%)

Given the workshop format, class participation will be assessed based on students’ preparation, analysis of mini-cases, and the depth of insights derived from external tool-based exercises.

Copyright © 2025 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Overview:

Digital technologies are reshaping operations, improving efficiency, quality, speed, and enabling new business models. The ability to integrate digital technologies into operational strategy is increasingly critical. Focusing on the operational enablers and implications of digital transformation, this course examines how companies integrate and scale digital technologies in their core operations.

This course examines how firms can leverage digital tools to improve workflows, enhance decision-making, redesign processes, and fundamentally restructure value chains. The course will expose students to how traditional firms are using digital technologies to transform their operations, and how digital-first firms are innovating in digitally-enabled operations.

Career Focus:

Designed for students aspiring to leadership roles at the intersection of technology and operations, the course is relevant for careers in operations, consulting, product management, entrepreneurship, and venture capital.

Students will analyze how firms digitize services and supply chains, streamline processes, and implement new business models. They will gain insights into advising firms on digital transformation, managing tech-driven operations, and investing in emerging business models.

Educational Objectives:

By the end of this course, students will be able to:

• Examine how digital technologies allow firms to improve efficiency, quality, and speed, and foster innovation. Students will recognize the importance of process design and adaptation in leveraging digital transformation.
• Analyze the role of digital integration in operations and how firms leverage digital technologies to synchronize workflows, systems, and data across internal and external partners.
• Assess how automation, AI, and data analytics transform operations by enabling predictive decision-making, intelligent automation, and scalable digital workflows.
• Understand the interplay between digital and physical operations, the different constraints and bottlenecks each present, and how to combine bits and atoms effectively for scaling.
• Understand how digital integration leads to the unbundling and rebundling of operations and its implications for restructuring traditional value chains.
• Identify opportunities and challenges in digitizing operations and recognize the importance of operational enablers such as real-time data accuracy, process redesign, and system interoperability, which are essential for unlocking the full potential of digital transformation.

Course Content and Organization:

This course will primarily use case discussions, with some sessions featuring guest speakers and hands-on exercises to deepen learning.

The cases will cover recent examples of traditional firms digitizing their operations and digital native companies in different geographic markets, and will feature examples from a variety of industries, including manufacturing, logistics, supply chain, financial services, hospitality, and technology.

The course will tentatively be structured into three modules:

Module 1: Foundations of Digital Operations

This module introduces fundamental concepts of digital transformation across industries, focusing on automation, AI, APIs, and data-driven workflows. Students will explore how digital technologies reshape operations, enable real-time decision-making, and drive efficiency. They will recognize the importance of operational enablers and process redesign in effectively integrating technology.

Module 2: Digital Integration and the Unbundling of Operations

Digital integration enables unbundling and rebundling of operations, redefining how firms create and capture value. This module examines the rise of specialized service providers and orchestrators—firms that coordinate multi-party ecosystems through digital platforms. Students will analyze how companies adapt their processes to new industry structures, shifting competitive dynamics, and changing operational roles.

Module 3: Scaling Digitally-Enabled Operations

This module focuses on the opportunities and challenges associated with scaling digitally enabled operations. The module concludes with final project presentations, where students will analyze the digital transformation of operations in a company or industry.

Grading / Course Administration:

Grading will be based on class participation (50%), several short assignments (15%), and a final group (or individual) project in which students will explore the digital transformation of operations in a company or industry (35%).

Office Hours: TBD, Morgan Hall 147

Note: EC MBA students who are interested in earning an additional 1.5 credits through a related Independent Project are encouraged to reach out to Prof. Kirby at term start.

By 2035 China will be the largest economy in the world and an innovation superpower. Engagement with China—as entrepreneurs, investors, or partners—is part of our collective future.

But in 2025, Chinese firms—and foreign firms in China—face challenges and opportunities under President Xi Jinping. We will delve into China's domestic business environment and the changing relationship between the private sector and the Chinese Communist Party. Students will gain an understanding of the dynamics between state-owned enterprises and private firms, the regulatory environment, and the role of the government in business activities.

Furthermore, as relations between the world's two largest economies, the U.S. and China, deteriorate further, companies must find creative solutions to counter ongoing global trade and technology wars while still responding to ever-changing policy directions in Beijing, Washington, and Europe. Our course will examine case studies of firms that have faced these challenges and will equip students with strategies for managing geopolitical risk in a deglobalizing business environment.

Ultimately, how can you succeed in doing business in and with China in the coming decade and beyond?

In our course, we consider these questions:

• How do foreign businesses succeed and fail in Chinese markets?
• How can Chinese firms, such as Huawei, DJI and ByteDance, navigate investment restrictions that threaten to "decouple" the U.S. economy from China's?
• What happens to firms caught in the cross-fire of deteriorating US-China relations?
• Will China's ambitions to become a "self-sufficient" superpower succeed or flounder? What about the United States’ attempt to “re-shore” semiconductor manufacturing?
• How do the Communist Party and Chinese governments—local, provincial, and national—shape market opportunities?
• How do Chinese firms expand overseas?
• How do family businesses survive and thrive in an economy where the state still plays such a large role?
• Will Chinese universities lead the 21^st century?
• What are the opportunities and risks for businesses in Taiwan, as "greater China" becomes integrated economically but with greater tension politically and militarily?
• In short, where is China going—economically and politically—and what will it mean for you?

We will be joined in this course by CEOs of many of the enterprises we study, in industries such as telecommunications, healthcare, consumer products, agribusiness, semiconductors, education, and automobiles.

Course Overview

This course prepares Harvard Business School students for their lifetime of engagement with China. It is built around a sequence of field cases, ranging from internet startups to revitalized state-owned enterprises (SOEs), across a wide range of geographical and product markets. This stands in addition to a series of technical notes address the cultural, economic, political, labor, resource and environmental contexts that shape business environments in China and elsewhere. Leading China observers and CEOs of major Chinese firms will visit the class.

Through cases, notes, discussion, and research, students explore the opportunities and risks of international and Chinese business in China and the outward expansion of Chinese firms. Key issues include:

• The nature of China’s political, economic, and of its regional markets
• The central role of politics in business: How well do you know your Party Secretary?
• The interconnectedness of global supply chains and difficulties with diversification
• The evolution of Chinese SOEs into modern, global corporations
• The diverse political risks Chinese firms encounter in foreign markets
• The challenges of developing public affairs strategies outside China
• Challenges and opportunities facing start-ups
• The special and evolving characteristic of China’s capital markets
• Strategies for protecting and developing intellectual property
• The emergence of an increasingly powerful middle class and its impact on the consumer market and corporate social responsibility

Audience

This course is suitable for any student interested in understanding emerging markets, government-business relations, and the impact of China’s remarkable economic and political transformation on international business. No prior knowledge or experience with China’s business environment is required. Cross-registrants are welcome.

Course Requirements and Grading

• Class participation based on assigned reading material: 50%
• Written Assignment: an essay on a topic of choice or an outline of a prospective HBS case: 40%
• U.S.-China policy memos short writing assignment: 5%
• Know your geography map quiz: 5%

Questions to help guide the reading of assigned materials will be released in advance of class on Canvas (no written response needed).

NOTE: class sequence may change to accommodate guest schedules

Copyright © 2023 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Course Overview

Virtually every organization considers growth a critical objective. But while almost universally desired, and much talked about, enterprise growth is quite poorly understood. Careful empirical studies show that very few enterprises grow profitably over sustained periods of time. Indeed, many organizations’ pursuit of growth is the very cause of their demise. When and how can companies grow profitably? This is the central issue examined in this course.

One of the primary objectives of the course is to get you to think strategically about growth. Growth involves a series of choices about rate (e.g. how fast to grow?), direction (scale vs. scope), and method of growth (e.g. organic vs. acquisition). A coherent set of choices regarding these elements constitutes a firm’s growth strategy and impacts whether it can grow profitably.

The course is organized into four modules.

Module 1: Introduction to the Concept of Growth Strategy—How Fast to Grow?
In the first module of the course, we introduce the basic growth strategy framework and focus on questions regarding the rate of growth: How fast should an organization grow? How can you tell if you are growing too fast (or too slow)? How can you determine the right rate of growth? What factors impede growth rates? What are the growth traps into which organizations can fall? A key theme in this module of the course is that growth is a dynamic process involving a balancing of market opportunities (demand) and organizational capabilities and resources (supply). Profitable growth requires getting this delicate balance right.

Module 2: Growth Through Scaling—The Challenges of Expanding Supply to Meet Demand
Growth in an existing line of business is one of the primary ways that organizations grow. This is particularly true for younger or smaller organizations in less mature industries. Typically, in these setting, market opportunities are not the constraint on growth, but instead tend to revolve around the organization’s capacity to scale. Very often, the very process of expanding the scale of the organization destroys the attributes (e.g. culture, operating system) that lead to the company’s success in the first place. In this module, we look at the challenges of increasing the scale of the organization while preserving distinguishing attributes of the company. A key theme in this part of the course is that growth almost inevitably requires changes in the organization itself, and that a key choice to be made is which elements of the organization should be preserved, and which should be changed.

Module 3: Growth Through Expanding Scope: Finding New Sources of Demand
Expanding the scope of the enterprise into new line of business (diversification) is the other common strategy for growth. In contrast to the organizations examined in Module 2, this module portrays organizations with ample resources and capabilities, but whose growth prospects are limited by lack of demand in primary markets. Their challenge is to find, if possible, new sources of revenue through entry into new markets. We will discuss the conditions under which scope expansion represent an attractive growth strategy.

Module 4: Growth Through Innovation and Transformation
Over the long-term, sustained growth often requires organizations to fundamentally evolve and transform their strategy, technology, business model, or organization. In this final module of the course, we examine the challenges of growth through transformation and seek to understand the reason some of these efforts succeed while other fail. We also explore the question whether there are ultimately limits to company growth.
The course will use a mixture of case studies drawn from a variety of contexts, including fast food, airlines, non-profits, luxury goods and services, rescue operations, life science, medical devices, software, professional services, manufacturing, and private aviation. We will also use readings to introduce the theoretical and conceptual foundations of the course.

Copyright © 2025 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

This course is about one of the largest industries in the world: energy. Not only will we cover energy sectors that have traditionally supplied economies across the globe, but we will also cover the energy transition needed to reduce climate change and its impacts. It will examine the economic, regulatory, and social contexts that provide the dynamic backdrop for how both new entrants and incumbent firms can navigate and drive the energy transition. How does the energy economy work, and how fast can it change? How are entrepreneurial start-ups disrupting the energy economy? How are corporations across sectors navigating and potentially driving the energy transition—or not? How are new policies being enacted worldwide impacting billion-dollar decisions? And how are different local communities responding, given the benefits and costs of enormous changes in the energy mix?

Energy tackles all of these questions and more.

This class is for students with a wide variety of interests seeking a better understanding of the role of energy in business and society. It will examine the energy transition in a time of surging global energy demand and the era of climate change. The course aims to drive an understanding of energy from both the supply and demand sides. It will unlock smarter perspectives in other domains, such as finance, real estate, and technology, that all rely on energy. Students will learn about new technologies and choices impacting financing, development, and deployment. Students will appreciate the interplay between market, regulatory, and societal influences on firm opportunities and choices.

Copyright © 2024 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Career Focus

Entrepreneurial Finance is primarily designed for students who plan to get involved with a new venture at some point in their career -- as a founder, early employee, advisor or investor. However, the course is also appropriate for students interested in gaining a broader view of the financing landscape for young firms, going beyond the basics of venture capital and angel financing to look at venture debt, bank finance, corporate venture capital and receivables financing.

Course Content and Educational Objectives

The goal of Entrepreneurial Finance is to help managers make better investment and financing decisions in entrepreneurial settings. The course covers all stages of the venture's life cycle from startup to exit, and delves into issues such as deal structures, incentives, business models and valuation in much greater detail than TEM. Approximately one-third of the cases concern technology-based businesses, though the emphasis is on gaining insights into entrepreneurial management, not technology per se. Typically, case protagonists have participated in over half the class discussions.

The first two modules of the course address key issues faced by entrepreneurs: how much money should be raised at each stage; when should it be raised; what is a reasonable valuation of the company; and how should funding, employment contracts and exit decisions be structured. They aim to prepare students for these decisions, both as entrepreneurs and as investors.

The next three modules look at a variety of financing models across the venture's life cycle, with an aim to understanding the incentives of each type of investor, the relative costs and benefits of each source of funding and the connections between a venture's financing strategy and its product-market strategy.

Inevitably, there will be some overlap with courses such as Launching Global Ventures, Financial Management of Smaller Firms and Venture Capital and Private Equity. We are aware of the content of each of those courses and will be sensitive to differentiation.

Copyright © 2023 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

‘Nothing happens until a sale is made’

Nothing happens until a sale is made. That simple point underlines the critical importance of sales. Every operating model and business plan ‘assumes’ a certain amount of sales, but that assumption is the tipping point. Without sales, the entire model is an exercise in frustration and futility.

The purpose of this course is to demystify sales and help you understand how to sell products and services within entrepreneurial settings. The course material is applicable whether you become an entrepreneur, venture capitalist, management consultant, general manager, product manager, salesperson, or sales manager. The course is geared toward entrepreneurial settings, specifically execution required by the founder. However, the best practices are applicable to larger company requirements as well.

“The #1 skill HBS alums wish they had spent more time understanding at school was how to sell.”
-Dean Nohria

Entrepreneurs and general managers must not only understand the sales process but also embrace that the ability to sell is the single most critical success factor of any new enterprise. This course does not approach sales from the vaunted perspective of ‘strategy’. It gets right into the very practical and tactical ins and outs of how to sell as a founder. In a larger sense, the entrepreneur and general manager must “sell” his or her vision to prospective employees, to angel and venture investors, and to strategic partners. While all true and all necessary, this course focuses mainly on selling to customers, whether that is through a direct sales force, a channel sales force, or building an OEM relationship. Sales is the one function that cannot hide behind the veil of corporate doubletalk; sales goals are either made or not made. Every organizational activity leverages off that single fact. Markets are not totally rational organizations and the firms with the best sales teams will usually win.

“Superior sales and distribution by itself can create a monopoly, even with no product differentiation. The converse is not true. No matter how strong your product, even if it easily fits into already established habits and anybody who tries it likes it immediately, you must still support it with a strong distribution plan.”
-From “Zero to One” by Peter Thiel

One common misconception is that product innovation alone is a winning tactic. It is not. Often the critical success factor is exactly how a firm goes to market – with its sales force. But the rules have changed – innovations like ‘product-led-growth’ models and social media are changing the status quo and forcing managers to consider new way to structure and incent sales teams.

CLASS REQUIREMENTS

Preparation and class participation are a requirement. We will cold call students to open each class. Every class is associated with a short assignment, and all students are required to be ready to discuss the assigned material.

Sales is a highly experiential, hands on skill that requires role playing and iterative practice to master. As such, Founder Selling uses a more experiential pedagogy during the semester. Unlike most courses at HBS, there is no final exam or final project. Instead, we will run seven experiential assignments, largely executed outside of the classroom, in parallel with the classroom sessions. You will learn how to book appointments, run the first sales meeting, demonstrate your product and service, close large complex deals, and run renewal and expansion calls. In addition to the course faculty, students will be assigned to a sales coach who will review assignment submissions with the course faculty and be available for one-on-one coaching after each assignment.

Class sessions will be 80 minutes long and will be largely be executed in three parts: a cold call opening in which a student presents his/her course of action as outlined in the case, class discussion of the case, and a presentation by the professor to emphasize the key leanings from the case. More than one unexcused absence will affect your final grade.

Copyright © 2023 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

‘Nothing happens until a sale is made’

Nothing happens until a sale is made. That simple point underlines the critical importance of sales. Every operating model and business plan ‘assumes’ a certain amount of sales, but that assumption is the tipping point. Without sales, the entire model is an exercise in frustration and futility.

The purpose of this course is to demystify sales and help you understand how to manage go-to-market functions within entrepreneurial settings. The course material is applicable whether you become an entrepreneur, venture capitalist, management consultant, general manager, product manager, salesperson, or sales manager. The course is geared toward entrepreneurial settings, specifically execution required by the founder, investor, or advisor. However, the best practices are applicable to larger company requirements as well.

“The #1 skill HBS alums wish they had spent more time understanding at school was how to sell.”
-Dean Nohria

This course explores the complex subject of how to build, manage, and scale the first sales force including how to:

• Hire your first salesperson and sales leader
• Develop a scalable demand generation program
• Pay your first salesperson
• Train, manage, promote, and fire your first sales team
• Establish your first sales plan
• Manage the board’s expectations on revenue
• Instrument an accurate forecasting model

“Superior sales and distribution by itself can create a monopoly, even with no product differentiation. The converse is not true. No matter how strong your product, even if it easily fits into already established habits and anybody who tries it likes it immediately, you must still support it with a strong distribution plan.”
-From “Zero to One” by Peter Thiel

One common misconception is that product innovation alone is a winning tactic. It is not. Often the critical success factor is exactly how a firm goes to market – with its sales force. But the rules have changed – innovations like ‘product-led-growth’ models and social media are changing the status quo and forcing managers to consider new way to structure and incent sales teams.

CLASS REQUIREMENTS

Preparation and class participation are a requirement. We will cold call students to open each class. Every class is associated with a short assignment, and all students are required to be ready to discuss the assigned material.

Sales management is a highly experiential, hands on skill that requires role playing and iterative practice to master. As such, Entrepreneurial Sales 102 uses a more experiential pedagogy during the semester. Unlike most courses at HBS, there is no final exam or final project. Instead, we will experiential assignments, largely executed outside of the classroom, in parallel with the classroom sessions.

Class sessions will be 80 minutes long and will be largely be executed in three parts: a cold call opening in which a student presents his/her course of action as outlined in the case, class discussion of the case, and a presentation by the professor to emphasize the key leanings from the case. More than one unexcused absence will affect your final grade.

Entrepreneurial Sales 101 is recommended but not required for this course, as 102 builds on many of the concepts introduced in 101. There is minimal overlap between Entrepreneurial Sales 101 and 102.

Copyright © 2023 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Career Focus

The course will equip students with a deep understanding of why the world looks as it does today, and through describing the challenges, opportunities and ethical challenges that some of the most important as well as controversial business leaders of the last century have faced, provides a unique opportunity to learn from the past in order to chart a better future.

Course Content and Organization

EGC is best seen as a journey, which grows in complexity and depth as students debate contested and sensitive topics. The course challenges students to think of business not in a vacuum, but in a rich context considering competitive landscapes, information asymmetries, conflicting interests, institutional and legal gaps, geopolitics, and cultural differences across countries. The five modules of the course provide a dynamic framework for exploring the challenging decisions entrepreneurs have faced in the different eras of globalization. The roles of business leaders in inflection points, including Nazi Germany, the struggle for Indian independence, apartheid-era South Africa, and conflicts in the Middle East, are examined. The cases, set across centuries, continents and industries, explore how different contexts and regulations have provided incentives for entrepreneurs to develop businesses in either productive or unproductive ways. Cases of stellar business success are accompanied by cases on morally-challenged figures, and conflicting views on the responsibilities of business are debated in widely differing settings. A highly diverse set of business leaders emerge as important actors shaping how local economies and the global economy have evolved. A typical class will try to get into the minds of the protagonists, establish the context in which they took decisions, debate the legacy of those decisions, and discuss how the class would have acted in those circumstances.

The five modules of the course are: First Global Economy; Globalization Reversed; Origins of Second Global Economy; Second Global Economy; New Deglobalization.

Course Administration

Course grades will be based on class participation (50%) and a final self-scheduled exam (50%). A paper can be substituted for the final exam. Throughout the semester, Professor Jones will be available to meet with students. To arrange a meeting, please contact Professor Jones directly, preferably by email (gjones@hbs.edu).

Career Focus

Life Sciences ventures face high levels of scientific, clinical and commercial pathway uncertainty, and these uncertainties present many opportunities for entrepreneurial innovation. This course is primarily designed for students who are interested in exploring entrepreneurial opportunities within the life sciences, including exploring ideation, generating and/or licensing intellectual property, business models, resourcing ventures with the appropriate financial and human resources, and scaling. The course will explore which areas of the life sciences are ripe for innovation and entrepreneurship and will cover therapeutics, devices, diagnostics, and related service providers, data, tools and technologies. Example topics of exploration may include emerging opportunities in pharma & biotech, medical device & diagnostics advances, and related topics such as digital therapeutics, platform technologies, use of real-world evidence, data and computing, AI and GenAI, decentralized clinical trials, the role of life sciences incubators, contract research/manufacturing organizations etc.

Educational Objectives

This course has been specifically designed for students who are considering founding or joining life sciences ventures upon, or soon after, graduation. This course covers many topics that are also important to students interested in working in or investing in the life sciences. While the course is focused on the life sciences, students need not have a scientific background, merely a passion for making an impact through participation in these ventures. The primary objective of this course is to enable students to explore entrepreneurship and careers within the life sciences. Students will explore opportunities along various aspects of the R&D and commercialization lifecycle, along science, clinical, regulatory and commercial areas of the lifecycle.

Key Learning Objectives include:

• Understand key business models for life sciences innovation
• Understand macro trends driving innovation in the life sciences, including the impact of emerging bioconvergence topics at the intersection of the life sciences, data and computing
• Define roadmaps for life sciences R&D and products, incorporating intellectual property concerns, clinical and regulatory pathways to commercialization.
• Explore financing sources, including early grants and non-dilutive financing sources, to equity financing
• Identify best practices for building life sciences teams

Class tools include case and/or lecture-based discussions based on a variety of life sciences ventures, including those in biotech, pharmaceutical, medical device, diagnostics, and related supporting technology and services organizations. In most classes, we will have case protagonists and guests, including life sciences entrepreneurs, investors and domain experts so you can engage directly with these practitioners from the burgeoning life sciences venture ecosystem.

Grading

Grading will be a combination of class participation (40%), assignments (20%) and a final written paper (40%).

Copyright © 2025 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Click here for a sample syllabus for this course

Overview

The nonprofit arts and culture industry generates more than $166.billions of economic activity in the US—approximately $64 billion in spending by arts and cultural organizations and an additional $103 billion in event-related expenditures by their audiences. This activity supports 4.6 million jobs. A report by the Conference Board noted that in addition to the enormous financial impact of the sector, “companies consider the arts to be important in building quality of life, stimulating creative thinking and problem solving, and offering networking opportunities and the potential to develop new business and build market share.”

Business of the Arts (BOTA) is designed to introduce students to the key issues faced by leaders in this important economic sector.

Career Focus:

This course is intended both for students focused on leadership careers in the nonprofit cultural industries and those interested in serving on the boards of arts organizations. The course also provides useful insights and frameworks for students pursuing careers in a range of for-profit creative businesses including film, television, and music.

Course Content and Organization

The course utilizes three approaches to learning—traditional case-based classes, talks by key arts leaders, and consulting assignments with Boston-area arts organizations.

Cases: Cases and required background reading cover leadership issues encountered by an extensive range of arts and cultural institutions both in the United States and abroad (e.g. the Louvre, Jazz @ Lincoln Center, the Los Angeles Philharmonic).

Guest Talks: Students will hear firsthand from a number of case protagonists who will discuss the challenges and opportunities they face as leaders of cultural organizations.

Projects: Students will assemble into five-person teams to work on projects throughout the course. Project partners include a wide variety of Boston-area arts and cultural institutions. Each project will focus on solving a specific and well-defined strategic or operational challenge currently facing the organization. The projects will require extensive data collection and analysis.

Performances: Students will have the opportunity to attend performances by several well-known arts organizations including the American Repertory Theater, the Boston Symphony Orchestra, and the Boston Ballet.,

Non-Disclosure Agreements: Partner organizations will provide student teams with confidential information. Students will be required to sign a confidentiality and intellectual property assignment agreement.

Grading / Course Administration

Deliverables: The course will have five deliverables: (1) Team Launch Document (2) Situation Analysis, (3) Preliminary Draft of Partner Presentation, (4) Final Partner Presentation, and (5) Individual Learning Reflection.

Grading: Each student’s grade will be based on (1) Class Participation, (2) Quality of Team Deliverables, (3) Partner Input, (4) Team Member Peer Evaluation, and (5) Quality of Individual Learning Reflection.

Pre-Requisites

None

Cross-Registration

A limited number of places may be available for cross-registrants.

Copyright © 2025 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Executive Fellows

Lee Kaplan

Brian Walker

Overview and Requirements

Problems with health care quality, access, and costs bedevil all countries. Health care—inefficient, erratic in quality and access, ripe for massive technological and consumer-facing innovations—is one of the largest and ripest sectors for innovation.

This course focuses on the creation of a business plan for an innovation in health care that can better meet these needs.

Students will continue to pursue plans generated in the prior Innovating in Health Care (IHC) course, offered in Q1 of 2025, and/or from Field Course: Business Plans for Innovating in Health Care, offered in Q2 of 2025. They may also enroll with a new plan. Students will review and offer advice for the business plans of their classmates.

This Field Course has a very clear focus: we want every startup to leave the course with Customers and/or Capital. We maintain a laser-like focus on this approach through teaching team feedback, the guests we invite to the course (such as VCs and healthcare providers), and the final presentation before an esteemed panel of judges.

Prerequisite

One member of the team, at a minimum, must be enrolled in the Fall Term 2025, Q1, 2185 - Innovating in Health Care.

Career Focus

For those interested in entrepreneurial health care leadership, consulting, or investing. Students interested in careers in health care/life sciences financing or leadership, or creating innovative health care services, health insurance, health IT, digital health, consumer-based innovations, or medical technology.

Educational Objectives

Additional field-based experience in creating a business plan for innovating new health care/life science ventures on topics chosen by the students or from those made available by the faculty. Students will gain exposure to the key players in their chosen research topic with the help of Prof. Herzlinger’s network and that of their classmates and the course advisers. The advisers consist of faculty from related HU schools—SEAS, HMS, KSG, SPH; regulatory/legal/ reimbursement experts; seasoned VC/PE investors; and CEOs of firms related to the topic of the business plan.

Course Content and Organization

The students in this course meet six times as a group in the classroom. Between these meetings, they meet with their advisers to further their progress.

Session 1

Introduction to the course –

What can the Field Course do for you?

What does a good business plan look like?
Assignment: Briefly present and post on Canvas your preliminary business plan interest and partners/contacts you are looking for.

Sessions 2-4

Assignment: Present refinement of your preliminary business plan interest and partners/contacts you are looking for. During the prior week, please post these requests on Canvas.

Session 5

Assignment: Present your progress to date in completing your business plan and your plans/needs for completion. During the prior week, post your plans on Canvas.

Session 6

Assignment: Present your final business plan and include questions you would like the class to answer in PowerPoint format, posted on Canvas.

Students are reminded of the Class Absence and Remote Attendance Policy.

Grading is based primarily on class participation and quality of business plan, relative to that submitted in prior IHC class.

Copyright © 2025 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Executive Fellows

Lee Kaplan

Brian Walker

Overview and Requirements

Problems with health care quality, access, and costs bedevil all countries. Health care—inefficient, erratic in quality and access, ripe for massive technological and consumer-facing innovations—is one of the largest and ripest sectors for innovation.

This course focuses on the creation of a business plan for an innovation in health care that can better meet these needs.

Students will continue to pursue plans generated in the prior Innovating in Health Care (IHC) course, offered in Q1 of 2025, or enroll with a new plan. They will also review and offer advice for the business plans of their classmates.

Prerequisite

One member of the team, at a minimum, must be enrolled in the Fall Term 2025, Q1, 2185 - Innovating in Health Care.

Career Focus

For those interested in entrepreneurial health care leadership, consulting, or investing. Students interested in careers in health care/life sciences financing or leadership, or creating innovative health care services, health insurance, health IT, digital health, consumer-based innovations, or medical technology.

Educational Objectives

Additional field-based experience in creating a business plan for innovating new health care/life science ventures on topics chosen by the students or from those made available by the faculty. Students will gain exposure to the key players in their chosen research topic with the help of Prof. Herzlinger’s network and that of their classmates and the course advisers. The advisers consist of faculty from related HU schools—SEAS, HMS, KSG, SPH; regulatory/legal/ reimbursement experts; seasoned VC/PE investors; and CEOs of firms related to the topic of the business plan.

Course Content and Organization

The students in this course meet four times as a group in the classroom. Between these meetings, they meet with their advisers to further their progress.

Session 1

Introduction to the course –

What can the Field Course do for you?

What does a good business plan look like?
Assignment: Briefly present and post on Canvas your preliminary business plan interest and partners/contacts you are looking for.

Sessions 2

Assignment: Present refinement of your preliminary business plan interest and partners/contacts you are looking for. During the prior week, please post these requests on Canvas.

Session 3

Assignment: Present your progress to date in completing your business plan and your plans/needs for completion. During the prior week, post your plans on Canvas.

Session 4

Assignment: Present your final business plan and include questions you would like the class to answer in PowerPoint format, posted on Canvas.

Students are reminded of the Class Absence and Remote Attendance Policy.

Grading is based primarily on class participation and quality of business plan, relative to that submitted in the prior Innovating in Health Care class.

Copyright © 2025 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

This course teaches specific practical skills that are required to become an effective entrepreneur through acquisition. The course is not a case-based course. It will meet weekly and students will be required to complete assignments on topics relevant to buying a small company such as how to screen potential acquisition targets, the likely types, terms and amounts of debt financing, the typical deal terms and the items open to negotiations, the sources of equity investments, including search funds, private equity partnerships and individual investors. We will also learn about the due diligence process and legal concerns when buying a smaller company. We will have guests in most classes who have practical, hands-on experience.

The course will have practical exercises designed to help entrepreneurs complete their acquisitions. These include pitching to potential equity investors, prospecting for potential targets, seller cold calls and negotiating bank loans.

The seminar is designed for students with a serious interest in buying a small company early in their careers.

Copyright © 2023 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Educational Objectives

The course is designed to enable students to develop and grow their businesses. Doing so while on campus has several advantages, including access to resources (faculty time and attention, library and computer access); advice from your peers in a structured environment; and devoted blocks of time during your EC year to move your business forward while your team is all in one location. The course employs a combination of field methods, classroom exercises, cross-team interactions, and access to faculty, guest experts, and other advisors. The largest single allocation of time is for working with your team to make meaningful progress on your own business.

"Joiner" students who are interested in taking the class by joining a business with one or more existing members are strongly encouraged to do so. We will create opportunities for businesses with one or more members to meet and combine with joiners.

Students can expect to:

1. Summarize and critique their existing business, its strengths and weaknesses, and set priorities for moving the business forward, including the most pressing priorities to be addressed during the course itself.
2. Develop a strategy for taking the business to the next level, including a plan for funding, and a plan and timeline for reaching scale.
3. Give and receive feedback from other highly motivated student teams.
4. Meet frequently as a team with the faculty advisor.
5. Receive feedback and counsel from outside business advisors.
6. Have opportunities to pitch your work to angel, seed, and venture capital investors.

This course can be thought of as occupying a space between an IP and a traditional course, giving you an opportunity to work on something of great interest to you, while preserving many of the benefits of a larger course, including opportunities for guest speakers, feedback from your peers, and clearly delineated deliverables and milestones that act as commitment devices to push the business forward.

In the past the School has provided each Field X team with a modest grant of around $2,000 to help launch their business. While we cannot guarantee the grant program will continue this year, we hope and expect that it will.

A substantial number of Field X businesses have been funded by mentors and investors they met through the course. Several dozen teams from last year are running their businesses full-time now, most of whom have received funding of $500,000 or more; in some cases far more.

In terms of requirements, "in between an IP and a course" means that there will be almost-weekly class meetings, but there will not, in general, be substantial weekly homework or required preparation for class, other than that you work to push your business forward.

Who Should Enroll?

Students who are sufficiently excited about a business they are running, or a business they want to start immediately, that they want to focus on it in a serious way. Some, because they treasure the lessons they are learning from building a business. Some, because they think their business has a legitimate opportunity to grow rapidly and create a successful career path for them. And some because they believe their business can do a substantial amount of good for the world and so they want to continue working on it during their EC year and perhaps after graduation.

Course Deliverables

The main deliverable will be the team’s final presentation and the supporting slide deck and report. There will also be intermediate deliverables building up to that point. In short, expect to produce a Word document and a Powerpoint deck with descriptions of your business at the beginning of the course and a (perhaps similar, perhaps very different) version at the end of the course.

On the final day of class, students who wish to will have the opportunity to present their businesses to an audience of angel, seed and venture investors at our Pitch Day event. At our most recent Pitch Day, the first run over Zoom, around 350 investors attended.

Short FAQ:

Q: Can I take Field X if I am the only person involved in my business?

A: Yes, Field X welcomes teams of all sizes; including solo founders, multiple team members in the class, and teams with multiple members, only one of whom attends HBS and takes the course.

Q: What are classes like?

A: Most weeks the class consists of an hour-long interactive talk/discussion with a luminary, followed by an hour of "mini office hours" in which student teams pair up with mentors who can help their business. Past speakers have included venture capitalist Tim Draper, Shark Tank's Kevin O'Leary, stellar entrepreneurs like Yvonne Hao of PillPack and Charles Curran of Armored Things, and many others with wisdom to share.

Q: Can I take the class if I just have an idea but I haven't started yet?

A: Yes, this is typically the situation of between a quarter and a half of the teams in the course.

Q: What if I don't even have an idea yet?

A: If you want to start a business but don't have an idea, we'd welcome you as a "joiner" in Field X -- we will match you up with a team that is doing something you find exciting and that is looking to add talent. If you want to start your own business and have a nascent idea, we can work with you to build it into something real.

Q: How about the other side of the coin, what if it's an old family business I'll be taking over, something like that?

A: Yes, that's also fine.

Q: Is Field X aimed at any particular sector, like tech?

A: No, Field X teams run the gamut, every year we have consumer, healthcare, finance, real estate, tech, arts and entertainment, social enterprise, you name it.

Q: What if my business has modest goals?

A: That's fine, in Field X we're happy to work with teams that want to serve a small need as well as teams with enormous ambition.

Q: If I take Field X, can I take Field Y? Do I have to take Field Y too?

A: You can take just X, just Y, or X and Y.

Cross Registration

Cross-registrants are welcome to take the course.

Copyright © 2024 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

NOTE: This course has many characteristics of an Independent Project. Field Y counts toward the maximum number of IP credits a student can receive. If you take Field Y, you may enroll in up to 6 other IP credits across your EC year and up to 3 credits from other IPs in the spring term.

Educational Objectives

The course is designed to enable students to develop and grow their businesses. Doing so while on campus has several advantages, including access to resources (faculty time and attention, library and computer access); advice from your peers in a structured environment; and devoted blocks of time during your EC year to move your business forward while your team is all in one location. The course employs a combination of field methods, classroom exercises, cross-team interactions, and access to faculty, guest experts, and other advisors. The largest single allocation of time is for working with your team to make meaningful progress on your own business.

Several dozen teams from last year are running their businesses full-time now, most of whom have received funding of $500,000 or more; in some cases far more.

Students can expect to:

1. Summarize and critique their existing business, its strengths and weaknesses, and set priorities for moving the business forward, including the most pressing priorities to be addressed during the course itself.
2. Develop a strategy for taking the business to the next level, including a plan for funding, and a plan and timeline for reaching scale.
3. Give and receive feedback from other highly motivated student teams.
4. Meet frequently as a team with the faculty advisor.
5. Receive feedback and counsel from outside business advisors.
6. Have opportunities to pitch your work to angel, seed, and venture capital investors.

This course can be thought of as occupying a space between an IP and a traditional course, giving you an opportunity to work on something of great interest to you, while preserving many of the benefits of a larger course, including opportunities for guest speakers, feedback from your peers, and clearly delineated deliverables and milestones that act as commitment devices to push the business forward. In terms of requirements, "in between an IP and a course" means that there will be some class meetings, but not every week. Coursework will be focused on improving and growing your business.

Who Should Enroll?

• Students who took Field X and who are still running and growing their businesses

• Students who are starting and/or running businesses in Spring of their EC year and who did not take Field X.

Course Deliverables

The main deliverable will be the team’s final presentation and the supporting slide deck and report. There will also be intermediate deliverables building up to that point. In short, expect to produce a Word document and a Powerpoint deck with descriptions of your business at the beginning of the course and a (perhaps similar, perhaps very different) version at the end of the course.

We will work hard in the course to connect students with sources of funding, including angel, seed, and venture investors. At the end of the semester there will be an opportunity for each team to present their business to a room full of such investors; in the past many fruitful relationships have been initiated through these presentations.

Short FAQ:

Q: Can I take Field Y if I didn't take Field X? If I did?!

A: Yes to both. Field Y is open to both students who took Field X and those who didn't. If we are above capacity we will give priority to students who took Field X.

Q: Can I take Field Y if I am the only person involved in my business?

A: Yes, Field Y welcomes teams of all sizes; including solo founders, multiple team members in the class, and teams with multiple members, only one of whom attends HBS and takes the course.

Q: What are classes like?

A: Most weeks the class consists of an hour-long interactive talk/discussion with a luminary, followed by an hour of "mini office hours" in which student teams pair up with mentors who can help their business. Past speakers have included venture capitalist Tim Draper, Shark Tank's Kevin O'Leary, stellar entrepreneurs like Yvonne Hao of PillPack and Charles Curran of Armored Things, and many others with wisdom to share.

Q: Can I take the class if I just have an idea but I haven't started yet?

A: Yes, this is typically the situation of between a quarter and a third of the teams in the course.

Q: What if I don't even have an idea yet?

A: If you want to start a business but don't have an idea, we'd welcome you as a "joiner" in Field Y -- we will match you up with a team that is doing something you find exciting and that is looking to add talent. If you want to start your own business and have a nascent idea, we can work with you to build it into something real.

Q: How about the other side of the coin, what if it's an old family business I'll be taking over, something like that?

A: Yes, that's also fine.

Q: Is Field Y aimed at any particular sector, like tech?

A: No, Field Y teams run the gamut, every year we have consumer, healthcare, finance, real estate, tech, arts and entertainment, social enterprise, you name it.

Q: What if my business has modest goals?

A: That's fine, in Field Y we're happy to work with teams that want to serve a small need as well as teams with enormous ambition.

Cross Registration

Cross-registrants are welcome to take the course.

Copyright © 2023 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Overview:

This course is designed for students considering starting a company or joining a startup and wanting to learn how to sell their company’s product. Too often, students graduate from HBS, raise capital and then investigate how to sell their company’s product or service. In this course, students are expected to experiment with different sales models and create a sales playbook at the end of the semester.

Career Focus:

If you are planning to start a company or become CEO of a startup, join a startup, or invest in early-stage companies, you will need to understand how to sell your product. This course can be for B2B, B2C or B2B2C businesses across all segments. The course is not designed for a specific industry but is designed for students to learn how to sell their products.

Educational Objectives:

The course is designed for students to experiment with different ways to sell your company’s product. Students are encouraged to reach out to prospective customers and to generate inbound sales leads to determine if the prospect is a qualified lead for your product.

Course Content and Organization:

We will meet four times during the semester. We will also provide classroom time for students to work on their sales playbooks. We will bring in former students who have built a sales playbook, closed their first customers and funded their business. These former students will share their learnings as they designed their sales playbooks.

We will also have guests in class who can help you think through who your ideal customer profile is and how to best reach and approach them.

We will also bring in a former student who successfully executed a pivot when the original product idea failed to sell.

Course Administration/Grading:

Enrollment for this course is by application only. To apply, please submit your CV and a paragraph of interest to this application form by January 15th, 2025. Students are also required to submit a Company Info Sheet, which can be accessed via a link within the application form. Students not starting their own company (and therefore not submitting a Company Info Sheet) are also encouraged to apply and will join another student to work on a playbook for the duration of the course. Email Kalkidan Tadesse (ktadesse@hbs.edu) with any questions. Early applicants are encouraged.

80% of the student’s grade will be based on their end of semester deliverable, the sales playbook they create during the course.

20% of the student’s grade will be based on class participation.

Copyright © 2023 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

To be considered for enrollment in Investing for Impact please submit this form before 5pm (Eastern time) on July 31^st 2025, although early applications are welcome and encouraged. This application process is designed to ensure that we have students who are enthusiastic about working with founders of small, local businesses that struggle to access capital, and to create teams with a diverse range of skills to match with our founders. Given that there is complexity to matching teams and founders, we will endeavor to place you with one of your top three choices of small businesses to work with and expect that you will remain enrolled in the course if you are matched as such. We will let you know if you have been accepted into the course by August 15th, 2025. Please let us know via email ASAP if your plans or intentions have changed. Note that the class will meet on “Y” day Wednesdays and Thursdays; most Fridays will be reserved for team time (i.e. class will not meet).

Course Overview

Investing for Impact (IFI) has both a class (case-based) and field component. For the field component, student teams will work closely with a small, Boston-based business to perform thorough due diligence (financial, operational, commercial) and ultimately present their findings and a fundraising strategy and/or an investment recommendation (for $25,000 to $50,000) to an Investment Committee comprised of HBS alumni. We will be working with local intermediaries such as Nectar, Commonwealth Kitchen, Boston Impact Initiative, LEAF and the BostonXChange. See here for more information, including about the HBS Impact Investment Fund and videos of some of our existing portfolio companies. Please read the Power Point Presentation here (pdf) for more information about this course.

Course Objective

To provide students with the opportunity to understand the challenges and opportunities for community-based impact investing by conducting diligence on an operating company in the Boston area that is looking to access capital for growth. The focus is supporting small businesses that have historically lacked access to growth capital in the Boston area. Structured as a combined case and field course to provide both case-based learning as well as hands-on student experiential learning in financial, commercial, and operational diligence, as well as experience with the impact investment process and working directly with business founders. Further, we hope that students will provide the small business owners the experience of a thorough due diligence process and the steps they need to take to appeal to potential investors. This collaboration is intended to provide learning and experience for both founders and students.

Course Format

Class will meet on Y-schedule. On Wednesdays and Thursdays we will have case-based discussions relevant to understanding the principles and concepts of impact investing. Most Fridays will be reserved for team time, meetings with the founders, and office hours with faculty (i.e. class will not formally meet but students are expected to use the time to complete their projects). Some sessions will be conducted with the business founders, and many will include guests. Students will also meet weekly in their small teams of two or three (during Friday’s class time or during another mutually agreed time) to plan and conduct due diligence on their partner company. Each team is expected to work closely with their business partners, making sure partners understand the purpose and process of diligence along the way. The final deliverable is a presentation of the team’s recommendation which will include: an analysis of the existing business, market sizing, financial forecasts and financing plan, and an assessment of opportunities and risks. Some companies may be recommended for an investment by the HBS Impact Investment Fund ($25,000 - $50,000 investments). Others will be recommending a growth strategy that can help the business access appropriate sources of growth capital.

Copyright © 2025 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Career Focus

Creating, launching and funding Life Sciences ventures is a difficult and daunting task, especially given recent market conditions. This course is a practical, hands-on field course primarily designed for students who are very serious about pursuing entrepreneurship within the life sciences, including therapeutics, medical devices, diagnostics, tools, software & data, contract research/manufacturing and more). The course will feature workshops with practitioners and domain experts providing guidance and exploring how to successfully navigate critical tasks when launching a life sciences venture. These tasks include negotiating licenses for intellectual property, developing clinical budgets and timelines, using these tools to develop a business model and resource the venture, exploring the process of building a syndicate and establishing a board of advisors, finding human talent to accomplish scientific goals, and more. All students interested in this course should have one of the following:

be actively pursuing a job or entrepreneurship in the life sciences post-graduation;

are already actively working on a life sciences company idea or startup;

joining a life sciences company and/or are already working part-time during the school year; or

have previous experience in the life sciences industry.

This field course complements concepts covered in the Entrepreneurship in the Life Sciences course and all other entrepreneurially-focused courses, but with a specific industry focus on the life sciences.

Educational Objectives

This course has been specifically designed to provide hands-on guidance and operational support for students who are seriously pursuing founding or joining life sciences ventures before, upon, or soon after, graduation. Students will learn and develop frameworks, tools, a network, and hands-on experience in critical functions of a life sciences startup, directly preparing them for a career in entrepreneurship in the Life Sciences. Sessions will feature skill-building workshops led by the instructor and outside experts as well as weekly peer-to-peer critiques on work-in-progress. Students are encouraged to work as a cohort to support each other through their networks and to offer insights based on their own experiences. While the course is focused on the life sciences, students need not have a scientific background, merely a passion for making an impact through participation in these ventures.

Course Content

Through hands-on workshops with industry experts and case and/or lecture-based discussions based on a variety of life sciences ventures, students will develop skills across every aspect of the life sciences venture creation landscape. Sectors of life sciences covered include those in biotech, pharmaceutical, medical device, diagnostics, and related supporting tools, technology and services organizations. Students can work on projects alone or in teams within the course. The field course will explore four different modules:

1. Pre-Requisites to Fundraise - what will investors or grant-making bodies expect you to bring them, and how to do you build this out in a rational manner that investors will believe; building a business plan; developing budgets and milestones; intellectual property considerations and licensing/creation.
2. When, and How, to Raise Funds - what do investors care about when considering a pitch, which investors should you target, how to build a syndicate, and which advisors do you want on board; negotiating term sheets.
3. How to Meet Scientific Deadlines - you raised money, and now you need to hit milestones - where and how to build teams or outsource to achieve scientific goals and have success; optimizing capital efficiency; legal and intellectual property development; regulatory considerations.
4. Industry Challenges and When to Get Help - when should you worry about regulatory concerns? Who do you hire internally or as a consultant? When and if to outsource to contract research organizations? How do you know what to worry about when you don't know what you don't know that is unique to life sciences ventures?

In most classes, we will have case protagonists and guests, including life sciences entrepreneurs, investors and domain experts so you can engage directly with these practitioners from the burgeoning life sciences venture ecosystem.

Key Learning Objectives include hands-on experience in successfully dealing with:

• Learning to operate and fund life sciences from industry-leading experts
• Avoid making the mistakes of others and learning to innovate in the industry
• Navigating careers within the life sciences
• Building a brand and community within the industry to leverage for help
• Building budgets; licensing/creating intellectual property; legal and regulatory considerations
• Fundraising with angel individuals and venture capital funds/investors
• Explore financing sources and how to practically access them, including early grants, non-dilutive financing sources, equity financing, and more
• Identify best practices for building teams (incl. compensation structures) & boards
• Explore ethical considerations while working in a hot-button field

Grading

The course is highly focused on ensuring each team’s venture evolves towards success criteria unique to their needs based on indication, modality, and requirements. Session participation, including working directly with industry mentors and routine session deliverables, will make up a large portion of the individual grade. All readings and deliverables are designed to move student ventures forward and will be critical to the ventures' successes. Grading will be a combination of class participation (40%), mentorship (bi-weekly summaries of activities, learnings and reflections - 20%), writing assignments (e.g., budget, industry reflections - 20%) and a final project (20%).

Copyright © 2025 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Course Overview

Entering its twelfth year, Private Equity Projects is a hybrid field and lecture series that provides the opportunity to work hands-on with leading private equity firms on "mutual value" projects and learn about the many things critical to success in PE beyond the transaction itself. Over thirty firms have participated, and over 90 percent requested renewed participation.

Through project work, students can "practice private equity" in a setting as close to authentic as possible. Projects will entail many aspects of private equity, and students will work directly with private equity firms and/or portfolio companies. A final presentation is made to a component of the private equity firm investment committee. Project work is designed to be of mutual value to students and the PE partner. Students can list the projects and the PE firm on their resumes upon the partner's review.

The course is structured to expose students to the inner workings of up to ten PE firms at once. Private equity firms hosting student projects for the 2025 year could include Advent, Apollo, Bain Capital, Berkshire Partners, CD&R, Great Hill, KKR, L Catterton, New Mountain, Odyssey, Warburg, Summit Partners, H Lee, and Warburg. For several years, the course has enjoyed very high ratings from PE firms and students and is an excellent relationship-building opportunity.

Projects range from sector vertical analysis, portfolio operations, re-underwriting failed deals, deal sourcing, platform deal add-on strategies, and more. The workload is carefully managed. In addition to the projects, a very popular slate of PE professionals provides full-class lectures on a variety of PE topics, including Deal Sourcing, Portfolio Operations, Capital Formation, PE CEOs, First Time Funds, Career Management, Recent Alumni Retrospectives, "Getting Paid" and Product Line Extensions. The professor pushes the guests hard to maximize learning for the students.

Professor Dionne also provides a popular weekly Random Musings report based on his recent Blackstone Senior Advisor role, his PE fund formation business, and his directorship of many companies.

A mid-term networking event is held with the local PE community in downtown Boston.

There is virtually no overlap between Starting Your Own Private Investment Firm, which Professor Dionne co-founded as a SIP, and PE Finance.

Who Teaches This Course?

The course will be taught by John Dionne, a Blackstone Senior Advisor and Senior Managing Director for almost 20 years. Mr. Dionne was a Member of the Private Equity and Alternative Credit investment committees and has led investments totaling $4 billion of equity over his career in Distressed and PE investing. He co-founded five multi-billion investment vehicles, including Blackstone's Tactical Opportunities Fund, its Energy Fund, and its Distressed Securities Fund. He has served on fifteen boards and raised over $30 billion in equity capital.

Professor Dionne ensures he is accessible to meet the various needs of his students.

Enrollment

The course could be open for cross-registration; enrollment will be limited to 50 students.

Enrollment by application only: To apply, reach out to Tyler McHugh (TMcHugh@hbs.edu) for more information. Early applicants are encouraged.

Applicants are asked to submit a brief one-page summary explaining their interest in the course.

There are no pre-requisite courses.

Copyright © 2025 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Course Overview Video

Course Overview

This course represents a unique opportunity for students to apply the skills learned in the classroom to a real-world public-market investment setting. Students will partner with an investment firm to work directly and deeply on an investment theme or question. In conjunction with their sponsor, students will develop a process and plan and execute it during the 14-week semester.

Dynamic weekly seminars supplement the project work and allow the class to come together to engage with industry leaders, protagonists, and asset allocators.

Students will learn first-hand the challenges and issues surrounding the diligence of an investment idea, the sourcing of opportunities, implementation, and portfolio and risk management. Students will develop and refine their investment process organization, creating a framework for investing. This should allow them to better utilize and develop pattern recognition and allow them to ponder: What is this firm's edge? How do they add alpha? How is the investment industry changing? Is the industry in a crisis?

This experience will not only help students shape their skills as investors-- modeling, pitching, participating on an investment committee--but also continue to build perspective on the eco-system of investment management.

Career Focus

Seminar in Investing is designed for the following types of students:

1. Those who will go into investment management.
2. Those who will aim to work or led a public company and want the lens of an investor into their company.
3. Those who want to peel back and better understand the eco-system of investment management at an individual investment and an investment firm level.

Learning Objectives

• Pattern recognition: Refine and develop a framework for investing
• Investment process organization: expose students to the investment process beyond research, from sourcing to implementation
• Develop more robust modeling and pitching skills
• Participate in an investment committee setting
• Work and develop relationships with incredible investors

Course Content

Field-Based Work: Teams of three will work with an investment firm on a specific investment theme or question; students will be allowed to rank top choices from a curated list of projects. Students will meet with their sponsor at least three times during the semester-- an introductory meeting, an in-person, and a final presentation. Students are expected to check in weekly with their sponsor. A final presentation will be given to their sponsors-- presented in front of the investment committee and senior management team. Students are expected to use their time with sponsors to think through and develop a research process and to better understand other issues surrounding an investment such as legal, trading and risk management. Students should also spend time shadowing other functions within the firm to better grasp the investment process.

The majority of the work on the projects will be done independently by the students using the resources at HBS and from the sponsoring firms. Students must be proactive and motivated; sponsors are giving their time for these projects and students must respect this commitment and deliver a strong product.

Classroom Setting: In addition to the project work, we will meet weekly over the course of the semester. Classroom time will be used for a mix of skill building, guests and time to come together to share challenges, learn from each other and seek feedback across teams. Interactive guest lectures will provide focus on building skills in the investment process from data sourcing and research to risk management and operations to asset allocation. The content of these sessions will help support project work and a deeper understanding of eco-system of investment management. Students will be expected to present once during the semester. There will be a presentation mid-way through the semester to update the class on the project and their firm. Presentations will simulate an investment committee, allowing peers to actively participate in an investment committee-like setting. Teams will be expected to have regular meetings with faculty.

Course Requirements and Grading

In addition to attending all the classroom discussions, students are expected to spend 3-5 hours a week working on their projects. Students will present once over the semester to their peers and give one final presentation to the investment committee of their sponsoring firm.

Students will be asked to submit their final presentation. These materials in combination with classroom participation will determine a student's grade.

Copyright © 2025 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Applications will be accepted through 5pm ET on August 8, 2025
A maximum of 20 teams/60 students will be accepted into the fall cohort
Application can be found here. Accepted students will be notified by August 20, 2025
Ventures enrolled in the course may be eligible to receive non-dilutive grant funding.

Career Focus

Startup Operations is designed for three types of students:

1. Those who have already launched or are about to launch a startup. See the course FAQ for more details about company stage expectations.
2. Those who are curious about working for early-stage startups or know they want to found a venture but don't have an idea yet.
3. Those who are interested in investing in startups.

There is no specific industry focus for this course - all sectors and business models apply - including CPG, social enterprise, nonprofits and bootstrapped businesses.

This field course complements concepts covered in Launching Tech Ventures, Entrepreneurial Sales and Marketing, and Founders Mindset.

Educational Objectives

This course is designed to provide hands-on guidance through the early stages of building your business. Students will test assumptions and hypotheses to evolve their product, build their strategic and operating roadmaps, create organizational plans and develop skills necessary to manage the many complexities of operating a startup. Sessions will feature skill-building exercises led by the instructor and outside experts as well as weekly peer-to-peer critiques on work-in-progress. Students are encouraged to work as a cohort to support each other through their networks and to offer insights based on their own experiences.

Course Content

Through a series of class exercises and intimate conversations with experienced startup leaders, students examine operational challenges in early-stage startups. Enrolled students’ ventures are “live” cases in the course; thus each student will not only learn through the startup they are working on, but through the 19 other startups in the course. Taking the perspective that there is more to just “build it and they will come”, the course will explore four modules:

1. Getting To Product Market Fit: Exploring best practices for customer feedback, solution iteration, metrics that matter and developing a product and operations roadmap.
2. Establishing The Startup Organization: Structuring early teams and the processes by which to operate your business. Topics will include: Who to hire and when - from technical hires and managing freelancers/first hires to product managers, operations, support and other key team members. Cross-functional communication from across and between the organization to external communication with customers, partners and investors - and role shifting as the organization scales.
3. Startup Business Operations: We will explore legal matters, budgets, contracts and early go-to-market strategies such as pricing and product marketing. We will also discuss the why/when/hows of raising venture capital.
4. Startup Evolution: As companies grow and scale, operations and products will evolve. We will explore when and how to pivot, shift and adapt to these changes as your companies evolve.

The course is highly focused on ensuring each team’s business evolves towards success criteria unique to their product and organization. Therefore, each team will build a Goals & Milestones plan as their first deliverable. The work to achieve these milestones will be a large percentage of the course grade. Session participation, including weekly peer-to-peer critiques, routine session deliverables, and a final reflection will make up the remaining elements of the individual grade. Light weekly readings, podcasts, and films will be required in prep for each session. All readings and deliverables are designed to move student companies forward.

Copyright © 2025 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Overview:

VCSME is a field course focused on operating and creating value in small and medium firms. Most of the sessions and lessons are taught through the lens of Entrepreneurship through Acquistion (EtA), but the lessons learned can be applied to many career paths and jobs. While not a prerequisite, many students who take VCSME have taken Financial Management of Small Firms (FMFS) in the fall semester. Students often take VCSME together with the field course Entrepreneurship through Acquisition (EtA).

Career Focus:

This course is geared towards students interested in Entrepreneurship through Acquisition including Search Funds, Self Funded search, and other EtA models. While the course is taught through the lens of EtA, the operating, leadership, and value creation lessons can be applied to many different career paths in management and investing.

Educational Objectives:

The educational objectives are to experience practical and theoretical models of value creation in small and medium firms. While small firms differ in industry, size, and complexity, there are many common themes that entrepreneurs focus on to drive value creation. Class sessions include a combination of vignette (mini-case) discussions, class exercises, role playing, and heavy guest participation. The course concept is to “bring the field to the students”.

Course Content and Organization:

Selected course sessions:
1. First day speech role play and early actions post acquisition
2. Financial systems, accounting, and metrics
3. Difficult conversations: Demotion, termination, star performer feedback
4. Hiring, recruiting talent to small firms, leading “A” players
5. Sales and building sales organizations in small firms
6. Growth through acquisition
7. CEO prioritization and Culture
8. Capital allocation
9. Selling your company and life post exit

Grading / Course Administration:

Grading is 50% based on class participation, 25% of pre-class assignments, and 25% final project (individual or teams of two).

Please see this video for more on this course.

Click here for application

Course Description

Taught by practitioner Jeff Bussgang (Flybridge co-founder and general partner), Field Course: Venture Capital Journey (VCJ) is designed for a small cohort of EC students who are serious about pursuing a career in venture capital – most of our students will enter the course (1) with previous VC experience as pre-MBA analysts, summer associates, or VC interns/scouts; (2) actively pursuing a VC job post-graduation; (3) having already secured a VC job post-graduation; or (4) starting their own VC fund.

Note that one of the goals of the course is to expand access and inclusion to the field of venture capital. Thus, the selection of students in the course will be intentionally diverse and include both students who came from the field as well as those who are keenly interested in the field, having had some exposure during their time at HBS through RC courses like TEM and Finance 101/102.

The focus of the course is to provide students with frameworks, tools, a network, and hands on experience in preparation for a career in venture capital (VC), ranging from seed to growth stage. The course will help students more deeply understand the conceptual underpinnings of venture capital investing and startup company financing. In so doing, we aspire to prepare students for a career in venture capital, with a particular focus on their personal and professional growth and fulfillment. Further, we will provide a “systems thinking” lens to the industry and prepare them to positive actors in the global VC / startup ecosystem as future investors and entrepreneurs.

The course builds on eight years of running the popular Rock Venture Partners (RVP) program, which had been organized as a series of year-long independent projects for students. The RVP program and the collection of IPs associated with it will cease to exist and will be superseded by this course.

In VCJ, students will learn all aspects of the venture capital process, including:

• Deal sourcing
• Developing an investment thesis
• Conducting due diligence
• Investment decision making
• Determining valuation and negotiating terms
• Constructing and managing a portfolio
• Board work
• Managing a firm

Further, students will have the opportunity to step back and learn about:

• Navigating a career in VC, including how to select a firm to join (with particular considerations to firm size, sector, geography, corporate vs. institutional), negotiate compensation, get promoted, and build a career and life in the industry.
• Brand building, community/content creation, and the opportunities and risks of leveraging various social media channels.
• The AI-native VC “tech stack” and relevant tools of the trade (e.g., Affinity, Carta, CB Insights, Pitchbook)
• Fundraising with high net worth and institutional Limited Partners (LPs) and how funds evolve over time.
• Recent innovations, including the role of incubators and accelerators, investor/operator funds, rolling funds, the globalization of the industry, and specific investment trends and innovation waves (e.g., web3/NFTs, blockchain, creator economy, tough tech, CRISPR and personalized medicine, health tech, fintech, investing in emerging markets).
• Ethical considerations, biases, and the racial/gender capital gap in the VC ecosystem

The course will consist of three components:

1. Classroom activities – classes will be a mix of case discussions, interactive workshops, and expert panel sessions.
2. Externship – students will work on externships at VC firms (typically sourcing deals, developing investment theses, and/or assisting with due diligence) or at an early-stage startup where their primary role will be to assist the startup in raising VC or – under the supervision of a VC mentor or faculty member – independent, self-guided thesis development focused on a particular sector.
3. Networking / Site Visits – students will meet in the field with VC partners and principals to get a sense of the different strategies that different firms employ as well as to build their individual networks, with a particular focus on deeper exposure to the Boston and NYC startup ecosystems (in person) as well as Miami and SF (virtually).

The class will meet for 90 minutes once a week during the fall term (Q1 and Q2) and require a project as described above.

The course will be capped at 30 students and will be application-based.

Grading will be as follows:

• 30% class participation
• 30% projects/independent research (based on bi-weekly summaries of activities, learnings, and reflections)
• 20% writing assignments (e.g., investment memo, industry reflections)
• 20% final paper (e.g., sector analysis, personal reflection)

Copyright © 2025 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Career Focus

This course is suitable for anyone who is interested in owning, managing or investing in smaller businesses.

Educational Objectives

The course focuses on how to manage smaller businesses with an emphasis on the financial aspects of buying and growing these businesses. The cases are designed to give students practical knowledge that will be immediately helpful if they plan to own or manage a small business, provide consulting or financial services to these businesses, or invest in smaller businesses. These smaller businesses are privately owned, are typically led by a CEO/entrepreneur supported by a very small management team, produce a service or product for which a current profitable business model exists (as distinct from many VC-backed developmental businesses), and frequently the businesses are of a scale that they can be acquired and owned by individuals instead of institutions or families. The managerial and financial challenges for these firms are different from those of larger, public firms and often require a different approach because of their small scale, lack of liquidity and the difficulty of attracting and deploying capital. The careers of small business entrepreneurs are also very different from the employees of larger firms, and we explore those differences through numerous guests and a few cases that focus on the advantages and disadvantages of the career choice.

Click on this link to see comments of former HBS students who discuss why they chose a career in entrepreneurship through acquisition: https://courseware.hbs.edu/video/?v=0_cteitfd6

Course Content and Organization

The course first focuses on how to buy a small business. We begin with the case of two HBS MBAs who chose to purchase a small business using a search fund instead of pursuing a more traditional career path. The case tracks their search process and highlights the challenges encountered when acquiring a small business. We then learn about different ways to fund a search through five other acquisitions by HBS graduates. We then focus on the market for smaller firms including cases about private equity firms that operates in the small business market.

We then focus on how to successfully manage the financial aspects of smaller firms. We explore the difficulty of growing these firms and explore which business models are more likely to succeed. And, of course, we explore how these businesses finance themselves as they grow. These smaller firms, unlike bigger firms, often face tradeoffs between liquidity and profitability, and a common feature of successful firms seems to be a willingness to sacrifice profitability for liquidity. These tradeoffs are particularly relevant to acquisitions made by recent MBA graduates as they navigated through the Great Recession and COVID. We discuss four recent acquisitions that faced significant financial hurdles.

We study capital investment decisions made by smaller businesses, decisions that emphasize financial capacity and lifestyle choices instead of maximizing market value. We study alternative growth strategies including approaches to sales force management in the context of a smaller firm. We also learn about the special problems that confront smaller business such as customer concentration and conflicts between outside investors and managers.

We conclude the course with integrative cases that follow the experience of entrepreneurs as they search for a smaller company, acquire it and grow it successfully, and then confront the decision of when to sell the business so that they can realize the benefits of their entrepreneurial venture.

The course is a prerequisite for the EC field course, Entrepreneurship through Acquisition, which is offered in the spring term.

Copyright © 2023 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Prerequisite: 1676 Founder Mindset

Coming soon

Course Description

Almost all human endeavors start with a Founder—a person who is willing to challenge the status quo, question prevailing wisdom on what is possible, and change our world. Founders notice problems and can see a potential solution that improves the lives of those around them. It’s an extraordinarily attractive proposition to so many, yet so few people are successful in accomplishing this goal.

A founder needs to make difficult decisions in the face of great uncertainty and massively imperfect information. How does one, often with relatively little experience, develop and exercise the judgement to make these decisions? This course will lead a discussion around The Founder Mindset and the characteristics that enables one to build businesses of significance and make a meaningful difference in the world.

Why Learn About The Founder Mindset?

The course examines the choices all founders make when starting and building a venture, and provides helpful frameworks and practical tips and tools for building, scaling, and eventually exiting the business. How do you assemble, motivate and lead a team when you have big ambitions, limited resources, and a compass instead of a map? The course will walk you through practical actions, such as selecting a team, choosing a business model, and what to consider when choosing a co-founder and writing a founders’ agreement. You’ll learn tactics for dealing with difficult situations, like firing an employee, pivoting your business model, or selling/closing the business. The course supplements case studies and discussions with simulations and role-plays, where you will be faced with challenging situations and forced to make difficult decisions. You will gain a sense of the intense pressures, difficult decisions, and extremes—highs and lows—that every founder confronts in some way.

We analyze certain pivotal choices made by over 20 founders who set out to change the world in small and big ways. We meet a Lebanese young woman who spent 10 years making the perfect swimming goggle, and we look at the journeys of people who want to save human civilization by moving to Mars or reversing climate change. We see the strange twists of fate that resulted in iconic companies like Tinder, Tesla, and Pandora. We will try to tease apart the business model and financing choices that contributed to the outcome. In most cases, the pivotal choices these founders made have their roots in “people decisions.” Yet most founders (and VCs) pay less attention to the "people" choices that are critical to success.

In this course, you will think about: How should teams be structured? How can a founder see his or her own blind spots? Can you augment a founder’s weaknesses by hiring a complimentary team? When should a CEO be replaced?

We observe how both successes and failures have common antecedents. We look at the journeys of people who have succeeded because of the way they handled their failures. We will discuss the importance of exercising judgment and making consequential decisions, all with imperfect information and insufficient resources. We will also explore the power of commitment. Despite different outcomes, each founder has made a difference that others can build on. And, by pushing their intellectual and emotional limits, founders usually emerge stronger and more resilient. The Founder Mindset is a course about this human journey to make a difference in the world.

Who Should Take This Course?

The course provides a strong conceptual foundation and practical tools for addressing common situations in entrepreneurship. In particular, this course should appeal to anyone interested in being a founder and creating something of significance. In addition, anyone interested in being involved with high-growth ventures, working with entrepreneurs as investors or advisors, working in entrepreneurial environments that are dynamic, complex and changing, or even just cultivating your own Founder Mindset can benefit from this course.

Course Structure

The course is structured into five modules that represent roughly five critical decisions that together form The Founder Mindset: Idea Generation & Commitment, Founding Team, Raising Money, Difficult Decisions, and Equity Value Creation. Each module addresses specific issues—such as choosing co-founders, negotiating equity, hiring, firing, working with your board, and building your team—that occur primarily in that stage.

• IDEA GENERATION & COMMITMENT focuses on early critical decisions a founder makes regarding idea selection and commitment. It examines the stress of maintaining outward positivity in the face of constant adversity and uncertainty, and how important it is to display commitment.
• FOUNDING TEAM explores the importance of hiring right, building a strong team, and establishing trust in your co-founder relationship.
• RAISING MONEY widens the perspective to consider how a founder should approach raising financing and how the organization should be structured so that it can deliver a product or service reliably.
• DIFFICULT DECISIONS addresses many of the perennial questions of entrepreneurship: “Should I persist, pivot, or perish (close the business)”? “How do I fire employees?” What does it mean to “fail well?”
• EQUITY VALUE CREATION addresses the cases where founders are challenged with the growth of their firms and the requirement to deliver financially, answering questions like where should the CEO focus, what metrics matter, are your actions value accretive or destructive, do you grow or exit, and is all value-creation monetary?

Course Requirements

Classes include case discussions, workshops, and team exercises that require your active participation. In addition to case discussions, you will be asked to deliver a pitch, conduct peer interviews, and reflect on your learning. There is no final exam, but instead a final project in which you will either deliver a comprehensive pitch or share how The Founder Mindset will help you achieve a greater impact.

Required Materials

You should come to class having already completed the assignment due for that day. That may entail reading cases or other required readings, watching videos, and/or participating in an activity. 

Copyright © 2024 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Course Overview

Generative AI (GenAI) stands at the forefront of a technological revolution, poised to redefine how businesses operate and deliver value. This course delves into critical questions at the heart of this transformation: How will GenAI reshape modern enterprise? What strategies should businesses adopt to integrate this technology effectively? How can existing data be leveraged to unlock new opportunities? What are the ethical and regulatory issues to consider?

These questions are pivotal whether you aspire to be a corporate innovator driving AI initiatives or a startup founder focused on the burgeoning GenAI market. Understanding the complexities of GenAI goes beyond using ChatGPT-type applications and prompt engineering. It requires immersive engagement in building with the technology, putting oneself in the decision-maker's shoes, and grappling with how GenAI can solve business challenges and opportunities.

This course offers an active learning environment where you will explore these questions through hands-on experience, directly linking conceptual understanding to business use cases. Whether you are a GenAI novice or possess some technical knowledge, this course is designed to enrich your understanding and prepare you for leadership in the GenAI-driven business landscape. You don’t need to know coding to take this class.

Educational Objectives

Our goal in this course is to deep dive into how Generative AI technology is driving rapid change across industries, companies, and business functions. We will examine this in a few different ways:

• Gain a good understanding of the technology and how it works. You'll do this by build a production scale Gen AI application using a no code platform. The HBS digital transformation (DTX) team will assist in the delivery fot he project.
• Learn about the basic foundations of the technology as well as the latest developments such as agentic applications, etc.
• A strategic focus on how Gen AI has the potential to disrupt business models. How can businesses improve productivity and efficiency using Gen AI? How can businesses innovate using gen AI?
• How are business functions changing because of Gen AI? We'll focus on marketing, consulting, R&D, etc.
• Gen AI is influencing a wide range of industries. We'll identify drivers of change across a range of industries (e.g., professional services, news media, education, advertising, software, and healthcare).
• Governance of Gen AI, risk management, responsible and ethical AI issues.
• Implications for Start-Ups and early stage investors. How to build and scale a Gen AI start-up and how to develop an investment thesis (whether as a VC or as a founder) for an early stage company.
• Emerging trends, ecosystems, and shifts poised to shape the next era of generative AI.
• The cases and protagonists are selected to highlight how organizations are using Gen-AI to boost efficiency, personalization, and innovation. These include large companies and start-ups.

Hands-on Projects

You will do a project designed to give you hands-on practice in learning how the technology works and how to build applications. The project is geared to proving you the capabilities to become an effective Gen AI product manager. You'll also do assignments geared to giving you the tools to do any professional work better and faster using the latest Gen AI tools. The final course project will allow you to apply the learnings from the course in a comprehensive setting to analyze the impact of Gen AI for a company or business function.

You will have access to HBS Enterprise GPT account and no code Gen AI builder tools for the course project.

Classroom Conduct and Grading Guidelines

• I expect full attendance by all students in all sessions. We only have 12 sessions for a packed agenda of content.
• The grading distribution is as follows:

Grading:

• 50% class participation
• 50% project
• The use of generative AI is not just encouraged but required for class preparation and all class assignments.

Copyright © 2024 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Career Focus

This course gives students frameworks and tools for (i) understanding what motivates people, including themselves, and (ii) designing incentive systems, broadly defined, that motivate both individual performance and organizational behavior. Students will learn to apply these concepts to enhance their own productivity while also developing skills to motivate others toward value-creating purposes. The course is useful for students in all career tracks and with any industry focus as it covers diverse cases across sectors, including but not limited to investment banking, law, consulting, technology, non-profit organizations, the automotive industry, and professional sports. The cases also span the organizational hierarchy, examining motivation challenges from frontline worker engagement to executive compensation, providing students with a comprehensive toolkit applicable across different organizational roles and at any career stage.

Educational Objectives

By the end of the course, students will:

• Understand the wide range of motivational factors that drive human behavior in an organizational context, including pay, perquisites, promotions, opportunities for skill development, social approval, fairness, stress, emotional states, autonomy, self-identity, and values
• Apply motivational principles to enhance their own productivity and effectiveness
• Have the skills to build and manage effective incentive systems, whether based on monetary compensation or based on other forms of rewards, that tap into people's underlying motivations and promote value-creating behavior
• Understand how an organization's incentive systems shape the mix of individuals who are attracted to, promoted within, and retained by the organization
• Know how to design organizational processes, such as hiring procedures and training programs, in ways that complement the organization's formal incentive systems
• Have the skills to evaluate and use digital tools and technologies (like AI and personal productivity trackers) to enhance personal productivity and employee motivation

Course Content and Organization

The course takes an interdisciplinary perspective and draws from behavioral science, the field that combines insights from economics and psychology to understand human decision making.

In order to establish a baseline from which the rest of the course builds, Module 1 explores the classical economic approach to analyzing both personal productivity and organizational incentive systems. Using an extremely simple view of motivation, the economic approach provides many useful insights for getting things done. The key observation is that it is impossible to perfectly measure and therefore impossible to directly reward the value that is created by an individual on behalf of an organization or themselves. When contending with this challenge, the designer of an incentive system—or someone trying to motivate themselves—faces an important tradeoff between inducing high levels of motivation and inducing the right types of behavior. All incentive systems represent different strategies for managing this tradeoff.

Module 2 challenges and expands the classical economic approach by considering a much richer perspective on what motivates people. Relying primarily on a psychological lens, this module examines how both personal motivational strategies and organizational incentive systems should account for the relevance of non-monetary rewards, the social nature of the workplace, the emotions experienced in a work environment, and the role of meaning and purpose in shaping motivation. Students will explore how these psychological factors affect their own productivity habits and decision-making processes, and how these factors can cause well-intentioned organizational incentive systems to backfire. Simultaneously, these psychological insights represent an opportunity for a skilled individual to harness a powerful set of motivators for getting things done, whether for motivating themselves or for motivating others.

Module 3 synthesizes ideas from earlier in the course and embeds them in the broader context of personal effectiveness and an organization's overall strategy and operations. The module will analyze the interaction of formal incentive systems with other organizational processes and self-motivation techniques that may undermine or reinforce value creating behavior. Special attention will be given to motivation challenges in remote and hybrid work environments, addressing how traditional motivation approaches must adapt to these increasingly common settings. Finally, students will have the opportunity to reflect on how their own personal values should interface with their approach when designing incentive systems to shape others' behavior and when developing strategies to motivate themselves.

Group Project and Evaluation

Students will work in groups of four or five to prepare a presentation on a frontier topic in the broad area of motivation—both self-motivation and organizational approaches. Examples: students might present a "mini-case" on a company that uses innovative incentive practices or personal productivity systems; students might report the results of a laboratory-style experiment exploring a novel source of motivation; or students might share a synthesis of lessons learned from a handful of interviews conducted with interesting thinkers in the field of motivation.

Students will be encouraged to incorporate both academic research findings and practical industry applications in their presentations, bridging theory and practice. The instructors will suggest a number of pre-approved topics from which students can choose, and students can also propose their own topics (subject to instructor approval and enough interest from other students to form a group). This project is not meant to be a full-fledged final course assignment, but instead a lighter-touch opportunity to explore an interesting idea in line with the course framework.

The components of the overall course grade are as follows: 50% based on class participation, 10% based on the group project, and 40% based on an exam at the end of the semester.

Copyright © 2025 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Global Climate Change explores the impact of human-induced climate change on modern society and economy. The premise of the course is that a changing climate, and the way we respond to it, will ultimately affect and even transform every aspect of modern capitalism. Thus, while the course should be of interest to students contemplating careers in climate-adjacent sectors and firms, it is intended as a broader introduction to frameworks for thinking about climate change that will be relevant to all areas of business.

Educational Objectives

This course explores the causes and consequences of climate change for business and society. It evaluates the impact of climate change on geopolitics and the global economy. It addresses the stakes for firms confronting the challenges of climate change, and introduces the tools and concepts that firms and policymakers use to evaluate and address climate change. Students will explore the role of business in global decarbonization, and the challenges and opportunities this transition will create for society and for markets.

Organization of the Course

GCC meets in 25 sessions divided into five modules. These address 1) the causes of climate change, 2) national and firm mitigation strategies, 3) the green energy transition, 4) strategies for climate adaptation, and 5) opportunities for climate entrepreneurship. The course uses a combination of country and company cases to explore these topics with a focus on the intersection of public policy and firm strategy. Written work will include a quiz (10%) and a final paper (40%).

Copyright © 2023 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Overview:

Entrepreneurship has been shown to be a major driver of economic development in markets like Israel, India, Singapore, China, and Estonia. These success stories highlight why promoting entrepreneurship globally has become an important policy agenda. From the perspective of entrepreneurs and investors, however, little research has been devoted to providing insights into how to successfully navigate these markets. While the strategies of lean experimentation, minimum viable product, bootstrapping, and staged investment are critical to startups in these emerging ecosystems, one needs to adapt the lessons from mature markets like Silicon Valley, New York, and Boston that receive the majority of attention in the media and in the classroom. Global Entrepreneurship develops strategies for entrepreneurs and investors in these emerging ecosystems around the globe. The course will have cases from 26 different countries on every continent. The course examines the multifaceted nature of entrepreneurship in emerging ecosystems and the issues that startups in developed markets face when expanding globally, highlighting the areas of context that affect the decisions of players in the sector. These areas will be highlighted in six modules which include differences in industry structure and the macroeconomy, availability and access to talent, financing sources, legal and regulatory environments, local culture, and exit markets.

Career Focus:

Global Entrepreneurship (GV) is a course for a variety of students. First, individuals potentially exploring careers in startups or venture capital in these emerging ecosystems will gain valuable insights into how to adapt strategies. These actionable insights will improve decision-making by providing a framework for adapting to local market context. Second, those who intend to pursue startups or venture capital investing in developed markets can gain a deeper understanding of what factors likely influence success and failure. Many startups in developed ecosystems eventually enter other markets and understanding constraints can aid this expansion. Additionally, venture capital investing has transitioned to a global phenomenon and being able to evaluate which emerging ecosystems are likely to be sustainable provides a roadmap for expanding an investment footprint. Finally, for those interested in evaluating economic and business environments generally, EOV provides a robust macro setting in which to understand how various levers aid or hinder economic development by examining one of the engines for such development, the entrepreneurial sector.

Educational Objectives:

Global Entrepreneurship is intended to provide critical knowledge and frameworks for founders and investors to navigate the complex setting of startups in emerging ecosystems or in developed markets are looking to expand around the globe. The course will provide institutional understanding as well as apply strategic and analytic tools to make important decisions.

Course Content and Organization:

The first module explores how the significant differences in industry structures and the macroeconomy affect the types of startups that we see in different markets. Emerging entrepreneurial ecosystems often exhibit diverse and evolving industry structures. Understanding this structure is critical to finding and developing startup opportunities. Unlike mature economies with established sectors, emerging markets are marked by rapid changes and the emergence of new industries.

There are several common types of opportunities that we see across emerging ecosystems. First, digitization and technology can allow certain sectors to be modernized in a way that is different from more mature economies. In areas like fintech, supply chain, and agriculture, technology can be used to modernize various elements of the economy and provide value to businesses and consumers. For example, 73% of Egypt is unbanked, having no access to financial services. In Mexico, that number is 50.9%. The increasingly pervasive nature of mobile connectivity and access to big data tools provides the opportunity to increase financial inclusivity through fintech startups. Mobile payments, saving, and lending are sectors in which we see startups flourishing. Startups in the fintech sector are often either hindered or helped by the responsiveness of government regulators like central banks. Similarly, in some countries, the financial sector is dominated by large family-owned banks that can become a barrier to market access. Many emerging markets also have very inefficient supply chains that dramatically hinder the efficiency of a variety of industries. By investing in technology and logistics, these supply chain startups, both in the B2B and the B2C space, can create tremendous value. Monetization of these types of opportunities, however, can prevent certain challenges. Finally, in many countries, agriculture still represents a large share of the domestic economy. Small farms and lack of resources often means that agriculture is highly inefficient. Technology can dramatically improve productive capacity of farms and increase food security in a country.

A second type of opportunity that entrepreneurs in emerging ecosystems develop are those that are imitations of successful startups in other geographies, both developed and emerging ecosystems. Imitation of a successful business model provides a roadmap for what types of opportunities may success. For example, the Saudi-based food delivery startup Jahez was founded in September 2016, three and a half years after Doordash was founded in Palo Alto. Careem, a ride hailing service in the MENA region, was founded in the UAE in 2012, three years after Uber was started in San Francisco. Similarly, MecadoLibre, an Argentinian-based ecommerce company often called the Amazon of Latin America, was founded in 1999, five years after Amazon itself. We also find that entrepreneurs will imitate startups from other emerging ecosystems. WeChat became the first superapp when it launched in 2011 in China. Startups like Grab (Singapore/Indonesia) and Gojek (Indonesia) soon evolved into similar offerings over time. The critical element of imitation startups is how they adapt to the local market in which customer tastes, buying habits, and willingness to pay may differ. For B2C companies, are customer buying habits and tastes similar? What are logistical constraints that differ? Are there legal or regulator concerns? For B2B companies, similar concerns must be considered. Additionally, in countries where the cash economy is prevalent, startups must consider how they can convince businesses to enter the formal economy.

A third type of startup that exists in some, but not all, emerging entrepreneurial ecosystems are deep tech companies. These types of startups rely on specialized technical skills that exist in a particular country and often develop startups that can have global reach. Sectors like biotechnology, artificial intelligence, quantum computing, and advanced materials find centers of excellence in a number of emerging ecosystems. The quality of STEM education as well as the government support for basic R&D can create opportunities to found companies that can have global impact. Often these companies enjoy a cost advantage as local labor may be cheaper than similar technical talent in developed ecosystems. Countries like Singapore, Korea, Japan, Poland, Hungary, Estonia, Argentina, and South Africa have pockets of technical domains that are world class. Key to exploiting these opportunities is ensuring that not only does the startup have access to quality technical talent, but that the company can recruit the necessary business professionals to access global markets.

Finally, all founders and investors in emerging ecosystems need to understand broader macroeconomic factors like declining investment in startups, rising interest rates, high inflation, and currency devaluation. The retrenchment in the global venture capital investing landscape hit emerging entrepreneurial ecosystems especially hard. Companies that could have easily raised follow-on funding only a year before suddenly found it impossible to raise capital. This sudden change means dramatic shifts in operating strategies for startups, often leading to reduced headcount and a focus on becoming profitable. Similarly, in countries with high inflation and currency devaluation, managing revenue and expenses can become difficult. In certain sectors, the cost of funds, for example in fintech lending, can become prohibitive. While the macroeconomy effects startups in all markets, the volatile nature of the macroeconomy in emerging ecosystems makes such strategic choices even more painful.

The second module of EOV examines where the talent for startups comes from in various countries. One of the critical factors influencing entrepreneurship in emerging markets is the availability of the right type of talent. These regions are characterized by a diverse pool of human capital with varying levels of expertise. Entrepreneurs must deal with talent shortages in certain specialized fields while harnessing the potential of a young and eager workforce. Moreover, cultural nuances and language barriers can impact team dynamics, requiring entrepreneurs to cultivate a deep understanding of local work environments and adopt effective cross-cultural communication strategies. Module 2 will examine strategies that founders can undertake to identify key technical and business talent to develop and grow their companies.

The third module deals with sources of financing for entrepreneurial ventures across different ecosystems. Access to financing remains a pivotal challenge for entrepreneurs in emerging markets. Traditional funding avenues, such as venture capital and angel investors, may be limited, prompting entrepreneurs to explore alternative financing models. We will examine the role of government programs in jump starting a venture capital sector as well and how those programs can be effective. Crowdfunding, impact investing, and government-sponsored initiatives become crucial lifelines for startups seeking capital in many geographies and understanding where and how they fit into a startup will be explored. Entrepreneurs in emerging markets must be adept at navigating these diverse funding sources and developing resilient financial strategies to weather the uncertainties inherent in such economies.

The fourth module examines differences in legal and regulatory environments and how they affect startups. Navigating the legal and regulatory landscape is a complex aspect of entrepreneurship in emerging markets. Regulatory frameworks may be less established or subject to frequent changes, creating uncertainty for businesses. Entrepreneurs must be agile and proactive, staying abreast of legal developments and building relationships with local authorities to ensure compliance. Bureaucracy and corruption are often major hurdles that affect entrepreneurs and investors. Similarly, legal frameworks around the types of securities, bankruptcy regulations, and taxation can be major impediments to startups.

EOV’s fifth module examines how cultural differences affect the vibrancy of startups and how entrepreneurs and investors can succeed despite these cultural differences. Understanding and integrating with culture is a cornerstone of successful entrepreneurship in emerging markets. Culture often affects the desire of individuals to start companies. For example, in Japan, failure historically was severely punished. The most sought-after jobs were in large companies in which title and compensation were determined strictly by tenure. Similarly, in other countries, like Hungary, a pervasive attitude of the lack of personal opportunity and a lack of creativity provide a difficult context in which to start companies. In Francophone countries like Cote d’Ivoire, risk aversion also runs deep. De-risking the startup process may be important for fostering pioneering entrepreneurs. Cultural nuances also influence consumer behavior, market acceptance, and even team dynamics.

The sixth and final module examines exit strategies. Once a founder takes professional investment capital, they are committing to an exit at some point in the future. The availability of exits, however, is a pervasive and perplexing problem for many ecosystems globally. Given that much of the global growth in startups is less than a decade old, few ecosystems have solved this dilemma. As such, many of the venture capital investors still manage their venture capital funds with little realizations flowing back to investors. Ultimately, if attractive exits cannot be executed, then these venture capital firms will not be able to continue to raise new funds. As such, the exit issue is critically important to solve.

Grading / Course Administration:

The grading for the course will be 50% class participation and 50% final exam.

Copyright © 2025 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Career Focus

Globalization and Emerging Markets is designed for students who will be investing, managing a business or nonprofit, or working for a government in an emerging or frontier market, as well as for those who wish to acquire a richer conceptual understanding of the nature of capitalism, globalization, and economic development worldwide. The unit of analysis of the course ranges from the international system as a whole through individual countries, alone and in comparative perspective, to multinational and domestic companies operating in emerging markets. Students are asked to adopt the perspective of different decision-makers, such as politicians, technocrats, investors, and managers. For instance, students may have to take the perspective of a large-cap mining firm in Mongolia, a domestic conglomerate in the Philippines, a muckraking foreign-run hedge fund in Russia, or the Prime Minister of Bhutan considering the development of a new hydropower project. Most of the cases are set beyond the so-called BRICs of Brazil, Russia, India, and China, in today’s “frontier” markets that are only beginning to attract the attention of mainstream investors, and some are purposefully historical in order to give insight into the evolution of the world economy and the strategies once pursued by states and companies in currently developed countries when they first emerged. The course should, in short, appeal to anyone considering spending part of their career working, investing, or thinking outside of the major developed markets.

Educational Objectives

The majority of economic growth is now occurring in countries that are not historically wealthy high-income democracies, and where many of the textbook assumptions regarding how markets function—such as the enforcement of contracts, anti-trust laws, universally low or absent tariffs, governments acting as referees rather than players—often do not hold. These trends and characteristics provide a unique set of opportunities for entrepreneurs and investors in the developed world and within emerging markets themselves, as well as for politicians and stakeholders searching for paths to development. But they also introduce significant risk for those doing business in the developing world. GEM provides frameworks to understand the processes of economic growth and development; to develop contextual intelligence regarding emerging markets; to manage within a weaker or less formalized institutional environment; and to think globally and dynamically about capitalism.

Course Organization

GEM consists of three interrelated modules that consider growth and business opportunities in emerging markets from complementary perspectives. First, we work through a framework to understand the process of economic growth and development, and in so doing develop the ability to analyze an emerging market at the level of the country. Second, we examine companies that need to understand this macro view in order to make cross-industry investment decisions as well as navigate the unique contexts of emerging market. The final module looks at the relationship between states and markets in globalization and between the developed and developing parts of the world economy. The course uses a variety of country and company cases from more than 20 different emerging and frontier markets to accomplish these objectives. The cases range from country cases on some of the fastest-growing economies in the world to cases on mining, gas, banking, infrastructure, retail, technology, tourism, private equity, and hedge fund companies operating in emerging markets.

Other EC courses that complement this course:

Energy, MITI, IMaGE, and BBOP.

Copyright © 2024 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Immersive Field Courses: IFCs require a firm commitment and carry a financial obligation. Financial aid is available in the form of a student loan, a need-based HBS scholarship, or a combination of both depending on your individual circumstances. The Add/Drop process at the start of the term is the mechanism for any IFC enrollment changes, and, after that point, the course fee is non-refundable. Refer to the GEO website for full details on IFCs and be sure you understand the Course Policies and Course Fee & Financial Aid. Visit IFC Financial Aid for a quick assessment to determine your eligibility and process or contact finaid@hbs.edu for more information.

Enrollment: Limited to 45 MBA students (due to the nature of IFCs, auditing is not permitted)

Course Overview

The continent of Africa is often misunderstood, and the opportunity for both impact and profit are underappreciated. The Africa IFC will highlight the many opportunities and potential challenges for students interested in business on the continent. Students will visit and work with companies in Cape Town and gain firsthand experience of business in Africa, by meeting and working with other young Africans in the area. We will reflect on a changing international environment marked by COVID, the decline of globalization, a possible global recession and a new Cold war ignited by the Ukrainian crisis, trade wars and tariffs. How are these factors affecting Africa, how are countries reacting to these challenges. How are these events impacting companies and how are companies reacting to these new difficulties. For students it will provide an opportunity to see and be part of problem solving and crisis management within an African corporate setting.

Our sessions will begin with a look at the major political, economic and social trends that are dominating the continent. We will then examine the business environment and look at the peculiar features of business on the African continent as well as the impact of technology. How business is conducted in a continent where infrastructure is often poor, data absent, and capital constrained. Many of the lessons in this IFC are applicable to Global Emerging Markets, especially those in Asia and Latin America..

While in South Africa and while on campus, students will have the unique opportunity of meeting with and learning from leaders in politics and business from across Africa. In South Africa there will also be opportunities to discover the social and cultural landscape of Africa, including the changing role of women in the society and how the issues of ethnic diversity and inclusion are tackled on the continent. The history and legacy of Apartheid will be examined.

I graduated from Harvard business school in 1980 and have worked on the continent for the last 42 years in both business and government. I hope to share with students the perspectives, network and experiences that I have gained over the decades. And with the network I have developed over those decades, I seek to place students within companies and projects where they can experience Africa first hand in both its difficulties and challenges, side by side its excitement and newness and its unique possibilities ...

The main deliverables will be:

• A) report at the end of the time in South Africa to be submitted to the company.
• B) a piece of written work to done in Boston which looks at the main themes covered in the classes and in the readings

Course Credit and Fees

Students will receive 3 credits upon successful completion of this course.

HBS will provide logistical support for the immersion (including accommodations, select meals, and local travel arrangements). Students will be charged a course fee towards defraying a portion of these costs. Students are responsible for booking and paying for their own round-trip air travel and any costs associated with required visa documentation and immunizations. Students should ensure adequate processing time for all visas, as travel fees are not refundable if a student does not secure visas on time.

For detailed information about what the course program fee includes and excludes, as well as information about student accommodations, please visit the GEO website or email geo@hbs.edu.

GEO continuously evaluates the safety and logistical feasibility of running Immersive Field Courses in each location. Please be aware that IFCs can be canceled at any time due to changes in global health and safety or other unforeseen circumstances. Students will not be redistributed into another IFC, nor will a new course be developed. Course fees will be refunded.

Copyright © 2024 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Immersive Field Courses: IFCs require a firm commitment and carry a financial obligation. Financial aid is available in the form of a student loan, a need-based HBS scholarship, or a combination of both depending on your individual circumstances. The Add/Drop process at the start of the term is the mechanism for any IFC enrollment changes, and, after that point, the course fee is non-refundable. Refer to the GEO website for full details on IFCs and be sure you understand the Course Policies and Course Fee & Financial Aid. Visit IFC Financial Aid for a quick assessment to determine your eligibility and process or contact finaid@hbs.edu for more information.

Enrollment: Limited to 45 MBA students (due to the nature of IFCs, auditing is not permitted)

Course Overview

The global race to eliminate greenhouse gases from the atmosphere has started in full earnest. The stakes are high; emissions released by human activities are taking a catastrophic toll on the planet, prompting potentially an irreversible climate crisis. As a result, countries and companies have committed to decarbonization initiatives and announced net zero targets. While there are significant climate-related problems that are common across the world, there are some unique challenges and opportunities that are faced by developing economies. IFC India presents an opportunity for students to advance their knowledge of sustainability efforts, decarbonization and net zero in the context of a broader development agenda. The course will address and unpack the fundamentals of decarbonization, the science and impact of net zero, and the need and ways to build a sustainable future. Students will explore the balance of maintaining basic development goals, such as improving infrastructure, reducing poverty, energy access, housing, transport services, water, food security, education, and healthcare —while prioritizing decarbonization and net zero initiatives. This course will integrate learning across BGIE, finance, general management, technology, LCA, CAP and more!

This is a research-based course consisting of case and research-based learning in Boston and field research in India. Students will work in teams of 4-5, focused on a particular research work stream. Potential work streams include energy generation (renewables, cleaner fossil fuels, decentralized solutions, and biomass), mobility, clean-tech, agriculture, urban resilience and adaptation, hard to abate sectors (steel, cement), carbon sequestering, and waste management. Students will be able to select which research work stream they work on and form their own team. In Fall 2025, students will address the opportunities and challenges presented by these work streams during four class sessions. These sessions will include cases, guests, and collaborative student assignments. In January 2026, students will visit 10-12 organizations (including their operating facilities) in Bangalore and Mumbai. These organizations could include private companies and government entities such as the Mumbai Municipal Corporation, Tata Power, JSW Steel, and Unilever, and startups such as Ohmium Green Hydrogen, Ather Mobility, StringBio, and Exponent Energy. We will also focus on rural development and energy access for the poor arranged through organizations such as the SELCO Foundation. The schedule during the Immersion is expected to be intense with quite a bit of road travel so please be prepared for that.

I have been doing business in India for over 30 years. This course will leverage my knowledge of the country and my network with business, government, non-profits, and development agencies to deliver a unique experience for students who not only want to learn more about climate related issues but also want to get a general understanding of doing business in India.

The final product is for each student team to produce a research paper on their work stream based on their research in Boston and the site visits in India.

Course Credit and Fees

Students will receive 3 credits upon successful completion of this course.

HBS will provide logistical support for the immersion (including accommodations, select meals, and local travel arrangements). Students will be charged a course fee towards defraying a portion of these costs. Students are responsible for booking and paying for their own round-trip air travel and any costs associated with required visa documentation and immunizations. Students should ensure adequate processing time for all visas, as travel fees are not refundable if a student does not secure visas on time.

For detailed information about what the course program fee includes and excludes, as well as information about student accommodations, please visit the GEO website or email geo@hbs.edu.

GEO continuously evaluates the safety and logistical feasibility of running Immersive Field Courses in each location. Please be aware that IFCs can be canceled at any time due to changes in global health and safety or other unforeseen circumstances. Students will not be redistributed into another IFC, nor will a new course be developed. Course fees will be refunded.

Copyright © 2025 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Immersive Field Courses: IFCs require a firm commitment and carry a financial obligation. Financial aid is available in the form of a student loan, a need-based HBS scholarship, or a combination of both depending on your individual circumstances. The Add/Drop process at the start of the term is the mechanism for any IFC enrollment changes, and, after that point, the course fee is non-refundable. Refer to the GEO website for full details on IFCs and be sure you understand the Course Policies and Course Fee & Financial Aid. Visit IFC Financial Aid for a quick assessment to determine your eligibility and process or contact finaid@hbs.edu for more information.

Enrollment Capacity: Limited to 45 MBA students (due to the nature of IFCs, auditing is not permitted)

Course Overview

IFC Israel will allow students to explore the Israeli startup ecosystem. Israel has the highest number of startups, venture capital, and patents per capita and over the last 30 years has grown to an exciting innovation and startup community. Students will be asked to work on a go-to-market project with an Israel venture capital-backed startup. The projects will provide an opportunity to integrate learning across a number of areas including finance, general management, technology, marketing, and leadership.

Additionally, working with Israeli companies will provide deep insights into factors that promote innovation ecosystems outside of the United States. Most startups will be Series B or Series C and have developed a product or service. The companies will be across a variety of sectors including cybersecurity, big data, life sciences, consumer products, and social enterprise. Students will rank projects and be assigned to teams in early September. Project work will be remote in the Fall. Students will spend approximately 10 days in January in Israel working on site with the companies. We will also have an opportunity to tour the major cultural and business center of Tel Aviv and explore the historical sites of Jerusalem.

Students will work remotely on the projects in the fall and on the ground in Israel in January during the immersion. The expectation is that field work will be part of the course requirement during the fall semester. Deliverables include a final presentation to senior management on recommendations from the project as well as a five- to ten-page reflection paper on the experience in the IFC.

This will be the sixth year that Professors Gompers and Ruback have taught the Israel IFC.

Course Credit and Fees

Students will receive 3 credits upon successful completion of this course.

HBS will provide logistical support for the immersion (including accommodations, select meals, and local travel arrangements). Students will be charged a course fee towards defraying a portion of these costs. Students are responsible for booking and paying for their own round-trip air travel and any costs associated with required visa documentation and immunizations. Students should ensure adequate processing time for all visas, as travel fees are not refundable if a student does not secure visas on time.

For detailed information about what the course program fee includes and excludes, as well as information about student accommodations, please visit the GEO website or email geo@hbs.edu.

GEO continuously evaluates the safety and logistical feasibility of running Immersive Field Courses in each location. Please be aware that IFCs can be canceled at any time due to changes in global health and safety or other unforeseen circumstances. Students will not be redistributed into another IFC, nor will a new course be developed. Course fees will be refunded.

Copyright © 2025 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Immersive Field Courses: IFCs require a firm commitment and carry a financial obligation. Financial aid is available in the form of a student loan, a need-based HBS scholarship, or a combination of both depending on your individual circumstances. The Add/Drop process at the start of the term is the mechanism for any IFC enrollment changes, and, after that point, the course fee is non-refundable. Refer to the GEO website for full details on IFCs and be sure you understand the Course Policies and Course Fee & Financial Aid. Visit IFC Financial Aid for a quick assessment to determine your eligibility and process or contact finaid@hbs.edu for more information.

Enrollment: Limited to 45 MBA students (due to the nature of IFCs, auditing is not permitted)

Educational Objectives

This is a research-based course. Our objective is to provide students with perspectives and insight into the eighth largest economy in the world. Although it is dominated by SMEs (companies with annual revenues of below €50m make up 82% of the employed population, and account for 92% of the active companies in the national economy), Italy is the second largest manufacturer and the second largest European exporter. Students will learn how Italy’s companies – that include some iconic brands that leverage the powerful “Made in Italy” label - have found a way to compete in a global marketplace through innovation, design, openness to trade, quality, as well as internationalization, and strategic flexibility. Italy’s family capitalism has shown it can evolve and adjust to a changing world. Students will analyze how it has done so even against longstanding structural, macroeconomic, political, and governance issues that have slowed economic growth, especially since the global financial crisis. Having suffered heavily from COVID-19 in part because of its large elderly population (Italy has one of the highest life expectancies in Europe), the country is the largest recipient of funds from the novel €795bn Next Generation EU recovery package that will allow unprecedented investment in digitalization, the green economy, education, and health.

Ranked first in cultural heritage in most rankings and endowed with historical cities, world-renowned cuisine, and geographic beauty, it is one of the top three most visited countries in Europe year in year out, with tourism making up 13% of GDP. Amid such rich cultural heritage lay the foundations of the birth and development of modern capitalism to which Italy has made unique contributions. This course will give a unique and fascinating opportunity to understand and see these first-hand.

Course Content

Classroom Sessions: The course will meet for five on-campus sessions during the fall semester, which will include case discussions and interactive lectures. The goals of the classroom sessions are to (1) provide an overview of the historical evolution and the present business, economic and political situation in Italy, (2) explore examples of how Italian companies innovate and compete, (3) gain an understanding of the structure of the Italian industrial landscape setting, (4) analyze the opportunities and issues of investing in the country and (5) understand the role of Italy in the birth of modern capitalism, including the history of double accounting, banking and its impact on trade and the arts. While on campus, we will visit Baker Library’s Medici Collection, comprising more than 150 ledgers and other manuscript volumes from the late 14^th to the early 18^th century that shed extraordinary light on the business and personal activities of six generations of one branch of Florence’s Medici family.

Immersion in Italy in January: The immersion will take us to Turin, Parma, and Florence. We will be meeting with CEOs, entrepreneurs, investors, historians, economists, and HBS alumni for interactive sessions. We will tour selected companies, factories, and museums.

Deliverables: Students will work in small teams to prepare a group presentation that examines one of the aspects of the course content to be delivered to the entire group at the conclusion of the program. Teams are then expected to submit a written paper (15-20 pages) soon after their return to Boston. Each student is also expected to submit brief thoughts (1 sentence to 1 paragraph) at the end of each day and a one-page reflection paper within one week after returning to campus. Students will be graded on attendance and participation, field work, peer feedback, and all deliverables.

-Class participation, including on immersion, 50%

-Paper (15-20 pages) 40%

-Thought Pieces and Reflection Paper 10%

Please note that this is a full course, and the pace and workload will be reflected in the course itinerary and schedule. During our time in January, there will be long travel days, numerous meetings, and visits to various companies and cultural institutions. Your full participation and engagement will be expected, required, and graded.

Course Credit and Fees

Students will receive 3 credits upon successful completion of this course.

HBS will provide logistical support for the immersion (including accommodations, select meals, and local travel arrangements). Students will be charged a course fee towards defraying a portion of these costs. Students are responsible for booking and paying for their own round-trip air travel and any costs associated with required visa documentation and immunizations. Students should ensure adequate processing time for all visas, as travel fees are not refundable if a student does not secure visas on time.

For detailed information about what the course program fee includes and excludes, as well as information about student accommodations, please visit the GEO website or email geo@hbs.edu.

GEO continuously evaluates the safety and logistical feasibility of running Immersive Field Courses in each location. Please be aware that IFCs can be canceled at any time due to changes in global health and safety or other unforeseen circumstances. Students will not be redistributed into another IFC, nor will a new course be developed. Course fees will be refunded.

Copyright © 2024 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Immersive Field Courses: IFCs require a firm commitment and carry a financial obligation. Financial aid is available in the form of a student loan, a need-based HBS scholarship, or a combination of both depending on your individual circumstances. The Add/Drop process at the start of the term is the mechanism for any IFC enrollment changes, and, after that point, the course fee is non-refundable. Refer to the GEO website for full details on IFCs and be sure you understand the Course Policies and Course Fee & Financial Aid. Visit IFC Financial Aid for a quick assessment to determine your eligibility and process or contact finaid@hbs.edu for more information.

Enrollment: Limited to 45 MBA students (due to the nature of IFCs, auditing is not permitted)

Career Focus

This course will expose students to Japan as a nurturing ground for both developing as well as enhancing the uptake of innovative products, services, and business strategies. This course will appeal to students who wish to acquire an understanding of alternative leadership styles and business models aimed at simultaneously creating economic and societal value. Through project work with a diverse range of business partners, from established corporations to burgeoning startups, students will have an opportunity to gain practical insights into Japan’s unique business ecosystem. This hands-on experience is invaluable for students aspiring to become leaders adept at navigating and leveraging diverse business landscapes for societal and economic benefit.

Educational Objectives

From cutting-edge robotics to technological art, from big data to nano-devices, Japan has become a hub for innovative projects that, despite their seemingly unconventional nature, have achieved considerable success. This course will expose students to a diverse range of pioneering organizations and business models, with the aim of achieving four learning objectives.

Firstly, the course provides students with firsthand experiences and insights into the distinctive challenges and opportunities of conducting business and introducing innovation in Japan. Secondly, it demonstrates how innovation can emerge and diffuse by combining novel business models and marketing strategies. Thirdly, students will have the opportunity to learn from social entrepreneurs and intrapreneurs who have developed innovations with a social purpose. Finally, the course will expose students to Japanese culture and traditions, allowing them to gain a deeper appreciation of a unique society.

Course Content and Model

Overview and Introduction: Students enrolled in the Immersive Field Course: Japan will work in small teams to undertake a project with an organization based in the Tokyo area. The course will meet for four on-campus sessions to (1) provide students with a basic understanding of the Japanese innovation ecosystem, (2) highlight some of the challenges and opportunities faced by businesses trying to bring innovation to market in Japan, (3) discuss how some emerging business models and marketing strategies lend themselves to new forms of organizing, and (4) allow time for student teams to work together, engage with their project partners to define and scope the projects that will take place in January, and to prepare for travel.

Projects: By the start of the course, project partners will have submitted a brief description of the business problem they would like students to address during the immersion. Before the second on-campus session, student teams will be formed. We will do our best to allocate students to their preferred project partners. In the period from October to December, student teams will engage in conversations and early work with project partners (scope the project, request/receive additional information, conduct telephone or Zoom interviews, develop early hypotheses, develop a work plan, etc.) in preparation for the field work that will take place in Japan. While in Japan, student teams will visit and work closely with their project partners in Tokyo. Students have the opportunity to assess the market/organizational environment by talking to customers, suppliers, government officials, and related organizations, as needed. Project teams will develop a set of recommendations before the last day of the immersion.

Deliverables: Student teams will present their recommendations to the project partners. In addition, each student will present their personal take-aways at a Capstone event. Final grades will consider: (i) participation and attendance during the four class sessions in the Fall semester, as well as in Japan; (ii) engagement with project partners; (iii) on-site activities in Tokyo and Tohoku; (iv) feedback from partner organizations and peers on project work; and (v) a final report.

Tours: Students will have the opportunity to take part in company visits as well as various cultural activities in Tokyo and the Tohoku region throughout their stay in Japan. Students will come to appreciate unique business protocols practiced in Japanese companies - e.g., exchange of name cards, silence in elevators, empathy to co-workers, being on time, etc. - that contribute to Japan’s unique approach to innovation and entrepreneurship.

Accommodations and Activities: Students will experience two different types of accommodations. In Tokyo, where the majority of overnights will take place, students will stay at a modern hotel in Central Tokyo. Students will take the bullet-train (Shinkansen) to the Tohoku region, where they will stay at a traditional Japanese ryokan. They will soak in hot spring baths (Onsen) and eat dinner wearing a yukata. Students will engage in volunteer work during their stay in Tohoku, as well as advise local social entrepreneurs and NPOs. Students will also have opportunities for other cultural activities in Tokyo, such as visiting live practice of sumo wrestlers.

Course Credit and Fees

Students will receive 3 credits upon successful completion of this course.

HBS will provide logistical support for the immersion (including accommodations, select meals, and local travel arrangements). Students will be charged a course fee towards defraying a portion of these costs. Students are responsible for booking and paying for their own round-trip air travel and any costs associated with required visa documentation and immunizations. Students should ensure adequate processing time for all visas, as travel fees are not refundable if a student does not secure visas on time.

For detailed information about what the course program fee includes and excludes, as well as information about student accommodations, please visit the GEO website or email geo@hbs.edu.

GEO continuously evaluates the safety and logistical feasibility of running Immersive Field Courses in each location. Please be aware that IFCs can be canceled at any time due to changes in global health and safety or other unforeseen circumstances. Students will not be redistributed into another IFC, nor will a new course be developed. Course fees will be refunded.

Copyright © 2024 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Immersive Field Courses: IFCs require a firm commitment and carry a financial obligation. Financial aid is available in the form of a student loan, a need-based HBS scholarship, or a combination of both depending on your individual circumstances. The Add/Drop process at the start of the term is the mechanism for any IFC enrollment changes, and, after that point, the course fee is non-refundable. Refer to the GEO website for full details on IFCs and be sure you understand the Course Policies and Course Fee & Financial Aid. Visit IFC Financial Aid for a quick assessment to determine your eligibility and process or contact finaid@hbs.edu for more information.

Enrollment: Limited to 45 MBA students (due to the nature of IFCs, auditing is not permitted)

Educational Objectives:

Saudi Arabia, the largest economy in the Middle East, is implementing its hugely ambitious Vision 2030 initiative, which aims to transform the nation and diversify its economy away from oil dependency. This transition entails massive change for the country, along multiple dimensions. The nation has also elevated its prominence on the global stage. While Saudi Arabia has tended to be seen through a set of limited lenses in the West, like any other society it is multifaceted and should be understood through diverse lenses.

Over the past few years, the country has poured enormous resources towards diversifying sources of economic growth away from petrochemicals. Societal change has been rapid in some dimensions – exhilarating and sometimes disconcerting – and on others has been glacially slow. This has triggered new entrepreneurial opportunities as well as identified some vulnerabilities for entrepreneurs, incumbent enterprises, and financiers.

Emerging sectors such as tourism, media, hospitality, entertainment, mining, metals, finance, and digital technologies, including fintech, AI, and clean energy, are gaining prominence, and this diversification opens doors for innovation and investment.

This Immersive Field Course presents a unique opportunity for students to explore first-hand the breadth, and the nuances, of Saudi Arabia's transformation. Through discussions, on-site visits, and interactions with alumni, companies and business leaders, and government officials, students will gain perspective on the Kingdom's trajectory, opportunities and challenges.

Course Focus and Format:

Five sessions will be held on campus in the fall. These sessions—which will include case discussions, non-case readings, guest speakers and panel discussions—will help prepare students for their in-country experiences. These sessions will explore the business and economic setting, along with aspects of the social and geopolitical context. They will also introduce students to frameworks for better understanding the broader institutional context they will encounter. Students will grapple with the extent to which lessons from their RC courses can either transfer over to the Gulf context, or need to be adapted. Professor Khanna’s work on Contextual Intelligence will be a central part of these discussions.

While students’ learning during the Saudi Arabia Immersion will be broad by design, they will also be organized into teams of 5-6 students, with each team focusing part of its learning (and ultimately writing a report) on a particular agreed theme.

Students will be in Riyadh for most of the Immersion, but will also travel as a cohort to Jeddah to continue to explore course themes.

Course Faculty:

Professor Tarun Khanna

My work for three decades at HBS and Harvard has been purely about economic development in emerging markets, typically through an entrepreneurial lens. An article I wrote in HBR in 2014, “Contextual Intelligence,” is used as part of the preparation for RC students in FGI, and I expect will be one of the conceptual anchors for this IFC. Similarly, frameworks that I have developed for competing in emerging markets, some with Krishna Palepu and then with dozens of PhD students over the years will be used in the Fall preparatory sessions for this IFC.

Senior Lecturer Andy Zelleke

I have previously led eight FIELD Global Immersion cohorts, including most recently the School’s first Cairo cohort. I currently serve as the Faculty Chair of the HBS Middle East, North Africa & Central Asia Research Center.

Grading:

20% - Fall interim presentation

20% - January pre-trip submission

60% - Team final paper and individual reflection paper

Course Credit and Fees:

Students will receive 3 credits upon successful completion of this course.

HBS will provide logistical support for the immersion (including hotel accommodations, select meals, and local travel arrangements). Students will be charged a course fee to help defray a portion of these costs. Students are responsible for booking and paying for their own round-trip air travel and any costs associated with required visa documentation and immunizations. Students should ensure adequate processing time for all visas, as travel fees are not refundable if a student does not secure visas on time.

For detailed information about what the course program fee includes and excludes, as well as information about student accommodations, please visit the GEO website or email geo@hbs.edu.

GEO continuously evaluates the safety and logistical feasibility of running Immersive Field Courses in each location. Please be aware that IFCs can be canceled at any time due to changes in global health and safety or other unforeseen circumstances. Students will not be redistributed into another IFC, nor will a new course be developed. Course fees will be refunded.

Copyright © 2024 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Immersive Field Courses: IFCs require a firm commitment and carry a financial obligation. Financial aid is available in the form of a student loan, a need-based HBS scholarship, or a combination of both depending on your individual circumstances. The Add/Drop process at the start of the term is the mechanism for any IFC enrollment changes, and, after that point, the course fee is non-refundable. Refer to the GEO website for full details on IFCs and be sure you understand the Course Policies and Course Fee & Financial Aid. Visit IFC Financial Aid for a quick assessment to determine your eligibility and process or contact finaid@hbs.edu for more information.

Enrollment: Limited to 45 MBA students (due to the nature of IFCs, auditing is not permitted)

Enrollment Capacity: Limited to 45 MBA students (due to the nature of IFCs, auditing is not permitted)

Course Overview

Twenty-five years ago, the Internet changed the landscape of the tech sector. Nearly every category incumbent across B2B and B2C was disrupted by Internet-first startups that dominate today’s “most valuable companies” list. Will history repeat itself as we enter the age of AI? Will a new cohort of native AI startups reshape the tech sector? Or will the incumbents maintain their leadership positions?

In this course, “Disrupting Silicon Valley with Artificial Intelligence”, we will explore these questions. During the Fall, students will be assembled into teams of 6-8 and assigned to an AI research project submitted by one of our sponsor companies. Last year’s projects were submitted by OpenAI, Waymo, NVIDIA, LinkedIn, HubSpot, Meta. Students will meet regularly throughout the fall with Professor Roberge to discuss research findings and brainstorm potential implications.

We will conclude the research phase of the course in early January and travel to Silicon Valley to present our findings to executives from these companies and meet with AI thought leaders in the region. Past guests include:

• Jay Puri (COO, NVIDIA)
• Tekedra Mawakana (CEO, Waymo)
• Dmitry Shevelenko (CBO, Perplexity)
• Aliisa Rosenthal (Head of Sales at OpenAI)
• Dylan Field (Founder/CEO, Figma)
• Drew Houston (Founder/CEO of Dropbox)
• Yamini Rangan (CEO, HubSpot)
• Ryan Roslansky (CEO, LinkedIn)
• Scott Belsky (CSO, Adobe)
• Frederick Kerrest (co-founder of Okta)
• Sid Sidbrandij (Founder, CEO of GitLab)

Course credit and fees

Students will receive 3 credits upon successful completion of this course.

HBS will provide logistical support for the immersion (including accommodations, select meals, and local travel arrangements). Students will be charged a course fee of GEO will input fee towards defraying a portion of these costs. Students are responsible for booking and paying for their own round-trip air travel and any costs associated with required visa documentation and immunizations. Students should ensure adequate processing time for all visas, as travel fees are not refundable if a student does not secure visas on time.

For detailed information about what the course program fee includes and excludes, as well as information about student accommodations, please visit the GEO website or email geo@hbs.edu.

GEO continuously evaluates the safety and logistical feasibility of running Immersive Field Courses in each location. Please be aware that IFCs can be canceled at any time due to changes in global health and safety or other unforeseen circumstances. Students will not be redistributed into another IFC, nor will a new course be developed. Course fees will be refunded.

*Note: Students can enroll in this IFC and Professor Roberge’s Entrepreneurial Sales 101 course. The course meeting times do not conflict.

Copyright © 2024 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Immersive Field Courses: IFCs require a firm commitment and carry a financial obligation. Financial aid is available in the form of a student loan, a need-based HBS scholarship, or a combination of both depending on your individual circumstances. The Add/Drop process at the start of the term is the mechanism for any IFC enrollment changes, and, after that point, the course fee is non-refundable. Refer to the GEO website for full details on IFCs and be sure you understand the Course Policies and Course Fee & Financial Aid. Visit IFC Financial Aid for a quick assessment to determine your eligibility and process or contact finaid@hbs.edu for more information.

Enrollment: Limited to 45 MBA students (due to the nature of IFCs, auditing is not permitted)

Career Focus

The course will expose participants to the environment in Singapore, offering an in-depth exploration of the

country's ecosystem with particular focus on the government’s efforts to facilitate an innovation hub that is

durable and relevant. The course is specifically designed to expose and evaluate the government’s role in fostering Innovation. We will also examine the role of Singapore in the evolving geopolitical environment. We will spend time on the various ways in which the Singapore Government has helped create the infrastructure, workforce, policies and incentives that attract entrepreneurs and private investors.

How much government support is enough? Is there a point at which support stifles innovation? How sustainable is the level of support?

The course will address these questions, examining the challenges of ensuring growth and long-term success on a global stage. Through interactions with government entities, investors, startups, multinational companies and academic centers, students will gain comprehensive insights into how each pillar functions. Our meetings will contemplate Singapore’s position in the APAC region, explore the role of its diverse population, stability, and transparency relative to other markets. We have secured a strong lineup of speakers, each leaders in their respective fields, to offer students a broad range of perspectives as they engage with the coursework.

Educational Objectives

Through immersing students in Singapore’s burgeoning biotech and technology innovation landscape and assessing the role of government programs and financial investment in driving this growth, exploration, and learning will center on a few key questions:

• The State of Singapore – How does the country’s industrial policy work?
• Singapore’s industrial policy has attempted to catalyze its innovation economy. How has this worked in practice and how will Singapore attract, retain, and develop top talent? Are its education and immigration policies sufficient to support this growth?
• What impact does Singapore’s geographic location have on its growth?
• As a strategic hub in the Asia-Pacific region, how does Singapore's position enhance its appeal to global businesses and investors? Is there an arbitrage on China, and will Singapore have to pick sides?
• What is Singapore's five-year and ten-year vision, and what are the potential advantages and challenges?
• How do students assess Singapore's strategic goals over the medium and long-term horizon?
• What are the likely advantages and challenges that will emerge as the country aims to further cement its role as a global hub?
• For the individual companies we visit throughout the course, how do Singapore’s policies and attributes help or impede their missions?

Course Content and Model

Overview and Introduction: In Fall 2025, we will hold approximately three sessions to provide students with a foundational understanding of Singapore’s rapidly expanding innovation landscape, framed around the government, finance, technology and biotech sectors. These sessions will highlight both the opportunities and challenges of launching and operating a venture within the region. Experts from Singapore’s private and public sectors will share their insights, offering a balanced perspective. The Fall classes will cover (preliminary): political history, geopolitical positioning, business environment and economic development, public/private partnerships and key sectors with a focus on information technology and biotechnology.

Upon arrival in Singapore in January, student teams will partner with one of the four pillars. Throughout the week, they will attend meetings across all four pillars while getting to know and working for their assigned entity and engaging with its representatives. At the end of the week, each team will present their findings, focusing principally on the role the region has played, on how their entity is influenced positively and negatively in the Singapore ecosystem and its intercross with the other pillars. The cohort will reconvene and present their view of the ecosystem to representatives.

Deliverables: Each student will present their personal take-aways at a Capstone event. Final grades will consider: (i) participation and attendance during the class sessions in the Fall semester, as well as in Singapore; (ii) engagement with project partners; (iii) on-site activities; (iv) feedback from organizations; and (v) a final report.

Tours: Students will have the opportunity to take part in company and government visits as well as various cultural activities. Students will come to appreciate the unique operating environment in Singapore.

Course Credit and Fees

Students will receive 3 credits upon successful completion of this course.

HBS will provide logistical support for the immersion (including accommodations, select meals, and local travel arrangements). Students will be charged a course fee towards defraying a portion of these costs. Students are responsible for booking and paying for their own round-trip air travel and any costs associated with required visa documentation and immunizations. Students should ensure adequate processing time for all visas, as travel fees are not refundable if a student does not secure visas on time.

For detailed information about what the course program fee includes and excludes, as well as information about student accommodations, please visit the GEO website or email geo@hbs.edu.

GEO continuously evaluates the safety and logistical feasibility of running Immersive Field Courses in each location. Please be aware that IFCs can be canceled at any time due to changes in global health and safety or other unforeseen circumstances. Students will not be redistributed into another IFC, nor will a new course be developed. Course fees will be refunded.

Copyright © 2025 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Overview:

Innovating inside established organizations is no easy feat. It is difficult to do something new when it breaks with traditional ways of working, potentially cannibalizes existing sources of revenue or involves risky and uncertain investments. History is littered with established companies (Blockbuster, Kodak, etc) that failed to meet these challenges and innovate.

This course centers on how to innovate within established organizations. The goal is to enhance students’ understanding of when, how and with whom to innovate following a generalizable roadmap. Through the semester, we will couple learning foundational concepts and principles about innovating at scale with frameworks that will helps students build their careers within established organizations.

Classes will mix case discussion, expert panels, and exercises (exercises will focus on developing a vision for innovation and persuading others to support innovative ideas)

Career Focus:

This course is tailored towards students looking to work (1) in established organizations within general management, strategy, corporate venture and innovation groups; (2) as strategy consults who will serve clients in these roles; (3) in private equity portfolio companies, as an operator. This class is also geared towards students who are interested in building skills that will help them persuade others of their innovative ideas.

Educational Objectives:

This course has three overarching learning objectives. Students will learn:

• When to be a first mover and innovate and when to strategically imitate and follow others in the market
• How to build capabilities to innovate inside established organizations across varying types of innovation (product, process and business model)
• How to partner with others through alliances, CVCs, strategic partnerships, to foster innovation

Course Content and Organization:

This course will have three modules that support the key learning objectives of the class:

Module 1: When to innovate

Class 1: The power of strategic imitation

Class 2: Dominant design and 2^nd mover advantages

Class 3: First mover advantage

Class 4: Exercise on crafting your vision for innovation by asking the right questions

Module 2: How to innovate

Class 5: Managing creative and innovative teams

Class 6: Developing innovative capabilities

Class 7: Geographic footprints and the location of innovative capabilities

Class 8: Buy vs. build decisions

Class 9: Exercise on persuasion and how to convince others in your company to support your idea

Module 3: Who to innovate with

Class 10: Assessing the benefits and disadvantages of alliances

Class 11: How to develop and run a corporate venture capital fund

Class 12: When and how to partner with startups

Class 13: When and how to partner with customers

Class 14: Summary and panel on careers

Scope:

Spans multiple industries including the following: beauty, gaming, sports, climate and energy, industrials, finance, military, technology, health and scientific fields, creative industries.

Grading / Course Administration

Grading will be based on participation and a take home final (50/50)

Copyright © 2025 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Executive Fellows

Lee Kaplan

Brian Walker

Overview and Requirements

Problems with health care quality, access, and costs bedevil all countries. The health care sector—inefficient, erratic in quality and access, ripe for massive technological and consumer-facing innovations—is one of the largest sectors that can be transformed with innovation.

The purpose of this course is to leverage the students in creating these innovations by focusing on how to make them happen. The students—with diverse backgrounds, or none—in the field, form a lifelong network.

The course follows a “how to” framework for the following four organizational stages of the three types of health care innovations: technology-commercializing, cost-controlling, and consumer-facing.

1. Evaluating
2. Starting
3. Scaling
4. Exiting

It is entirely taught through current field-based cases in all aspects of health care—digital, technological, service, and insurance. The CEOs of the firms depicted in the case studies typically attend the class. It is supplemented with optional pedagogical videos (e.g., reimbursement).

Course Requirements

Students prepare a business plan, which uses the framework of this course, for an organization that is a technology-commercializing, consumer- facing, or cost-controlling innovation.

The course offers advisers from other HU schools—HMS, SEAS, KSG, SPH, CS; established health care firms; legal/regulatory/reimbursement experts; and VC/PE investors.

Career Focus

For students interested in careers in managing, consulting, and investing in innovative health care/life sciences firms or creating innovative health care services, health insurance, health IT, digital health, consumer-based innovations, or medical technology.

Educational Objectives

Innovating in Health Care (IHC) enables students to create successful innovative health care ventures that respond to the massive opportunities created by the escalating cost and uneven quality and access of health care systems globally.

Innovating in Health Care (IHC) enables students to:

• Identify the one primary purpose of the innovation—technology-commercializing, consumer-facing, or cost-controlling.
• Learn the differing organizational, financing, accountability, technology, and consumer characteristics of virtually every major kind of health care organization.
• Understand how to align the innovation with the Six Factors that critically influence this kind of innovation—structure (the status quo), financing (who pays for what and why), technology, consumers, accountability, and public policy.
• Create business models that respond appropriately to any Six Factors misalignments and that feature the strategy, financing, management, and organizational structure appropriate for that kind of innovation.
• Learn the key factors in the four stages of growth of innovative health care ventures: evaluation of initial idea; starting up; scaling up; and exiting.

The field-based cases in Innovating in Health Care cover every part of the health care sector, including bricks and mortar primary care centers, insurance, virtual health care services, AI, digital health, medical devices, biopharma, diagnostics, payment and delivery intermediaries, telemedicine, DTC and PBM pharmaceutical delivery, and SaMD. The course has a global focus with case studies set in Africa and the U.S. Its cases discuss startups, firms that are scaling up, established firms that are recreating themselves, and firms that are contemplating exits.

The CEO of the firm described in the case study typically attends the session.

Content and Organization

The course is organized into four modules, taught through field-based cases and summary notes by Prof. Herzlinger and the Teaching Team.

The first module, Innovating in Health Care, discusses the opportunities and risks for health care innovations and introduces students to the analytic framework of the Six Factors that critically shape innovative health care ventures and their impact on business models for three different kinds of health care innovations: consumer-focused, technology-commercializing, and cost-controllers. Students present their ideas for innovative health care business models for feedback from their classmates. The second module discusses case studies of health care startups. A panel on payment elucidates the process of coverage, coding, and payment in the U.S. and the varieties of cost effectiveness analyses used in many other developed countries to determine the price.

The third module contains cases of innovative healthcare firms that are scaling up in medical technology, health insurance and delivery, digital health, and associated intermediaries.

The fourth module contains cases of firms contemplating various forms of exit. Students present their business plans for feedback.

Prof. Herzlinger has founded a number of successful, entrepreneurial health care firms that have saved hundreds of thousands of lives; served on the Boards of directors of many large, public health care firms; written a number of best-selling books on health care entrepreneurialism and the health care plan of a U.S. presidential candidate; and often testified in the U.S. Congress.

Business Plan Requirements

Students prepare a business plan, which employs the IHC Framework, to create an entrepreneurial opportunity in health care.

Some ideas for projects are posted on the course platform, but you can devise your own project, as well, after Prof. Herzlinger and the Teaching Team approves it. Students frequently form teams with fellow MBAs and cross registrants, a significant number of which continue as ongoing businesses (for example, the Phreesia (PHR) case study: https://www.hbs.edu/faculty/Pages/item.aspx?num=38231).

For an optional catered session, you will prepare a 5-minute presentation of your business plan idea for a health care innovation. Those presenting will email the presentation materials the day before your presentation.

Your business plan should cover the following topics:

• The type of opportunity
• Six Factors alignment
• The business model
• Next steps

Grading

Students are reminded of the Class Absence and Remote Attendance Policy.

Class participation and the business plan will account for a significant percentage of the grade.

Copyright © 2025 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Overview:

Long-term success hinges on both innovation—creating something new—and renovation—reinvigorating what already works. This course tackles a critical yet often overlooked question: How do you sustain and expand a product or service’s impact over time, rather than just launching “the next big thing”?

Educational Objectives:

Drawing on the spirit of former Coca-Cola CMO Sergio Zyman’s perspective on “renovation”—keeping an offering’s essence intact while re-energizing it for greater impact—we will ask ourselves how to:

• Assess the quality of an innovation. Develop a framework to assess whether a new product or service will truly connect with consumers and stakeholders.
• Market to maximize reach and longevity. Craft strategies that not only drive adoption but also sustain relevance in evolving competitive landscapes.
• Manage a product life cycle. Lead offerings through continuous renovation to ensure they stay fresh and profitable as consumer needs shift.

Career Focus:

Students looking at careers with any element of product management, marketing, business strategy, and innovation will learn essential frameworks and tools that will serve as a compass for decision making. The course will also be of interest to investors and stakeholders who need to assess the possible impact of these decisions.

The course is appropriate for students anticipating a career in which sensing opportunity for new products/services/business models and successfully bringing those ideas to market are key activities --- corresponding to the “innovation” part of the course title.

Another key feature of the course is that it addresses the notion of “renovation” of the product line over time. We seek out to understand how to successfully manage and sustain a company and the product life cycle over time for long-term success. The course will cover a wide variety of contexts and thus be useful for those starting their own companies or joining an established organization.

Course Content and Organization

The course is organized around four modules. Many of the cases were newly developed within the last past few years. These are augmented by several “classic” cases which have served as the foundation of courses on product policy at a host of business schools and companies around the world.

For many discussions, we will take a longitudinal look, i.e. examining the evolution of a story, rather than just a snapshot. Accordingly, there are many (B) case class handouts and/or slides to uncover the trajectory of the story.

MODULE 1: Why “AND” renovation? The Challenge of Market Evolution

This module maps out the key issues of the course focusing on the importance of the management of the product line over time. We will gain the dynamic perspective of assessing and understanding the development/trajectory of companies and products/services over time --- and the need for innovation AND renovation as a company evolves.

We discuss a case on Peloton in which the company nicely creates a category --- in class we will delve into later developments. We also cover the full history of Apple’s MP3 player, the iPod, which some have called “The Perfect Thing,” as well as the trajectory of the Pokemon Company, which has been able to sustain the popularity of the franchise for several decades. Our discussion into Carvana’s pioneering of the entirely on-line car buying experience sets the stage for our subsequent discussion into when and how to effectively innovation, and when and how to renovate.

MODULE 2: Sensing and Assessing Market Opportunity.

In this model, we will set out to understand useful approaches to judging the opportunity for success as well as familiarize ourselves with basic theoretical perspectives on the product life cycle. Cases discussed include Casper Sleep, a DTC mattress company, that sought to evolve over time from a single mattress offering to the “Nike of Sleep.” Patch attempted to make a marketplace for carbon credits, and sought to expand its scale and scope.

These examples demonstrate how assessing marketing opportunities comes hand-in-hand with foresight for perspective growth and subsequent renovation. Questions we discuss in this module include: What are the sources of marketing capital that companies and brands can use to successfully launch --- as well as subsequently renovate --- their products? How can one best learn quickly at the concept stage about the subsequent likely trajectory of a product or service?

MODULE 3: Product Line Extensions

Product lines tend to get longer over time: extending lines are part of the tool kit necessary in managing a product or service over time, and in satisfying customer needs more precisely and blocking competitive advances. Cases include Evernote, an online notetaking app. We will discuss the company’s reconfiguration of its product line and pricing in response to changes in the competitive landscape and consumer needs.

Some questions we consider in this module include: When does a product need a refresh? How long should the product line be? When should one worry about cannibalization? When not? How far can one stretch a brand?

MODULE 4: Product Line Breadth/Extending the Brand

While Module 3 examines line evolution within a given category, Module 4 looks at evolution of the company’s offering across product categories. Cases include Topgolf as it extends from its golf range/bar/entertainment complexes into related categories, e.g. golf simulators leased to hotels and casinos and “pop up” events at major sports stadiums.

We will continue to emphasize both empirical and theoretical perspectives to gain a grounded understanding of questions such as: Can companies manage the portfolio so that the different categories are complementary rather than competing? How far can one stretch a brand as it expands in scope?

The four modules taken together provide a comprehensive look at both the Innovation and Renovation of the product line over time, as well as at how to Optimize the Product Line Architecture.

Grading / Course Administration:

Grading will be based 50% class participation and 50% a final exam.

Copyright © 2025 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Course Overview

This is a course about exploiting the opportunities created by the emergence of a global economy and managing the risks that globalization entails. All managers now face a business environment where international, macroeconomic, and political phenomena matter. Understanding the genesis of financial and currency crises, stock market booms and busts, social and labor unrest, the rise of populism, and major swings in politics and policies is a crucial aspect in taking informed managerial decisions. Adverse macroeconomic and political phenomena can have a catastrophic impact on firm performance: witness the strong companies destroyed by the Mexican tequila crisis and those damaged by recent protests around the globe. Yet, such episodes also create business opportunities – and not just for the hedge funds and speculators that profit from them. Managers that have and use a coherent framework for understanding and analyzing these phenomena will enjoy a competitive advantage.

Career Focus

Internationally oriented careers; careers in global financial management; senior executive jobs; careers in policy-making.

Educational Objectives

The educational objectives of the IMaGE course are threefold.

First, the course aims to provide participants with a basic understanding of how contemporary macroeconomics explains dramatic events in the international economy, such as recurrent banking and financial crises in several countries. Much of this explanation focuses on the role of confidence, expectations, and crowd psychology. These factors result in aggregate behavior - e.g., demand in the U.S. economy as a whole - behaving in a different manner than would be suggested by simply summing individual behavior. This, in turn, justifies the establishment of macroeconomics as a separate discipline, distinct from microeconomics with its focus on individual firm and household decisions.

Second, the course discusses how institutions can be developed which focus the uncoordinated actions of individual households and firms as well as voters and politicians on good, rather than bad, overall outcomes. Such institutions are key determinants of macroeconomic and political outcomes. In some countries, legal, political, and economic institutions are able to coordinate private decisions on stable and productive paths. Where institutional development is weak - as seems to be the case in much of the developing world - private actions are poorly coordinated and the result is greater macroeconomic volatility, higher political risk, and slower growth. Understanding what constitute good institutions and how institutions influence economic and political behavior is therefore crucial.

Finally, the course is intended to develop a simple framework linking institutional design and macroeconomic performance. This framework can be used to evaluate how globalization is likely to change the performance of specific markets and thus assess the associated risks and opportunities.

Course Content and Organization

Most of the cases and class discussions focus on the country level, although several cases look at specific sectors (e.g., the retail industry in Chile, or the startup sector in Israel) or particular policies (inflation targeting in Brazil), and others span multiple countries (Chinese investments in Africa, or climate change). The course itself consists of four modules.

The first module ("Macroeconomic and Financial Dynamics") uses the experience of a famous economist (John Maynard Keynes) and several countries which have suffered through tremendous economic dislocation to identify and develop the issues of communication, confidence, coordination, and institutional development that are central to the remainder of the course. It investigates the mechanisms underlying recent macroeconomic and financial crises and explores their institutional underpinnings as well as their economic and political consequences. Representative cases include the Mexico Tequila crisis of 1994-95; Populism, banking crises, and exchange rate crises in Argentina; and Uganda and the Washington Consensus.

The second module ("Competing Institutional Models") studies how the U.S. and other rich countries have developed institutional structures permitting the coordination of individual business decisions on good economic outcomes, as well as their influences on macroeconomic policy design and performance. Moreover, it demonstrates how institutional differences across countries ultimately rest in differences in norms and beliefs, and explores how changes in the environment can render previously successful institutional structures outmoded, thereby creating both opportunities and risks for firms and households. Representative cases include Margaret Thatcher and the Blair wealth project; Latvia navigating the strait of Messina; Eliot Spitzer pushing Wall Street to reform; and Israel between the oligarchs and the startup nation.

The third module (“Politics: Influence and Unrest”) studies the dynamics leading to the creation and fissuring of political consensus on institutions, broad policy orientations, and specific policies. It gives special attention to the role of information influencing politicians’ choice of policy and the people’s preferences, as well as factors generating information bias. It explores the interactions between all stakeholders influencing policy-making (ruling elites, companies, media, and the people) and their impact on business. Representative cases include Lobbying in the chemical industry in the U.S.; Unrest in Chile, Looting at Walmart International; and Dominion Voting Systems v. Fox News.

The fourth module ("The Future of Globalization") uses the macroeconomic and political economy tools and insights built in the previous modules to study the latest trends in globalization and their effects. It discusses how the increasing integration of international trade and of the global capital markets can affect the economic performance and generate political turmoil within previously successful and stable nations by undermining the internal coherence of the institutional structures on which their economic performance rested and the policy options available to them. Representative cases include the Trans-Pacific Partnership; Goodbye IMF conditions, hello Chinese capital: Zambia’s copper industry and Africa’s break with its colonial past; the 2012 Spanish labor reform; and Climate change: Paris, and the road ahead.

Copyright © 2024 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

IMCM is suitable for all students interested in gaining a broad perspective on investing and the asset management business. This includes both those targeting careers in asset management and those interested in learning how to manage effectively their personal wealth, current and future. This course aims at de-mystifying the world of investing as a black box full of incomprehensive complexity. While talent has a nature component, it also has an important nurture component. Investing is within the reach of any creative, motivated, well-trained individual – every student in the school.

The course has an eminently practice-oriented focus. Its main objective is to develop a framework for investing through the evaluation of specific investment decisions and opportunities across a wide array of public and private markets. Students learn how to evaluate any investment opportunity and, just as importantly, how to enhance value and how to build a deal flow, while developing the specific analytical tools that apply in each market and type of situation.

Students get a broad understanding of capital markets, assets classes, investing styles, and instruments (equity markets, bond markets, credit markets, real estate, privates, active and index investing, value and growth investing, activism, ESG investing, tail risk hedging, futures and swaps, etc.).

Students also explore investing from the asset owner perspective, learning modern practices in portfolio construction for personal and institutional investors (family offices, endowments, pension funds, and sovereign wealth funds). They examine portfolio construction and risk management, identification of investment talent and skill, investment vehicles, and costs (types of fees, taxes, etc.).

This course makes special emphasis on being current and on hearing directly from investors. The average age of each case in this course is short and sessions on capital markets and asset classes are updated every year. Classes often feature guest speakers to help students develop an up-close perspective on the issues raised in the case discussion and enhance students’ skills in investment decision making.

Copyright © 2025 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Career Focus

Global capital markets are vast and dynamic, with over $100 trillion in listed public equities and more than $300 trillion in sovereign and corporate bonds outstanding. Every day, public markets set prices for CEOs and CFOs, financial institutions, and investors, all seeking to raise and invest money in a way that drives the economy forward. A public exit - whether through an initial public offering of common stock or a stock-financed merger with an already public acquirer - remains a critical step in corporate transformation by private equity investors and innovation by venture capitalists. Because public capital markets play such a key role in the global economy, government regulators and policy makers continually monitor their health and pay heed to the signals they are sending.

Investment Strategies is most directly applicable to students interested in pursuing careers in finance including mutual funds, hedge funds, pension funds, endowments, wealth management, financial consulting, marketing and client service, sales and trading, investment banking, private equity, venture capital, and corporate finance. However, many students have found that a thorough understanding of public capital markets and the business of investment management is valuable in a wider set of careers outside of finance and in managing their personal wealth.

The focus of Investment Strategies is financial markets, principally equity markets, taking the perspective of an institutional portfolio manager and considering the efficacy of value investing, arbitrage, and other active investment strategies.

Educational Objectives

The goal of this course is for you to develop an investment philosophy, a set of guiding principles that shape your approach to understanding and investing in public capital markets. While this philosophy is directly applicable to professional investment management, it is also relevant for corporate finance, investment banking, and personal finance. A cornerstone of any investment philosophy is a view on the efficiency of markets.

An efficient market is one where prices reflect true fundamental values. In an efficient market, there is little value in the selection of individual securities. Higher returns come only from bearing greater risk. Investing in efficient markets means minimizing transaction costs and choosing maximally diversified portfolios that deliver an optimal tradeoff between risk and return.

An inefficient market, by contrast, is one where prices differ - sometimes substantially - from fundamental values. These deviations from fundamental value create opportunities and risks for sophisticated investors in both security selection and asset allocation.

Content and Organization

The course is organized into two parts. The first part develops a conceptual framework for the functioning of markets, spread over three topics:

• Introduction to Public Market Investing
• Market Efficiency and Arbitrage
• Trade Execution

The second part puts these ideas into practice, examining specific investment philosophies and strategies such as:

• Value Investing
• Distressed Situations
• Asset Value Investing
• Short Selling
• Activism

The materials consist of cases, class polls, and a textbook. A number of classes are built around visits from successful and well-known money managers.

Copyright © 2023 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

The MS/MBA Capstone is an intensive project that requires teams of students to apply and integrate the skills they have learned across core disciplines developed in the program curriculum. Specifically, teams will be expected to design, build and launch a new technology-based product/service venture, and thereby to demonstrate mastery with respect to three areas of knowledge: Design Knowledge: The use of human-centered design methods to understand users, identify solutions to their needs, and gather feedback via rapid, iterative prototyping. Technical Knowledge: The use of rigorous system engineering methods to plan, design, develop, build, and test a complex technology-based product/service, integrating knowledge across multiple engineering disciplines. Business Knowledge: The use of business model analysis and lean experimentation methods to develop and test a set of hypotheses that capture how the new product/service will create value, including business model design, pricing, sales and marketing, operating model and profit formula.

The Capstone is divided into two parts, the first of which is an immersive course completed during the January term of the G2 year (Capstone I). The subsequent spring course (Capstone II) follows on from and builds upon work completed in January. Given students prior coursework, a working knowledge of human-centered design methods, systems engineering techniques, and business modeling and lean experimentation is assumed. Launch Lab therefore focuses on the practical application of these skills to team projects, supplemented by content in three areas: i) seminars on advanced methods and techniques, ii) workshops that demonstrate how to put these skills and tools into practice, and iii) guest speakers who share their experience in the areas of design, technology and business.

Copyright © 2023 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

The MS/MBA Capstone is an intensive project that requires teams of students to apply and integrate the skills they have learned across core disciplines developed in the program curriculum. Specifically, teams will be expected to design, build and launch a new technology-based product/service venture, and thereby to demonstrate mastery with respect to three areas of knowledge: Design Knowledge: The use of human-centered design methods to understand users, identify solutions to their needs, and gather feedback via rapid, iterative prototyping. Technical Knowledge: The use of rigorous system engineering methods to plan, design, develop, build, and test a complex technology-based product/service, integrating knowledge across multiple engineering disciplines. Business Knowledge: The use of business model analysis and lean experimentation methods to develop and test a set of hypotheses that capture how the new product/service will create value, including business model design, pricing, sales and marketing, operating model and profit formula.

The Capstone is divided into two parts, the first of which is an immersive course completed during the January term of the G2 year (Capstone I). The subsequent spring course (Capstone II) follows on from and builds upon work completed in January. Given students prior coursework, a working knowledge of human-centered design methods, systems engineering techniques, and business modeling and lean experimentation is assumed. Launch Lab therefore focuses on the practical application of these skills to team projects, supplemented by content in three areas: i) seminars on advanced methods and techniques, ii) workshops that demonstrate how to put these skills and tools into practice, and iii) guest speakers who share their experience in the areas of design, technology and business.

Copyright © 2023 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Overview

Launching Global Ventures explores how founders and leaders turn global complexity into strategic advantage. The present era of heightened geopolitical tensions, breakthrough technological innovations, and significant demographic change presents not just complexity but immense opportunity. This course provides frameworks for recognizing patterns across markets to design ventures that thrive on, not just survive, global uncertainty.

Global ventures, or “born globals”, are enterprises that become distributed across multiple countries very early in their life cycle. For these businesses, globalization is a core component of their business model rather than a by-product of growth. While early internationalization may offer advantages, it also exposes the venture to substantial risk. How do founders and managers overcome the “difficult middle zone of globalization” to fully realize the advantages of an international-first business model?

Through cases on ventures whose operations span multiple continents, we will examine ventures that are leveraging Africa's growing workforce, responding to the demand for automation in East Asia’s aging economies, and coordinating global climate action in South America, all while balancing scale with local adaptation.

Career Focus

Launching Global Ventures is for students who aim to be unconstrained by geographic boundaries in their pursuit of opportunity. It is designed for those who aim to:

• Build globally minded ventures from day one
• Lead innovation within multinational organizations
• Identify cross-border investment opportunities
• Design policies to foster entrepreneurial resilience in countries with limited domestic markets

Educational Objectives

The course equips students to adopt a global-first perspective when analyzing entrepreneurial opportunities, harnessing globalization across four dimensions: products/services, talent, technologies, and capital.

Students will acquire frameworks to enable them:

• Analyze strategic gains and tradeoffs from globalization
• Balance scale and location-specificity
• Evaluate and maximize the value of strategic international partnerships
• Cultivate powerful cross-border networks.

Course Content

The course has two modules:

• Designing the Right Global Business Model: Analyze how entrepreneurs design and refine models for cross-border viability, to understand what makes business models thrive where others struggle. Examine how macroeconomic forces, government policies, cultural norms, and digital infrastructure shape entrepreneurial success.
• Funding, Growth and Exits: Investigate how global ventures attract capital, manage investor relationships across cultural divides, and execute successful exit strategies. Topics include accelerator models for international startups, expansion dilemmas, valuation frameworks for emerging markets, and exit timing. Students will explore cross-border negotiations, investor alignment strategies, and decision-making amid competing incentives.

Each module combines written and live cases, practical exercises and conversations with founders and investors.

Students will leave the course with a sharper intuition for assessing international opportunities, able to draw parallels between different countries, industries, and funding environments and develop a toolkit for navigating entrepreneurial uncertainty across borders.

Grading / Course Administration:

The grading for the course will be based on class participation (50%) and a final paper or project (50%).

Copyright © 2025 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Career Focus

Launching Technology Ventures (LTV) is designed for four types of students:

1. Those who will start their own companies.
2. Those who will join early-stage startups (typically in a product manager, business development, sales, marketing, or growth role).
3. Those who will work at growth stage technology firms (in a similar range of roles) that try to maintain a similar, nimble operating model as a startup.
4. Those who are interested in investing in startups.

The class focuses on pre-product-market fit technology-based ventures in a range of information technology-based sectors. Business models covered include SaaS, freemium, e-commerce, transaction-based, and tough tech. There is a heavy focus on Artificial Intelligence (AI) throughout the cases and coursework.

Educational Objectives

The course takes the perspective of founders struggling to achieve product market fit in their early-stage startups. Our cases focus on founder decisions during this search and discovery phase, both in the experiments that they design and run as well as the organizations they build.

LTV has a tactical, implementation bias rather than a strategic one. There is a modest overlap with Product Management and Entrepreneurial Sales, but LTV is solely focused on pre-product-market fit startups and takes the perspective of the founder. LTV is complementary to Scaling Tech Ventures (STV), which focuses more on post product-market fit startups, and Founder Mindset, which focuses more on human issues and a founder’s psychology.

LTV helps students learn the playbook for finding product-market fit while learning to design more attractive, enduring business models, answering the question why some startups are valued at only 2x revenue while others are valued at 10x revenue and why some startups struggle to attract venture funding while others raise hundreds of millions of dollars.

Course Content

Through a series of case studies and intimate conversations with startup founders, LTV students examine management challenges in early-stage startups and the range of experiments that are conducted during this phase of development. The course takes the perspective that a startup is an experimentation machine and modern AI tools serve as an accelerant to more efficient and effective experiments. We explore six modules:

1. Ideation and Customer Value Proposition Experiments. What are the best methods to develop and test startup ideas early in the development process? What are the right analytical techniques to derive insight into the power of a value proposition, conduct customer discovery, and determine whether a startup has achieved product-market fit? How can modern genAI tools assist in the ideation and value proposition discovery process?

2. Go to Market Experiments. What is the right mix of direct and indirect selling efforts and at what phase in the startup's lifecycle should each be employed? How can founders themselves be the most effective sales engine for an early-stage company, even though it clearly does not scale as a go to market approach? What is the optimal mix of different customer acquisition methods, such as growth hacking, SEO, SEM, email, and affiliate programs? How should a startup think about working with channel partners or other gatekeepers in the face of asymmetric bargaining power and potentially divergent interests? What are the best practices for attracting and managing developers who can leverage a platform's API?

3. Business Model Experiments. When is the best time to trigger monetization experiments and how should a freemium model be best executed? What are the different pricing and business model approaches that a startup can take, particularly when trying to deploy an innovative model and drive adoption in the context of a network effect-based business opportunity? How does one evaluate the quality of the startup business model and appreciate the relative pros and cons of business model choices?

4. The Startup Organization and Hiring. What is the best design for a startup organization intended to effectively execute on running startup experiments? When should a seed stage startup recruit its first sales professional and what hiring criteria should they use? The first marketing hire? How can a growth organization be created and how should it interact with the other functions, particularly product and marketing? When is the right time to build a community team? How can modern, flexible product development techniques, such as agile and continuous deployment, be utilized to enhance the rate of experimentation and thus the chances that product-market fit can be achieved?

5. Ecosystem and Ethics. What are the important ethical considerations that a startup founder needs to consider, particularly as they face key moments such as financing and exit opportunities? How are a founder’s obligations to stakeholders challenged under pressure and uncertainty? More broadly, why does the startup ecosystem contain so many market failures that lead to biases and inequities – particularly in terms of access to capital for female entrepreneurs and entrepreneurs of color?

6. Financing and Exits. What is the best way to align financing needs with a startup’s operating plan, considering the key milestones and valuation inflection points ahead? If things are going well, or (all too frequently) not well, how should a founder consider and navigate exit options?

The course has 24 cases, 3 exercises, and a wrap-up session. The three exercises are: (1) startup business model deconstruction using current student’s startups; (2) startup pitch workshop; and (3) startup hiring workshop. In nearly all of the cases, the case protagonist will be a class guest. Case protagonists are 50% female, 50% male, and racially diverse. In addition to meeting the case protagonists in class, coffees and lunches are arranged to allow for more intimate exposure to a wide range of startup founders and investors, helping students build a strong network in startupland.

Note: No student who is in the JD/MBA program, or who is an attorney, or who has completed one year of law school should enroll in LME

Career Focus:

Every MBA should understand how law affects business. In addition to serving as a Senior Lecturer at HBS, I am a retired Securities Litigation Partner at WilmerHale in Boston. I draw upon examples from my practice and have designed the course to develop legal literacy by honing instincts that will help business leaders avoid legal pitfalls, attain a competitive edge and promote long-term success. Expanding well beyond the basic legal concepts introduced in LCA, the course will refine students’ understanding of how law affects all aspects of business, and develop a deeper appreciation of how legal systems operate and how to operate within the boundaries of legal systems. In response to increased student interest in private equity, a module of the course focuses on contracts and understanding legal documentation relating to private equity transactions. The course will also explore legal issues involved in starting, joining or investing in start-ups and decision making from the time an entrepreneur conceives, starts to build and obtains financing through development of exit strategies. The course has a global perspective and should be of interest to both U.S. and non-U.S. students.

No prior legal training is assumed. Class discussion will be based on both business school cases and other materials including excerpts from judicial opinions, statutes, news reports and analysis, and actual deal documentation. Most of the classes will run the usual 80 minutes although a few sessions may be merged for deep dives into selected topics and interaction with class guests who will appear by Zoom or in the classroom.

Educational Objectives:

The course has four objectives:

• Explore the global legal environment, develop an approach to managing and maximizing the value of the corporate legal function, and analyze the dynamic nature of law;
• Develop literacy in: basic agency, contracts, legal documentation, torts, and the dynamics of litigation; explore intellectual property (IP), mergers and acquisitions (M&A), and the basics of bankruptcy; and examine contemporary issues in securities law, private equity transactions and regulatory responses to complex financial instruments;
• Enhance understanding of the legal life cycle of a start-up including structuring and financing issues, tax considerations, founder/investor conflicts, liquidity and exit issues; and
• Consider what’s customary and fair in various transactions and the communication challenges of translating legal advice and analysis into decision-ready advice managers can use.

Course Content and Organization:

• Day 1: Overview of the Course

Module 1: Contracts -- Basic & Complex

• Day 2: Contract Basics
• Day 3: What Does the Contract Say? What Does it Mean?
• Day 4: Complex Contracts: PE – Part I
• Day 5: Complex Contracts: PE – Part II
• Day 6: Contracts – Earnout Provisions

Module 2: Additional Building Blocks

• Day 7: Torts and Toxic Torts
• Day 8: IP – Patents and Patent Licenses
• Day 9: IP – Copyrights
• Day 10: Litigation and Litigation Strategy
• Day 11: Bankruptcy
• Day 12: Securities Law – What is a Security
• Day 13: Securities Law – Operating in the Securities Markets
• Day 14: Regulation of the Securities Market
  

Module 3: Starting & Growing Businesses

• Day 15: Breaking Away – Covenants not to Compete
• Day 16: Coming Together – Forming a Business
• Day 17: Choice of Organization
• Day 18: Financing a Start-up Company
• Day 19: Employers and Employees
• Day 20: Employment – Compensation
• Day 21: Break All The Rules? Uber/Airbnb
• Day 22: Break-down/Wash-outs: Downrounds
• Day 23: The Power of Contract: Downrounds Part II
  
• Day 24: The Start-up vs. The Incumbent

Module 4: Succession & Liquidity

• Day 25: Exit Strategies or Not
• Day 26: PE Exits
• Day 27: IPOs – Old and New
• Day 28: Fulfilling the Promise – Dealing with Lawyers and Course Wrap

The Legal Environment of Business: introduces the concept of law as incorporated in the legal systems of various countries, highlights differences among the major types of legal systems, develops approaches to managing the legal function and maximizing its utility; introduces the concepts of jurisdiction and the basics of litigation.

Contracts and Private Equity Documentation: Introduces contract law and builds on that introduction to develop an understanding of private equity deal documentation and the essential elements of the contracts underlying private equity transactions, including mergers.

Liability: Torts, Crimes, and Litigation over Major Transactions: explores the various types of liability and litigation encountered by businesses including basic torts and tort litigation, Merger and Acquisition litigation, IP lawsuits, antitrust suits, bankruptcy litigation, and criminal prosecution in the context of securities regulation and international white collar crime.

The Legal Environment for Entrepreneurship and Exit Strategies: explores the role of the legal systems in creating and sustaining a climate that facilitates entrepreneurial activity and the role of counsel in helping to launch, grow and protect new businesses. It considers the following stages in the life cycle of a start-up: Formation (pre-formation issues, different forms of business organization, NDAs, contractual arrangements and other legal protections for corporate assets and opportunities, and governance and control under VCs); Employment Relationships (certain legal aspects of developing, rewarding and retaining employees, including non-competition agreements, assignments of rights, and employment litigation); and Growth and Exits (strategies for maximizing the value of intellectual property, founder/VC disputes , wash-outs, and legal aspects of exit strategies, including PE exits and IPOs).

Grading:

50% of the final grade will be based on class participation and 50% on a self-scheduled final exam.

Copyright © 2023 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Leadership Execution and Action Planning (LEAP) focuses on the tenacity, tactics, and grit required to influence action across a wide range of organizational challenges. While traditional leadership courses contemplate “what” is leadership, LEAP focuses on “how” leaders must take action at critical moments to shape their organizations and their careers. The course helps students transition from a classroom understanding of leadership to the often-messy reality of rolling up one's sleeves and getting things done. It takes the point of view of a leader who: (1) is new to a situation, (2) must take action, and (3) is asked to operate within a system that she or he may not fully control or has not designed.

New leaders often stumble when tasked with closing the gap between a desired end-state and executing an action plan. LEAP is designed to give students pattern recognition and practice in developing action plans across a variety of challenges they are likely to face immediately after graduation, including: transactions (mergers), turnarounds, crisis management, scaling, reinvention, and career action planning.

The course will develop skills in diagnosing, designing, and executing complex actions. It forces students to contemplate the managerial tradeoffs and constraints they will face when tasked with achieving results.

An additional underlying theme of the course is on personal failure, highlighting the major missteps and early career challenges that leaders fall into. The course asks students to evaluate their own blind spots and shortcomings regarding leadership style, execution management, and career development. Through the lens of case protagonists at various stages of their careers, LEAP gives students the opportunity to practice identifying common execution traps and missteps.

LEAP is an integrated leadership course, building on concepts from organizational behavior, strategy, and general management. It brings these themes together in case discussions and exercises that focus on the personal decisions managers face in high-performance, high-stakes, and career-defining moments. Students will examine leaders in private and publicly owned companies, family businesses, and non-profits. The course will analyze the successes and setbacks of protagonists in each case, nearly half of whom will be present in class to discuss their views and, in some class sessions, to solicit student feedback about their ongoing execution challenges.

Course Objectives

LEAP has the following key learning objectives:

1. To enable students to get things done successfully.
   
   
2. To understand the risks, trade-offs, and constraints leaders face when tasked with achieving results under conditions where they have limited skills, time, and resources available.
   
   
3. To develop the leadership capabilities and interpersonal skills required to become an effective “implementer /operator.”

Underlying Themes and Goals

The industry, organization, and protagonist settings in the course are highly diverse. Cases will focus on protagonist perspectives ranging from the CEO to initial-entry positions (i.e., of the type that many students may experience soon after graduation). It offers a manager’s perspective on how to drive program execution.

This course will develop implementation and project management skills. A critical skill required of program managers is triage – developing and assigning priorities based on their urgency and importance. Successful execution also requires making tradeoffs given constraints of time, capital, talent, and political capital. LEAP will introduce students to several general tactics, common traps, and tools related to execution.

This course will focus on execution. The course focuses on the alignment of tactics required to drive performance across a range of business activities. Case Students will develop implementation approaches for existing business problems in each module. The course will illustrate how difficult projects get done, how policies and procedures get carried out, and how improvements are delivered.

This course provides frameworks to guide the process of developing and implementing action. LEAP demonstrates “how” to lead implementation efforts – from diagnosis to design to execution. It presents several frameworks to help students with various action-planning challenges:

• How to determine whether the “agreed upon” goal is actually an “achievable” goal.
• How to evaluate tradeoffs among resources.
• How to manage stakeholders in positions of power, both formal and informal.
• How to create alignment among the culture, formal organization, people, and critical tasks.
  
  

This course will emphasize learning from failure. A running theme throughout the course is overcoming adversity and learning from personal failure. Students are challenged to grapple with their own prior failures while analyzing management teams that have experienced major setbacks. Each module includes at least one business case where the leadership team failed to achieve their goals. Students will discuss how to manage failure, seek feedback, and make mid-course corrections. The intent is to develop the student’s ability to learn from failure and discuss how to overcome early setbacks in a career. Frequent protagonist participation will also provide students with access to seasoned executives who will discuss their biggest execution failures.

Course Module Structure

The course is organized into six modules that illustrate execution challenges where leaders may have a sound strategy, but “getting things done” is difficult and results may fall short of desired outcomes. While there is some overlap among modules on the course frameworks for action planning, the distinct lessons of each segment of the course are outlined below:

Module 1: Transactions Business transactions, particularly post-merger integration, are among the most difficult of leadership challenges business managers face in their careers. Even seasoned merger experts make catastrophic (and career-sabotaging) mistakes while leading through these complex periods of change. The transactions module discusses the common leadership pitfalls of merger integration, highlights management styles that seem relevant in successful merger leaders, and it offers approaches that can serve as a starting point for leading a merger process. Other topics include:

• Rigorously designing and executing integration.
• Choosing the right leadership team.
• Addressing conflicting organizational culture issues and retaining key talent.

Module 2: Turnarounds in For-Profit and Non-Profit Organizations Turnarounds represent a high-risk execution challenge for leaders. Leaders must make decisions about what to cut, who to cut, what to keep, and how fast it all must happen. This module focuses on the common mistakes, management styles of successful turnaround leaders, and action plans that can serve as the starting point for a leader tasked with managing a turnaround. Other topics include:

• Evaluating the conditions for change.
• Creating and communicating a turnaround narrative.
• Protecting the base business while changing direction and creating forward movement.

Module 3: Crisis Building on the turnaround module, here we examine how the added elements of restricted time and lack of information combine to create unique challenges for companies in crisis situations. Unlike a turnaround, a crisis can be a catastrophic event, or a series of seemingly small events, that often surprise leaders. Most organizations are not designed to prevent or manage crises; it is not a question of if a crisis will happen, but when, and what kind. Other topics include:

• Examining tradeoffs between taking immediate action and acting with an untested approach.
• The challenge of leading in situations where confusion and chaos often exist.

Module 4: Scaling Expansion is inherently risky to an incumbent organization’s existing architecture. Scaling a business, particularly into new geographical markets or product categories, involves addressing cultural, administrative, and economic tradeoffs. Successful leadership in these scenarios requires managers who are capable of action planning for growth, as well as exerting control and influence across cultural, political, and economic divides. Other topics include:

• Developing an organizational architecture that supports the expansion into new product-classes, market categories, and geographic regions.
• Maintaining an organization’s culture and values while attempting to professionalize and create formal systems and structures.

Module 5: Reinvention Reinvention is a process whereby established organizations respond to external environmental shifts that threaten to upend their core business model, technologies, cultural values, and/or operational norms. Reinvention represents a managerial paradox: executives must both preserve and change aspects of the business that once made them successful but could render the organization obsolete in the near future. This module will examine several mature businesses that faced a near collapse and how their leaders attempted to redefine the organization to attract new consumers and markets. Other topics include:

• How innovations affect mature organizations and how to respond to technological shocks.
• How firms both preserve and change elements of “what we do” (their strategy) and “who we are” (their organizational identity).
• How to attract new talent and infuse confidence back into a workforce that has suffered a significant downfall.

Module 6: Action Planning Your Career The career module focuses on analyzing career paths, tradeoffs between personal ethics and success, and, importantly, navigating failure. The module provides students an opportunity to contemplate their career objectives. It provides students with examples of overzealous life planning and the unforeseen interpersonal dilemmas that can derail a career plan. Additional key topics are:

• The tradeoffs between mapping career goals and maintaining work-life balance.
• Career resiliency and overcoming early failures after graduation.
• Individual action plans related to career transitions that students will face in the next 5-10 years.

Grading and Evaluation

Course grades are based on three components: class participation, written action-planning exercises, and a final exam.

• Class participation comprises 45% of the grade. Participation will be evaluated for both frequency and quality. As part of the participation grade, students will also submit a short written analysis of a failure they experienced in their professional endeavors prior (or during) their time at HBS. The essay will describe a significant failure, discuss lessons learned from the failure, and how the student dealt with the aftermath. Several individuals (4-5) per section will be chosen to present their failures and the lessons learned to the rest of the class at the end of the semester.
• A midterm written exercise that outlines an action plan, along with short action planning write-ups throughout the semester, offer opportunities to practice and apply course frameworks. The midterm and write-ups comprise 20% of the grade.
• A written final exam will be scheduled during the exam period following the last day of class. It will mirror the format of the midterm written exercise. Students are not required to be on campus to take the exam. The final comprises 35% of the grade.

Copyright © 2024 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

According to the best research available (which we will read in this class), to be a successful leader, you need to understand happiness and manage to it—yours and others’. Unfortunately, most leaders have to learn this fact by hard experience. Furthermore, they are never exposed to the expanding science of happiness, which contains a wealth of information on how to be happier as a leader, and make others happier as well.

This class has four objectives:

1. Students will create a map of their own happiness, desires, motivations, strengths, and weaknesses. In short, they will know themselves much more deeply.
2. Students will become conversant in the expanding science of happiness, reading original research in the field.
3. Students will learn practices to manage their levels of well-being and life satisfaction.
4. Students will learn how to lead others in a way that increases happiness.

Students will self-administer the best surveys on happiness, read some of the most influential modern research on the topic, discuss the research in class, and apply their knowledge to leadership scenarios. They will leave after seven weeks, prepared to use the material during the balance of their time at HBS and in the workforce. Not only will this give them a competitive advantage in the labor market; it will also help them enjoy their work and lives.

Copyright © 2025 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Overview:

Family businesses dominate the economies of most countries. According to research by McKinsey, businesses owned by families account for more than 70% of global GDP and 60% of global employment. They range in size from the corner store to the conglomerate, and include industry leaders in many sectors. Most family businesses begin as decisions made by founders to continue the legacy of what they have built by passing ownership down to their children. For those embarking on an entrepreneurial journey, it may turn into a family business at some point.

Leading a family business is a unique opportunity and challenge. It requires a mix of skills, many of which you have already learned at HBS but need to be tailored or adapted to a different environment. Through this course you will build those skills, learning from the experiences of those who have successfully navigated the risks and rewards of being a family business leader.

Career Focus:

The course will be relevant if you plan to:

• Work for a business that is owned by your family
• Be an owner of a family business, even if you don’t intend to work there
• Serve as a board member of a family business
• Explore the option of being the non-family leader of a family business
• Plan to start a business that you may decide to keep rather than sell

While the emphasis of the course will be on operating companies, there will be relevant takeaways for those planning to take a leadership role in a family office or family foundation.

Educational Objectives:

The objective of the course is to prepare you for the unique challenges and opportunities that accompany running a family business. It will address the following core questions:

• What is unique about family businesses compared to other kinds of companies? Are they more vulnerable to failure?
• What are the main types of family businesses and how does leadership vary across them?
• What kind of governance (family, corporate, etc.) is required to make effective decisions in a family business?
• How do you define success in a family business that goes beyond maximizing shareholder returns?
• How do you build and sustain competitive advantage?
• How do you plan for effective succession and transition of leadership?
• What are the key strategies for managing conflict?
• How do you create a career path as a family member or non-family member?
• How do you expand a family business beyond its original core?
• How do you turn around a once-successful family business that is struggling?
• When is the right time to sell the family business? How do you navigate that process?
• What are the danger zones and warning signs that leaders need to pay attention to?

Course Content and Organization:

The course will be divided into two main modules. The first module will focus on building the core leadership toolkit across topics such as strategy, governance, and succession. The second module will emphasize specific opportunities and challenges that leaders will likely encounter, such as how to navigate the career progression or turnaround a family business that has fallen on challenging circumstances.

Each session will involve a case discussion. Some of the cases will be of the standard variety and some will be “live cases” where the leaders from family businesses will be integrated throughout the session. Most cases will include a guest speaker who will share their leadership experiences and answer questions. Cases in the 2025 version included:

• 99 Ranch
• Ayala Corporation
• Benetton/Edizione
• Carvajal S.A
• COFRA/C&A
• J.M. Huber
• Market Basket
• Milo’s Tea
• Pentland Brands
• White Castle

The core text for the course will be Harvard Business Review’s Family Business Handbook, written by Josh Baron and Rob Lachenauer.

Grading / Course Administration:

Students will be graded on a mixture of engagement in class and a final paper. For the final paper, you will draw on your learnings from the course to develop a leadership plan. That plan will synthesize your views on what makes leadership of a family business similar and different from a non-family business, what type of leadership roles you might explore in a family business, a personal assessment on what skills you need to develop to succeed in that role(s), and an action plan to build those skills.

Copyright © 2025 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Course Overview

Making decisions is integral to every manager’s job. Making Difficult Decisions: The General Manager’s Role (MDD) explores the kinds of decisions made by general managers (GMs) and how context influences the generation of options, and the effectiveness of the decisions made.

The course views management as an activity that enables coordinated action in pursuit of organizational performance. Our emphasis is on how GMs get things done through making and guiding decisions—both larger and smaller. We show how to use decision-making processes to achieve produce results and to move an organization forward.

The course defines context broadly, with a particular emphasis on contexts characterized by high uncertainty and high stakes. We examine cognitive, interpersonal, and organizational factors that undermine effective decision making and introduce techniques for diagnosing and overcoming predictable pitfalls. Decisions are particularly challenging for general managers because they must rely on others – principally subordinates – to provide important critical input and data that inform decisions, as well as to implement the choices made. The major constraint facing most managers is not a lack of vision but rather the resources available to them. Therefore, the essence of general management lies in fully understanding and harnessing the capabilities of the human resources around them. Effective decision making goes far beyond merely knowing what one wants to accomplish. It requires developing a vision based on a clear-eyed evaluation of others’ capability, communicating that vision, gathering and considering feedback, overseeing implementation, and responding to the unexpected.

Making Difficult Decisions places particular emphasis on frameworks that help managers make, communicate, and implement decisions effectively. These practical management skills include how to craft and interpret dialogue, how to diagnose one's own biases to reduce the likelihood of error, and how to diagnose group dynamics. We treat decision making as a process and explore the major considerations involved in designing effective decision processes. The course does not address decision making tools such as data analytics, game theory, and simulations.

Developing aptitude in and understanding of these issues helps managers influence the design, direction, and functioning of organizational processes. The aim of MDD is to develop students' understanding and use of highly relevant, practical skills, and how to use them in day-to-day activities that enhance their ability to make better decisions and to improve their own and their team's performance in decision making generally. Throughout, our focus is on high-level processes that are of interest to general managers; for this reason, case protagonists are typically division presidents or higher.

Course Content

A distinctive feature of the course is its variety of teaching materials, including experiential exercises, role-plays, multimedia cases, and visits from case protagonists, in addition to the usual HBS written case studies. Settings are varied as well. They include a wide variety of businesses and industries, ranging from startups to multinationals, across industries. MDD also features many non-business protagonists and situations, including presidential taskforces, mountaineering expeditions, hospital administrators, and executives and engineers in the space program.

MDD uses three types of sessions, interspersed throughout the semester, to teach a set of related ideas and frameworks.

Session Type I: HBS Case Study classes – spanning sectors, industries, and organization size. In each, GMs face one or more important decisions, and wrestle with multiple challenges. These cases include traditional paper and multimedia formats. As in any HBS classroom, students are expected to participate regularly and actively in these discussions. Good contributions offer clear, rigorous argument, present detailed substantive recommendations, describe a coherent, internally consistent perspective or point of view, move the discussion forward by posing questions or drawing links between others’ comments, present relevant examples from personal experience or constructively critique positions, sharpen the class’s understanding of issues, or deepen an ongoing debate.

Session Type II: MDD includes 6-8 “lab sessions” that allow students to practice management skills in realistic simulated conversations. These sessions present a single situation in an organizational context, with a protagonist who must determine what to do. Students will experiment, receive real-time feedback, and observe others, an effort to develop practical management skills. Practice and repetition are used to help students understand how to put into action concepts introduced in case discussions and lectures.

Session Type III: The course also includes dialogues with successful GMs, who share their experiences and engage in conversations driven by student questions. We anticipate welcoming 6 guests to class, including 4 case protagonists and 2 full session guest dialogues.

The principal purpose of the course is to improve students’ ability to make and implement better decisions in complex, interdependent the contexts involving of often complex interdependencies with others (subordinates, superiors, and even members of other groups or organizations). The course design reflects the following assumptions:

• This ability is relevant to all students and is not strictly the province of general managers.

• Everyone has distinct behavioral ‘footprints’ that shape how we make decisions.

• Being aware of one’s footprint and developing self-awareness is a valuable skill for any manager/leader.

Assignments & Grading

The work for MDD includes case preparation, participation in case discussions, and participation in lab sessions; 40% of a student’s grade will be allocated based on participation in class discussions (including dialogue sessions with guests); 20% based on participation in lab sessions, and 40% based on a final written submission. In lieu of a final exam or paper, students are asked to prepare a written self-diagnosis reflecting on – and applying – the frameworks and competencies that they are developing throughout the semester. These submissions reflect work done throughout the semester and are not expected to require extensive time after classes end.

Copyright © 2025 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Overview:

Without customers, there is no business!

Managing Customers for Growth (MCG) focuses on how firms design and implement customer management activities to achieve sustainable customer growth. The course explores the fundamentals of customer value, including strategies for customer acquisition, retention, and development. By leveraging customer analytics tools and technologies, students will develop a data-driven approach to customer management. This course is relevant for students interested in marketing, growth strategy, customer experience, and data-driven decision-making.

(Syllabus from prior years: http://www.evaascarza.com/MCG_Syllabus_Fall2024.pdf)

Career Focus:

This course is particularly useful for students pursuing careers in roles where managing customer relationships and driving customer growth are central. This includes:

• Entrepreneurs and Business Leaders (e.g., CEOs, CMOs, Chief Growth Officers, Chief Customer Officers) seeking to build and scale customer-centric businesses.
• Consultants and Strategists advising companies on customer acquisition, retention, and monetization strategies.
• Investors and Analysts evaluating business growth trajectories and customer lifetime value.
• Product Managers and Marketing Professionals who need to understand customer segmentation, data-driven growth strategies, and personalized marketing interventions.

Educational Objectives:

This course provides students with frameworks, insights, and tools to successfully acquire, develop, and retain customers. Key learning objectives include:

1. Understanding and Measuring Customer Value: Students will learn foundational frameworks for assessing customer lifetime value (LTV), customer-base analysis, and cohort dynamics to inform strategic decision-making.
2. Leveraging Data for Customer Growth: The course explores how firms use data-driven insights for segmentation, personalization, and targeted interventions, as well as the ethical considerations of customer data use.
3. Executing Customer Management Strategies: Students will examine trade-offs in customer acquisition vs. retention, monetization strategies, and how to balance personalization with scale.
4. Developing Quantitative Intuition: Through hands-on exercises and workshops, students will strengthen their ability to translate customer data into strategic decisions and communicate effectively with data science teams.

Course Content and Organization:

The course is structured around three core modules, each addressing a key aspect of customer management:

Module 1: Measuring Customer-Driven Growth
Focuses on valuing customers, assessing customer-base dynamics, and measuring growth strategies. Students will analyze customer data and perform a Customer-Base Audit exercise to evaluate business health.
• Topics include: Customer lifetime value (LTV), customer valuation techniques, cohort analysis, and key metrics for growth measurement.

Module 2: Understanding Customers and Managing Growth
Explores customer segmentation, acquisition-retention trade-offs, and challenges in monetization. The module includes an exercise using clickstream data to create customer personas and growth strategies.
• Topics include: Acquisition vs. retention trade-offs, engagement-driven business models, customer segmentation, and monetization strategies.

Module 3: Managing Customers through Personalized Interventions
Covers personalization strategies, incrementality targeting, and ethical considerations in algorithmic decision-making. Students will explore real-world cases on AI-driven personalization and algorithmic bias.
• Topics include: Hyper-personalization, uplift modeling, fairness in AI-driven marketing, and customer data privacy.

The course concludes with a wrap-up session synthesizing key learnings.

Grading / Course Administration:

Student performance is assessed based on the following components:
• Class Participation (40%) – Engaged contribution to case discussions and in-class exercises.
• Three Short Quizzes (20%) – Assessing comprehension of key concepts throughout the course.
• Final Project (40%) – A customer management strategy project, completed individually or in pairs.

Technical skills are not required for this course. Workshops will include a data scientist to assist with technical aspects.

Copyright © 2025 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Career Focus

The Managing Human Capital course has been specifically designed to teach practical skills for the future general manager (not just the human resource practitioner) who seeks to manage both other people and their own career with optimal effectiveness. As such, at its core, this course is intended to sharpen three capabilities: people development; people management; and career management. We will explore, at a more advanced level than was possible in LEAD, those people-related issues and challenges that any good general manager should understand to be effective.

The term human capital implies that people have the capacity to drive organizational performance. The basic premise of this course is that how one manages and develops others can be the source of sustainable competitive advantage for organizations and for individual leaders within them. Any and all students who believe they will need to effectively manage other people to produce superior business results (revenues, profits, growth) while also creating a unique place to work (such that superior business results are sustainable) should take this course.

Educational Objectives

The objective of Managing Human Capital can be captured in a simple question: How can I create places where talented people will gather, produce, develop, and thrive?

While the question is simple in concept, it is remarkably difficult to execute—proven most recently by the Great Resignation. Future graduates of HBS, like the population at large, will have more and more choices about how to work and how to manage work, especially given advances in “big data,” AI, and other workplace technologies. They, and their companies--from the great global enterprises of the 21st century to the smallest entrepreneurial venture--will struggle with common questions and concerns about the people who work in their organizations, such as:

• Module 1 (Hiring): What kind of people do I need, and how do I hire them?
• Module 2 (Socialization): How do I effectively on-board them, setting them up for success?
• Module 3 (Performance Management): How do I keep them fully engaged and productive?
• Module 4 (Compensation and Rewards): How do I make sure they are properly incented to do what the organization needs them to do?
• Module 5 (Coaching Effective Managers and Talent Development): How do I develop them over time, so they are prepared to take on bigger roles down the road? How do I let go those who are not contributing?
• Module 6 (Structure): How do I architect my group, team, division, or organization to make the management of human capital easier, not harder? And, as we enter an age in which technology has made the boundaries within organizations far more fluid, how do I make sure the “organizational” or “workplace” structures upon which organizations have traditionally relied actually yield the “collaboration structures” we need to get work done?

In each module, we will intentionally discuss cases that frame both traditional and bleeding-edge “Future of Work” approaches to each human capital challenge. The ‘answer’ will often lie somewhere in-between the extremes but will, with regularity, come back to a set of guiding criteria that connect how human capital is managed with the goal of organizational performance. We will also aim to collectively answer the question: how can I be ready for the way human capital will be managed when I come back for my 10th or 20th reunion--and what experiments should I conduct in my teams and organizations the interim to stay on the leading edge (without accidentally reinventing the wheel and rediscovering things we already knew)?

In each module, and indeed within almost every session, we will explore these topics through three lenses: managing others, being managed by others, and managing our own human capital.

Course Content and Organization

We are all in the class to learn new ways to manage human capital. But we all learn differently. As a result, this course will draw on a range of different ways to learn.

Cases. A majority of classes will be case-based, using materials that highlight and illustrate issues in the management of human capital.

Workshops. Learning can sometimes be best done in exercises designed to apply and practice what I teach about the management of human capital. I have carefully selected (and, in some cases, designed) workshop exercises that relate to most modules of the course.

Research and Technical Knowledge. An article or chapter that discusses good practice for each of the levers discussed in the course will accompany most case discussions.

The Class. This is a discussion-based class, where we learn from each other. With these topics, there will be ample opportunity for people to wrestle with the best way to manage. As always, our best conversations will be when we choose to find both areas of difference and areas of agreement.

The Instructor. My career, both prior to academia and now as an academic, has been focused on exploring how to run organizations such that they make their people more effective, not less. I hope to share my own perspectives, as well as those from more general research, during our classes.

Guests. We will have a wide range of guests in our class. We will have guests who are protagonists in a case, subject matter experts, and successful C-Suite executives. My goal with these guests will be to understand their perspective on the core issues of the class.

Brief “Live Case” Assignment. I believe we learn best when we are engaged directly with organizations and the people leading them. The brief “live case” assignment will be an opportunity for you to talk directly with a small handful of the 2700+ alumni of the MHC course about their experiences, including the most and least successful ways in which their human capital has been managed by others (bosses, mentors, etc.) over their careers to date. (Think of this as a chance to hear both their best and worst stories and then make sense of those stories using the lessons of the MHC course.) We will devote one session, facilitated by an expert, to teach us how to effectively conduct such a discussion about a person’s development and career path. The final deliverable will be a short, written “live case”: a short memo that ties the alumni experiences back to aspects of the course. My hope is that seeing these concepts in action will help you understand what works well and what doesn't. (Note: The alumni interviews will be conducted by groups of students, but the memo will be written individually.)

The final grade will be determined 50% on class participation, 50% on written work.

Because of the nature of the exercises, workshops, simulations, and conversations in MHC, each section will be limited to 86 students. As a result, cross-registrants are rarely accepted but may submit a request via this link.

Please email professor Ethan Bernstein (ebernstein@hbs.edu) directly with any questions.

Copyright © 2023 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Course Overview

The course approaches economic interdependence from the perspective of firms, asking students to consider the choices that managers face as they participate in and shape cross-border trade and investment.

Career Focus

This course should interest any student who plans to work for a firm with transnational interests or investments or students with significant interests in the global and domestic politics that affect trade and capital flows.

Educational Objectives

The course aims to equip students with a deeper understanding of globalization and international business by focusing on three broad themes. First, we will consider the variety of domestic institutions and the relationships between institutions, markets, and competitive advantage. We will consider how various organizations of labor markets, financial markets, and regulatory regimes, for example, create opportunities and barriers for multinational firms. Second, we will focus on the more informal domestic “rules” that shape international openness and, therefore, the strategic environment for transnational business. These informal rules and bargains include the political coalitions that sustain globalization and the dynamics of international business in different contexts of economic and political inequalities. Lastly, we will consider transnational firms as political actors, creating and shaping domestic and international politics rather than simply reacting to the decisions of policy-makers. Intellectually, the focus is on achieving a deep understanding of the incentives, constraints, and worldviews of relevant actors for firms in their global endeavors.

Course Content

The course will be divided into three modules. The first module looks at varieties of capitalisms, meaning the profound differences in market organization in different countries and regions. We will focus on cases in which an understanding of domestic rules, formal and informal, creates opportunities and constraints for transnational firms, for example examining Shell in 1990s-2000s Russia, Google in Europe, battles between financial firms and states in sovereign debt markets, and Chinese firms on the “belt and road.” The second module covers the multilateral and domestic institutional contexts for international trade and capital flows. The cases will allow us to consider how firms succeed and fail by understanding or misunderstanding the political and social arrangements, in addition to economic conditions, that surround international openness. We will also consider the sources of fragility for globalization itself by narrating the rise and fall of what is sometimes called the “global liberal order.” Students will understand and evaluate, for example, how China’s entry into the WTO affected international trade and consider whether global capital flows have strengthened or weakened global “rules.” The final module looks at firms in contexts of change and uncertainty. Here, we consider the profound changes to the global business landscape accompanying the rise of illiberal populisms and competition, even confrontation, between the US and China, and the interdependence of technology and digital markets. We will look at how firms confront markets and politics in technological innovation and competition (data access and management, financial technology, semiconductors), in frontier markets (platform e-commerce in Iran and free trade zones in North Korea), and amid global hostilities (the US vs. Huawei in 5G, New Energy Vehicles and tariff regimes).

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Service is the business of people helping people, and people are born to help one another. The survival of our species literally depends upon it. Yet, service organizations are often designed and managed in a way that prevents us from realizing our potential.

Service organizations are complex and diverse, and they continue to grow in prominence. They account for 63% of the global economy, 80% of the U.S. GDP, and 86% of the jobs taken by last year’s graduating class of Harvard Business School MBAs.

Managing Service Operations (MSO) teaches students how to effectively design, manage, and improve service organizations. Students will learn:

• How to create distinctive and sustainable service strategies,
• How to execute service models that enable customers, employees, and owners to simultaneously thrive, and;
• How to adapt to evolving customer needs and changing competitive landscapes.

A general management course, MSO resides at the intersection of leadership, strategy, marketing, and operations. It draws upon cutting-edge research and field examples from a broad array of industries, including financial services, government, healthcare, hospitality, professional services, restaurants, retail, and transportation. The course is useful for students planning to lead, work in, advise, or invest in service organizations.

Copyright © 2025 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Course Content

Financial services firms play a critically important role in the global economy. They finance investment, facilitate payments, and help firms and households save and manage risk. These financial services are provided in an array of organizations and structures – from fintech startups to private credit funds to multi-trillion-dollar global banks and large insurance companies – in an industry that is always under the threat of disruption. There is no industry that has seen as much disruption – both good (innovation) and bad (crisis) – as financial services.

In Managing and Innovating in Financial Services, we examine the challenges and opportunities faced in financial services as incumbent firms and startups try to navigate and shape an environment in which competition, technology and regulation are constantly changing.

We will look at a variety of financial institutions and financial service providers including banks, nonbank financial intermediaries, insurance companies and fintechs. We will examine decisions through the lens of these firms with government policy and regulation as an important factor that often shapes their decisions.

The course is divided into four modules.

Module 1: Banking. In this module, we will study the business of banking. Banks are worth studying both because they are important credit providers and because of their unique role in the payment system: they are the only entities that can hold accounts at the Federal Reserve and are thus critical for moving money across the financial system. You can’t understand innovation and tech disruption without understanding the basics of banking. There are three reasons why. First, many of the problems innovators are trying to solve are focused on gaps in banking services, while many of the challenges these innovators face stem from the fact that they are not banks. Second, there are many opportunities to help banks get better; much of fintech is about providing services to banks. Third, many innovators depend on banks as their partners – either to provide credit to them or to facilitate their financial transactions, both in lending and in payments. In this first module, we will seek to understand the drivers of value in banking. This will involve getting up to speed on understanding bank financial statements and valuation, which are likely unfamiliar to you even if you’ve worked in finance. We will develop a set of tools that will be valuable in evaluating banks, nonbank financial intermediaries, fintechs, and insurance companies. We will also examine when things go terribly wrong in banking by examining the Silicon Valley Bank crisis, the Global Financial Crisis, and the ongoing regulatory response to both.

Module 2: Credit. We will focus on the main types of credit: residential mortgages, small business loans, consumer credit, and lending to middle-market (private credit) and large firms. Our main focus will be on firms that are innovating in the way they provide these loans. Some of these firms are fintechs, but others are banks and yet others are nonbank financial intermediaries like business development companies and private credit funds. We will develop a framework for understanding how a credit intermediary creates value.

Module 3: Payments. We will explore the payments system and the innovations taking place in that sector. Much fintech activity in this area builds off the traditional payment rails. We will review these traditional payment rails, discuss firms that are trying to bundle payments with credit and other services, and examine international payments. We will also discuss stablecoins, central bank digital currencies, and real-time payments.

Module 4: Insurance. In the final module, we will look at insurance – both property and casualty (P&C) and life insurance, including the role of private equity in insurance. Insurance comprises about one third of the financial sector, and firms in this sector are playing an increasing role in the financial lives of individuals and in the allocation of credit to the corporate sector. Private equity and asset management firms are also getting involved in insurance because they see insurance as a stable source of funding, well-suited to making illiquid investments.

WHO SHOULD TAKE THIS COURSE?

This course is for anyone who wants to pursue a career in finance.

• If you’re interested in becoming an entrepreneur in financial services, there are three related ways this course can be helpful. First, almost half the cases consider entrepreneurs in finance or financial services startups; understanding their journeys will inform you about the opportunities and challenges. Second, the course is designed to help you better understand the financial services landscape and thus help you identify and evaluate entrepreneurial opportunities. Third, you will learn about the types of partner firms you will need to succeed as an entrepreneur in financial services, whether banks, Banking-as-a-Service providers, or payment processors, to name a few.
• If you want to be an investor – in private equity, private credit, or capital markets – you need to understand how the financial system works. This course provides a holistic view of the financial system. I know of no other course at HBS or other business schools that provides a broad overview of the financial system. Moreover, as an investor you will likely be heavily dependent on the availability of credit, which is a principal focus of this course.
• If you want to work at an established financial intermediary -- at a bank, insurance company, or payments company -- this course is highly relevant for obvious reasons. Relatively few HBS students will start out working in these types of firms – particularly the more mature versions of these companies – but many will eventually land in these types of firms or end up consulting for them. I also believe that this is a missed opportunity. It is a large, very highly compensated sector with opportunities to work on important problems and have big impact.

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Video: Market Perspectives

Course Overview

This case-based course applies market perspectives and economic analysis to contemporary issues. The cases explore concrete situations that highlight the challenges and tradeoffs of decision-makers. Issues explored include: education, urban development, illegal drugs, rent control, housing, drug pricing, racial references, corporate political action, social media, sea level rise, employment of people with disabilities, and the like. We explore situations in which businesses’ pursuit of profits both positively and negatively affect their communities, including their employees, local physical and social environments.

We use a collection of basic economic concepts including supply and demand, externalities, incentives, property rights, agency conflicts, and information asymmetries. We develop these tools and then apply them to contemporary issues, which enables the discussions to go beyond the generalities of headlines to grapple with practical solutions to specific problems. For example, instead of discussing general environmental challenges, we focus on how a small island community deals with the impact of sea level rise and related concerns, highlighting costs and benefits, property rights and the complexity of decision-making.

The course doesn’t push a political philosophy. Rather, it encourages students to discuss their own approaches using the tools that are frequently applied to business decisions. What to optimize, how to optimize, and who benefits or loses, are frequent concerns in our case discussions. There are rarely right or wrong answers but using the tools of business analysis can help frame the discussion productively so that we can gain a better understanding of our own perspectives, and the perspectives of those who favor a different approach.

Course Structure

The course is taught using case method, with traditional and multimedia cases along with occasional supplementary readings. 19 class sessions plus a paper. Classes meet on the Wednesdays and Thursdays of the Y-schedule (no Fridays).

Grading

50% based on class participation and polls

50% based on a paper

Copyright © 2024 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Overview:

Each year, hundreds of HBS students walk across the Commencement stage with plans to take on an advisory role, whether consultancy or joining a partner-based organization. In addition, many more also prepare to enter other careers where their roles will be more advisory than operational. In most cases, these students have no direct advising background whatsoever. For those who have worked as an analyst or summer intern, never has their prior experience had less bearing on their post-MBA career. Before these students lies a daunting challenge: facing the most challenging market conditions in over a decade, they must quickly prove themselves as a skilled advisor to executives, relying only on introductory firm training and apprenticeship learning. This course thus aims to address a critical and timely need within the HBS curriculum by offering students a comprehensive and integrated approach for attaining success in their post-MBA role as advisors and counselors.

Given the ongoing challenges of today’s landscape, Mastering Consulting and Advisory Skills (MCAS) seeks to develop critical consulting skills among a core group within the EC: aspiring, committed consultants who need to build competency to immediately add meaningful value to their teams, client organizations, and firms. By focusing on applied skills and fundamental mindsets, MCAS aims to differentiate students from the pack and prime them for impact from Day 1.

This course addresses a growing demand within both HBS and the consulting firms many HBS students join after graduation. It was created by Senior Lecturer David Fubini, who spent 34 years at McKinsey & Company, during which time he established and headed the firm’s Boston office, as well as led a number of critical organizational and strategic practices. Professor Fubini developed the course with input from HBS students, who wanted to chart fulfilling and successful careers in consulting, and from Partners at major consultancies, who recognized that many MBAs arrive unprepared amid a changing professional services landscape. The course design also builds on the historically successful EC course Professional Firm Management, and leverages learning from the Leading Professional Services Firm Executive Education course. The outcome is a course curated by and for aspiring-consultant students, that is taught by a deeply experienced practitioner, and which fills a critical white space within the HBS curriculum.

Career Focus:

Mastering Consulting and Advisory Skills seeks to help students gain a comprehensive knowledge of the tools, skills, frameworks, and mindsets required to be successful across all facets of their advisory/consultative roles. While many consulting firms’ initial training programs highlight the skills required to complete key tasks—performing analyses, building models, crafting presentations—they are, by necessity, short and introductory only. This course goes deeper. Grounded in the understanding that relationships are paramount to success as an advisor, this course covers how to manage teams, partners, clients, firm politics, and the consultant’s life and career. Understanding the complexities of the role, this course will present students with complex and difficult situations to develop strategies for dealing with industry-specific dilemmas. The course covers this material through a mix of cases, workshops, and discussions.

This course provides students with an academic and pragmatic lens to consulting in order to create a comprehensive toolkit they can use in both consulting and industry roles. Importantly, it does so in a foundational way that will build on summer internships and other consulting experiences, while still remaining accessible to committed newcomers. It moreover does so as a short course in order to deliver on only the most essential learnings. With this course, students can start their careers with a meaningful set of skills they can apply before formalized training even begins. Put simply, this course will help students master consulting and advisory skills.

Educational Objectives:

MCAS has the following key learning objectives:

1. To equip students with the tools, skills, frameworks, and mindsets to quickly add value by tackling business challenges in a structured, methodical, and logical manner.
2. To get students closer to mastery—to go beyond any prior consulting experience and firm trainings to prime them for differentiated impact in their organizations from Day 1.
3. To illustrate the core differences between the “operator” and “advisor” role, as well as the benefits and limits to each.
4. To assess and address the tasks, relationships, and dilemmas consultants may face.
5. To apply and practice many of the core skills that will make students more successful as counselors and advisors.

Grading / Course Administration:

Class participation, a series of assignments, and a final paper are the three evaluation methods used in MCAS.

Class participation will comprise 50% of the grade. Participation will be evaluated for both frequency and quality. Absences and lack of preparation will have a significantly negative impact on participation grades. Students will also be asked to submit thoughtful, relevant questions in advance of designated guest visits.

A series of three assignments will comprise another 25%. These assignments will be clearly specified as additional submissions on their Canvas page.

A final paper of roughly 1,500 words will comprise the remaining 25%.

Copyright © 2025 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Overview

In a VUCA world (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, Ambiguous), far more value is created by companies like Amazon, Meta, and Alphabet that develop entirely novel business models than by entrenched incumbents, such as P&G or Ford, which struggle to eke out market share gains. However, many of the most valuable new ventures, like Tesla and Netflix, are also among the most shorted stocks as investors struggle to see their long-term potential.

To understand why and how this might occur, the overarching framework applied throughout this course covers “The Complete Strategy Landscape”[1]. This illustrates that companies must not just be concerned with the value captured by the one-time formulation of a beautifully aligned competitive strategy, which was the focus of the RC Strategy course, but by the value potential of their business model and with its value realization through effective implementation over time.

Within this landscape, the Corporate Strategy course addresses three questions that challenge every modern corporation. The first and most fundamental is, "How do companies create shareholder value across multiple markets?" in the midst of radical technological and social change. The second, whose identification won Ronald Coase the Nobel Prize in Economics[2] and which, unless we believe that one company will take over the world, is the logical corollary of the first, asks, "What is the limit to the scope of the firm?" The third question addresses the administrative issue of "How can we effectively manage a multi-business corporation?" to engender entrepreneurship and adaptability while maintaining control and realizing economies. All companies, whether large, diversified multinationals or small entrepreneurial startups, wrestle with these issues, and their appropriate resolution enormously impacts performance.

Course Content and Organization

The course is structured into four modules:

1. Business Models and The Complete Strategy Landscape

How can firms create enormous entrepreneurial value by developing new business models? The module focuses on understanding how novel business models – the combination of "job to be done," assets required to deliver that service, and monetization method – create value. We will examine WhatsApp (worth $22b?...) and Walmart in its competition with Amazon. The module also studies how firms transform their activities to the evolving external opportunity set. We will examine the transformation of the FBI after the 9/11 attacks, Komatsu's introduction of "SmartConstruction," and the digital transformation of a large bank in Latin America (Davivienda), among others, to understand how to evaluate the potential in new ways of doing business.

2. Resources and the Continuum of Effective Corporate Strategy

The course identifies valuable resources (and capabilities) that can function as the "Mickey Mouse" that adds value to the corporate portfolio. By studying strategies at firms as different as Danaher and Clorox, it introduces a continuum of effective corporate strategy, ranging from conglomerates and private equity firms to tightly related corporate entities and startups. It demonstrates that the same "better off" and "ownership" tests apply to every effective corporate strategy. This logic can be captured in a company's objective, scope, and corporate advantage statement.

3. Scope: Businesses and Portfolio Transformation

Defining the boundaries of the firm - the limit to its scope - is critical to crafting the corporate portfolio. At the extreme, this determines which businesses to enter and exit, as well as the extent of vertical integration and geographic expansion of the firm. More generally, this requires developing a portfolio that is robust to changes in the external environment and has to address the choice between internal development of new businesses and corporate M&A. This module delves into scope choices in various settings, from a narrow (Zoom) versus a broad (Microsoft) Scope or large global organizations (Cadbury) to startups (Foodology).

4. Organization and the Role of Corporate Headquarters

To justify ownership of any business a corporation must have the appropriate structures, systems, and policies to actually realize value. This module examines these design choices, focusing on the role of corporate headquarters in shaping and controlling business unit strategy and performance, building centers of competence, and sharing activities. It covers specific tools corporate executives use, including delegation of authority, approaches to resource allocation, and corporate initiatives. The module concludes with cases on corporate transformation, highlighting the challenge of realigning resources, organizational structure, and scope to face a constantly evolving competitive landscape.

Career Focus

The perspective adopted throughout the course is that of the CEO and the pragmatic challenges they face in crafting a strategy that successfully exploits available opportunities while confronting the realities of competition in the 21^st century. As a result, the course should be of value to anyone interested in managing, consulting, financing, or investing in a company that operates in multiple businesses, geographies, or activities.

[1] See D. Collis, “Wy do so Many Strategies Fail??” Harvard Business Review July/August 2021 pp 82-93.

[2] R. Coase “The Nature of the Firm,“ Economica: 1937.

Overview

This course uses works of literature, primarily novels, in place of case studies. Its aim, as a former student put it, is to show "how people develop the skills, courage, and perseverance to use power, money, and influence in constructive ways."

The course readings for this course come from many countries, they include novels, short stories, plays, and excerpts from classic works of moral philosophy. The readings also span many centuries, ranging from ancient Greek plays to Shakespeare to contemporary works.

Educational Objectives

Literature provides a distinctive and important perspective on leadership. First, it offers a strong dose of realism. None of the novels in the course is a simple, inspiring tale of moral heroism or sainthood. This authenticity provides a valuable learning opportunity: it is easier to learn from people who are like most of humanity - complicated and flawed - than from a gallery of heroes and villains. Realism also reveals leaders' struggles and failures and displays the blind spots, assumptions, and behavior that can derail leaders.

In addition, fiction lets students see leaders from the inside. In real life, people in charge rarely give complete, unvarnished accounts of their thinking. In contrast, fiction lets us watch leaders reflect, worry, scheme, hesitate, commit, exult, and regret. As one former student put it, "To enter the mindset of the characters, to be them, to feel what they feel...This is the privilege of the fiction reader."

Finally, leaders have to make hard decisions, and this course draws literature and on classic works of moral philosophy to provide a practical framework for making these decisions. The course is organized around this framework. The first part focuses on accountability, the second on character, and the last on pragmatism.

Format

The course meets in the afternoon block for two hours. Enrollment is limited to 60 students in order to foster in-depth discussion and wide participation.

Copyright © 2025 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Course Description:

Artificial Intelligence (AI) is changing how value is created and captured in the economy

One critical change: You have your direct labor, and also your indirect labor through the data generated by your work. The value of labor shifts from renting embodied expertise to selling

codified capabilities. These capabilities can be recombined with other capabilities, enhanced over time, duplicated at no cost and commoditized to destroy its uniqueness and value

This change could shift how you should navigate your career and develop and value your expertise. The lessons will be useful to anyone entering today’s labor market, entrepreneurs starting new ventures, and investors. Students will develop their strategy through simulated negotiation exercises, experience from guest speakers, and practice in the field along-side experts.

Learning Objectives:

To get a sense for the fundamental shift in negotiating today’s labor market, consider the following: in today’s environment, your expertise can be codified. Consider the new Tom Hank’s film Here (2024), where an AI model of Tom’s acting expertise can be used to face-swap and de-age him. Using similar technology, the emails, presentations and digital trail of your judgement on-the-job can be transformed into a model of your expertise that is disembodied, scaled, recombined and sold. How should you manage, price and negotiate over the data generated by your work? What if instead, you find yourself the owner of data generated by people you employ? How should you use it to remain competitive? What are the legal, ethical and social implications of the choices you make? We will use theory and evidence from economics, law, and psychology to understand what your best strategy is, and to anticipate how the labor market and economy will be transformed by these negotiations in aggregate.

Using the lessons and frameworks we develop from examining the development of AI and data technologies we will examine individual choices you will need to make in an AI enabled world. These could include how you should use the technologies to clone your own expertise, how you should negotiate the rights to your codified labor and how you should navigate employment contracts or other business agreements over your direct labor and any data byproduct that can be used to train AI models. We will also re-think the power of collective action in securing these rights in a changing environment. Throughout, students will develop a process for recognizing the elements that have, and have not, changed fundamentally in the era of information access and exploitation.

Career Focus

This course is designed to help students consider how to develop and value their expertise in a world where cognitive skills that were exclusively embodied are increasingly being built into models that can be scaled and continue to learn.

Faculty Expertise

Prof Cullen is a leading labor economist whose research covers the impact of information and AI for firms, employees, and entrepreneurs. Prof Ghosh has been teaching courses on entrepreneurship and technology. He has built leading companies in the transition to the mobile and Internet economies. More recently he has been studying the development of AI and its likely social and business implications. Professors Cullen and Ghosh have designed this course to explore the implications of data and AI on the job market and offer practical insights to students who are entering the work force.

Structure:

The course is 6 modules with a mix of case and project-based learning exercises.

Module 1: In what direction is valued expertise heading, and over what time horizon? We will study the case of Klarna, a successful FinTech company that cut employment by half as AI technologies have been instituted across functions. We will place the adoption patterns we observe in historical context by examining past episode of general purpose technologies. With the future of Klarna in mind, we ask you to consider how to describe your own expertise as a job applicant.

Module 2: Codifying your own expertise: After discovering the power of harnessing AI technology to sell your expertise and job marketability, we will be joined by the founder and CEO of Delphi.ai, cutting edge technology allowing you to build your many clones of expertise. The goal of this session is to set students up to create valuable models that pave the way toward selling expertise and marketing ones potential. On a practical note, this session will give students the tools necessary to deliver their final project: a set of clones, their resumes and a career strategy.

Module 3: The revolution of the knowledge-service industries: We will examine the organizational and technological changes taking place in the consulting industry. Joined by leaders at BCG and McKinsey, we will discover the jagged frontier of AI capabilities replacing and enhancing MBA skillsets. We will construct the short, medium and long-run potential for the organization of consulting services and the role of the newly minted MBA.

Module 4: Negotiated value: In this session we compare and contrast the value extracted by the creative expertise, as a function of negotiated rights. By examining the music industry and Hollywood entertainment industry, we explore how technology does not define the winners and losers, but the institutions and contracts negotiated fundamentally shift who can extract value. Negotiated rights also define the incentivize structure for the future development of valuable expertise, and the market structure for labor. We will be joined by the Chief Negotiator of the Hollywood Writers’ Guild to explore the tactics for negotiating rights and value.

Module 5: AI organizations: We will continue to develop codifying our expertise by combining clones to form an organization. We will have a case discussion of the platform facilitating entire organization of AI clones. We will then use the platform to build an organization of clones that can make decisions over resources. By the end of class, student will all be able to conceive of “1-person unicorns,” to quote Sam Altman. These tools will further student final projects.

Module 6: Re-imaging your expertise, resume and career trajectory: In this class students will present their final projects in small groups. The projects will display the nature of expertise, codified, replicated, recombined and deployed. Students will demonstrate the use of these clones in their AI-forward resumes, and the career strategy that makes use of these new valuable assets.

Evaluation:

Participation in class discussions: 50%

Final Project: 50%

Describe your career strategy

• Digital clones or agents that codify your capabilities
• Resume that includes how you can scale your expertise
• Terms on which you are willing to offer your capabilities

Career Focus & Educational Objectives

Managerial success requires the ability to negotiate. Whether you are forging an agreement with your suppliers, trying to ink a deal with potential customers, raising money from investors, managing a conflict inside your firm, or resolving a dispute that is headed towards litigation, your ability to negotiate will determine how well you perform.

Because others do not have the same interests, perspectives, and values as you, negotiation skill is critical-professionally and personally. This course will enable you to become a more effective negotiator by enhancing your abilities to:

• Identify (often-overlooked) value-creating potential in different situations;
• Design and execute agreements that unlock maximum value on a sustainable basis;
• End up with an appropriate share of the value that is negotiated;
• Understand the vital role of ethics in negotiation, even where the parties' ethical standards vary dramatically;
• Work with people whose backgrounds, expectations, perspectives, values, and ethical standards differ from your own; and
• Reflect on-and learn from-your experience.

This course will teach you how to analyze, prepare for, and execute negotiations at a sophisticated level-through actions both at and away from the bargaining table. It will give you the opportunity to enhance your strengths as a negotiator and to shore up your weaknesses.

Course Content

Moving from simple (two-party, one-shot, price deals) to complex (multiple parties and issues, internal divisions, long time-frames, cross-border deals), the course integrates three complementary perspectives: analytic, behavioral, and contextual. While we will analyze a number of traditional case studies, the heart of the course is a series of interactive negotiation exercises. These exercises will give you hands-on negotiating experience. You will learn first by actually negotiating, and then by stepping back to compare your approach and results with others. You will be able to test your analytic ability and tactical skill, and to experiment with new approaches.

The course is a laboratory in which you will be both experimenter and subject. Sometimes the most important learning comes from apparent "failure"-and so the course is designed to let you fail in the safe setting of a classroom, and thus help you avoid costly real mistakes.

All of the sections of EC Negotiation will cover the foregoing in considerable depth, though individual faculty members may vary in their emphases, case material, and sequencing.

Grading & Course Requirements

Grading will be based on class participation and the final exam (or paper if permitted by instructor). The exact weighting may vary from section to section. In all instances, however, diligent completion of the negotiation exercises is essential.

Please note this course is offered in both Fall and Spring terms.

Copyright © 2023 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

What can we learn from studying highly skilled negotiators and diplomats grappling with some of the world’s most challenging problems? This course explores how modern diplomacy and negotiation can effectively address seemingly “intractable” international conflicts and overcome barriers to agreement in civil wars, interstate conflicts, environmental challenges, as well as in trade and finance. Drawing on in-depth cases in national and global contexts, the course will develop diagnostic and prescriptive characteristics of effective negotiation and diplomacy as tools of political, military, economic, environmental and financial statecraft.

The course will pay close attention to the “how” and the skills of effective negotiation and diplomacy. How are negotiation and diplomacy conducted at the highest levels both at and away from the conference table? How can leaders use negotiations and the combination of diplomacy and other sources of leverage (sanctions, coalitions, the threat of force, etc.) to achieve their objectives? How do global and business leaders most effectively overcome daunting barriers to a desired agreements? In service of these objectives, the course will draw on case studies of some of recent history’s greatest negotiators both playing official and unofficial roles, look at in-depth, personal interviews from the instructors’ American Secretaries of State Project, in which we have already spent considerable time with nine former US Secretaries of State focused on their toughest negotiations (and expect to have at least two more such interviews with Mike Pompeo and Tony Blinken before the course is projected to start spring 2026). Throughout, we will study examples where negotiation and diplomacy paid off and where they failed in order to extract best practices and common mistakes.

Overview:

This course explores the power of ownership in shaping company success, as well as how to be effective as an owner of a company.

Most of the world’s companies are privately held, or they are publicly traded but controlled by founders (e.g., Google, Facebook), families (e.g., Ford), or charities (e.g., Novo Nordisk). In all these cases, a relatively small number of owners exercise ultimate control over decision-making. Within the constraints of what is legally allowed, these owners define the main parameters by which the company operates.

We will explore this power through three main lenses:

1. Ownership as an influence on company behavior. How does ownership guide how companies define success? How does ownership shape competitive advantage and affect company survival?
2. Ownership as a choice. What are the potential models of ownership? What are the career possibilities in different ownership models? When should companies consider changing models? As a founder, how should you think about ownership?
3. Ownership as a skillset? What is the difference between management and ownership? What makes someone effective at ownership? How do you prepare to be an effective owner?

By understanding these dynamics, students will be able to build long-term, sustainable strategies that account for the strengths/weaknesses that are built into both their companies as well as those of their competitors. Many of you will work for companies that are not widely held by the public, and virtually all of you will compete against such companies. For those who plan to start a company and want it to last beyond your leadership, you will need to consider whose hands to leave it in after your departure. The course may also open up career pathways you hadn’t considered, or influence how you think about your planned entrepreneurial venture.

Career Focus:

This course is designed to be broadly relevant to students, since ownership is a dimension that shows up in virtually every setting. A deeper understanding of ownership will help you make better decisions about your career as well as in your role as an organizational leader. It will have particular relevance for those who plan to be a company owner, as an entrepreneur, executive, and/or investor.

Educational Objectives:

The main objectives of the course are to:

• Increase exposure to the full range of ownership models and how they differ from each other, including: charity, cooperative/mutual, employee, family, founder, and government. We will also consider “hybrid” companies that are publicly traded but controlled by a founder, foundation, or family
• Learn how to analyze companies and industries through the lens of ownership
• Explore pros/cons of long-term private ownership models
• Build the skillset of an owner

The key questions we will explore are:

• In what ways does the ownership of a company affect how it competes?
• What are the strengths and weaknesses of different ownership models?
• When is it time to change a company’s ownership model (e.g., going from private to public or vice versa)?
• What does it take to be good at ownership (vs. management)?

Course Content and Organization:

The course is divided into four main modules:

1. Defining success. The objectives of most companies are far more complex than a focus on maximizing shareholder value. Students will learn a methodology for assessing and articulating more complex owner goals.
2. Creating advantage: Ownership shapes both the resources that companies have access to (human, financial, and social capital) as well as how they allocate those resources to create advantage. Ownership models can be seen as solutions to specific strategic problems, such as scaling a business or sustaining a culture. We will explore the competitive advantages and disadvantages of different ownership models, how companies can use ownership as a competitive weapon, and how to predict what companies will do based on who owns them.
3. Building to last: Not all companies care about longevity – for some, it is a purely financial decision, for others the goal is to be acquired, or to serve a time-limited purpose. However, for many companies, longevity is a critical part of how they define success. We will examine why once-prosperous companies fail and the ways in which ownership influences corporate mortality.
4. Engaging effectively: Ownership is a skill that can be learned and is distinct from management. Many students will be owners of a company at some points in their lives. We will investigate what it means to be effective at ownership, learning from the owners of sports teams. We will explore how a shift in ownership model (e.g., going from public to private) can be a tool for changing a company’s trajectory. We will also consider the “Founder’s Final Act,” which is the choice that a founder makes about where to locate ownership when they leave the business. That choice will have a profound impact on the company’s future path.

Each session will involve a case discussion. Some of the cases will be of the standard variety and some will be “live cases” where company leaders and/or owners will be integrated throughout the session. A number of cases will include guest speakers from the company.

Cases for the Spring 2025 course, with guest speakers where noted, were:

• The Hershey Company
• John Lewis Partnership
• Tata
• Mondragon
• New Balance. Guest Speaker: Chris Davis, Chief Marketing Officer and 2nd generation family member
• Vanguard. Guest Speaker: Cara McCutcheon, Chief of Staff to the CEO
• Rolex
• Tribal Councils Investment Group of Manitoba. Guest Speakers: Heather Berthelette, CEO, and Chief Dennis Meeches, President
• Wegmans. Guest Speaker: Colleen Wegman, CEO, 4^th generation family member
• Land O’Lakes. Guest Speaker: Teddy Bekele, Chief Technology Officer
• Oakland Athletics. Guest Speaker: John Fisher, Principal Owner
• Dell Technologies. Guest Speaker: Steve Felice, Former President and Chief Commercial Officer of Dell
• David Weekley Homes. Guest Speaker: David Weekley, Chairman and Founder

Grading / Course Administration:

Students will be graded based on engagement in class and either a final exam or a final paper. In the exam/paper, students will apply the lessons from the course to a company, including the ways in which a company’s ownership has shaped its strategic choices, how ownership has been a source of competitive advantage/disadvantage, and what they see as the primary strategic issues/options for that company in the future.

Copyright © 2025 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

This course aims to change the way you understand and see power. Power is one of the most talked about topics, but it is also one of the most misunderstood—and therefore vilified—ones in our society. Many assume power is predetermined by personality or wealth, or that it’s gained by strong-arming others. Many write it off as “dirty” and want nothing to do with it. Our misconceptions about power, what it is and where it comes from have devasting consequences for all of us individually and collectively. Individually, these misconceptions are frustrating, because they prevent people from having the impact that they wish to have in their lives, at work, in their community, and in society. Collectively, they make us less likely to identify, prevent, or stop power abuses that threaten our freedoms and well-being.

Course overview:

Designed for individuals at any stage of their career, this course is meant to debunk our fallacies about power and explore the fundamentals of power in interpersonal relationships, in organizations, and in society. In doing so, it will lift the veil on power, revealing to you what it really is and how it works, ultimately unleashing your potential to build and use power to effect change at home, at work, and in society. It is meant for those who want to make things happen, despite the obstacles that might stand in their way. This course also prepares you to use power responsibly, resist its corruptive perils, and exercise it to make the world a better place. As such, it will equip you to leverage power and influence not only for personal gain but also for the common good.

The course introduces conceptual models, tactical approaches, and assessment tools to help you develop your own influence style and understand political dynamics as they unfold around you. By focusing on specific expressions of power and influence, this course will give you the opportunity to observe effective—and ineffective—uses of power in different contexts and stages of a person’s career. The subject matter will challenge you to define for yourself what constitutes the ethical exercise of power and influence in your life.

The course builds on the book “Power, For All: How It Really Works and Why It is Everyone’s Business” (Simon & Schuster, 2021) that I co-authored with Tiziana Casciaro. Some of the chapters of the book will be assigned together with other readings throughout the course, but you do not need to have read the book (except for the introduction that will be an assigned reading for the first session) before the beginning of class.

The detailed list of readings and the detailed schedule of each of the course sessions will be posted in early August, which will give you ample time to prepare before the beginning of the course.

Course Modules & Objectives:

After introducing the fundamentals of power that will enable you to understand power across contexts and levels of analysis, the course will help you develop your own sources of power and your repertoire of influence styles before focusing on what it takes to become more effective change makers. The course will be structured around five interrelated modules:

Course Pedagogy:

The course will rely on a mix of traditional case studies, biographical case studies of historical figures, exercises, and class visits by guests who experienced different paths to and through power. The exposure to the development and uses of power in many different social settings including the private, public, social enterprise and non-for-profit sectors, and at various points in history will allow a comprehensive analysis of power in action. In addition, self-assessment tools will be included throughout the course to help you assess your own bases of power and influence style. As part of the course, you will also engage in two in-class simulations, as well as an individualized, personal coaching session, all of which will be debriefed in class.

A number of readings, both required and recommended, will supplement the case material and the various simulations and exercises described above. The course builds on the book “Power, For All: How It Really Works and Why It is Everyone’s Business” (Simon & Schuster, 2021) that I co-authored with Tiziana Casciaro. The chapters of the book will be assigned together with other readings throughout the course, but you do not need to have read the book before the beginning of class.

Course Requirements:

Grades will be based on two components (each accounting for 50% of the final grade):

1. Class participation: (50%)--including class attendance, contribution to class discussions and completion of the different exercises, coaching sessions and simulations. Students’ participation will be assessed based on the following criteria:

The class participation grade rewards students who help our collective learning through their contributions to class discussions. High-quality interactive class discussions are critical to this course, because learning about power and influence is an exercise in rigorous logical reasoning, which we achieve collectively by wrestling with incomplete information and conflicting interpretations, and by making disciplined use of qualitative and quantitative data.

2. Final paper assignment: (50%)

Overview

This is an advanced corporate finance course focused on private equity (PE) investing. The course offers a deep dive into growth equity and buyouts, also touching on closely related investing strategies such as distress and private debt. Students will examine a wide variety of investment settings: from lower middle market companies to mega-cap, from the United States to emerging markets, from buy-and-build situations to turnarounds to mature businesses, from “home-run” deals to troubled investments. (The course does not cover venture capital or real estate segments of PE.)

Through these case studies, the goal of the class is to understand when and how private equity firms consistently add value: what are the persistent and repeatable sources of risk-adjusted excess returns in the private equity space, what skills and institutional features enable that success, and what opportunities and challenges are presented by recent developments in the PE industry.

Students will gain exposure to a set of practical skills including deal assessment and due diligence, valuation, deal execution, capital structure, governance, change management, and setting incentives. In addition, a substantial part of the course will be spent on strategic elements of deal making.

Career Focus

The course is intended for students who are interested in working for a private equity firm, leading a private-equity owned operating company, investing in private equity as limited partners, or providing advisory services to private equity firms. This course is also appropriate for all students who are interested in a detailed and rigorous exploration of corporate finance, as many of the decisions taken by PE firms have a direct parallel to the strategic and financial decisions taken by companies more broadly and by other types of investors. The majority of cases will integrate these topics from a PE investor’s perspective. Guests will attend many of the classes.

Educational Objectives

This course has two objectives. First, it builds a rigorous approach and toolkit for sourcing, analyzing, negotiating, structuring and managing PE investments. The second goal of the course is to provide students with a deep understanding of the private equity industry in a broad sense: its common tools, strategies, impact, and factors that have been affecting its evolution.

Course Content and Organization

The course has 28 sessions, followed by a final exam. The course is organized into five modules.

• Module 1: Deal Sourcing and Valuation

This module will explore various strategies employed by private equity firms to identify and evaluate investment opportunities. Students will be expected to articulate clear, compelling and differentiated investment theses. Important tools for evaluating investments – including LBO investment return models, returns bridges, financial statement analysis, and broader due diligence questions – will be examined.

• Module 2: Deal Execution

This module highlights the critical levers utilized by private equity investors in structuring transactions, examining how funding choices enable or impede success, while increasing or mitigating risk. Capital structure, security choice, alignment of incentives, and broader capital markets issues will be central to the cases in this module. A detailed exploration of the structure and functioning of credit markets and their central role in private equity transactions will be highlighted.

• Module 3: Deal Management

This module explores the important choices that private equity firms make after closure of the transactions. In particular, the critical operational levers that drive value creation will be examined, as well as governance, board effectiveness and impact, and debt management. The interaction between investor and portfolio-company operating executives will be examined from multiple perspectives.

• Module 4: Realizations

This module examines timing of the exit and highlights the critical mechanisms for realizing value. A variety of realizations will be presented, including leveraged recapitalizations, strategic and financial sales of portfolio companies, initial public offerings, and secondary transactions.

• Module 5: Private Equity Firm Strategic and Management Issues

This final module takes a step back from deal-level analyses and looks at the organizational and strategic issues of private equity organizations. The goal is to understand why and which practices are likely to deliver sustained profitability in the future, and also to reflect on LPs pressures and needs.

Grading / Course Administration

Students are expected to be active participants in class discussion, offering a variety of quantitative and qualitative insights that contribute to the assessment of each day’s decision.

Class participation and the final exam each count for 50% of the course grade. Some cases include assigned exercises/submissions, typically due before class, which count towards the participation component of the course grade.

Copyright © 2025 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Career Focus:

This half course provides an introduction to product management, focused primarily on improving and scaling existing products at technology companies. It is designed for three types of students:

• Those who aspire to be Product Managers, or are broadly interested in Product Management.
• Those who will join larger established technology companies.
• Aspiring founders that are interested in learning how to grow technology products after finding product-market fit.

Educational Objectives:

A Product Manager is obsessed with the problem their product tries to solve and works to both define the product’s functional requirements and lead cross-functional teams to develop, launch and improve their product over time. Taught by an experienced former Google product executive, this course aims to provide an introduction to product management and expose students to key product development and growth strategies so they can build, optimize and scale products following graduation.

Product examples cover a range of technology products but most are focused on consumer facing software products in the internet, mobile and marketplace sectors. In the 2024-2025 academic year, cases and exercises will be grounded in products from: Uber, Spotify, Ancestry, Amazon, YouTube, Netflix, Slack, Redfin, Xero, Duolingo, Peloton and more. No prior knowledge of Product Management, design, engineering, or computer science required. Those interested in career transitions are especially welcome.

The final deliverable for the course will be a 4 hour case-based take home exam.

Please note, this course is focused on improving and scaling existing products that have already achieved product market fit at technology companies. While the course also addresses how to generate new product ideas and how to find initial product market fit, these topics are not a primary focus.

This course is a natural companion to Launching Technology Ventures and Startup Operations, both of which focus on early stage ventures searching for initial product market fit. It also complements Scaling Technology Ventures, which has a cross-functional perspective and focuses on overall organization design.

Course Content

In this half course, students will take the perspective of a Product Manager at a technology company tasked with improving and growing a product. Through case studies, individual exercises, assigned readings, and conversations with product leaders, students will examine different management opportunities and challenges related to building and growing technology products and practice applying key product strategies to real current situations that PMs at leading technology companies face. We will explore three different modules:

1. Improving Existing Product Functionality.
   How to determine which user pain points should be fixed and fix them? How to attract new users to a core product? How to optimize a conversion funnel? How to winback churned customers?
2. Adding New Product Features.
   How to prioritize new features? How to respond to the competition? How to price a new product feature? Which country to launch a new product in? How to reinvigorate a product with a new vision?
3. Pursuing Adjacent Products.
   How to find a new product adjacency? How to develop a MVP for a new product adjacency? How to shut down a poor performing product and reallocate the team to a new growth opportunity?

Course Pedagogy

The PM class leverages two core pedagogies: (1) cases and (2) exercises. Usually there are two classes per week, one that is case-based and the other that is exercise-based. Cases you are familiar with. Exercises are formatted in a similar way to cases except they require students to submit their answers (1pg / roughly 2hrs of work) in advance of class for a grade. These exercises are modeled after PM in-person or take-home interview questions. These may require students to do work/research that extends beyond the information provided. Most importantly, they give students an opportunity to create a key PM artifact and get feedback on their submission. Class discussion of exercises mirrors a traditional case discussion, but also includes the characteristics and components of a good exercise answer. Examples of previous year’s exercises: wireframing, churn analysis, user interviews and drafting a PR/FAQ.

Copyright © 2023 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

For an audio description of this course, click here.

Career Focus

This course is designed for students who may found, join, or fund private startup companies that sell to (or around) governments to solve giant problems or who may want to become extreme innovators inside government at some point themselves. The cases feature a broad range of contemporary technology applications, and the course may be of particular interest to students curious about AI, autonomy, blockchain, sensors, crowdsourcing, platforms, and related topics. The course also tackles career questions for students who wonder how to spend time making a difference in both the private and public sectors.

Course Content and Organization

Four modules make up the bulk of the course.

Ideas. What should public entrepreneurs work on? We tackle “problem-finding” and “solution-finding”. We touch on customer discovery to understand needs of citizens and public workers. We meet entrepreneurs who used the tools of design thinking and explore how they can be adapted for public problems.

Risk. How can public leaders and their private partners take on riskier projects? And how do we navigate obstacles to that? We consider whether lean startup techniques can be applied to these efforts.

Opportunity. How can businesses bring new products and services to the public? We look at ways of choosing channels, customers, and modes of revenue-generation. We weigh selling to governments or selling around them. We also look at raising capital for these business models and investing in them.

Scale. We ask how do private and public leaders bring these efforts to transformative levels? We look at the idea of government as a platform and ways to leverage their network effects for growth.

We tackle these topics mostly through case discussion, and we spend time with many guests. Three-quarters of the cases include some private company angle. One third of the cases have a non-U.S. component.

Grading and Course Requirements

Grading is based on class participation and a final exam.

Copyright © 2023 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Career Focus

This course provides students with the skills and knowledge essential for a career in managing, developing, or investing in real estate. Real estate is a multidisciplinary industry that requires strong analytical rigor as wells as broad strategic thinking.

Educational Objectives

Students will learn about the interplay of capital structures, building characteristics, stakeholders, and legal parameters. The class goals are to illustrate the process of sourcing, underwriting, and ultimately acquiring real estate investments.

Content and Organization

The course is organized into three modules.

Deal Making Fundamentals – The first module focuses the mechanics of real estate deal making and provides a foundation to understand the fundamentals of deal structuring, property types, negotiation and sourcing techniques.

Stakeholder Motivations – Students will learn to understand the various stakeholders’ economic incentives, legal constraints, moral and ethical motivations and fundamental human behavior. Negotiation games and role play will be an important part of this section.

Success and Failure The last module will reflect an investment committee style organization highlighting key decision-making characteristics that may lead to success or failure.

Pedagogical Mix

Real estate lends itself to case method teaching as virtually every subject requires quantitative and qualitative analysis, judgment calls, quick thinking and development of practical action plans. "Cold calling" and active participation are frequent and important components of class. We expect that students will be prepared as most classes will have the case protagonists or other industry leaders present.

Most homework assignments are required to be completed in groups. Additionally, polls will be used frequently and are considered an important aspect of class participation. The course will have a final exam.

Copyright © 2023 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Career Focus

This course is intended for any student interested in a career in private market investing. Specifically, we will cover topics pertaining to investing, managing, and developing investments in real estate and private asset backed companies. The course will be divided into three modules. The first module will focus on portfolio construction and understanding investment risks associated with private investments. The second module consists of the analysis of specific transactions with an emphasis on whether to pursue a specific transaction or not based on its investment merits. This section of the course will be run as an investment committee. We will focus on the attributes of both successful and many unsuccessful transactions. The final module consists of a focus on private investment firms, their compensation structures and how they impact behavior. For the final project students will be asked to develop an investment concept and present it via a paper and investment proposal. Industry leaders will judge the final presentations.

The course guests have historically included some of the leading private investors in the world, including Howard Marks, Barry Sternlicht, John Grayken, Ken Caplan, Mike Fascitelli, and Karsten Kellwig, among many others.

Educational Objectives

1. How to construct a private investment portfolio

2. How to assess the risks and returns in private investments and real estate portfolios

3. How to perform relative value analyses of differing investments

4. How to manage troubled investments (when to hold 'em and when to fold 'em)

5. How to understand how compensation issues affect performance

Course Content and Organization

Conceptual Framework: the course is divided into three parts with special emphasis on private equity financial analysis for transactions and portfolios. The course will analyze issues associated with both successful and troubled investments. We will address the issue of when to "double down" on an underperforming investment. We will incorporate a relative value approach in differentiating more attractive investments based upon their risk adjusted returns. The first module focuses on portfolio level issues, the second will review individual transactions and the third will look at the management and investment issues from the perspectives of both general partners and limited partners. The analysis will also include a study of firm economics and the resulting incentives from the 2/20 standard compensation model. Finally, students will prepare an investment proposal and present the investment concept.

Pedagogical Mix

Private equity real estate investments lend themselves to the case study method as virtually every subject requires both quantitative and qualitative analysis, judgment calls and development of a practical action plan. "Cold calling" is a frequent and important component of the class. Polling will be done frequently.

Textbook readings and technical notes supplement the cases, while additional optional books and articles are suggested for more exposure to theoretical concepts. A very significant component of the course will be presentations by case protagonists including leading industry figures. Senior executives from the industry will be in class to discuss the case and offer practical perspectives on lessons learned from the case. Out-of-class review sessions are offered by the professor to supplement concepts included in the case, particularly with regards to modeling certain concepts included in the given case. The workload and preparation are above average for the HBS EC courses.

Copyright © 2023 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Career Focus

This course is designed for students interested in managing, developing, advising on, or investing in commercial real estate. Real estate—when including single-family housing—is the largest asset class in the world. The global real estate industry ranges from small homes and local shops to multi-billion-dollar institutional portfolios. At every stage of the real estate lifecycle—conception, financing, development, operations, and sale—there are opportunities to create value and build wealth.

Educational Objectives

The course prepares students to:

• Analyze different asset classes and phases of the property cycle
• Evaluate uncertainty across people, projects, capital structure, and the macro environment
• Manage real estate projects and portfolios effectively
• Think critically about real estate deals
• Lead in a dynamic and evolving global industry

While rigorous in financial content, the course is suitable both for students pursuing full-time careers in real estate and for those interested in understanding their own homes and personal investments through direct ownership, partnerships, or securities. It is also an excellent precursor for related Spring electives including Real Estate Private Equity and Real Estate Investing.

Course Content and Structure

The course is organized into four modules:

Module 1: Foundations
Introduces the analytical framework for real estate investing and development. Topics include market analysis, key players, terminology, and basic financial tools.

Module 2: Asset Classes
Provides a deep dive into both traditional and emerging real estate sectors. Students study the major commercial property types—office, hotel, industrial, retail, and multifamily—with an emphasis on their defining characteristics, market dynamics, operating models, and performance metrics. The module also examines newer and rapidly evolving sectors such as senior living, single-family rentals, data centers, and select public infrastructure (e.g., power, water, and transit), highlighting how they compare with core Real Estate asset classes in terms of risk, opportunity, and investor interest.

Module 3: Capital Markets
Focuses on sources of real estate capital, including public and private debt and equity. Case studies cover private equity syndications, mortgages, REITs, and private credit. These examples also reinforce development processes, deal structures, and capital strategies.

Module 4: Trends and Innovation
Explores transformative trends reshaping the industry. Topics include PropTech, ConstrucTech, FinTech, globalization, sustainability, adaptation to climate change, and several of the newer investment classes introduced in Module 2.

Course Requirements and Grading

• Participation: 50%
• Final Exam: 35%
• Polls and Homework: 15% (primarily group work)

Polls are used frequently and are considered an integral part of class participation. The workload and preparation level are above average for an HBS EC course.

The course includes technical notes, mini-lectures, and a comprehensive toolkit for future use. Optional activities may include building site visits, career events, and industry networking opportunities.

Cross-Registration: Allowed by petition and subject to instructor approval.
Prerequisites: HBS Finance 1, GSD SES 5304 Real Estate Finance, Development, and Management, KSG API-141 Finance, or an equivalent course in financial analysis.
Auditing: Not permitted.

Copyright © 2025 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Course Overview and Objectives

This course is about one question: What is the proper role of the government in the market economy? We study the role of government as it plays out in the real world, using vivid case studies from many countries, decades, and policy angles. At the same time, we align these cases with a rigorous theoretical framework that clarifies the circumstances under which government intervention in the market can improve outcomes.

The goal of this course is to deepen your insight into and influence on the debate over economic policy. Private-sector managers are better able to position their organizations, both defensively and offensively, if they understand why and how governments act. Moreover, exceptional private-sector leaders are now widely expected to provide informed, intelligent leadership on the policy issues at the heart of this course.

Career Focus

The course is designed for students who aim to lead private-sector institutions of systemic importance, influence public debates over government policy, or occupy policymaking positions at some point in their careers. The skills and knowledge it develops, however, are increasingly valuable to the broad range of businesses, non-profit organizations, and civil society institutions whose activities intersect with government policy.

Course Structure

The course opens with a case on why a hypothetical competitive market economy can be used as a starting point for analyzing what role government should play. Market economies are miraculous when at their best: flexible, decisive, and self-correcting.

But markets are not always at their best, and the first module of the course confronts major real-world departures from this hypothetical starting point. These departures mean that government policy can improve the efficiency of the economy, in principle making all individuals better off. Policy areas addressed here include antitrust regulation, environmental protection, education, health care, and fiscal and monetary policy.

We may want the government to do more than remove inefficiencies, so the second module tackles questions of economic justice and their implications for the government's role. In particular, in this module we study central debates over the taxation of individuals and firms, the provision of economic assistance, and the determination of the boundaries of policy.

As this summary shows, the cases we discuss take us step-by-step through a rigorous conceptual framework that provides the intellectual backbone for the course. At the same time, each case gives us a chance to examine an important policy area in some depth. Accompanying each case are a set of core concepts and suggested readings. The core concepts represent fundamental insights into the role of government, so an understanding of them can substantially increase one's ability to analyze a given policy decision. The suggested supplemental readings are starting points for pursuing areas of particular interest in greater detail. They include many foundational pieces of scholarship, as well as newer and less scholarly works that shed light on these issues.

Course Administration

Course grades will be based on class participation (50%) and a short paper (50%). For the paper, students will apply the tools and ideas from the course to prepare, with one or two partners if they wish, an analysis of a government policy problem of their choice. The course is designed so that the time required to prepare the paper is comparable to the time a student would devote to a final exam. Throughout the term, Professor Weinzierl will be available to meet with students by appointment. To arrange a meeting, please contact his assistant, Deannah Blemur, at dblemur@hbs.edu.

Copyright © 2022 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Course Overview

Space is a place of unparalleled possibility for humanity, and it is in the midst of a revolution. In this course, we will learn about this revolution and the companies, such as SpaceX, Blue Origin, Axiom, Planet, and more that are driving in. We will be joined by leaders in the industry, including prominent HBS alumni, eager to help you join them in building a new space age with the private sector as its engine. We will learn about the history of civilian space agencies like NASA and of the military in space, and we will debate their role in the future. We will study the economics underlying the sector, where public-private linkages are deep and essential. And we will ask ourselves, and our guests, what animates our interest in space and justifies devoting time, effort, and resources to it.

The course consists of fourteen 80-minute sessions organized around Space to Grow: Unlocking the Final Economic Frontier, a book authored by Prof. Weinzierl and his former research associate (and this course’s inaugural teaching fellow) Brendan Rosseau. Each session will be devoted to a chapter of the book, and most will include guests who are leaders in today’s space industry. Supplementing the book are optional reading assignments.

Career Focus

“In the future, every business will be a space business.” A past guest of this course coined this phrase to capture an important truth: space is so intertwined in our everyday technologies, and our capabilities in space are expanding so rapidly, that every industry, every function, and every geography will depend on and utilize space to drive value. No matter your path after HBS, spending time learning about what’s happening in space will make you a smarter and more innovative leader.

If you’re already planning (and even coming from) a career in space, you know that HBS has staked out a leading position in the sector among our peer business schools. This course is the home base of the HBS space network, with hundreds of members from startup founders to senior executives at the largest NASA contractors and everyone in between. We want your expertise in our discussions, and we’re sure you’ll come away with a more holistic (and informed) perspective on all aspects of the sector.

Educational Objectives

• Develop an informed view on the history of and recent dramatic changes in how the space sector functions, including the evolving relationship between public and private actors.
• Consider and evaluate different forecasts for the further development of the space sector, including space-for-earth and space-for-space activities in LEO, cislunar, Mars, and other areas of operation.
• Identify feasible ways of regulating and governing decentralized space activities, including the establishment of property rights, through existing or new institutions.
• Understand one’s own vision for space and be able to explain why it is worth pursuing.

Course Outline

Grading

Copyright © 2024 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Career Focus

Scaling Technology Ventures (STV) is designed for students who aspire to found, join, or invest in growth-stage technology ventures. Students will learn how leadership teams address the challenges and opportunities ventures face after achieving product-market fit – and how to activate and manage exponential growth.

The course reflects the recent shift in market sentiment from “growth at all costs” to “find a path to profitability,” in placing particular emphasis on how ventures scale by achieving not just product-market fit, but profit-market fit.

Classes cover a diverse array of tech and tech-enabled businesses, including e-commerce, ed-tech, SaaS, HR-tech, mobile apps and gaming, marketplace platforms, mobility solutions, social media, two-sided platforms, robotics, and cybersecurity.

Educational Objectives

The course exists to address a gap in management scholarship between two fundamental stages of corporate development – exploration and exploitation. This model leaves out a critical phase connecting these two stages, which the course calls extrapolation – the period of dramatic top-line growth that occurs midway through a typical S-curve, after a venture has confirmed product-market fit and raised its first round of VC financing.

Adopting the perspective of a founder and CEO, a functional leader, or an investor, cases in the course frame many of the critical opportunities and challenges associated with activating exponential growth and managing through the extrapolation phase as a venture scales. Scaling situations are presented through a variety of functional lenses, including strategy, product management, sales and marketing, engineering and technology, talent, and operations.

In nearly every class, the course hosts case protagonists – founders, CEOs, and some VCs – as guests, mostly in person and on campus. Many guests also stay for roundtable lunches with students after classes.

Students have the opportunity to participate in several optional workshops with guests and outside experts. In past years, topics have included product management, performance marketing, venture capital, and diversity in tech.

Scaling Technology Ventures is a natural companion, and complement to, the EC course Launching Technology Ventures (LTV), though there is little if any overlap between the two courses.

Enrollment in STV is limited to 70 students per section.

Course Content

Through case discussions and dialogue with company founders, STV examines executive leadership and functional management challenges in scaling ventures after the "search and discovery" stage of startup evolution. Case companies have included Asana, BlaBlaCar, Catalant, Chegg, Chewy, Cobalt Robotics, Darktrace, FIGS, Mistral, Nextdoor, OhmConnect, Perch, Linden Lab, Supercell, Shopify, thredUP, TikTok, Wayfair, and Zoom, among others. The course also features an online computer-gaming simulation that enables students to compete against one another as rival SaaS firms vying for users, market position, and capital investment.

Case classes are organized into six modules that comprise the course’s Six S Scaling Framework. These variables represent external and internal enablers of successful scaling:

Activating Growth

Strategic Opportunity and Market: What does it take to “cross the chasm” to the early majority? How large is the serviceable addressable market, and will it support scaling? How scalable and repeatable is the business model?

Scope and Speed: How does a venture scale by expanding into new geographies, products, and markets? What does it take to manage multiple revenue streams? How fast should your expansion or diversification take place?

Solution: What constitutes a repeatable and scalable offer? How does the offer maintain sufficient homogeneity to address an extensible market, while establishing sufficient differentiation to fend off competitors?

Managing Growth

Structure: When and how should a rapidly scaling venture introduce more formal roles, systems, and processes? What organizational design choices favor scaling? What are the trade-offs between autonomy and control?

Senior Team: When should a venture replace its founder with a “professional” CEO? At what point should you recruit experienced executives into leadership positions? When should you start hiring specialists over generalists?

Spirit: How do scaling ventures design culture? How do they assimilate hires who are less mission-driven and more political than the first wave of recruits? How do ventures mitigate friction between the old guard and new talent?

Final Deliverable

Students have a choice between taking a final exam or completing a final project. The exam consists of a course-relevant case with assignment questions. The project invites students to apply course concepts to a scaling venture. For the project, students are encouraged to work in teams to address opportunities and/or challenges presented by their project sponsors and then prepare a report outlining their research, analyses, and recommendations.

Copyright © 2024 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Career Focus

SESC is tailored for individuals aiming to pioneer and lead positive and lasting change within various sectors, including social enterprises, government, and the private sector. Whether you aspire to launch or lead a social enterprise, innovate within policymaking and philanthropy, catalyze systemic change, or drive corporate social responsibility initiatives, this course provides the critical insights, frameworks and tools needed. Graduates will be well-positioned for roles that demand a deep understanding of leading and scaling social enterprises and designing and implementing solutions that drive measurable systemic change.

Who should take the course and why?

1. Aspiring social entrepreneurs (both for-profit and non-profit) who want to lead effective social enterprises that create impact and ultimately solve big social and environmental problems.
2. Business leaders who seek to influence the systems that can generate positive social change.
3. People whose work will be influenced by changing systems (e.g. climate, equality, healthcare, education), whether they are directly involved or not so they can better understand and make a positive contribution to the forces shaping their ecosystems.
4. People who are involved in systems change through a governance or advisory capacity, such as serving on non-profit boards, as a major donor, or in consulting roles.

Educational Objectives

1. Enhance your ability to critically analyze social enterprises and understand how to lead and scale them effectively.
2. Learn how to design and implement strategies that effectively address systemic problems that lie beyond the capacity of any single social enterprise or organization.
3. Gain insights into how different sectors can work together towards common goals, understanding the roles of policy, business, and non-profit organizations in driving systemic solutions.
4. Cultivate leadership skills necessary for navigating the challenges of social entrepreneurship and systemic change, focusing on resilience, stakeholder engagement, and adaptive strategy.
5. Create a community of students from across the university who are passionate about social and environmental change, and connect with over 500 alumni of the course, many of whom are building high growth social enterprises.

Course Overview

Social entrepreneurs don’t just build organizations, they change systems. This course will explore the frameworks, tools, mindsets, and best practices that successful social entrepreneurs use to maximize their impact. The course not only looks at social entrepreneurship through the lens of traditional entrepreneurship, but also asks how people motivated by disrupting entrenched and often inequitable systems differ from traditional entrepreneurs. We will look at differences in mindset and character; capacity for systems thinking; empathy in product/service design; and their ability to navigate diverse sources of capital to build either for-profit, nonprofit, or hybrid organizations. SESC take a deep dive into how social entrepreneurs can become systems entrepreneurs by developing a coherent systems strategy, collaborating with others, building power, and mobilizing change.

Since the skills required to sustain effective engagement with social systems can differ subtly from the organizational management skills often deployed by social enterprises, the course also discusses the distinct leadership capabilities needed to sustain multi-stakeholder systems change efforts. The course features a diverse group of protagonists in diverse contexts (issues, geographies, stages, organizational forms), but asks students to go deep on a single social entrepreneur of their choice over the semester, culminating with an integrative final assignment that through a peer review process can lead to the development of a new case study for the class.

Course Modules

1. Introduction to Social Entrepreneurship and Systems Change: Overview of foundational concepts, mindsets of social entrepreneurs, and the importance of systems thinking as an intuitive lens to achieving long-lasting impact.
2. Designing for Systems Change: The process of developing and testing effective solutions to enduring problems through the idea of being proximate, using design thinking to identify needs, and understanding the role of positive deviance in identifying workable solutions.
3. Building and Scaling Social Enterprises: The steps to build social enterprises from identifying the right funding sources (venture philanthropy and impact investing), to developing strategies for direct scale and replication, to evaluation practices, to governing for excellence. The module concludes with cases that shift towards indirect approaches to scale via policy and mindset shifts.
4. Understanding Complex Challenges & Implementing System Solutions: Tools and frameworks for analyzing complex problems: stakeholder mapping, identifying leverage points, and designing context-specific solutions. Exploring effective strategies for influencing systemic change, including collaboration, innovation, and narrative shifting.
5. The Role of Business in Systems Change: Examines how business leaders can contribute to solving complex social issues in collaboration with government and nonprofit sectors.
6. Leadership for Systems Change: Insights into the personal and professional journey of systems leaders, including skill development, risk management, and the cultivation of resilience.

Assessment

Grades will be based on class participation (50%), and a final project (50%). The final project is a paper written in several parts that profiles a social enterprise of one’s choosing and using the tools and frameworks of the course, assess the strengths and weaknesses of the organization, with a peer review process to learn from one another’s work and propose a new case study for future iterations of the course.

Why This Course

SESC provides a holistic approach to tackling social and environmental problems. This course offers a unique opportunity to learn from both leading academics and experienced practitioners, inspiring students to become effective agents of change in their communities and beyond. The faculty are both experienced social entrepreneurs and systems change agents, who bring a wealth of real-world experience and insights into the classroom. The course structure is further enriched by extensive contributions from expert guests, ensuring that most classes feature talks and interactive sessions with leaders from various sectors. These practitioners will share their experiences, challenges, and strategies, providing students with unparalleled exposure to contemporary issues and solutions in the field of social entrepreneurship and systems change.

Copyright © 2025 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Course Overview

Spiritual Lives of Leaders engages in a conversation that we seldom have at Harvard Business School – or across Harvard generally – that we believe you’ll find fascinating, inspiring, challenging, and useful. We invite everyone to participate equally in this conversation – whether you describe yourself as interested and curious, spiritual but not religious, an atheist or agnostic, a charismatic believer, or a lapsed fill-in-the-blank.

Students who experienced the three-year J-Term origins of this course came brimming with deeply personal and practical questions: What is spirituality? How can it be cultivated? What does spiritual leadership look like? How can I reconcile apparent tensions between my faith and the demands and aspirations of career and life? What do I need to know about the faith traditions of others to succeed as a leader operating in different communities around the world? Why do the institutions of religion so often fall short – or do real damage, contributing to deep division and conflict?

In Spiritual Lives of Leaders, we aim to create a space apart from the high hurry of our day-to-day lives to explore these questions. We’ve curated an amazing community of leaders, scholars, and thinkers from around the world to help us. Many of the leaders we invite fit us into very crowded calendars precisely because this area is important to them, and yet they don’t often get asked about their deepest commitments and influences that inform their leadership.

Why Should You Take This Course?

The following are questions that students who have taken this course have shared with us. If any of these resonate with you, that’s a pretty good sign that you would find value in joining our conversation and our community:

Living an Integrated, Purposeful Life

• “How do I live an integrated life where I can bring my faith and my own beliefs into the workplace? How do I integrate my career aspirations with my own personal values and personal aspirations?”
• “I’m curious what I can learn from religions not my own to make me a better leader for the future teams I get the opportunity to lead.”

Role of Spirituality in the Lives of Leaders

• “How do senior leaders translate convictions and insights from their private, internal spiritual lives to their public, external leadership?”
• “What is the role of spirituality and religion in the lives of high-pressure decision-makers? Is there a difference between the two?”
• “How can I build deep, enduring relationships with my business partners in other cultures by understanding their spiritual practices and commitments?”

When Faith and Work Collide

• “How can I hold strong to my personal faith while leading in a secular organization?”
• “When is it appropriate for me to talk about my own faith and beliefs in the workplace, while also ensuring that I am being inclusive?”

Bringing Meaning to Work

• “How can we bring meaning and purpose to the day-to-day lives of our employees?”
• “How can an atheist create a bond that seems to automatically exist between spiritual people?”

Repairing the World

• “How can leadership bring people together and away from the current divisive rhetoric and populism? How can leaders, especially young women, navigate challenging power asymmetry situations where there is very little appetite for change from within?”
• “In many contexts, religion and faith traditions appear to create deep division, conflict, and animosity toward others, so is there anything to be done without rejecting spirituality and faith altogether?”

Requirements

• Attend one 2-hour class each week, for 12 weeks across term
• Attend six 90-minute Journey Group sessions across the semester; groups are formed from a small cohort of students drawn from across participating Harvard schools.
• Participate in several optional field trips on selected weekends or evenings across the semester; planned destinations include the Arnold Arboretum, the Harvard Art Museum, the Harvard Dance Center, and a field retreat to a site such as the Society of St. John the Evangelist (just across the river) or Blue Cliff Monastery.
• Volunteer to design and lead sessions with invited guests, who will feature in most of our weekly sessions. Past guests have included Ken Frazier (CEO, Merck), Dr. Lisa Miller (Columbia University), David Brooks (NYT columnist and author), Martha Minow (former dean, Harvard Law School), and Larry Bacow (president, Harvard University).
• Submit a final paper or project reflecting on your spiritual journey and learning across the semester.

Grading

There are two graded requirements:

1. Class participation
2. Final paper/project

Participation is assessed more by quality and intensity of engagement than by simple quantity of classroom comments. We offer numerous opportunities across term to demonstrate engagement with the course and our guests and to help build a sense of community in the classroom and beyond.

Course Premise

Spirituality, faith, and religion play a crucial role in many people’s lives. They undergird convictions about right and wrong, help people to persevere through great hardship, inform people’s self-understanding and meaning-making, and shape people’s worldviews. In the best case, spirituality, faith, and religion can bring people together. In the worst case, so recently in evidence on campus and around the world, they can tear people apart.

Despite their centrality to many people’s experiences, however, spirituality, faith, and religion remain relatively unexamined—especially from a personal perspective—across the University. This course provides an opportunity to address this gap by bringing together students and faculty from across the University to explore what we can learn in conversation with leaders around the world who are informed by these practices and commitments.

This course grows out of our highly successful experience in piloting this curriculum across three well-subscribed J-Term SIPs. Student interest in this course has grown each year we have offered it, and we are currently collaborating with 30 students and faculty from across the University to build out the syllabus and terrain of the course to match most closely student needs and interests. While we expect a strong student base from among our own MBAs, we are scheduling the course in a timeslot that will accommodate a group of committed cross-registrants.

Aspiring cross-registrants desiring more information about the course can reach out to our teammates in their respective schools and programs, including Practitioner in Residence John Brown and Assistant Dean Laura Tuach (HDS), Adjunct Lecturer Metta McGarvey (HGSE), Professor Scott Westfahl (HLS), Professor Howard Koh (HSPH), Senior Fellow Tina Fernandez (ALI) and HBS Executive Fellows Angie Thurston and Rich Phillips This course is a move toward reconnection, toward integration, not just for the purpose of making meaning for ourselves but also to reconnect with each other.

Course Goals

By the end of the course, students should understand how an awakened sense and understanding of spirituality and faith traditions can drive both individual and corporate purpose, as they have seen this modeled in invited leaders from the realms of business, public health, education, and public policy. They also should have a better sense of how this awakened sense can help them to guide their own personal and professional agency across careers of increasing responsibility. Most broadly, they will have a deeper appreciation and understanding for what has been a crucial aspect of existence for individuals and societies.

Our hope is that this course will have a profound influence on your self-understanding, on your formation as a leader, on your understanding of the communities in which you will operate, and on your sense of personal purpose.

Course Outline

To serve the objectives outlined above, we are planning to organize our term into three principal modules, focused on three stages of the development of a global leader. These stages, with examples of existing curriculum that students have encouraged us to continue to offer, are presented below. We will continue to build out our plans and guest list across the summer and fall and invite your active participation even before term begins.

I. The Inner Journey – Learning to Make Meaning

• The Dance of Dharma
• Leadership and Character
• Making Meaning in the Workplace
• Finding Meaning in Relationship with Nature

II. The Outer Journey – Focusing On Your Leadership Role

• Difficult Decisions: How Faith Shapes Boardroom Debate
• Faith as An Enabler and Disabler
• Linking Spirituality, Health and Leadership
• Poetic Justice: Islam and Business

III. Moving Beyond – Locating Purpose in the World

• Moral Growth as a Business Leader
• Spiritual Philanthropy in Emerging Markets
• Trans-Generational Change: The Lessons of Ashoka
• Spirituality in Technology
• Regenerative Capitalism

Readings and Teaching Formats

The assigned readings for the course will be drawn from a variety of sources, including a curated selection of readings from ancient wisdom traditions as well as contemporary readings, some composed by invited guests. While we have developed a number of case studies for use in the course, we will favor experiential learning over case-based pedagogy, as well as live interaction with our invited guests.

We are currently assembling the final reading list for the course and can offer recommendations to students wishing to dive in across the summer and fall.

Journey Groups

During an early Tuesday afternoon class session, each student will be assigned to a 5-person Journey Group. Groups will be designed to be cross-sectional in nature, with representatives drawn from across participating schools in the University. This group will meet six times across the semester, ideally at a consistent time, agreeable to all members of the group, every other week from early February through mid-April. While some sessions can take place over Zoom, we strongly encourage in-person meetings, and some in-person sessions will be required.

Journey Groups are intended as safe, confidential spaces for students to share their understanding of their guiding values and to keep track of their own spiritual exploration across term. A favorite exercise is called Rivers of Life, in which students draw (yes, with colored pencils and drawing paper) a map of the significant life experiences that have shaped the leaders they have been, and are becoming.

A student shared with us this past year that her Journey Group was different from any other small group she participated in at school because “this is the only meeting that is about me.” That’s not a bad statement of our ambition in creating this aspect of the curriculum.

Copyright © 2024 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

SVC-S is an abridged version of the course Strategies for Value Creation. This integrated course combining elements of strategy and finance has four modules: (1) Understanding value creation, (2) Creating competitive advantage, (3) Sustaining competitive advantage, and (4) Driving profitable growth. Given the compressed nature of the course, SVC-S will place a somewhat greater emphasis on valuation and financing considerations.

SVC-S is designed to provide students with the knowledge, skills, and judgment needed to make better investment, strategic, and operating decisions. Cases typically analyze the value implications of major strategic decisions or analysis of unique business models. Similar to SVC, the course will utilize more strategy concepts (creating and sustaining competitive advantage, managing competitive interactions, etc.) than a typical RC Finance class, and will utilize more financial concepts (measuring value and assessing risk) than a typical RC Strategy class. The goal is to see value creation as an important—but by no means the only—corporate objective and a guiding principle for making important business decisions.

Student evaluation will be based on class participation and a final exam.

For information on the SVC course go to: Strategies for Value Creation (SVC)

Overview

This course explores the unique aspects of creating effective strategies for technology-intensive businesses. What are effective strategies for winning in markets with network effects? How can technology be leveraged to build multisided platforms? How can firms create and capture the value from intellectual property assets? What are the unique challenges of governing technology-intensive firms? And how can they build and sustain value in emerging technologies?

Industries covered range widely, including Generative AI, esports, autonomous vehicles, collaboration tools, cybersecurity, cloud services, e-commerce, social networking, browsers, semiconductors, operating systems, streaming media, intellectual property, mobile communications, electronic ink, blockchain, crypto currency, and wearable technology.

Course Content and Organization

The course is structured into six modules:

Network Effects: Technology-intensive businesses have unique attributes, which make their products increasingly valuable if more consumers buy their product or if more complements become available. What are the implications for market tipping, pricing and growth strategies?

Multisided Platforms (MSPs): The most important competitive battles in technology are no longer between standalone products or services, but between platforms. Many of the most successful companies are those who build multisided platforms (MSPs), which spawn large ecosystems of users and suppliers of complementary products and services. Why and how are MSPs different from “normal” firms? What are the key strategies for creating successful MSPs?

Tactics—Judo & Sumo Strategy: Many of the critical challenges in fast-moving technology businesses are tactical in nature: how and when do firms cooperate and compete with firms within their industry? How can small firms use their larger competitors’ size to their own advantage (judo strategy)? When and how can large firms impose their will (sumo strategy) against other players in their ecosystem, without running afoul of antitrust laws?

Managing Intellectual Property: A defining characteristic of technology industries is the disproportionate share of value which resides in intellectual property (IP) assets. We will explore the current challenges in the system of patents, how firms create IP and build business models enabling them to appropriate value from their IP.

Governance of Technology Firms: Startups and large firms in the technology world face special governance problems, especially asymmetrical information between management and boards.

Look Forward, Reason Back: Large-scale industry change happens faster in technology than in other markets. Cutting edge technologies have unique problems related to untested demand, uncertain performance, and the challenge of how firms can build and maintain their competitive edge in order to take advantage of new technological opportunities. This module explores how managers ‘look forward’ into highly uncertain environments, then ‘reason back’ to devise strategies for today.

Career Focus

The course should be of particular interest to those interested in managing a business for which technology is likely to play a major role, and to those interested in consulting, private equity or venture capital. The course may also be valuable for students who do not necessarily plan to pursue a career related to technology. Indeed, the concepts and frameworks covered (e.g., network effects, judo strategy, multisided platforms) apply well beyond technology industries.

Copyright © 2025 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Overview of Strategy for Entrepreneurs

All startups start as ideas. They are conjectures, hypotheses, and predictions about how a firm can make money by solving a problem that the market has yet to solve. As with any new idea, knowing with certainty if your startup idea will work is impossible. Worse yet, a startup idea is a bet with an unknown probability of success and an unknown payoff. When inspiration strikes, and you write down an exciting startup idea on a napkin, you don’t know if it will work, and you don’t know how much value it will generate.

Strategy for Entrepreneurs (SfE) will teach you how to effectively learn about your idea’s chances of success and the value your firm might create. The benefits of learning are twofold. First, you generate signals about your idea’s potential that can convince others—from investors to employees—to join you. Second, if you learn your idea stinks, you can iterate and pivot to a new, more promising idea.

But learning—especially about startup ideas—is challenging. Signals are biased and noisy. Designing experiments is non-trivial, and running tests is expensive. Failure is hard to admit and learn from. Getting to and listening to feedback is challenging. The ideas with the most potential and impact are often also the ideas that are hardest to test.

SfE is structured to help you learn in the face of all these challenges. Beyond the course frameworks and cases, SfE will guide you and give you time to build with Generative AI tools, which if used effectively will radically accelerate your ability to learn about the promise of your idea and develop it into a scaled venture. The course is designed for entrepreneurs, but the examples, cases, and exercises are relevant for future investors, product managers, and joiners, too.

Course Structure and Content

The course structure is unusual.

Roughly 50% of the sessions are case discussions.

The other 50% of the course focuses on hands on learning and building. You will develop, test, apply AI tools to, and get feedback on a startup idea you work on over the semester.

Students should enter the course with an idea they would like to develop into a startup, either now or in the future, or an idea they have already started to build. The course will then push you to develop your idea through writing, building, and experimentation. On the writing front, you will be pushed to clearly articulate the problem you are solving, outline a solution, and describe how you will make money; throughout the course, you will give and receive written and in-person feedback on the idea you write. At the semester's mid-point, the course shifts towards building and experimentation, with one week devoted to running experiments and multiple sessions focused on using AI to efficiently build out your startup idea.

SfE’s unusual structure and focus on developing and testing a startup idea make it an excellent complement to more case-centered early-stage entrepreneurship courses like Launching Technology Ventures (LTV), Avoiding Startup Failure, and Founder’s Mindset. The focus on learning to use AI tools to develop, test, and scale an idea makes it excellent complement to Product Management and Digital Marketing Workshop.

The cases and exercises focus on early and growth-stage startups. The cases feature startups from across the globe and a diverse set of protagonists. While focused on for-profit ventures, many cases feature founders focused on broadening the benefits of innovation and technology. The course includes startups from across the globe, including the US, India, Ghana, and Colombia, and startups working on a range of problems, including women’s and mental health, cloud kitchens, the circular economy, b2b compliance training, on-demand laundry, and even toothbrushes. The course will help you develop the following skills:

• How to run convincing startup experiments.
• How to use Generative AI tools to generate startup ideas, build software, and experiment.
• Map a startup’s traction and business model into funding and valuation numbers.
• How to give other entrepreneurs effective feedback on their startup ideas.
• Write cogently, persuasively, and effectively.
• When to ignore and when to listen to advice from VCs and other key stakeholders.
• Identify and evaluate market gaps with customer interviews, minimum viable product tests, pricing surveys, and more.
• Decide in the face of uncertainty and limited data.
  
  

You can learn more about the course on the public version of the course website: www.sfehbs.com

Copyright © 2025 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Career Focus

This course is appropriate for students interested in pursuing careers in any management function (e.g., operations, marketing, finance) in firms that make, sell and/or distribute physical products, or in organizations (e.g., consulting firms, investment banks, private equity firms, software providers, transportation providers) that analyze, invest in, and/or offer products and services to those firms.

Educational Objectives

Supply Chain Management (SCM) builds on aspects of the first-year Technology and Operations Management (RC TOM) course. However, whereas RC TOM focuses primarily on producing and developing products and services, SCM emphasizes managing product availability, especially in a context of rapid product proliferation, short product life cycles, and global networks of suppliers and customers. Hence, topics not examined in RC TOM such as inventory management, distribution economics, and demand forecasting are explored in depth in SCM.

SCM also differs from RC TOM in that RC TOM concentrates primarily on material and information flows within an organization, whereas SCM focuses on managing material and information flows across functional and organizational boundaries. Due to the boundary-spanning nature of supply chain management, the SCM course also has strong links to the first-year courses in marketing, leadership, and strategy. The course emphasizes the "general manager's perspective" in managing supply chains. Cases in the course illustrate that barriers to integrating supply chains often relate to organizational issues (e.g., misaligned incentives or change management challenges) and operational execution problems (e.g., misplaced SKUs in a retail store) that fall squarely in the domain of the general manager. Numerous case protagonists and expert guests will join sessions throughout the semester to share their broader management perspectives.

Data-driven, analytical decision-making is often critical in supply chain management, and thus SCM also builds on aspects of the first-year Data Science and AI for Leaders (RC DSAIL) course. However, whereas RC DSAIL focuses primarily on mechanics and applications of particular data science techniques, SCA emphasizes how to deploy data science (analytics) capabilities in business operations and how employees can best leverage their own expertise and data science tools to improve business outcomes. The course makes clear that suitable information technology and appropriate use of analytical tools are necessary, but by no means sufficient, for supply chain management.

Grading

Grading will be based on class participation, engagement, and a capstone project consisting of playing a week-long “Supply Chain Game” simulation and writing a corresponding report.

Copyright © 2024 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

The course won the 2021 Teaching Recognition Award for Excellence in Sustainable Finance Education from the Financial Times.

Career Focus

This is an investing/finance course, designed to build on skills introduced in the RC finance course, but with an emphasis on how investors should incorporate what have traditionally been considered “non-financial” criteria in their decisions: for example, climate risk, environmental sustainability, minority representation on boards, and even the potential to create social good. Covering both public and private markets, the course will present the unprecedented opportunities that have arisen due to energy transition and other trends through rigorous approaches to business model assessment, valuation, transaction structuring and exits, as well as equity selection and portfolio construction. The course also explores incentives, decision-making, and the crucial problems and opportunities within the industry itself.

This course is geared toward students interested in working in the investment industry - whether directly, as an asset manager/investor, advisor or private individual, or indirectly as an entrepreneur or operator receiving investment capital. The course will also provide important learnings for students looking to work in the development and non-profit sectors where collaboration between the public and private sectors is important. We will emphasize practical skills, including pitching stocks, performing diligence, measuring impact, and evaluating portfolio performance.

This course will be differentiated from other excellent offerings at HBS by focusing on the intersection of investing/finance and key global challenges, guided for example by the UN Sustainable Development Goals, including climate, gender equality, and poverty reduction. Emphasis will be placed on the analytical tools needed to understand the financial perspective and make investing decisions; however, students will also be learn to rigorously assess investments in the context of non-financial objectives. Investing – Sustainable Investing is a finance course, which could be taken on a stand-alone basis or as a complement to Private Equity Finance, VC/PE, and Entrepreneurial Finance, Investment Management or Investment Strategies.

Course Content and Objectives

An increasing share of assets globally are subject to a non-traditional (environmental, social, and governance [“ESG”] and impact screens), including over 30% of all professionally managed assets worldwide (ca. $30 trillion). Most large asset managers (e.g., Morgan Stanley, Bain Capital, TPG, Blackrock, State Street) are establishing sustainability investment practices, and developing products to meet the demands of capital owners, including pension funds, endowments, and family offices.

The promises are seductive: better long-term risk management, “doing well by doing good”, and new sources of alpha such as investment in energy transition which is viewed as a “once in a generation” investment opportunity. Skeptics argue a focus on non-traditional criteria may distract from and reduce returns, or, on the other extreme, shift funding away from worthy philanthropic causes. Using tools from both the asset pricing and corporate finance toolkits, this course examines these questions in detail: What does it mean in practice to incorporate non-traditional preferences and criteria? How do such activities affect risk and return? Do these new practices actually alter company behavior, or create social value? How is and how should social value be defined and measured?

In public markets, we evaluate the costs and benefits of negative screens, ESG integration, and activist investing. Private market cases cover venture capital in Asia and Africa, private equity in the US renewables market, as well as instruments involving the public sector, such as social impact bonds.

Cases critically examine the logical and market case for a wide range of models, ranging from those that seek (and obtain) above market returns, to those designed to use the power of financial contracting to unlock innovation and help transform the social sector. Cases will require rigorous financial and investment analysis, building on and extending skills acquired in the RC finance courses.

The landscape is changing quickly; nearly every case was written or updated for this course in the past twenty-four months; most classes will feature protagonists as guests. Recent cases include TPG Rise Climate, Blackrock Circular Economy Fund, Generation investment Management, CPPIB, Carbon Credit Investing, and British International Investments among others.

Course Organization

The first module provides an overview of the industry, an introduction to key challenges, and the existing evidence base. The second module investigates private market activity with a focus on how firms make investment decisions given both traditional and non-traditional objectives. The third module examines the challenges related to defining, measuring and managing “impact” or non-traditional goals and objectives. The fourth module explores objectives and implementation in the public market context including negative and positive screens, engagement and activism and ESG integration. The fifth module looks at the frontiers of this practice including robo-investing and the evolution of large-scale financial institutions.

Class Sessions: The course has approximately 14 cases, some of which include simulations or group exercises. Class participation and other activities will account for 60% of the grade.

Paper/Project: The Paper/Project will account for 40% of the grade.

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Course Format:

Spring Q3Q4. Students will meet once a week for a 120-minute session and will discuss cases, interact with guests, and/or actively apply tools.

This course is for founders, joiners, investors, and consultants aspiring to create value by designing (or helping design) the management systems necessary to bring new ventures from early-stage startups to growth-stage and beyond. Early-stage ventures initially (and naturally) rely on informal interactions to develop their offers, connect with customers and investors, and launch operations. Upon entering the growth stage, scaling ventures introduce, often of necessity, increasingly formal management systems to recruit, organize, direct, develop, and motivate their employees. However, the application of conventional wisdom often results in top-down systems that are excessively bureaucratic and hinder agility. This course will help you learn how to build a growth-stage venture while keeping your employees empowered and your organization nimble. You will learn to build a solid foundation that will allow your organization to amplify its impact in today's highly volatile environment.

Educational Objectives

The goal of this course is to expose you to management systems used by ventures to overcome tradeoffs between scale and agility. By ventures, we mean entrepreneurial organizations prioritizing innovation and employee empowerment, rather than standardization and tight monitoring of rote processes. This is not a course about launching a startup or financing it, nor a course about highly stable, established enterprises. This course is about leading and managing an entrepreneurial organization as it accelerates growth, usually the point at which most ventures need to formalize management systems. Through cases, readings, and a final project, the course will introduce the tools organizations need to enable growth across one or more markets, while continually adapting to new and changing circumstances.

Course Content

a. Formalizing management systems to support growth. You will learn about why, when, and how ventures start to formalize management systems—for example, developing operating budgets and determining different job functions— and how they evolve these systems and functions through various stages of growth. You will also learn about how executives adjust management systems to different forms of growth—organic, inorganic (through M&A), franchising or licensing, and so on. Our discussions will highlight the core tension of this course for high-growth organizations — between empowering employees or teams to adapt to new markets and implementing formal systems to drive disciplined execution.

b. Driving results. Employees in growth-stage ventures must explore new opportunities in the market while driving the growth of offerings where the organization has already achieved product-market fit. You will learn how to design performance alignment systems, such as Objectives and Key Results systems (OKRs), Balanced Scorecards (BSCs), and Performance-potential models, to hold employees accountable for driving financial results for established offers, while encouraging them to uncover new opportunities for offerings and growth.

c. Agility and empowerment. Next, you will learn how to develop decision-support dashboards and guidelines, as well as agile teams, to enable employees to share best practices and achieve coordination, while preserving employees’ empowerment and ability to continue learning (e.g., through a Structured Empowerment Framework). You will also uncover how data analysis (including AI and machine learning techniques) can be incorporated into the development of such dashboards and guidelines.

d. Building systems for learning. Growth-stage ventures that empower their employees also need to ensure that those employees have the skills to find out how to drive results. You will learn how to build feedback and information systems to (a) initially train employees, (b) provide them with direct feedback on their decisions (e.g., through performance assessments), (c) promote peer-to-peer feedback (e.g., through enterprise social networks), and (d) engage employees in developing new ideas and best practices (e.g., through surveys, contests, agile process and teams, and A/B testing).

e. Connecting empowerment to culture. Beyond holding employees accountable, growth-stage organizations need to build a culture promoting the pursuit of shared goals in line with the organization’s purpose and values—not just the goals of emerging silos. You will examine systems (such as value-based recruitment and training, value-based assessments, and rituals) used to keep employees aligned with the growing organization’s values and purpose.

Final Project/Report. The course will provide you with the opportunity to work with a growth-stage venture, applying concepts and tools from the course to solve problems and uncover new ways to foster growth as a consulting team would. You will be asked to deliver a final report or presentation to the organization and then to submit a final report for the course.

Copyright © 2024 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

We talk to people to achieve success in every aspect of business and life. Even though we do it constantly, conversation is hard, especially for leaders. This course will sharpen your conversational awareness, confidence, and skills using the TALK framework, derived from cutting-edge behavioral science:

Topics: in which we figure out what to talk about, and when and how to switch topics effectively.
Asking: in which we learn how to ask and answer questions well.
Levity: in which we aim to balance humor and warmth with gravity.
Kindness: in which we remind ourselves to speak respectfully, engage receptively with opposing views, and listen responsively.

In this course, you will:

• Reflect on your conversational goals: Why do we talk? What does it mean to do it well? How do these goals play out over the short- and long-term?
• Study the TALK framework to understand conversation as a fundamental part of the human experience--a complex, repeated game we play with others every day, one filled with hundreds of micro-decisions.
• Participate in many immersive conversation exercises (both silly and serious)--always as yourself (no role playing).

• Take advantage of this safe environment to practice specific conversational approaches that may (or may not) work for you.
• Record and listen back to yourself to reflect on your conversational performance and progress.

Course logistics:

• 13 session course: Experiential exercises, weekly reflections, and an individual final project
• 2 sections of 60 students
• Some class sessions will take place in the Hives (depending on classroom availability)
• Course guests will include experts on sales/persuasion, matchmaking, conflict management, designing work meetings, freestyle music, digital communication, and conversational AI.
• Grading is based on class participation, assignments, and a final project.
• No technical background required.
• This course focuses mostly on human-to-human dialogue (interacting with other people), not monologue/public speaking.

Course Overview

Tough tech ventures face both high levels of technology and commercial pathway uncertainty, and therefore demand their own strategies and tactics for managing risk vs. reward. Historically, most entrepreneurship courses (at HBS, and elsewhere) disproportionately focus on consumer- and /or software-centric business model and product experimentation tools (e.g., business model canvas, Lean Startup methodology) which are optimized for venture opportunities with relatively low technological and/or market uncertainty.

While tough technology has the potential to transform incumbent industries and tackle our most pressing societal issues, the tough tech ventures which design and deploy these solutions confront a number of challenges that are distinct from those faced by more mainstream startups. This course has been built from the ground up to dig deeply into these challenges and to provide impactful and actionable frameworks which build on all the tools learned so far at HBS to overcome them in order to drive impact at scale.

Career Focus

This course has been specifically designed for students who are considering founding, joining or investing in tough tech ventures upon, or soon after, graduation. While the course is focused on advanced technology, students need not have a technical background, merely a passion for making an impact through participation in these ventures. The primary objective of this course is to enable students to holistically understand and evaluate tough tech ventures at the various stages of their development, identify specific commercialization frictions and apply a set of strategies to overcome those challenges and successfully lead these ventures to scale in order to generate financial returns and deliver the intended impact.

Key Learning Objectives

• Understand key founding and funding models for tough tech innovation
• Define tough tech R&D and product roadmaps, incorporating intellectual property concerns and “technoeconomic” forecasting
• Articulate paths to market and business models while accounting for tough tech value chains and competition
• Explore and negotiate strategic partnerships and investments
• Analyze the tough tech lifecycle financing sources and tradeoffs from early grants and equity to later stage deployment capital
• Examine global and local market failures that affect tough tech ventures and policy interventions that may stimulate (or stymy) the investment in, and scalability, of these ventures
• Identify best practices for designing, building, incenting and leading successful tough tech teams
  
  

Course Content & Organization

The main class tool will be case discussions based on a variety of tough tech ventures, including those pursuing frontier clean energy, material science, biotech and aerospace technologies. We will have case protagonists and guests in every class including tough tech entrepreneurs, investors and domain experts so you can engage directly with these practicioners from the burgeoning tough tech venture ecosystem. Additionally, the course will borrow heavily from Professor Matheson’s activities in founding, leading and investing in tough tech ventures and Professor Krieger’s research on R&D strategy and tough tech ventures.

Grading will be a combination of class participation, periodic written reflections and a final written case done in small Teams.

Copyright © 2023 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

For a sample syllabus, click here.

Career Focus

This course is designed for students who are interested in the intersection of education (K-12 and higher education) and business — whether that means starting a business in the education sector or being a board member or investor, to someone who wants to make a difference in the education sector while pursuing a career in other industries.

This course draws on the extensive experiences of the instructor (HBS ’93) who has been a social entrepreneur in the education sector for the past three decades. His work includes founding a venture backed school network, leading a firm that has been advising and supporting public school districts around the US, investing in numerous educational startups, and serving as a board member in numerous educational non-profit organizations.

This course is geared for students of all backgrounds, and everyone can deeply engage in the class discussion. Education work-related experience is not necessary.

Course Overview

The course covers a wide range of topics across K-12 and higher education. Topics include education reform efforts, adaptive and personalized learning approaches, disruptive innovations such as AI and machine learning, and system-level change efforts. The broad set of topics will create an opportunity for the class to deepen its understanding of the complexities and constraints of the sector while ferreting out what works. Cases are set in various markets including the U.S., Asia, Europe, and Latin America. A third of the cases are set in a non-US context.

The cases feature social entrepreneurs leveraging entrepreneurial and managerial practices to deliver pattern-breaking change in K-12 schools and higher educational institutions. The cases will examine protagonists working within established educational systems as well as through independent education-focused organizations. Three-quarters of the cases are on private enterprises (for-profit and non-profit) and about a third of the cases are on private venture-backed companies. Nearly all the sessions include visits from case protagonists.

Course Organization

In addition to an introductory module which will provide background and context of the education sector, the course will be organized into the following modules:

• Personalizing learning: How can schools meet the unique needs of each student? What role can technology play in this effort and how is it changing the role of the teacher and the classroom?
• Striving for equity and performance: How should schools define success beyond test scores? What are the skills and aptitude necessary for the future? How will the recent ruling by the Supreme Court of the U.S. impact the definitions of success, merit, and equity?
• Achieving systemic coherence: What are ways in which leaders can align systems, structures, and resources to lead an inherently complex organization that serves a vast range of needs?
• Evaluating opportunities: How should social entrepreneurs define success for families and schools while satisfying investors? The course will examine ventures that are rapidly adapting technology, selling directly to parents (e.g., consumers) as well as to institutions (e.g., colleges, schools). The course will evaluate emerging ideas and ventures and get a chance to ponder the question of how social entrepreneurs can do well and do good at the same time.
• Disrupting higher education: What will the rapid changes occurring among colleges and universities mean for the future? How are entrepreneurs using technology and new business models to bring quality post-secondary education to all?
• Scaling change: How can entrepreneurs and leaders scale what works? What are the challenges in replicating, scaling, and sustaining successful models?

The course also endeavors to foster a strong community of students who share an interest in the education sector across HBS and other parts of Harvard University.

Grading and course requirements

Grading is based on class participation (50%) and final paper (50%).

Copyright © 2025 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

At the root of the transformation occurring in the health care industry—both in the United States and internationally—is the fundamental challenge of improving clinical outcomes while controlling costs. Addressing this challenge will require dramatic improvements in the processes by which care is delivered to patients. This, in turn, will involve novel technologies, fundamentally different approaches to care delivery, a rethinking of incentives, and new roles for individuals and organizations throughout the health care sector. This course will equip students with strategies and tools to help navigate the ever-changing landscape of the health care industry.

Career Focus

This course is appropriate for students interested in understanding the fundamental improvement challenges facing the health care sector and developing strategies for addressing them. Students may have career interests in organizations that provide health care (e.g., hospitals, medical groups, retail clinics) or in firms that partner with, supply, consult to, or invest in such organizations (e.g., payers, biopharmaceutical and device companies, health information technology, venture capital and private equity).

Educational Objectives

This course will help students develop the managerial skills required to identify and implement transformational change. It will draw upon a range of approaches for improving value in health care delivery, including continuous improvement, organizational redesign, population health management, precision medicine, patient engagement, digital health, payment reform, and the creation of appropriate incentives for value delivery and innovation. For each of these approaches, the course will emphasize the importance of identifying improvement opportunities, implementing relevant changes, and measuring their effects on performance.

Course Faculty

The course will be co-taught by Susanna Gallani and Robert Huckman.

Susanna Gallani is the Tai Family Associate Professor of Business Administration. Her research focuses on performance management systems in health care organizations and how these systems operate to align behaviors, measure, and reward performance. Themes that are central to her interests include the role that performance management systems play in improving health care value, enhancing health equity, and reducing workplace burnout.

Robert Huckman is Albert J. Weatherhead III Professor of Business Administration, the Howard Cox Faculty Chair of the HBS Health Care Initiative, and the Unit Head for Technology and Operations Management. He studies topics related to performance improvement, digital innovation, and consumer engagement in health care. He is a member of the Board of Trustees of Brigham and Women’s Hospital and serves as an advisor to several private health care companies.

Course Format

Transforming Health Care Delivery is a case-based course. Typically, students in the course have formed a close-knit community to support each other's interests in learning more about the health care industry. To that end, Professors Gallani and Huckman will host optional, small-group “coffee chats” about current topics in health care.

Course Content

The course is organized into the following modules:

• Module 1— Prioritizing Health: This module will discuss various dimensions of a critical challenge in health care delivery—improving the value of care delivered to patients. Beyond managing cost, the challenge of improving value depends critically on shifting the focus of delivery systems from health care to health. Prioritizing health requires delivery systems to address issues related to the social and behavioral determinants of health, preventative care, effective management of chronic disease, and understanding the limits of medical intervention.
• Module 2— Optimizing Care: This module will consider how health care systems can organize to deliver value by providing health more effectively and efficiently. The approaches covered include redesigning care around the patient, aligning incentives and compensation, leveraging specialization, building insight through clinical data management, and fostering workforce resiliency and wellbeing.
• Module 3— Transforming Delivery: This module will examine new approaches and technologies for delivering care with a focus on improving health and increasing value. The topics covered include efforts to leverage new technologies (e.g., precision medicine, telemedicine, extended reality (XR), and generative AI), new models of care delivery (e.g., retail locations and home-based settings), and new care providers (e.g., non-physician providers, including patients and their families).

Grading and Evaluation

Students will be evaluated on the basis of class participation and a final paper that involves developing a short case that applies course themes to a specific organization using publicly available information. These papers will be completed in teams of 2-3 students. Teams will be able to select the organizations they study. Further guidance will be provided early in the term.

Copyright © 2024 President & Fellows of Harvard College. All Rights Reserved.

Career Focus

This course is intended for students pursuing a range of career options as business executives, investors, and/or consultants. First, it would be of interest to those who at some point in their career see themselves as a CEO or senior manager potentially leading a troubled enterprise (small, medium, or large) through a crisis or through significant performance transformation. Secondly, it would be important for investors dealing with distressed organizations needing restructuring or significant performance improvement. Finally, it will be of value to those who expect to support or interface with troubled enterprises as management consultants or as a restructuring advisors.

Educational Objectives

The focus of this course is the leader as a strategist, architect, decision maker, and change agent in a turnaround or transformation environment. This course will present situations where you can analyze potential opportunity in turnaround situations and decide if there is a reasonable chance for the managers in the case to create value. It will also present many situations where you will be challenged to develop a plan of action for the managers that will lead to the creation and realization of value.

Our curriculum will include a number of practical ‘how to’ sessions covering topics such as designing turnaround programs, successfully driving necessary cultural change, and transformation performance management techniques and systems. Some of these sessions will include and be co-taught with practicing executives and advisors. In others, we will invite case protagonists and guest speakers who have decades of hands-on experience to share with the class.

The course will be structured around several turnaround levers—some connected with planning and some with execution. The course will open and close with sessions devoted to analyzing leadership skills fundamental to planning and executing successful turnarounds.

Course Content and Organization

The course will include some brand-new cases with the CEO protagonists present in class, in order to give students first-hand exposure to turnaround challenges. We will look at a range of organizations, including small and large companies, family-owned ventures, private and public firms, and US and international companies.

We will structure the course around several turnaround levers that leaders use to transform businesses--both those in need of comprehensive turnarounds and those momentarily facing lackluster performance.

We will also adopt a holistic view of turnarounds that combines the analysis of strategy, organization, operations, culture, and finance. While these elements are analytically distinct, we will examine how they interact with and shape each other to either (1) preserve cash; (2) create a new value proposition and/or (3) unlock new growth avenues.

There will be synthesis segments after each group of cases to solidify learnings connected with each turnaround lever.

The opening and closing of the course will be devoted to analyzing leadership skills fundamental to planning and executing successful turnarounds. We will examine, among others, the importance of personal and organizational resilience, the management of critical thinking (logos), emotions (pathos), and relationships (ethos), and the challenges involved in professionalizing a leadership team in a crisis.

This course will be 25 class sessions that will be primarily case-oriented with some additional readings and high-profile in-class speakers, along with two project days.

This course complements Creating Value Through Corporate Restructuring and Financial Management of Smaller Firms.

Final Paper

Students will work in teams of three or four. Each team will choose an organization that has undergone a recent turnaround. The turnaround effort must have ended or be advanced enough to allow in-depth analysis.

Students will examine the turnaround process by applying the tools and principles from the course. In the write-up, I expect that you will explain the challenges the organization faced and how it dealt with them (2000 word description of the turnaround effort and why you chose it) and what you learned (separate 500 word analysis using tools and principles from the course, plus your own recommendations for the company).

A more detailed summary of the outline for this paper will be provided at the start of the term.

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Overview

This course examines the strategic challenges facing businesses in the U.S. healthcare industry. Using the lenses of business strategy, microeconomics, and health policy, students will identify and gain valuable insights into how healthcare businesses navigate complex market forces, regulatory pressures, and competitive dynamics. Cases will highlight how strategic principles can be leveraged to create opportunities in healthcare, and why some strategies are likely – or unlikely – to succeed. We will also examine the impact of government policies and regulations, both from a business standpoint and through the broader lens of societal implications.

Prominent government officials and business executives will contribute to select class sessions, complementing case discussions.

Educational Objectives:

The course aims to equip students with a strong understanding of the landscape of the US healthcare industry and key strategic challenges within it. Objectives include:

• Obtain insights into the complexities of the healthcare industry and the roles of key stakeholders
• Apply strategic frameworks to analyze business opportunities and competitive dynamics in healthcare markets
• Examine the impact of healthcare policies and regulations on firms as well as other stakeholders, including patients, employers, and taxpayers

The course will balance conceptual lectures with real-world applications, leveraging case studies, lectures, and discussions.

Career Focus: