MBA Required Curriculum
(FIRST YEAR)
The Entrepreneurial Manager
In order to “educate leaders who make a difference in the world,” the Harvard Business
School has always had general management as its core educational organizing framework.
The Required Curriculum has historically had a core course in general management and
The Entrepreneurial Manager (TEM) provides a powerful context in which to learn about
general management. TEM seeks to build the knowledge, skills, and attitudes required
to succeed as an entrepreneurial manager. The knowledge, skills, tools, and frameworks
that TEM develops are built upon the foundation of your other RC courses including
TOM, LEAD, LCA, FRC, Marketing, Strategy, and Finance, integrate those lessons into
a overall framework, and help general managers at all types of organizations (e.g.,
small companies, large companies, non-profits, and public servants) become more effective
at enhancing the value of those organizations.
HBS professor Ken Andrews described three roles for the general manager:[1]
- Setting strategic direction by taking into account external opportunities and threats, the availability of internal
resources relative to requirements, the aspirations and values of senior management,
and obligations to stakeholders and society. In the context of TEM, this concept
permeates our first module: Defining and Developing the Business Model.
- Designing organizational structures and processes that allocate responsibilities, promote cross-functional integration, recruit/develop/promote
employees, acquire critical resources and financing, and budget/monitor financial
performance. Andrews’ second core concept sets the stage for our second module: Resourcing the Business Model.
- Leading the firm by: 1) making tough tradeoffs when setting strategy, resolving cross-functional conflict,
and making hiring/firing decisions; and 2) communicating a vision that motivates employees
and secures commitment from other stakeholders. Properly considered, this final role
of general management leads to our third module: Operating the Business Model.
For many of you, your careers will evolve in the setting of small, entrepreneurial
firms. More than half of HBS graduates become entrepreneurs at some point in their
careers. Recent surveys spanning HBS MBA indicate that 30% of alumni currently work
in a firm that they founded, 46% have launched at least one company in their careers,
and 31% intend to start a firm in the future. Among the founders, 36% launched their
companies at the school or within four years of graduation, 34% became founders 5-14
years after leaving HBS, and the balance started companies 15+ years after graduation.
But studying startups and small firms conveys powerful lessons about general management
for those pursuing careers in other contexts as well. We will see that entrepreneurial
managers in large companies as well as the public sector benefit just as much as a
small firm’s founder from the lessons we will explore. Examining small companies
allows us to more fully understand decision-making and incentives at a much deeper
level. Unlike executives in large, established corporations, founders do not inherit
a strategy; they must formulate one. Likewise, a startup has no organizational structure
or processes; its founder must design them. Finally, startups confront a demanding
environment. Uncertainty is high; resources are constrained. We will find that in
TEM, the attitudinal orientation, decision-frameworks, and actions can help managers
at all firms improve the exploitation of value increasing opportunities.
Entrepreneurial managers typically face an environment in which the importance of
general management is paramount. In the face of such challenges, entrepreneurial managers
must have a bias for action. TEM teaches you how to decompose such complex situations,
identify critical choices confronting the enterprise, and make high-risk/high reward
decisions with limited data.
MBA Elective Curriculum
(SECOND YEAR)
Course Title |
Faculty Name |
Term |
Quarter |
Credits |
3 Technologies that Will Change the World in the Next Decade |
Shikhar Ghosh |
Spring 2025 |
Q3Q4 |
3.0 |
Avoiding Startup Failure |
Lindsay Hyde |
Spring 2025 |
Q3Q4 |
3.0 |
Business at the Base of the Pyramid
(also listed under
General Management)
|
Natalia Rigol, Benjamin N. Roth |
Fall 2024 |
Q1Q2 |
3.0 |
The Coming of Managerial Capitalism |
Tom Nicholas |
Spring 2025 |
Q3Q4 |
3.0 |
Data for Impact: Impact Measurement from Startup to Fortune 500 C-Suite |
Benjamin N. Roth, Natalia Rigol |
Spring 2025 |
Q3Q4 |
3.0 |
Entrepreneurial Finance
(also listed under
Finance)
|
Raymond Kluender |
Spring 2025 |
Q3Q4 |
3.0 |
Entrepreneurial Finance (Q2)
(also listed under
Finance)
|
Shai Bernstein |
Fall 2024 |
Q2 |
1.5 |
Entrepreneurial Sales 101: Founder Selling |
Mark Roberge, Lou Shipley |
Fall 2024 |
Q2 |
1.5 |
Mark Roberge, Lou Shipley |
Spring 2025 |
Q3 |
1.5 |
Entrepreneurial Sales 102: Building, Managing, and Scaling the First Sales Team as
a Founder, Investor, or Advisor |
Lou Shipley |
Spring 2025 |
Q4 |
1.5 |
Entrepreneurship in Life Sciences |
Satish Tadikonda |
Fall 2024 |
Q1Q2 |
3.0 |
Entrepreneurship Outside the Valley
(also listed under
Finance)
|
Paul Gompers |
Spring 2025 |
Q3Q4 |
3.0 |
Field Course: Business of the Arts
(also listed under
Marketing and General Management)
|
Rohit Deshpande, Henry McGee |
Spring 2025 |
Q3Q4 |
3.0 |
Field Course: Entrepreneurship through Acquisition (Application Only)
(also listed under
Finance)
|
Richard Ruback, Royce Yudkoff |
Spring 2025 |
Q3Q4 |
3.0 |
Field Course: Field X
(also listed under
Finance)
|
Randolph Cohen |
Fall 2024 |
Q1Q2 |
3.0 |
Field Course: Field Y: Projects in Business Management
(also listed under
Finance)
|
Randolph Cohen |
Spring 2025 |
Q3Q4 |
3.0 |
Field Course: Foundry AI Lab |
Thomas Eisenmann, Shikhar Ghosh |
Fall 2024 |
Q1 |
1.5 |
Field Course: Go to Market Sales Playbook Field Study |
Lou Shipley |
Spring 2025 |
Q4 |
1.5 |
Field Course: Investing for Impact
(also listed under
Finance and General Management)
|
Archie L. Jones, Emily R. McComb, Brian Trelstad |
Spring 2025 |
Q3Q4 |
3.0 |
Field Course: Life Sciences Venture Creation |
Satish Tadikonda |
Fall 2024 |
Q1Q2 |
3.0 |
Field Course: Scaling Minority Businesses
(also listed under
General Management)
|
Archie L. Jones, Henry McGee |
Fall 2024 |
Q1Q2 |
3.0 |
Field Course: Startup Operations |
Julia Austin |
Fall 2024 |
Q1Q2 |
3.0 |
Field Course: Startup Operations Studio (SOS) |
Julia Austin |
Spring 2025 |
Q3Q4 |
1.5 |
Field Course: Venture Capital Journey |
Jeffrey Bussgang |
Fall 2024 |
Q1Q2 |
3.0 |
Financial Management of Smaller Firms
(also listed under
Finance)
|
Richard Ruback, Royce Yudkoff |
Fall 2024 |
Q1Q2 |
3.0 |
The Founder Mindset |
Reza Satchu |
Fall 2024 |
Q1Q2 |
3.0 |
IFC: India; Development While Decarbonizing - India’s Path to Net Zero
(also listed under
General Management)
|
Vikram Gandhi |
January 2025 |
J |
3.0 |
IFC: Silicon Valley; Disrupting Silicon Valley with AI |
Mark Roberge |
January 2025 |
J |
3.0 |
Launching Tech Ventures |
Christina Wallace |
Fall 2024 |
Q1Q2 |
3.0 |
Jeffrey Bussgang |
Spring 2025 |
Q3Q4 |
3.0 |
Law, Management and Entrepreneurship
(also listed under
General Management)
|
John Batter |
Fall 2024 |
Q1Q2 |
3.0 |
John Batter |
Spring 2025 |
Q3Q4 |
3.0 |
Making Difficult Decisions: The General Manager’s Job (MDD)
(also listed under
General Management and Technology & Operations Management)
|
Amy Edmondson, Tiona Zuzul |
Spring 2025 |
Q3Q4 |
3.0 |
Managing the Future of Work |
Christopher Stanton |
Spring 2025 |
Q3Q4 |
3.0 |
Navigating Your Worth: AI, Negotiations, and the Nature of Expertise |
Zoe Cullen, Shikhar Ghosh |
Spring 2025 |
Q4 |
1.5 |
Product Management |
Sara McKinley Torti |
Spring 2025 |
Q3 |
1.5 |
Public Entrepreneurship
(also listed under
General Management)
|
Mitchell Weiss |
Fall 2024 |
Q1Q2 |
3.0 |
Risks, Opportunities, And Investments In The Era Of Climate Change (ROICC)
(also listed under
Accounting & Management and General Management)
|
George Serafeim |
Spring 2025 |
Q3Q4 |
3.0 |
Road to the White House 2024, a Private Sector Perspective on Presidential Politics |
Robert F. White |
Fall 2024 |
Q1 |
1.5 |
Scaling Technology Ventures |
Jeffrey Rayport |
Spring 2025 |
Q3Q4 |
3.0 |
Strategy for Entrepreneurs
(also listed under
Strategy)
|
Rembrand Koning |
Spring 2025 |
Q3Q4 |
3.0 |
Sustainable Investing
(also listed under
Finance)
|
Vikram Gandhi |
Fall 2024 |
Q2 |
1.5 |
Systems for Scaling Ventures (SSV)
(also listed under
Accounting & Management)
|
Tatiana Sandino |
Spring 2025 |
Q3Q4 |
3.0 |
Tough Tech Ventures |
Joshua Lev Krieger, Jim Matheson |
Spring 2025 |
Q3Q4 |
3.0 |
Turnarounds and Transformation
(also listed under
Organizational Behavior)
|
Ranjay Gulati |
Spring 2025 |
Q3Q4 |
3.0 |
Venture Capital and Private Equity |
Jo Tango, Archie L. Jones |
Fall 2024 |
Q1Q2 |
3.0 |