Showing a Presence: HBS Students and Faculty Uncover Valuable Lessons on Hurricane Relief Trek

A student helps clear debris from a home.

The trek is an ongoing tradition at HBS—a fun, low-risk way to explore an industry or a corner of the world with fellow MBA students. In January, a group of more than 50 MBAs, joined by nine faculty and staff, continued that tradition but focused on a different sort of destination: hurricane-ravaged New Orleans.

"When people ask me about my winter break I still haven't figured out the short answer," says Kathleen Kearney (HBS '06). At the start of the fall semester, Kearney and a group of 14 other students formed the Student Association Hurricane Relief Committee to raise relief funds and to identify areas where HBS students could most effectively aid in the recovery effort. The idea for the trek arose from their desire to launch a long-term commitment to New Orleans by establishing on-the-ground relationships with business, government, and nonprofit leaders and fostering future field studies, summer internships, case studies, and employment opportunities.

Students take a break while working on a hurricane-damaged home.

Kearney and 15 other participants worked on a community rebuilding effort that involved cleaning out and gutting hurricane-damaged homes. Overall, students participated in one of five project "silos" on the trek, including two focusing on economic development, one on assessing public school education reform, one working in higher education with Dillard University, and one concentrating on community rebuilding efforts. Projects ranged from a business strategy report created for the mayor's office to brainstorming performance measures and curriculum ideas for the area's public schools.

"We wanted to blend student enthusiasm and expertise as best we could," says trek leader Anthony D'Avella (HBS '07). "So many aspects of our work fell into place because we were on the ground," he adds. "Showing a presence meant a lot to people." Students who participated in the trek knew that they weren't going to solve the problems of New Orleans in one week, notes D'Avella. "This is the first step of a journey."

The devastation of Katrina

Researching Katrina

Faculty who accompanied students on the New Orleans Hurricane Relief trek did so out of their own desire to aid in current relief efforts and to cultivate research that could help create a more coherent response to future disasters.

Herman B. ("Dutch") Leonard, Social Enterprise Initiative cochair, a professor of business administration at HBS and the George F. Baker, Jr. Professor of Public Sector Management at the Kennedy School of Government, interviewed a number of area business owners and managers to determine what they found most useful in getting their organizations up and running again. "Whether or not people are prepared for a disaster, there are things that they can do after the fact that will help them recover more quickly," he notes. Leonard and other faculty plan to codify some of Katrina's lessons in a collection of brief cases that would be directly applicable to business and government leaders in the aftermath of a disaster.

Leonard says a few issues recurred in his interviews. "Many business owners advised, 'Pay no attention to your business in the short run; pay attention to your employees. If you're not able to reassemble them, you're history.' " Credit availability and the importance of explaining one's situation and needs to creditors and customers outside the affected region were two other subjects mentioned frequently.

The trek was Leonard's second visit to New Orleans post-Katrina. In the areas where there was severe flooding, things looked much as they had in September, he says, yet the energy and enthusiasm of people working to rebuild their lives in New Orleans was heartening-as was the focus of student trek participants. "The MBA curriculum prepares our students well to take on a complicated, ill-defined problem," Leonard observes. "There's plenty of opportunity for that in New Orleans today."