James J. Hill Professor of Business Administration, Emeritus
Malcolm Salter has been a member of the Harvard Business School faculty since 1967. His teaching and research focuses on issues of corporate strategy, organization, and governance.
Over the years, Professor Salter has taught and helped develop a wide variety of courses at HBS. Most recently, he has taught courses in Leadership and Corporate Accountability, Governance and Corporate Control, and Competition and Strategy in the MBA Program. In addition to teaching at HBS, he has also taught at the Harvard Law School (2 years) and the Kennedy School of Government (4 years).
Professor Salter is author of Innovation Corrupted (Harvard University Press, 2008), which addresses the origins and legacy of Enron’s collapse; co-author of Changing Alliances (HBS Press, 1987), a study of business-government-labor relations the world auto industry; Diversification through Acquisition (Free Press, 1979), a study of how real economic value can be created through corporate diversification; and many other articles and papers addressing issues of corporate strategy and internal governance and control.
In addition to his scholarly activities, Professor Salter served as Senior Associate Dean for External Relations from 2003 to 2006. He has also served as Chair of the Elective Curriculum in the MBA Program, Chairman of the Advanced Management Program and the International Senior Managers Program (the School's two most senior executive education programs), and Chairman of the General Management Area (a section of the faculty encompassing the subject areas of general management, entrepreneurial management, and international management).
From 1986 to 2006, Professor Salter was also president of Mars & Co., a strategy consulting firm with offices in Greenwich (CT), London, Paris, San Francisco, Tokyo, and Shanghai.
Professor Salter is a Trustee and Director of the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute where he serves on the Finance Committee and is Chair of the Trustee's Science Committee. He is also an Overseer of the Boston Symphony Orchestra. Active in civic affairs at both the municipal and state levels of government, Professor Salter served as Chair of Newton’s (MA) Citizen Advisory Group from June 1, 2008 to May 1, 2009, charged with developing a new financial and management model for this city of 85,000 residents and thirteen villages.
He is also a founder of the Friends of Boston Art, a past Overseer of the Boston Museum of Fine Arts and the Rose Art Museum at Brandeis University, a former Trustee and Treasurer of the Shady Hill School, and a past director of Schlegel Corporation and Christie's, the London-based auction house.
Professor Salter is a graduate of Harvard University where he received his AB, MBA, and DBA degrees.
Although much has already been written about the rise and fall of Enron, four important questions remain unanswered: What management behavior and practices led Enron down the path from truly innovative to fraudulent management? How could Enron’s board of directors have failed to detect the business, ethical, and legal risks embedded in the company’s aggressive financial strategies and accounting practices? Why did Enron’s external watchdogs—security analysts, credit-rating agencies, and regulatory agencies—fail to bark? What actions can prevent Enron-type breakdowns in the future? Innovation Corrupted addresses each of these questions. 