Rembrand Koning is an Assistant Professor of Business Administration in the Strategy Unit at Harvard Business School. His research examines matching and selection frictions in firm growth and strategy, with an aim to help entrepreneurs and executives improve their odds of selecting scalable ideas, promising markets, and high-potential talent.
Rembrand M. Koning
Assistant Professor of Business Administration
Assistant Professor of Business Administration
Rem Koning is an Assistant Professor of Business Administration in the Strategy Unit at Harvard Business School. Professor Koning studies how managers and entrepreneurs discover new ways to create value. His work explores how bias in how we discover hinders firm performance, leads managers to overlook promising new practices and talent, and drives inequities in who benefits from innovation and competition. However, his research also shows how companies can counter biases in discovery to build better strategies and more inclusive innovations.
To understand how firms and entrepreneurs discover his work builds on ideas from a range of disciplines, including sociology, economics, and business strategy. It also relies on a range of methods, including randomized control trials (RCTs), text analysis, and machine learning approaches. He has studied entrepreneurs and firms worldwide and in various industry contexts, including online startups, scientific discovery, biomedical innovation, and retail trade. His papers have explored how social skills improve matching and diffusion in small business advice networks, how A/B testing enables the discovery of product-market fit, how male-dominated online platforms can distort the direction of product innovation away from the needs of women, how shifts in the boundary of the firm have led US companies to miss out on diverse talent, and how the demographic background of innovators impacts who benefits from innovation.
He teaches strategy and entrepreneurship to executives and MBA students. His work has appeared in the Strategic Management Journal, Organization Science, Research Policy, the Papers & Proceedings of the American Economic Association, the Journal of Organizational Design, and the American Sociological Review. It has been covered by the Wall Street Journal, Vox, the New York Times, and Forbes. Professor Koning earned his Ph. D. at the Stanford Graduate School of Business, where he received a Kauffman Dissertation Fellowship. He graduated from the University of Chicago with bachelor’s degrees in mathematics and statistics.
Rem Koning is an Assistant Professor of Business Administration in the Strategy Unit at Harvard Business School. Professor Koning studies how managers and entrepreneurs discover new ways to create value. His work explores how bias in how we discover hinders firm performance, leads managers to overlook promising new practices and talent, and drives inequities in who benefits from innovation and competition. However, his research also shows how companies can counter biases in discovery to build better strategies and more inclusive innovations.
To understand how firms and entrepreneurs discover his work builds on ideas from a range of disciplines, including sociology, economics, and business strategy. It also relies on a range of methods, including randomized control trials (RCTs), text analysis, and machine learning approaches. He has studied entrepreneurs and firms worldwide and in various industry contexts, including online startups, scientific discovery, biomedical innovation, and retail trade. His papers have explored how social skills improve matching and diffusion in small business advice networks, how A/B testing enables the discovery of product-market fit, how male-dominated online platforms can distort the direction of product innovation away from the needs of women, how shifts in the boundary of the firm have led US companies to miss out on diverse talent, and how the demographic background of innovators impacts who benefits from innovation.
He teaches strategy and entrepreneurship to executives and MBA students. His work has appeared in the Strategic Management Journal, Organization Science, Research Policy, the Papers & Proceedings of the American Economic Association, the Journal of Organizational Design, and the American Sociological Review. It has been covered by the Wall Street Journal, Vox, the New York Times, and Forbes. Professor Koning earned his Ph. D. at the Stanford Graduate School of Business, where he received a Kauffman Dissertation Fellowship. He graduated from the University of Chicago with bachelor’s degrees in mathematics and statistics.
- Publications
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- Koning, Rembrand, Sampsa Samila, and John-Paul Ferguson. "Inventor Gender and the Direction of Invention." AEA Papers and Proceedings 110 (May 2020): 250–254. View Details
- Hasan, Sharique, and Rembrand Koning. "Designing Social Networks: Joint Tasks and the Formation of Network Ties." Art. 4. Journal of Organization Design 9 (2020). View Details
- Hasan, Sharique, and Rembrand Koning. "Conversations and Idea Generation: Evidence from a Field Experiment." Art. 103811. Research Policy 48, no. 9 (November 2019). View Details
- Hasan, Sharique, and Rembrand Koning. "Prior Ties and the Limits of Peer Effects on Startup Team Performance." Strategic Management Journal 40, no. 9 (September 2019): 1394–1416. View Details
- Chatterji, Aaron, Solène Delecourt, Sharique Hasan, and Rembrand Koning. "When Does Advice Impact Startup Performance?" Strategic Management Journal 40, no. 3 (March 2019): 331–356. View Details
- Ferguson, John-Paul, and Rembrand Koning. "Firm Turnover and the Return of Racial Establishment Segregation." American Sociological Review 83, no. 3 (June 2018): 445–474. View Details
- Hasan, Sharique, John-Paul Ferguson, and Rembrand Koning. "The Lives and Deaths of Jobs: Technical Interdependence and Survival in a Job Structure." Organization Science 26, no. 6 (November–December 2015): 1665–1681. View Details
- Working Papers
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- Cao, Ruiqing, Rembrand Koning, and Ramana Nanda. "Biased Sampling of Early Users and the Direction of Startup Innovation." Harvard Business School Working Paper, No. 21-059, November 2020. View Details
- Koning, Rembrand, Sharique Hasan, and Ines Black. "Hunting for Talent: Firm-Driven Labor Market Search in America." SSRN Working Paper Series, No. 3576498, April 2020. View Details
- Dimitriadis, Stefan, and Rembrand Koning. "Social Skills Improve Business Performance: Evidence from a Randomized Control Trial with Entrepreneurs in Togo." SSRN Working Paper Series, No. 3459643, September 2019. View Details
- Koning, Rembrand, Sampsa Samila, and John-Paul Ferguson. "Female Inventors and Inventions." Working Paper. (SSRN Working Paper Series, No. 3401889, June 2019.) View Details
- Koning, Rembrand, Sharique Hasan, and Aaron Chatterji. "Digital Experimentation and Startup Performance: Evidence from A/B Testing." Harvard Business School Working Paper, No. 20-018, August 2019. (Revised September 2020. SSRN Working Paper Series, No. 3440291, August 2019) View Details
- Ferguson, John-Paul, and Rembrand Koning. "Industrial Change, the Boundary of the Firm, and Racial Employment Segregation." Harvard Business School Working Paper, No. 20-069, December 2019. View Details
- Koning, Rembrand, and John-Paul Ferguson. "Does Public Ownership and Accountability Increase Diversity? Evidence from IPOs." Harvard Business School Working Paper, No. 19-071, January 2019. View Details
- Koning, Rembrand. "Do Network Dynamics Undermine Idea-based Network Advantages? Experimental Results from an Entrepreneurship Bootcamp." Working Paper, August 2016. View Details
- Cases and Teaching Materials
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- Koning, Rembrand, John D. Macomber, Pippa Tubman Armerding, and Wale Lawal. "mPharma (B)." Harvard Business School Supplement 721-429, January 2021. View Details
- Koning, Rembrand, John D. Macomber, Pippa Tubman Armerding, and Wale Lawal. "mPharma (A)." Harvard Business School Case 721-428, January 2021. View Details
- Koning, Rembrand, Elie Ofek, and Nicole Keller. "Thinx, Inc.—Breaking Barriers in Feminine Care (Abridged)." Harvard Business School Case 721-021, December 2020. View Details
- Koning, Rembrand, Andy Wu, Nataliya Langburd Wright, and Tarun Khanna. "MassChallenge." Harvard Business School Case 720-469, May 2020. (Revised July 2020.) View Details
- Collis, David J., Andy Wu, and Rembrand Koning. "Walmart Inc. Takes on Amazon.com." Harvard Business School Teaching Note 720-437, February 2020. View Details
- Collis, David, Andy Wu, Rembrand Koning, and Huaiyi CiCi Sun. "Walmart Inc. takes on Amazon.com." Harvard Business School Case 718-481, January 2018. (Revised January 2020.) View Details
- Koning, Rembrand, Elie Ofek, and Nicole Keller. "Thinx, Inc.—Breaking Barriers in Feminine Care." Harvard Business School Case 720-443, March 2020. (Revised November 2020.) View Details
- Koning, Rembrand. "Walmart's Online Challenge: Amazon.com." Harvard Business School Case 719-461, January 2019. View Details
- Cowgill, Bo, and Rembrand Koning. "Matching Markets for Googlers." Harvard Business School Case 718-487, March 2018. (Revised August 2018.) (More about Bo Cowgill.) View Details
- Publications
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- Koning, Rembrand, Sampsa Samila, and John-Paul Ferguson. "Inventor Gender and the Direction of Invention." AEA Papers and Proceedings 110 (May 2020): 250–254. View Details
- Hasan, Sharique, and Rembrand Koning. "Designing Social Networks: Joint Tasks and the Formation of Network Ties." Art. 4. Journal of Organization Design 9 (2020). View Details
- Hasan, Sharique, and Rembrand Koning. "Conversations and Idea Generation: Evidence from a Field Experiment." Art. 103811. Research Policy 48, no. 9 (November 2019). View Details
- Hasan, Sharique, and Rembrand Koning. "Prior Ties and the Limits of Peer Effects on Startup Team Performance." Strategic Management Journal 40, no. 9 (September 2019): 1394–1416. View Details
- Chatterji, Aaron, Solène Delecourt, Sharique Hasan, and Rembrand Koning. "When Does Advice Impact Startup Performance?" Strategic Management Journal 40, no. 3 (March 2019): 331–356. View Details
- Ferguson, John-Paul, and Rembrand Koning. "Firm Turnover and the Return of Racial Establishment Segregation." American Sociological Review 83, no. 3 (June 2018): 445–474. View Details
- Hasan, Sharique, John-Paul Ferguson, and Rembrand Koning. "The Lives and Deaths of Jobs: Technical Interdependence and Survival in a Job Structure." Organization Science 26, no. 6 (November–December 2015): 1665–1681. View Details
- Research Summary
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- Additional Information
- Areas of Interest
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- diversity
- entrepreneurship
- experimentation
- innovation
- strategy
- biotechnology
- high technology
- software
- Africa
- India
- United States
IndustriesGeographies