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The Network Effect: HBS and the Arts in NYC

By: Margot Dushin 06 Feb 2020

Since 1993, HBS has been a catalyst for building social value. Organizations and professionals from around the world participate in our Executive Education programs, access our research publications, and interact with our students and alumni through field-based projects, recruitment activities, and community engagement programs.

The HBS Social Enterprise Initiative (SEI) network extends across the globe, and is exemplified in the students and alumni applying their skills to the arts in New York City. Initiated through SEI fellowship programs, a network of HBS alumni are now leading change within arts organizations. In New York, world-renowned arts and cultural institutions abound. While it is the masterpieces and the performances that typically garner headlines, management and operations are what entice HBS MBAs. They focus on issues relating to new audiences, new markets, digital transformation, and more.

American Ballet Theatre 
Following the completion of her Leadership Fellows position at Lincoln Center, Kara Medoff Barnett (MBA 2007) stayed on with the organization and eventually served as the founding Managing Director of Lincoln Center International. In February 2016, she was appointed Executive Director of the American Ballet Theatre.
Executive Director, Kara Medoff Barnett, MBA 2007 
Hired 1 Social Enterprise Summer Fellow since 2018 
Hired 1 HBS Leadership Fellow since 2017

Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts
Over the past two decades, Lincoln Center and HBS have engaged in a partnership to create career opportunities for MBAs and to build a talent pipeline that has had ripple effects throughout the industry. Past Fellows have gone on to leadership roles in organizations including the American Ballet Theatre, Disney Theatrical Group, Museum of Modern Art, and the Office of Cultural Affairs in Dallas, Texas. 
Hired 42 Social Enterprise Summer Fellows since 1999 
Hired 12 HBS Leadership Fellows since 2002

Whitney Museum of American Art 
When the Whitney Museum hired a summer strategy intern in 2015, it sparked a wave of engagement with HBS at a key time in the museum’s growth. Since then, interns and full-time Fellows have led projects focused on membership acquisition and retention, tourism strategy, and earned revenue. 
Hired 9 Social Enterprise Summer Fellows since 2015 
Hired 3 HBS Leadership Fellows since 2016
2017-18 Leadership Fellow, Andrew Cone, is now Chief Strategy Officer at the Whitney Museum

Learn more in our recent report, Understanding our Social Impact: 25 Years of Social Enterprise at HBS.