Harvard Business School » Social Enterprise » Faculty & Research

Faculty & Research

Research

Our faculty provide education and expertise rooted in real-world experience, linking theory and practice to shape business practice and train business leaders.

Nonprofit Strategy & Governance

Expanding its early focus on helping nonprofits operate more efficiently to the emerging space of social enterprises and the challenges of measuring social impact, the HBS faculty has developed a body of knowledge that encompasses leadership, strategy, and governance of mission-driven organizations across the spectrum, from entrepreneurial ventures to more established firms.

Business for Social Impact

Since its inception, the Social Enterprise Initiative has explored the role of business in creating social value. Today, SEI continues to examine the challenges and opportunities in harnessing the power of the markets to create both economic and social value.

K–12 Education

In 2003, HBS launched an MBA elective course focused on entrepreneurship in education reform and cofounded the Public Education Leadership Project (PELP) in collaboration with the Harvard Graduate School of Education. This multiyear research project focuses on the management levers needed to create and sustain high-performing K–12 public school districts in the United States. These efforts have resulted in more than 30 case studies focused on adapting and applying management concepts within urban public school systems to drive improved performance and on using entrepreneurial strategies to effect systemic change in K–12 education.

Impact Investing

Through teaching, research and engagement with practitioners and alumni, we are critically examining questions such as: What is the purpose of investing for impact? What return profiles are realistic? How do different strategies actually create social value? How is and how should social value be defined and measured? What does it mean in practice to be an impact investor?

Initiative Chair

Faculty

Lynda M. Applegate

Baker Foundation Professor
Sarofim-Rock Professor of Business Administration, Emerita

Rohit Deshpande

Baker Foundation Professor
Sebastian S. Kresge Professor of Marketing, Emeritus

Dutch Leonard

Eliot I. Snider and Family Baker Foundation Professor
and Professor of Business Administration, Emeritus
George F. Baker, Jr. Professor of Public Management

Anthony Mayo

Thomas S. Murphy Senior Lecturer of Business Administration
C. Roland Christensen Distinguished Management Educator

Lakshmi Ramarajan

Anna Spangler Nelson and Thomas C. Nelson Associate Professor of Business Administration

V. Kasturi Rangan

Baker Foundation Professor
Malcolm P. McNair Professor of Marketing, Emeritus

Benjamin N. Roth

Purnima Puri and Richard Barrera Associate Professor of Business Administration

Ethan C. Rouen

Terrie F. and Bradley M. Bloom Associate Professor of Business Administration

William A. Sahlman

Baker Foundation Professor
Dimitri V. D'Arbeloff - MBA Class of 1955 Professor of Business Administration, Emeritus

Debora L. Spar

Jaime and Josefina Chua Tiampo Professor of Business Administration
Senior Associate Dean, Business in Global Society
Unit Head, General Management

Brian L. Trelstad

William Henry Bloomberg Senior Lecturer of Business Administration
Joseph L. Rice, III Faculty Fellow

Mitchell B. Weiss

Richard L. Menschel Professor of Management Practice
Chair, MBA Required Curriculum