Service Overview
Baker Research Services (BRS) staff provides support for HBS faculty, faculty support staff, and doctoral students across the research spectrum- from advising on best resources for a project to managing research projects from beginning to end. The group is a mix of librarians, MBAs, statisticians, and economists with deep expertise working with licensed and publicly available data sources.
HBS Faculty
Our services can leverage your time and add value to your research. We provide:
Literature Reviews (for cases, articles, books, teaching prep.)
Scholarly journals; popular, business, and trade press; working papers
Document delivery – provide copies of articles, working papers, dissertations
Citation tools support
Database Management and Analysis
Methodological and statistical consultations
Data retrieval, cleaning, merging, analysis, management
Programming and programming support
Excel modeling
Data storage in a secure, permanently accessible online repository
Database Creation
Batch article searching to capture counts of keywords or article citations
Pulling historical data from disparate electronic and print sources together in a database (e.g. company founding dates)
Screening, merging, subsetting existing data sources
Buying and Licensing Data
negotiate favorable contract and license terms
reach deals for best possible pricing
identify cost-share partners
Background Information/Data/Fact Checking
Teaching prep
Media interview prep
Case writing prep
Finding/creating maps and other images
HBS Doctoral Students
We provide guidance and support for your research, including:
Data Consultations
We can help you identify the right data for your project, and help you determine whether we already have access to the data or whether it must be acquired from elsewhere.
Help Desk
We provide coaching and training on business and research concepts, and in the use of research tools such as SAS, Stata, Excel, Citation Tools, and other software available in our Computer Lab. Contact BRS to schedule a consultation with a staff member.
The BRS Computer Lab (Baker 130)
We provide access to financial database platforms (such as Datastream, Bloomberg, and others), GIS tools, and other software to assist with data gathering, clean-up, and analysis. Baker 130 is staffed and open 8:30am-5:00pm, Monday-Friday.
HBS Staff
BRS provides research support for Research Associates, Faculty Support Staff, and other HBS staff including coaching and training on business and research concepts, guidance in finding information using Baker Library and Harvard Library resources, and help in the use of research tools such as SAS, Stata, Excel, Citation Tools, and other software available in our Computer Lab.
New Research Associates are encouraged to contact BRS early in their assignments for advice and training.
Contact us to schedule a consultation with a BRS staff member.