Ryan L. Raffaelli
Marvin Bower Associate Professor
Ryan Raffaelli is the Marvin Bower Associate Professor of Business Administration at Harvard Business School. He created and teaches the MBA course "Leadership: Execution and Action Planning" (LEAP) and serves on the faculty of several executive education programs, including Leading and Building a Culture of Innovation and Leading Change and Organizational Renewal.
Professor Raffaelli's research focuses on organizational reinvention and leading change. His work introduces the concept of "technology reemergence," a process whereby organizations and industries faced with technological change reinvent themselves. He also studies how leaders infuse values and meaning into institutions during periods of instability. Professor Raffaelli’s research has been published in journals such as Administrative Science Quarterly, the Strategic Management Journal, the Academy of Management Journal, the Academy of Management Annals, Research in the Sociology of Organizations, as well as in a number of edited handbooks on innovation and management. He serves on the editorial board of Administrative Science Quarterly and is a faculty associate at Harvard's Weatherhead Center for International Affairs. His work has been covered by such media as The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Economist, The Washington Post, NPR, Fortune, CNBC, Fast Company, and Rolling Stone.
Professor Raffaelli's research has received several awards, including the inaugural "Best Research Methods Paper" from the Strategic Management Society, and "Best Paper" and "Giarratani Rising Star" distinctions from the Industry Studies Association. His doctoral thesis won multiple "Best Dissertation" awards from the academic community, including the Technology and Innovation Management (TIM) Division of the Academy of Management, the European Group for Organizational Studies (EGOS), and the INFORMS Technology Innovation Management and Entrepreneurship Division. In recognition of his research at the intersection of leadership, strategy, and technology studies, he was awared the Richard Hodgson Fellowship at Harvard Business School.
Professor Raffaelli earned his undergraduate degree in business administration from Georgetown University and studied corporate strategy at Oxford University. He holds master’s degrees in business and government relations (MPP) and in organizational ethics (MTS) from Harvard University. He received a PhD in management and an MS in organization studies from Boston College.
Before his academic career, Professor Raffaelli was an executive in Accenture’s strategy management consulting practice, advising Fortune 500 firms, global nonprofits, and various U.S. government agencies. He also served briefly as a White House liaison to NASA.