International Scope

Howard Stevenson, Vice Provost, Harvard University Resources and Planning

Howard Stevenson is vice provost for Harvard University Resources and Planning and Sarofim-Rock Professor of Business Administration at Harvard Business School (HBS).

When the Sarofim-Rock Chair was established in 1982 to provide a foundation for research and teaching in the field of entrepreneurship at Harvard, Stevenson was its first incumbent. At the faculty, entrepreneurship is now a required course with 13 courses in entrepreneur-ship on offer. Stevenson was also a founder and first president of the Baupost Group.

Do you think that entrepreneurship is an innate or a learned trait?

I believe that drive is innate and/or learned early in life. There are skills that make for successful entrepreneurship that can be and are learned.

What are the business and entrepreneurial ethics that you try to instill in the mindsets of students in your teachings?

I try to remind them that if entrepreneurship is the pursuit of opportunity beyond the resources your currently control, acquiring resources always require trust. Contracts and laws will never suffice.

How important is education is for nurturing students to become entrepreneurs whatever their chosen fields?

In our alumni records over 85% of those who start business are still in business five years later. It is clear that greater knowledge, both theoretical and practical, makes a difference in survival rates. Much of the education can simply be synthetic experience.

In the US today, do you think that academics in the area of entrepreneurship and business education play an important role in forming an entrepreneurially driven economy?

One of the most important roles of the formal entre-preneurship education phenomenon is demonstration. Entrepreneurial cultures often simply teach people that it can be done by people with whom the prospective entrepreneur identifies. The change toward academic entrepreneurship gives bright people permission to see entrepreneurship as a worthy use of their time, skills and talents.

Do you think that, internationally, there needs to be more academic programmes focussed on entrepreneurship?

Yes. Entrepreneurship is a highly localised phenom-enon with knowledge of the people and context required. We can teach some things that are uni-versal but for many who intend to create local busi-nesses, local training is critical.

How do you think education fits into the fruition of entrepreneurial activity of an economy?