Action Learning at MIT Sloan

Name: Petra Aliberti Tel: (617) 253-6679 E-mail: aliberti@mit.edu

Global Economics and Management

Technological Innovation, Entrepreneurship, and Strategic Management

Capital budgeting; Corporate strategy and policy; Developing countries, economics; Energy; Executive Education; Foreign investment; Global business practices; Globalization; Green industries; Industrial partnerships; International finance; International management; Latin America; Management Education; Mergers and acquisitions; Mexico; Non-market strategy; Oil; Risk management; Strategic management; Sustainability; Taiwan

Donald R. Lessard is the EPOCH Foundation Professor of International Management at the MIT Sloan School of Management. His research interests are on global strategic management, and project management, with an emphasis on managing in the face of uncertainty and risk and in the energy sector.

He has published extensively on these topics in academic and professional journals, and is co-author of Strategic Management of Large Engineering Projects: Shaping Institutions, Risks, and Governance (MIT Press 2001 with Roger Miller).

A member of the MIT faculty since 1973, Lessard has served as Deputy Dean of the Sloan School with responsibilities for research, international programs, and executive education; co-chair of the Energy Education Task Force that launched an Institute-wide undergraduate energy minor; and founding director of the MIT Executive MBA, the BP Projects and Engineering Academy, and the Li and Fung Executive Development Program. He also led the MIT-Merrill Lynch Partnership, MIT's first large-scale collaboration with a financial services firm.

A leader in international management education, Lessard is a past President of the Academy of International Business and Dean of the Fellows of the Academy. He is a Senior Fellow of the Fung Global Institute, a Hong-Kong based think tank. A Senior Advisor to the Brattle Group, he has led major consulting assignments with firms, banks, and government agencies throughout the world.

Lessard earned his BA in Latin American studies and his MBA and PhD in business administration from Stanford University.

Mexican Multinationals: Insights from CEMEX [2008]

"Frameworks for Global Strategic Analysis," Journal of Strategic Managment Education, 1(1). [2003]

"Risk and the Dynamics of Globalization," in Birkinshaw, Markides, Stopford, and Yip, eds., The Future of the Multinational Company (Chichester, England: Wiley). [2003]

Strategic Management of Large Engineering Projects: Shaping Institutions, Risks, and Governance (MIT Press, 2001)

Capital Flight: The Problem and Policy Responses. Washington, D.C.: Institute for International Economics, 1987.

International Financing for Developing Countries : The Unfulfilled Promise/Wp0783 (World Bank Staff Working Papers, No 783). Washington, D.C.: World Bank, 1986.

Financial Intermediation Beyond the Debt Crisis (Policy Analyses in International Economics, No 12, September 1985). Washington, D.C.: Institute for International Economics, 1985

International Financial Management: Theory and Practice. New York, NY: Wiley, 1985.

Control of Indirect Financial Subsidies in Canada's Budget: Diagnosis and Recommendations [1982]

Currency Changes and Management Control: A Note on the Integration of the International Controller's and Treasurer's Functions [1974]

Shari Loessberg is an experienced entrepreneur in established and emerging markets. In the US, she founded and runs Big World, a strategy firm focused on new ventures in new markets. She also co-founded Zeta Networks, a tech startup with roots at MIT. In addition, Loessberg spent five years in Moscow, where she was a partner, director, and general counsel of Brunswick (now UBS Russia), a start-up investment firm in the earliest days of the Russian equity market. She has particular experience in emerging market venture capital and investment, and entrepreneurship in emerging economies. She serves on the advisory council of Accion's Frontier Fund; as an advisor to Endeavor International; and has served as a founding director of financial services startup companies in Vietnam and Africa. She also serves on the board of National Financial Partners (NYSE: NFP) and several US-based tech companies

Name: Patricia Curley
Tel: (617) 253-5701
E-mail: pcurley@mit.edu

Global Economics and Management

Strategic management, Public policy; EU, Scandinavia; High tech (IT, Cleantech); impact, e-government; Knowledge work, networks; Leadership from below; New Ventures

Trond Undheim is a Senior Lecturer at the MIT Sloan School of Management.

He teaches and mentors across MIT Sloan Action Labs (China/India Lab, G-Lab, EM-Lab, GO-Lab), and manages industry relationships. Trond is a leading expert on strategy, technology policy, entrepreneurship, and the role of technology in society. Previously, he was the director of standards strategy and policy at Oracle Corporation where he lead global business development, drove standardization, and influenced government policy in the EU. He also served as the national expert of e-government in the European Commission, where he created ePractice.eu, the world's most successful best practice initiative in e-government, e-health, and e-inclusion. As project manager at the Norwegian Board of Technology, he coached high-level expert groups on Cleantech and Software policy which led to government policy on open standards. At the Norwegian University of Science and Technology, his research project on electric vehicles was funded by the European Union. Undheim also ran the business incubator Innovision AS, where he sought seed capital for startups, two of which (Falanx and Plasus Technologies) were later acquired.

Undheim is the author of Leadership From Below (2008), which explains how the influx of ideas from Asia, Scandinavia, and social networking is changing the workplace. He is the editor-in-chief of the European Journal of ePractice, a Fellow at the Research Group for Marketing and Consumer Science, KU Leuven in Belgium, and a former visiting researcher at UC Berkeley. He is also the wine columnist for Color Magazine USA.

His research interests include strategic management, innovation, entrepreneurship, leadership, and e-government, particularly applied to high tech and emerging markets. He regularly speaks to global audiences.

Undheim holds an MA in sociology and a PhD in sociological technology and policy studies from the Norwegian University of Science and Technology.

Web Site: http://trondundheim.com/

Name: Patricia Curley
Tel: (617) 253-5701
E-mail: pcurley@mit.edu

Institute for Work and Employment Research

Benefits; Career development; Changing work environments; Changing workforce; Compensation; Employment relations; Future of work; Gender/race issues, workplace; Hiring; Human resource management; Industrial relations; Labor market policy; Managing diversity; Organizations; Recruitment; Social networks; Sociology; Turnover; Worker / Management relations; Workplace inequality and diversity

Emilio Castilla is an Associate Professor of Management at the MIT Sloan School of Management.

Castilla studies how social networks influence organizational and employment processes and outcomes over time. He tackles this question by examining different empirical settings with longitudinal datasets, both at the individual and organizational levels. His focus is on the hiring, retention, and job mobility of employees within and across organizations and locations, as well as on the impact of teamwork and social relations on performance. His research and teaching interests include organizational theory and behavior, economic sociology, and human resources management.

Castilla joined the MIT Sloan faculty in 2005, after being a faculty member for three years in the management department of the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania. He is a member of the Institute for Work and Employment Research at MIT, as well as a Research Fellow at the Wharton Financial Institutions Center and at the Center for Human Resources at the Wharton School.

Castilla holds a Graduate Diploma in business from Lancaster University, UK; a BA in economics from Universitat de Barcelona; and a PhD in sociology from Stanford University. 

Web Site: http://webite.com

The Paradox of Meritocracy in Organizations . Administrative Science Quarterly. [2010]

Gender, Race, and Meritocracy in Organizational Careers . American Journal of Sociology [2008]

Dynamic Analysis in the Social Sciences. Academic Press & Elsevier [2007]

American Journal of Sociology [2005]

Social Networks and Employee Performance in a Call Center . American Journal of Sociology [2005]