Michael Porter ’69
Brookline, MA

Region 1 Candidate

“I see my role as that of an intellectual entrepreneur, who tries to bring new ways of thinking to bear to address some of society’s most complex challenges,” explains Michael Porter ’69. Referred to by The Wall Street Journal as “The Most Influential Living Strategist,” Porter has done groundbreaking work on the competitiveness of companies, regions and nations and has shaped corporate strategy and government policies worldwide. He has also brought strategic thinking to bear on complex social problems, including healthcare, urban economic development and the environment.

Porter graduated Phi Beta Kappa and Tau Beta Pi from Princeton with his BSE in aerospace and mechanical engineering. “My student job to make ends meet, which grew into supervising all the students working at the Graduate College dining halls, exposed me to organizations and the importance of management,” he says. He earned his MBA and PhD at Harvard and is the Bishop William Lawrence University Professor at Harvard Business School. A University Professorship is the highest professional recognition that can be awarded to a Harvard faculty member, and Porter teaches across the university. In 2001, Harvard Business School and Harvard University jointly created the Institute for Strategy and Competitiveness, dedicated to extending the research pioneered by Porter and disseminating it to scholars and practitioners on a global basis, including leaders of the world’s largest companies. His work is also taught in many disciplines and at virtually every business school in the world.

A founding member of the Counsel on Competitiveness, America’s leading private-sector competitiveness organization, Porter has played an active role in U.S. economic policy. He also chairs the Global Competitiveness Report of the World Economic Forum, which ranks 120 countries on competitiveness. Porter is currently working in Rwanda and Colombia: In Rwanda, he has been a personal advisor to President Kagame, helping that nation craft an economic plan, develop the private sector and build relationships around the world. In Colombia, he has assisted President Uribe in the creation of a national council on competitiveness to coordinate that nation’s economic future.

Also engaged in assisting nonprofits, foundations and hospitals, Porter himself has founded three nonprofit organizations, including the Initiative for a Competitive Inner City (ICIC). Founded in 1994, this private-sector organization acts to revitalize distressed inner-city communities across the U.S. using market-based principles and building partnerships with leading corporations as well as with the Small Business Administration and the U.S. Conference of Mayors.
Porter has also brought his expertise to organizations he personally holds dear. An avid fan of the Boston Red Sox, he serves as senior strategy advisor to the team. And at Princeton, Porter helped build the Policy Research Institute for the Region (PRIOR) at the Woodrow Wilson School. PRIOR was established to address the public policy issues facing New Jersey, New York and Pennsylvania, with an understanding that these issues cut across not only state and municipal borders, but also across academic disciplines.

The recipient of innumerable awards and honors, including fourteen honorary degrees from universities around the world, Porter notes, “My goal has been to influence scholars but, more importantly, to influence the world of practice. To me, new ideas and new ways of thinking about problems are the most powerful forces for societal change. Universities, like Princeton, have a duty and a responsibility to connect the world of scholarship to the world of action.”