Clayton M. Christensen author photo
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Clayton M. Christensen

Né(e): April 06, 1952 – Salt Lake City, Utah, United States

Clayton M. Christensen was a Harvard Business School professor and business theorist best known for popularizing disruptive innovation. His books include The Innovator’s Dilemma and How Will You Measure Your Life? Widely influential in management and entrepreneurship, he was ranked among the world’s top business thinkers and earned multiple bestselling titles.

Biographie et Parcours de l'Auteur

Clayton M. Christensen was an American business scholar and author whose work changed how executives, entrepreneurs, and policymakers think about change. Born in Salt Lake City, Utah, in 1952, he grew up in a family and faith tradition that emphasized discipline, service, and education. He studied economics at Brigham Young University, served as a missionary in South Korea for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, then continued his education as a Rhodes Scholar at Oxford before earning an MBA from Harvard. His early career moved across consulting, government service, and entrepreneurship, including time at Boston Consulting Group, work in Washington, and leadership at a technology manufacturing company he helped build. Those experiences gave him a rare vantage point: he had seen strategy from the boardroom, the bureaucracy, and the startup, and he eventually returned to Harvard to complete a doctorate and join the faculty of Harvard Business School.

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Citations

quote
It was a process, where piece by piece, what you did seemed to be innocuous or good. Most things that turn out to be bad choices, at the time we made them, seemed to be very rational. You just can’t allow yourself to get victimized by marginal-cost thinking
-Best practices writ large
quote
I will never work on Saturday or Sunday, and I’m always out of here by 6 p.m
-Best practices writ large
quote
If we can't see beyond what's close by, we're relying on chance—on the currents of life—to guide us
-How Will You Measure Your Life?
quote
The marginal cost of doing something 'just this once' always seems to be negligible, but the full cost will typically be much higher
-How Will You Measure Your Life?
quote
The person I decide to be has to be robust enough that it doesn't matter what happens in my life
-The Business of Life
quote
Theory is of immense value to managers
-Is Your Org Chart Stuck in a Rut? Try a Scientific Experiment
quote
In higher education, we’ve never had disruption emerge until now
-Planning for disruption
quote
What matters most is ‘Where can I do the most good?’
-The Disruptor
quote
What job are you trying to get done that cause you to come to McDonald’s to hire a milkshake at 6:30 in the morning?
-The Jobs to Be Done Theory of Innovation

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Voix de la Communauté

"Clayton Christensen, 58, is one of the most influential business theorists of the last 50 years"

Forbes

"Harvard Business School professor Clayton Christensen, known by many as the ‘godfather’ of disruptive innovation, died at 67"

CNBC

"Clayton Christensen: influential business thinker who propounded ‘disruptive innovation"

The Independent

"Clayton Christensen is still the most influential business thinker in the world, according to Thinkers50"

Forbes

"Clayton M. Christensen was a giant both in academia and in stature"

The Harvard Crimson

"Clayton Christensen, creator of ‘disruptive innovation’ theory and prominent LDS leader, dies at 67"

The Salt Lake Tribune

"Clayton Christensen, one of the most influential management thinkers of the last century, died Jan. 23"

Quartz

"Clayton Christensen, influential scholar of ‘disruptive innovation,’ dies at 67"

The Washington Post

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