Teaching
Below you will find links to materials, blogs, and YouTube channels related to strategy and other topics.
Available content by class
PHD 1506 – Research Design / Quantitative Research Methods I(not taught this semester)
- Syllabus and Course Content
- Brightspace site (Quizzes, etc)
GB604 – MBA Global Strategy
- (not taught this semester)
MG300 – Strategic Management
- (not taught this semester)
Class tools
Blogs with interesting analysis, research, and commentary (in no particular order)
- CivilTalk – A company co-founded by my uncle Keith Fox, with the intent to foster substantive discussions about the key issues in politics, economics, and civic society today
- Musings on Markets – My friend Will Sparks pointed out this professor from NYU (Aswath Damodaran) who provides nice, digestible insights on the financial markets
- Organizations and Markets – A co-operative development between a number of scholars, including one of my advisors Dick Langlois, which has a number of interesting applications of organizational economics (no longer publishing but a number of good historical articles nonetheless)
- Benedict Evans’ Newsletter – My friend Will Pearce pointed out this really insightful newsletter that looks at trends in tech and strategy and implications for equity markets and beyond
- WILTW – A product of 13D research, this is another recommendation from Will Pearce that is heavy on the “deep think”. Note that the subscription price is steep
- WBW – Admittedly not a deep cut, nonetheless Tim Urban puts out a number of interesting perspectives on a variety of topics
- Visual Capitalist – Need a nice infographic on a topic of the moment? You will probably find one here
- The Daily Shot – Global macro trends, visualized
- A16Z – Some interesting discussions and podcasts about developments in the Valley and beyond
- No Mercy, No Malice – Another Will Sparks recommendation of a marketing professor at NYU with punchy reads and graphical illustrations
- Neighborhood Notes – Shameless plug for a travel blog that my wife and I update from time to time (not nearly as often as we should) based on our trips here, there, and everywhere for conferences, her work, and for fun
- Statistical Modeling – A blog run by a number of faculty at Columbia talking about statistical models, causal inference, and more, with Andrew Gelman and others contributing
- Morning Brew – An eclectic daily newsletter that my wife and sister-in-law found a while back – a nice way to get broad coverage of the day’s stories with some interesting sidebars, too
- Future Today Institute – A group that my wife Ashley pointed out to me led by Amy Webb, who has worked on building a portfolio of “futurism” tools – the intent of which is to anticipate how major strategic plans might play out in the coming year
- Gravity Exists – I actually don’t remember how I originally found Adam Grimes’ work, but it is always an interesting discussion of contemporary issues and how they can influence trading strategies. This is the most current in a series of iterations of his branding.
- Thought Sparks – A blog by Rita McGrath (who has written on prescience, seeing around corners, and transient advantage, among other things) that dissects some of the bigger and smaller trends of the day (there is a podcast, too)
- Strategy and Competitiveness – A blog by Robert Sawhney which has some interesting examples and insights published from time to time
- EconLog – A blog format that features work by several authors including Bryan Caplan, an economist at George Mason who writes from a libertarian perspective
- EconPhD – Frankly, I completely forgot about this site but I used it a lot during my PhD studies (it is outdated in many ways, but some good information endures). A good source of basic information about the PhD process (in economics at least) and classic texts and references, with a set of links to helpful lecture notes
- A Simple Model – An intriguing site that provides good resources on valuation, financial literacy, and financial model development, among other items
- Middle Ground – A very interesting series that “explores whether two different groups of people, opposed in their beliefs, can come together empathetically and find middle ground.” Some interesting prompts and a fascinating format on a wide variety of topics – many of the policy position questions were interesting to me.
Interesting YouTube Channels and Podcasts
- 3Blue1Brown – Do you want to really understand math at a deeper level and from multiple angles? Grant is a magician when it comes to simple but powerful explanations of maths across the levels
- StatQuest – A similar treatment to 3Blue1Brown but for statistically related topics
- Kurzgesagt – Simple explanations of complex phenomena, with an emphasis on interesting “what if” questions
- Charisma on Command – A number of discrete tactics with examples to help you have a more commanding presence in personal and professional settings
- Primer and Minute Physics – Admittedly not as relevant for business and economic applications in all cases, there are a number of videos on these two channels that touch on pertinent applications (e.g., supply and demand) while also just having a bunch of cool stuff that helps you think about how the world works (e.g., test sensitivity, why the solar system is flat, etc.)
- Rick Makadok’s Strategy Research Proseminar – A series of video interviews with some of the leading lights in the field of strategy and beyond – if you want to learn more about the cutting edge of research in this field, here is a good place to start
- Veritasium – Bunch of interesting topics in math, science, and social science that is digestible and with good guest speakers
- How I Built This – Again – a well-known production but this podcast does what it says on the tin: “A podcast about innovators, entrepreneurs, idealists and their stories about the movements they built.” Probably my favorite show on NPR
- Cantor’s Paradise – The compendium of math publications on Medium; lots of interesting topics here
- The STR Divison of the Academy of Management’s Meet A Theory and Meet a Method series
- The full compendium of playlists administered by Strategic Management Society
Useful teaching tools
Content and Class Exercises
- Carpenter strategy toolbox
- PollEverywhere
- Kahoot
- Lee Bolman exercises
- Page West’s strategy ‘case map’
- How I Built This
- Business Wars
- Intrinsic Value / Margin of Safety calcuator (for Ben Graham fans)
- (Free) Cases (i.e., outside HBSP)
- Robins Case Network – My colleague Jill Brown pointed out this repository of great cases to me
- Stanford GSB
- Case Centre
- MIT Sloan
General Decision Making Tools
- Bayesian Binomial calculator – My former student Dan Berlin showed me this calculator, which compares the success rates of two groups or items to determine if the groups significantly differ from another in a Bayesian framework which allows for more straightforward interpretations than a frequentist orientation
Long-form Simulations
Dissemination Tools
- Bookdown (a way to elegantly structure and publish lecture notes)
Great Lectures for Content and Inspiration
- Bernstein’s 1973 Guest Lecture Series on the “Unanswered Question”
- Gilbert Strang’s 2005 Lectures on Linear Algebra
- Walter Lewin’s Last Lecture
- Feynman’s Messenger Lectures
- Carl Bender’s Lectures on Mathematical Physics and Perturbation Theory
- Hans Rosling’s Notes on Global Statistics (one of my favorite TED talks)
- How to Speak by Patrick Winston
- Gruber’s Principles of Microeconomics at MIT
- Duncan Foley’s Advanced Microeconomics at the New School (Entropy-based economic models)
- Wharton Course on Private Equity
- Roughgarden’s Algorithmic Game Theory
- Mathematical Finance at MIT
- Modern Physics as taught by Leonard Susskind at Stanford