Clayton M. Christensen, a professor at Harvard Business School whose groundbreaking 1997 book, “The Innovator’s Dilemma,” outlined his theories about the impact of what he called “disruptive innovation” on leading companies and catapulted him to superstar status as a management guru, died on Thursday at a hospital in Boston. “The Innovator’s Dilemma,” which The Economist called one of the six most important business books ever written, was published during the technology boom of the late 1990s. By laying out a blueprint for how executives could identify and respond to these disruptive forces, Professor Christensen, himself an entrepreneur and former management consultant, struck a chord with high-tech corporate leaders. Image The Economist called Professor Christensen’s “The Innovator’s Dilemma” one of the six most important business books ever written. That praise helped make the book a best seller (it had sold more than a half-million copies by 2007), and Professor Christensen a marquee name in the business world.

Source: New York Times January 25, 2020 20:03 UTC