Effective Strategies for Media Companies Leading in Turbulent Environments

The 2009 program will be held in California. The program will be offered on the HBS Campus in 2010. The information below is based on the program offered in 2008, and does not reflect potential changes to faculty and course content for the 2010 course.

Your Course of Study

Designed by HBS faculty with extensive industry experience, the curriculum addresses the central issues that confront media companies. Via relevant case studies and small group sessions, you will:

  • Examine companies from a wide range of media industries, including print, publishing, radio, television, and music
  • Address issues that are key to each of these arenas and that exemplify industry best practices
  • Gain a comprehensive understanding of how to meet the two central challenges for media organizations today:
    • Getting noticed by audiences bombarded with a superabundance of choices
    • Getting paid for the content your company provides
  • Interact with a group of peers with diverse functional, cultural, and industry backgrounds

The program addresses four themes: the evolution of technology, changes in customer behavior, strategic responses to competing business models, and organizing for innovation.

  • Technology
    • Identifying central sources of competition amid newly emerging and rapidly evolving technologies
    • Formulating strategic moves in an environment of substantial technological uncertainty
  • Customer behavior
    • Understanding the impact of technology on consumer behavior
    • Exploiting customer heterogeneity through new business models
    • Customers as innovators
  • Business models
    • Identifying a range of strategic options: process and idea generation, timing, execution
    • Principles behind effective strategies
    • Product versus portfolio approaches
      • Business versus corporate strategy
  • Organization
    • Managing change: strategy and process
    • Organizational structures and re-design
    • Leadership, culture, and strategic change