In case you’ve missed the Jill Lepore-Clayton Christiansen Harvard University faculty feud, here’s a brief recap:
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In case you’ve missed the Jill Lepore-Clayton Christiansen Harvard University faculty feud, here’s a brief recap:
Historiann 
“You keep referring to Lepore by her first name. Do you know her?
I’ve never met her in my life.”
Enough said! Thank you Jill.
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Such an astonishing staging of defensive and abortively outraged mansplaining.
Also a really offputting read if your name is also Jill.
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Historiann, thanks for the reading assignment. (Some of us don’t read papers unless told otherwise.)
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Can’t honestly say that I read all the linked material (i.e. the assignment). When I see such discourse, it makes me appreciate my choice of more precise sciences. I am with Jill Lepore; disruption seems like a great discussion topic, and money maker, but otherwise a useless idea.
Despite the questionable intellectual contribution, management departments have prepared the ground for the biggest heist in history. Namely, the CEOs compensation bonanza.
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I liked this essay, although my mouse hand (since I never got into this new-fangled touch-pad thing) was starting to cramp up. I loved the part about getting run over by a taxiing plane when you thought you were in a meadow, but would like even more to be mowed down by a Bucyrus steam shovel in the frozen food aisle of the Great Atlantic and Pacific Tea Company!!!
A few footnotes:
*** There’s a t.v. news show that starts off its run with “thank you for disrupting your afternoon…” which makes me want to puke. How can you think you’re doing journalism of any kind or value, on whatever platform, if you’re trying that hard to be both cute and relevant?
*** In 17th century Maryland they called them “dangerous innovaccons,” and they were ILLEGAL!
*** I forgot the third one…
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more precise sciences
The story is not about the precision of the data but about the quality of the analysis. I don’t imagine that scientists have any innate analytical superiority relative to economists or historians. I mean, how could that be?
Thanks, H’ann, for linking the article by Jill Lepore. I would not have seen it (or Christiansen’s reply) otherwise. It’s both comforting and useful to know there is critical, data-driven assessment of “disruptive innovation” out there. My old provost was really into this as a strategy (for something) in the university. It amazes me that academics fall for this stuff without engaging their inner skeptic.
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Good job for the Business Week reporter asking whether he knew Lepore. Clay obviously doesn’t like criticism from a woman (or maybe a historian).
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Yeah, the B-school geniuses don’t think their work should be disrupted at all! Douchey.
Isn’t capitalism inherently disruptive? Isn’t that the POINT of capitalism? Markets create winners and losers. Duh.
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Not only does Christensen first-name Lepore, he refers to himself in the third person, by his full name. I’m sure there’s an exception somewhere, but I’ve yet to encounter someone who does that who isn’t extremely full of himself (and it’s always himself; I’ve also yet to encounter a woman who does that).
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Historiann does that occasionally (but it’s only one name, like Cher or Madonna.)
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We’ll start to worry if you start calling yourself “The Historiann.”
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