Predoctoral Research Associate (Summer 2027)

Harvard Business School (HBS) is seeking multiple Predoctoral Research Associates starting in Summer 2027 to support an assigned faculty member in one of the following academic units. 

• Accounting & Management

• Business, Government and the International Economy

• Entrepreneurial Management

• Finance

• General Management

• Marketing

• Negotiation Organizations & Markets

• Organizational Behavior 

• Strategy 

• Technology and Operations Management

Research subjects can include but are not limited to: labor economics, marketing economics, private equity / venture capital disclosures and taxation, decision making and gender stereotypes in shaping beliefs, industrial organization and the market design of digital platforms, media economics and economics of digital platforms, emerging financial technologies and alternative data, political economy and empirical corporate finance, R&D strategy and the economics of innovation, entrepreneurial management, corporate social responsibilities focused on climate change and gender diversity, asset pricing shaping politics and markets, specialized knowledge commercialization and micro-geographic environments shaping innovation, behavioral economics, intergroup inequity, and tech strategy. 

Please note the faculty currently hiring include: 

• Ray Kluender: Professor Kluender researches analyzes the determinants of financial well-being and the nature of financial distress, traces the frontier of how entrepreneurship and technology can solve social problems, and identifies market failures and the implications for appropriate corrective policies. Current projects involve partnerships with large-scale financial technology companies and employ a wide range of empirical approaches. His predoc researcher will get hands-on experience with every stage of the research project from conception through publication and will develop a wide range of empirical skills to prepare them for PhD programs. A two-year commitment is expected. Professor Kluender's three prior predocs are currently pursuing PhDs at Princeton, Berkeley, and Harvard. 

• Maren Hoff

• Zoe Cullen: Professor Cullen is a labor economist whose research examines how information, technology, and firm behavior shape the well-being of workers and society. Her current projects study how artificial intelligence is reshaping the value of human expertise and the distribution of wages across workers and firms, as well as contemporaneous forces determining worker bargaining power. These projects involve large-scale field experiments and partnerships with technology and payroll companies, drawing on administrative data and a wide range of empirical methods. Her predoc researcher will get hands-on experience with every stage of the research process, from designing experiments through analysis and publication, and will build the empirical and institutional skills needed for a top PhD program. Professor Cullen's prior predocs are currently pursuing PhDs at MIT, Princeton, Chicago, and Yale.

Overview: The Predoctoral Research Associate position reports directly to faculty supervisors and administrative manager in the Research Staff Services office.  Ideal candidates will be comfortable in an environment that requires a high level of independence, intellectual curiosity, and the ability to use discretionary judgment.  

Primary duties:

• Work under the general direction of HBS faculty on topics central to HBS research agenda.  Provide subject-area knowledge, analysis and interpretation to faculty member.  Identify and explore a wide-range of questions related to faculty’s research agenda.

• Write cases, case supplements, project reports, and policy memos from start to finish creating original writing based on subject-area expertise, research, and interviews, and write articles for applicable business audiences such as Harvard Business Review.

• Develop, design, conduct, analyze, and implement research using data science knowledge and prior knowledge of requested statistical packages. Perform statistical programming. Experience with NLP. 

• Manage and manipulate data using requested packages, such as STATA, Python, R, or MATLAB.

• Ensure compliance with department, University, and federal regulations. Complete work with only general direction.  Be aware of department, School, University policies and potential outside research policies.

• Under general direction of faculty member, must be able to take complex research ideas, concepts, and methodologies and apply them to new projects and situations.  Must be able to structure assignments and keep faculty member informed as necessary, using own judgment.

• Build trust and collaboration by being present on-site and engaging directly with colleagues and various constituents.

• Responsible for other duties as assigned.