Biography
Richard Rumelt received his doctorate from the Harvard Business School in 1972, having previously earned a Master of Science in electrical engineering from UC Berkeley. He worked as a systems engineer at the Jet Propulsion Laboratories and served on the faculty of the Harvard Business School. He joined the UCLA faculty in 1976. From 1993 to 1996 he was on long-term leave from UCLA, serving on the faculty at INSEAD, France. At INSEAD, Rumelt headed the Corporate Renewal Initiative, a research-intervention center devoted to the study and practice of corporate transformation.
Rumelt was president of the Strategic Management Society from 1995 to 1998. He received the Irwin Prize for his book Strategy, Structure, and Economic Performance. In 1997, he was appointed Telecom Italia Strategy Fellow, a position he held until April 2000. He has won teaching awards at UCLA and received a best paper prize in 1997 from the Strategic Management Journal.
Rumelt’s research has centered on corporate diversification strategy and the sources of sustainable advantage to individual business strategies. His current research interests center on the dynamics of industry transitions, with a focus on the patterns and forces shaping the evolution of complex industries.
Education
DBA Management, 1972, Harvard University
M.S. Electrical Engineering, 1965, UC Berkeley
B.S. Electrical Engineering, 1963, UC Berkeley
Recognition
Richard P. Rumelt. (2011). The Perils of Bad Strategy. McKinsey Quarterly, (2011, 1): 30-39.
Bardolet, David; Lovallo, Dan; and Richard Rumelt. (2010). The hand of corporate management in capital allocations: patterns of investment in multi- and single-business firms. Industrial and Corporate Change, 19 (2010): 591-612.
Richard P. Rumelt. (2009). Strategy in a structural break. McKinsey Quarterly, (2009,1): 35-42.
Liggett, Thomas M., Lippman, Steven A. and Rumelt, Richard P. (2009). The Asympotic Shapley Value for a Simple Market Game. Economic Theory, 40 (2009): 333-338.
Allen P. Webb (interviewer). (2009). Management lessons from the financial crisis: A conversation with Lowell Bryan and Richard Rumelt. McKinsey Quarterly, (2009, 3): 61-67.
Lovallo, Dan P. and Lenny T. Mendonca (interviewers). (2997). Strategy's strategist: An interview with Richard Rumelt. McKinsey Quarterly, (2007, 4): 56-67.
Richard Rumelt and Steven A. Lippman. (2003). The Bargaining Perspective. Strategic Management Journal, 24 (2003): 1069-86.
Richard Rumelt and Steven A. Lippman. (2003). The Payments Perspective. Strategic Management Journal, 24 (2003): 903-927.
Video
Richard Rumelt
How would you describe a good corporate strategy?
Richard Rumelt's Big Idea for the Thinker's 50, 2013
Filmed and Edited for the Thinkers 50 by KDH Creative
Good Strategy/Bad Strategy: the difference and why it matters
Speaker(s): Professor Richard Rumelt
Chair: Professor Gordon Barrass
Recorded on 20 October 2011 in Sheikh Zayed Theatre, New Academic Building.