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Wharton's 24 research centers and initiatives reflect the full diversity and rigor of research interests and activity at the School.
These interdisciplinary centers serve as a meeting of the minds for Wharton and Penn faculty students, and members of the business community, who come together to study and debate key business challenges. Their work generates courses, academic programs, community outreach, published research, and partnerships among academics, government, and industry.
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Entrepreneurship
Sol C. Snider Entrepreneurial Research Center
Ian C. MacMillan, Director
The Sol C. Snider Entrepreneurial Research Center is focused on increasing understanding of the processes that lead to the creation of social wealth through new business creation and development, both within existing organizations and via independent start-ups. Developed from locations worldwide such as China, South Africa, and the U.S., the Center's current research topics include large-scale job creation, productivity, and international competitiveness. The Center is also co-home to The Journal of Business Venturing, the most influential publication in the field.
Wharton Small Business Development Center
M. Therese Flaherty, Director
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Ethics
Carol and Lawrence Zicklin Center for Business Ethics Research
William S. Laufer, Director
Ethical issues in financial services and global business transactions, as well as the relationship between markets and morality, are emphasized in the research sponsored, conducted, and disseminated by the Zicklin Center. This vital resource serves as a focal point for the interaction of business, professional, and academic leaders concerned with responsibility in business.
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Family Business
Wharton Global Family Alliance
Raphael (Raffi) Amit and Ian C. MacMillan, Co-Directors
The Wharton Global Family Alliance develops in-depth research about family businesses, primarily in the areas of governance, philanthropy, and wealth management. It combines rigorous scholarly research with the practical experience of successful global families to highlight the social impact of families worldwide. It has become the knowledge leader in family business research, offering a robust research agenda and a wide variety of outreach programs to a global audience.
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Finance
Financial Institutions Center
Franklin Allen, Francis X. Diebold, Richard J. Herring, and Carol A. Leisenring, Co-Directors
Technology, regulatory changes, and globalization are revolutionizing the financial services industry; and the Financial Institutions Center is dedicated to addressing the many important issues that result. Through coursework and communications designed for academics, financial practitioners, and policy makers, the Center helps industry members and students of financial services keep pace with the changes that affect their lives and their work.
Rodney L. White Center for Financial Research
Marshall E. Blume, Director
Through a wide range of financial research, a working paper series, a reprint series, and a highly respected annual seminar, the White Center has established itself as an important source of information to the financial community. Members have the opportunity to participate in groundbreaking financial research, and the center provides a number of research grants to Wharton faculty members each year.
Weiss Center for International Financial Research
Richard Marston, Director
Information is the key to evaluating risks and seizing opportunities in our global financial marketplace. The Weiss Center is the world's first research center devoted exclusively to an understanding of international finance. By sponsoring research on markets, financial instruments, and global economics, the center enhances the understanding of this complex subject for both current and future financial managers.
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Global Initiatives
Weiss Center for International Financial Research
Richard Marston, Director
Wharton Faculty Research Initiatives in China
Marshall Meyer,
Z. John Zhang
Wharton Global Family Alliance
Raphael (Raffi) Amit and Ian C. MacMillan, Co-Directors
Wharton/INSEAD Center for Global Research & Education
John R. Kimberly, Noah Gans, Mauro Guillen
Combining the resources of two world leaders in management education, the Wharton/INSEAD Center for Global Research & Education expands the boundaries of global research through collaborative efforts across the two schools. The Center supports joint publications, faculty and doctoral student exchanges, development of new curricula and global teaching innovations.
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Health Economics
Center for Health Management and Economics
Lawton R. Burns, Director
By focusing on research and communication, the Center for Health Management and Economics explores how managerial insight and economic incentive can improve the current state of health care provision. The Center fosters interaction between academic and business leaders through hosting annual conferences, publishing a quarterly digest, and supporting a variety of research projects. Works in progress include international price comparison for pharmaceuticals, hospital ownership conversions, and alignment of physician groups and health systems.
Leonard Davis Institute of Health Economics
David A. Asch, Executive Director
A formal cooperative venture among the University of Pennsylvania's schools of medicine, business, nursing, and dental medicine, LDI works to improve public health through multidisciplinary studies on medicine, economics, and social and ethical issues that influence health care. The Institute emphasizes research on the efficient allocation and appropriate use of health care resources and the development of innovative health care delivery systems.
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Human Resources
Center for Human Resources
Peter Cappelli, Director
Since 1921, the Center for Human Resources (formerly the Industrial Research Unit) has been bringing academics and practitioners together, fostering interaction through multidisciplinary research, regular meetings, and frequent information bulletins. Today, the Center continues to explore the strategic role of human resource management in areas like labor relations, increased productivity, public policy, work and family issues, and workforce education. Wharton's Council on Employee Relations is the Center's program for management/employee issues.
Council on Employee Relations (formerly Labor Relations Council)
Peter Cappelli, Chairman
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Insurance and Pensions
S.S. Huebner Foundation for Insurance Education
J. David Cummins, Director
For more than half a century, the S.S. Huebner Foundation, named in honor of insurance education pioneer Solomon S. Huebner, has worked to bolster insurance education at the college level. By promoting an increase in the number of professors specializing in insurance and by enriching the field's literature through its own published materials, the foundation provides greater opportunities for students interested in the dynamic field of insurance.
Boettner Center for Pensions and Retirement Research
Olivia S. Mitchell, Director
The Boettner Center supports scholarly research, teaching, and outreach on global aging, successful retirement, and public and private pensions. The center also disseminates research findings to international audiences of academics and policymakers as well as supports data development efforts at the University of Pennsylvania.
Pension Research Council
Olivia S. Mitchell, Executive Director
The Pension Research Council sponsors interdisciplinary research on the entire range of private pension and social security programs, as well as related benefit plans in the United States and around the world. Council projects are motivated by a need to address the long-term issues that underlie contemporary concerns and seek to broaden public understanding of these complex arrangements through research into their social, economic, legal, actuarial, and financial foundations of privately and publicly-provided benefits. Members of the Council's Board, appointed by the Dean of the Wharton School, are leaders in the employee benefits field.
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Management and Leadership
Center for Leadership and Change Management
Michael Useem, Director
Increasingly, organizations worldwide are confronting turbulent markets, demanding shareholders, and discerning customers; and many firms are restructuring to meet these challenges. Their success depends largely on the quality of leadership that exists at all levels of management. Dedicated to building a basic and practical understanding of leadership and change, the Center explores and communicates effective strategies for restructuring.
SEI Center for Advanced Studies in Management
Jerry Wind, Director
The SEI Center seeks to identify and understand trends in management practice and their impact and to design and implement research programs to meet the future needs of management. The results will provide both educational material for faculty and guidelines for corporate action. The Center conducts a series of workshops, conferences, and lectures for the exchange of knowledge and information to gain a better understanding of how successful enterprises will be organized and managed in the 21st century and what these corporations should do today to prepare themselves.
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Real Estate
Samuel Zell and Robert Lurie Real Estate Center
Joseph E. Gyourko, Director
The Zell/Lurie Center actively promotes and funds cutting-edge, scholarly research of interest to academics, policy makers, and real estate professionals. Results are reported through the acclaimed Zell/Lurie Working Paper Series, the Wharton Real Estate Review, and other scholarly publications. The Center's education component focuses primarily on the Wharton student body, encouraging student interest through a lecture series, a research competition, the Real Estate Club, and academic fellowships and scholarships.
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Retailing
Jay H. Baker Retailing Initiative
Stephen J. Hoch, Director
The Jay H. Baker Retailing Initiative links retail theory with practice by forming a partnership among world-class researchers, educators, students, and the global leaders of today's retail industry.
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Risk Management
Risk Management and Decision Processes Center
Howard Kunreuther and Robert Meyer, Co-Directors
Low-probability events with potentially catastrophic consequences, such as natural and technological hazards and industrial risk, are the chief concern of this Center. Through a program of descriptive research (exploring how people interact and make decisions regarding risk) and prescriptive analysis (proposing ways that people and groups can make better risk-related decisions), the Center investigates the effectiveness of incentive systems, insurance, regulation, the communication of risk information, and other strategies.
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Service and Operations
Fishman-Davidson Center for Service and Operations Management
Morris A. Cohen and Marshall L. Fisher, Co-Directors
Through research and teaching, the Fishman-Davidson Center strives to understand the role of the service sector, the largest component of the economy in all developed countries. The Center's varied programs include a partnership with industry for sponsored research, a faculty-management forum and information exchange, and a variety of workshops that address an emerging paradigm: It is the services that physical goods provide, and not the goods themselves, that add value to the consumer.
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Sports and Business
Wharton Sports Business Initiative
Kenneth L. Shropshire, Director
The goal of the Wharton Sports Business Initiative (WSBI) is to forge a partnership among top level sports business leaders, Wharton faculty and students to generate and disseminate knowledge about the sports industry through educational programs, strategic corporate partnerships, high-level student consulting assignments, forums, and research. From internships and research to executive education, this Initiative will serve as the center for all sports business related activities associated with the Wharton School.
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Technology
Wharton e-Business Initiative (WeBI)
WeBI is a partnership between business leaders, Wharton faculty, and students to generate and disseminate new knowledge about e-business through research, academic programs, and strategic corporate partnerships. WeBI funds and conducts interdisciplinary research projects to address critical, emerging issues in e-business.
William and Phyllis Mack Center for Technological Innovation
George S. Day and Harbir Singh, Co-Directors
Bringing together leaders from business, government, and labor, the Mack Center provides a forum for probing critical issues, discussing research, and planning future study. As the umbrella organization for all of Wharton's technology management initiatives, the Center will support the research and publishing activities of Wharton faculty members, create an endowed professorship, and support a student-run conference. In the field of technological change, the Center sponsors the Emerging Technologies Management Research Program.
Emerging Technologies Management Research Program
Michael S. Tomcyzk, Managing Director
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Fast Fact:
In 1921 Wharton established the first research center at a business school (Industrial Research Unit), creating a new role for business schools as incubators for scholarly research that impacts business policy and practice.
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