Dr. Ing. h.c. F. Porsche AG Chair
of Strategic Management and
Digital Entrepreneurship

Prof. Dr. Stephan Stubner

The field of strategy nowadays presents tremendous challenges and opportunities to shape one’s reality, independently of initial circumstances. It is about using inventiveness to transform a raw idea into a set of precise goals. And it is about outlining a plan to achieve them using adequate decision-making instruments. The quote “A pile of rocks ceases to be a rock pile when somebody contemplates it with the idea of a cathedral in mind” by Antoine de Saint-Exupery highlights the creative potential that emerges from a strategic mindset. For family businesses, this perspective offers a framework for a critical assessment of the edifice that the family wants to build, as a living legacy creating economic and public value.
My key aim is therefore to inspire students to embrace strategic thinking and empower them with the framework and mindset for success. Our students shall become critical thinkers and doers with a solid understanding of strategy tools and the underlying theories.

In 2013, I became Chairholder of the Dr. Ing. h.c. F. Porsche Chair of Strategic Management and Family Business at HHL Leipzig Graduate School of Management. Ever since my early academic education I had strong ties to HHL. ... read more I graduated from HHL in 2000. After my doctoral studies at Friedrich-Alexander-University Erlangen-Nuremberg I returned to Leipzig and joined HHL as Assistant Professor of Strategic Management and Organization and Academic Director of the Entrepreneurship Program in 2007. Since then, I have also been teaching at top national and international universities such as WU Vienna, ENPC Paris, and IMD Lausanne. I am an active member of the European Academy of Management (EURAM), the Academy of Management (AOM) and the Strategic Management Society (SMS).
Before my academic career, I gained extensive experience in consulting when working for The Boston Consulting Group. I co-founded two online companies and supported many other start-ups as a mentor, coach and investor.

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Our research activities

Research at the Chair of Strategic Management and Digital Entrepreneurship focuses on strategy and entrepreneurship in organizations. Building on solid theory base combining rigor and relevance, researchers at the Chair analyze relevant phenomena scientifically and derive transferrable recommendations. With its strategy and entrepreneurship focus in research, the Chair assesses the following research topics:

• corporate entrepreneurial activities in established companies
• digitalization efforts in new ventures
• strategies in the digital era and the use of disruptive technologies

We actively participate in the international research community through publications in leading journals such as the Harvard Business Review, Harvard Business Manager, International Journal of Entrepreneurial Venturing, Journal of Family Business Strategy, Management Review Quarterly or the Schmalenbach Business Review and through discussions and presentations at academic conferences and workshops, e.g. the Academy of Management (AOM), the Strategic Management Society (SMS), the European Academy of Management (EURAM) and the international family firm research association (ifera).

Collaboration with colleagues from different disciplines ... read more is used as a foundation to ensure that multiple perspectives are considered. In addition to scholarly research, our focus lies on the development of industry competencies.. The Chair of Strategic Management and Digital Entrepreneurship also offers master thesis supervision alongside current research projects. The theses of M.Sc. students usually pursue a more theoretical approach whereas MBA students rather deal with conceptual and or application oriented topics.

Courses

The Porsche AG Chair coordinates the elective „Strategy“ in the M.Sc. program and is overlooking the content of all other strategy-related courses at HHL Leipzig Graduate School of Management. In teaching, the Chair takes on a holistic and cross-functional perspective and a strong practical orientation. We focus on equipping our students with skills relevant in practice as well as knowledge and application of strategy tools and their underlying theories, team work, communication and logical reasoning.

Besides Prof. Dr. Stephan Stubner and Dr. Dominik Kanbach, several experts from academia and practice are involved in the teaching of strategy at HHL Leipzig Graduate School of Management. Past contributors include Prof. Dr. Torsten Wulf, Chair of Strategic and International Management at the University of Marburg, Prof. Dr. Harald Hungenberg, Chair of Management at the University of Erlangen-Nuremberg, Prof. Dr. Burkhard Schwenker, Chairman of the Supervisory Board of Roland Berger Strategy Consultants and Honorary Professor at HHL.

Publications