Success Story

Harvard Business School
Institute for Strategy & Competitiveness

Based at the Harvard Business School, the Institute for Strategy and Competitiveness is dedicated to the study of competition and its implications for company strategy; the competitiveness of nations, regions, and cities; and the relationship between competition and society. Scholars and practitioners use its work widely in business, government, and nongovernmental organizations such as universities, economic development organizations, and foundations.

Figure 1 : Homepage for the Cluster Mapping Project at the Institute for Strategy & Competitiveness, Harvard Business School

The Cluster Mapping Project uses statistical techniques to profile the performance over time of regional economies in the United States, with a special focus on clusters. Clusters are a geographically proximate group of interconnected companies, universities, and related institutions that arise out of linkages or externalities across industries.

Michael E. Porter, Bishop William Lawrence University Professor at Harvard Business School, leads the Institute. The Institute s staff comprises research associates, office personnel, and IT specialists. The Institute is dedicated to deepening, extending, and disseminating the body of research that Professor Porter has pioneered over the last two decades.

The ISC uses data visualization techniques to allow its constituents to quickly and easily evaluate and interpret data and to facilitate competitiveness of companies, regions, and industries.

In advanced nations such as the United States, many of the most important influences on competitiveness are found at the regional level. Regional economies are specialized, with each region exhibiting competitiveness in a different mix of industry clusters. Clusters are a
geographically proximate group of interconnected companies and associated institutions in a particular field, including product producers, service providers, suppliers, universities, and trade associations.

Measuring the performance and competitive strength of regional economies has been difficult because clusters have not been systematically identified and mapped across all U.S. regions. To address this challenge, Professor Porter and his team have launched the Cluster Mapping Project to define clusters statistically and create objective, detailed profile of regional economies across the United States.

Economies are analyzed at various geographic levels, including states, economic areas, and metropolitan areas.

Figure 2 : Barchart with legend showing employment in high wage clusters for San Diego, CA in 2001

For example, the data presented here is divided into three broad categories:

• overall regional economic performance,
• composition of the regional economy, and
• cluster competitiveness.

The data can be used to identify the most important clusters in the region’s economy, compare the region’s cluster position versus other regions, understand the drivers of the region’s relative wages, employment growth, and formation of new establishments, and assess the region’s patenting performance.

To see the Cluster Mapping Project in action, go to their web site at:
http://data.isc.hbs.edu/isc/index.jsp. Free registration is required.