Nicholas G Carr

A former executive editor of the Harvard Business Review, Nicholas Carr writes and speaks on technology, business, and culture. His intriguing 2003 Harvard Business Review article “IT Doesn’t Matter,” was an instant sensation, setting the stage for the global debate on the strategic value of information technology in business. His 2004 book, Does IT Matter? : Information Technology and the Corrosion of Competitive Advantage, published by Harvard Business School Press, was a bestseller and kept the worldwide business community discussing the role of computers and IT in business.

Already a business bestseller, his latest 2008 book, The Big Switch: Rewiring the World, from Edison to Google, examines the future of computing and its implications for business and society. The Wall Street Journal says The Big Switch is “destined to influence CEOs and the boards and investors that support them as companies grapple with the constant change of the digital age.”

A prolific and nimble writer, between October 1997 and May 2003, Carr held top editorial positions at Harvard Business Review, where articles he edited won McKinsey Awards in 1999, 2000, 2001, and 2002.  He writes regularly for the Financial Times, Strategy & Business and The Guardian and his articles have also appeared in the New York Times, MIT Sloan Management Review, Wired, Business 2.0, Boston Globe, Industry Standard, The Banker, Director, BusinessWeek Online as well as in his popular blog, Rough Type.

He also edited The Digital Enterprise, a book of HBR writings on the Internet. Nick is working on an eagerly anticipated new book, The Shallows: Mind, Memory and Media in an Age of Instant Information. With publication scheduled to coincide with the birth of the worldwide web, the book will examine the intellectual and social consequences of the Internet.

Carr has served as a commentator on CNBC, CNN, and other networks and has been a featured speaker worldwide at industry, educational, and government forums. In Spring 2008 CIO Insight named Carr’s Does IT Matter?  one of the all-time “Top 15 Most Groundbreaking Management Books” and Ziff Davis included him as one of only a handful of IT management thought leaders on their “100 Most Influential People in IT” list. In 2007 eWeek named him one of the 100 most influential people in IT and in 2005, Optimize magazine named Carr one of the leading thinkers on information technology. Earlier in his career, Carr was a principal at Mercer Management Consulting. He holds a B.A. from Dartmouth College and an M.A., in English literature, from Harvard University.

Nicholas Carr talks about:

Does IT Matter?

Much has been written about information technology’s broad impact on industries and processes, but what about its effect on the competitive advantages of individual companies?  In this presentation, Nicholas draws on his book Does IT Matter? and his Harvard Business Review article “IT Doesn’t Matter” to examine the strategic role of IT and provide a set of new imperatives for IT management.  An informative and stimulating presentation that challenges the assumptions and stirs the thinking of business executives and technologists alike.

The New World of IT Management

As more and more computer and communications products and services become commodities, market power is shifting from IT vendors to IT users.  In this presentation, Nicholas shows how smart companies are “capitalizing on commoditization” to dramatically reduce their IT expenditures – while actually strengthening their capabilities.