Shawn Cole
John G. McLean Professor of Business Administration at Harvard Business School
Associate Professor of Business Administration, HBS at Harvard Kennedy School
Schools
- Harvard Business School
- Harvard Kennedy School
Expertise
Links
Biography
Harvard Business School
Shawn Cole is a professor in the Finance Unit at Harvard Business School, where he teaches and conducts research on financial services, social enterprise, and impact investing.
Much of his research examines corporate and household finance in emerging markets, with a focus on insurance, credit, and savings. He has also done extensive work on financial education in the US and emerging markets. His recent research focuses on designing and delivering advice and education over mobile phones, with an emphasis on agricultural and financial management.
He has worked in China, India, Indonesia, South Africa, and Vietnam. He is an affiliate of the National Bureau of Economic Research, and the Bureau for Research and Economic Analysis of Development. He is on the board of the Jameel Poverty Action Lab, as the co-chair for research.
At HBS, he has taught FIN1 and FIN2 in the core curriculum, Business at the Base of the Pyramid, and courses on impact investing, as well various executive education courses. He currently teaches the PhD development sequence in the department of Economics.
Before joining the Harvard Business School, Professor Cole worked at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York in the economic research department. He has served on the Boston Federal Reserve''s Community Development Research Advisory Council, served as an external advisor to the Gates Foundation, and was the chair of the endowment management committee of the Telluride Association, a non-profit educational organization. He is a cofounder and board chair of a non-profit, Precision Agriculture for Development.
He received a Ph.D. in economics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 2005, where he was an NSF and Javits Fellow, and an A.B. in Economics and German Literature from Cornell University. His work on insurance earned the 2015 "Shin Research Excellence Award;" in 2015 he was also named given a “Faculty Pioneer Award” from the Aspen Institute.
Harvard Kennedy School
Shawn Cole is a professor in the Finance Unit at Harvard Business School, where he teaches a second-year elective course “Business at the Base of the Pyramid.”
His research examines corporate and household finance in emerging markets, with a focus on banking, microfinance, insurance, and the relationship between financial development and economic growth. He has worked in China, India, Indonesia, South Africa, and Vietnam. He is an affiliate of the National Bureau of Economic Research, MIT’s Jameel Poverty Action Lab, and the Bureau for Research and Economic Analysis of Development.
He has taught FIN1 and FIN2 in the core curriculum, as well various executive education courses, and currently teaches a portion of the PhD-level development class in the department of Economics.
Before joining the Harvard Business School, Professor Cole worked at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York in the economic research department. He currently serves on the Boston Federal Reserve's Community Development Research Advisory Council, and has served as an external advisor to the Gates Foundation, and as the chair of the endowment management committee of the Telluride Association, a non-profit educational organization.
He received a Ph.D. in economics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 2005, where he was an NSF and Javits Fellow, and an A.B. in Economics and German Literature from Cornell University.
Videos
Shawn Cole Discusses Microinsurance: Part 1-Investment Impact of Rainfall Insurance
Harvard Food+ Research Symposium: Shawn Cole
SEAG | Digital Technology in Developing Economies
FAI Video: Shawn Cole Discusses Microinsurance and Factors Affecting Take Up (Part 2)
Shawn Cole / The Life and Times of the Field Research Associate
2015 Aspen Faculty Pioneer Award Winner – Shawn Cole, Harvard Business School
Research Seminar by Shawn Cole on "The Promise & Pitfalls of ICT for Agriculture"
Development Economics and Market Design Conference: Shawn Cole
Prof. Shawn A. Cole
Impact Investing at Harvard with Shawn Cole and Vikram Gandhi
PROF SHAWN COLE
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