BOISE BASED ORGANIZATIONS SELECTED AS FIELD IMMERSION PROJECT PARTNERS FOR HARVARD BUSINESS SCHOOL
City of Boise Energy Program and Downtown Boise Association announce their selection along with twelve other Boise based organizations.
Boise will soon host a team of students from Harvard Business School for one week, May 9th to 16th, as part of a required course called the FIELD Immersion. Boise and its twelve participating organizations join the 171 FIELD Immersion Project Partners spanning 15 cities across 15 states. Together these Partners combined to host more than 1,000 Harvard Business School students in all.
“I’m honored that Boise will be welcoming students from the Harvard Business School FIELD program. The students are getting great real-world learning and our community will get real benefits from their work,” said Mayor of Boise Lauren McLean. “Some of the FIELD team will be with the city’s Climate Action team, helping us innovate ways to increase participation in energy efficiency programs, to reduce energy consumption in residential buildings, to increase residential energy efficiency savings, and more. When they’re all done, they’ll present their findings, and I can’t wait to hear what they found.”
“The opportunity to partner with Harvard Business School through a FIELD Immersion Project is exciting for our downtown,” said Jennifer Hensley, Executive Director of Downtown Boise Association. “Through a survey process in 2021, we heard a call from the community to look deeper at making sure that families feel included and find a variety of offerings in Downtown Boise and we look forward to finding out what the students uncover through this process.”
The FIELD Immersion is a course designed to strengthen and develop students’ ability to manage and operate effectively in a variety of business contexts. City of Boise and Downtown Boise Association executives have been working with their teams remotely in the months leading up to their arrival. While here, the students will pitch their ideas to the leadership team, conduct field research with consumers around Boise, and present their final recommendations to management. The purpose of this immersive experience is to provide students with the opportunity to ’learn by doing’ through the challenge of introducing a new product, service, or customer experience for their Partner company. This requires students to also focus on building contextual intelligence and team effectiveness skills while delivering value in an unfamiliar context.
Harvard is quick to acknowledge that this important learning experience would not be possible without the Project Partners.
“We are extremely grateful to City of Boise, Downtown Boise Association, and all the FIELD Immersion Project Partner organizations for all they do on behalf of our students,” said Carrie Elkins, Professor of Business Administration and Faculty Chair for the FIELD Immersion. “The students benefit immeasurably from this experience, and we hope the partner organizations do as well.”
The full list of Boise and Idaho-based FIELD Immersion Project Partners includes Albertsons, City Go, City of Boise Energy Program, College of Western Idaho, Downtown Boise Association, Lovevery, Melt Organic, PetIQ, The Roundhouse, Trailhead, Duck Club Entertainment (Treefort Festival), and Visitpay.
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