Event: Microeconomics of Competitiveness (MOC) Faculty Workshop
Led by: Prof. Michael E. Porter, Harvard Business School
Date: December 10–11, 2019
Venue: Harvard Business School, Boston, Massachusetts, USA
Siam University Representative: Assoc. Prof. Dr. Jomphong Mongkhonvanit, Vice President and Dean, Graduate School of Business
Partnership: Siam University Thailand Competitiveness Institute ↔ Harvard Business School Institute for Strategy and Competitiveness (ISC)
Category: News / Harvard Business School Partnership, Competitiveness Research & Strategy
Overview
Assoc. Prof. Dr. Jomphong Mongkhonvanit participated in the prestigious Microeconomics of Competitiveness (MOC) Faculty Workshop at Harvard Business School (HBS) on 10–11 December 2019 — a landmark convening of business faculty from universities worldwide, led personally by Professor Michael E. Porter, the University Professor at HBS and one of the most consequential business strategists of the modern era.
The workshop coincided with the formalisation of a significant institutional partnership: the collaboration between Siam University’s newly established Thailand Competitiveness Institute and Harvard Business School’s Institute for Strategy and Competitiveness (ISC) — a link that directly connects Thailand’s national competitiveness research agenda with the world’s foremost centre for competitiveness scholarship.
Dr. Jomphong also had the honour of presenting Prof. Porter with his own Springer-published book — “Coopetition for Regional Competitiveness: The Role of Academe in Knowledge-Based Industrial Clustering” — a work drawn directly from Porter’s landmark Microeconomics of Competitiveness framework and applied to the Thai and ASEAN regional context.
Professor Michael E. Porter: The Architect of Modern Competitiveness
Professor Michael E. Porter is the Bishop William Lawrence University Professor at Harvard Business School — the highest honour in Harvard University’s faculty ranks. Over a career spanning more than five decades, Porter has transformed how governments, businesses, and academic institutions think about strategy and competitive advantage.
His foundational contributions include the Five Forces Framework for industry analysis, the Generic Strategies (cost leadership, differentiation, and focus), the Value Chain concept, and — most relevant to this collaboration — the theory of clusters and the microeconomics of competitiveness, which examines how the business environment within which firms operate shapes their productivity and innovative capacity.
Porter’s work on clusters — geographically concentrated groups of interconnected companies, suppliers, institutions, and universities — has been enormously influential in shaping national and regional economic development policy worldwide. The insight that competitiveness is ultimately built at the level of the location, not the firm alone, has reshaped how governments invest in economic development, how universities position their role in regional economies, and how industries organise themselves to compete globally.
The Microeconomics of Competitiveness (MOC) course at HBS, and the associated faculty network that the MOC Workshop convenes, is the primary mechanism through which Porter and his colleagues have spread this framework to universities and policymakers across the world.
The MOC Faculty Workshop: A Global Competitiveness Community
The MOC Faculty Workshop at HBS brings together faculty from universities around the world who teach the Microeconomics of Competitiveness curriculum, alongside leading researchers and practitioners in competitiveness, clusters, and economic strategy. The December 2019 edition — captured in the group photograph showing more than a hundred participants in HBS’s distinctive amphitheatre setting — represented the state of the global MOC faculty community at a moment of significant relevance to Thailand and ASEAN’s development trajectory.
For Dr. Jomphong, participation in the MOC Faculty Workshop placed him directly within the global network of competitiveness scholars who are translating Porter’s frameworks into national and regional economic development strategies across every continent. The conversations, insights, and connections generated in these workshops directly inform how universities teach strategy, how governments design cluster policy, and how regions position themselves for competitive advantage.
Siam University’s Thailand Competitiveness Institute: A Harvard Connection
The formal partnership between Siam University’s Thailand Competitiveness Institute and Harvard Business School’s Institute for Strategy and Competitiveness (ISC) represents one of the most significant academic partnerships in Siam University’s history — and one with direct national policy relevance.
The ISC, directed by Prof. Porter, is the primary institution through which HBS’s competitiveness research is connected to real-world economic development challenges. Its work spans national competitiveness assessments, cluster mapping, social progress measurement, and the design of economic development strategies for countries and regions worldwide.
The Thailand Competitiveness Institute, established at Siam University under Dr. Jomphong’s leadership, is designed to serve as the local institutional home for this work in Thailand — applying Porter’s frameworks to Thai clusters, industries, and regions, and contributing research and analysis that can inform Thailand’s economic development strategy.
As Dr. Jomphong noted: “Siam University has had a great privilege to collaborate with Harvard Business School on Strategy and Competitiveness.” This collaboration is not merely prestigious — it is substantively important, connecting Thailand’s competitiveness research directly to the world’s most sophisticated and policy-relevant competitiveness scholarship.
Presenting the Book: From Porter’s Framework to Thai Context
One of the most symbolically resonant moments of the workshop was Dr. Jomphong’s presentation of his book — “Coopetition for Regional Competitiveness: The Role of Academe in Knowledge-Based Industrial Clustering” (published by Springer) — to Prof. Porter personally.
The book’s significance is clear from its subject: applying Porter’s cluster and competitiveness frameworks to the Thai and ASEAN regional context, exploring how universities (academies) can serve as anchors for knowledge-based industrial clusters and regional competitiveness. The concept of “coopetition” — cooperative competition, where firms and institutions simultaneously cooperate and compete to generate collective advantage — adds a layer of theoretical sophistication drawn from the realities of Asian industrial organisation.
Presenting this work to Porter — whose foundational cluster theory it directly builds upon — represents a full circle of academic exchange: Porter’s framework, applied to Thailand, refined through empirical research, and returned to its originator as a contribution to the evolving body of competitiveness scholarship.
Key Takeaways
- Dr. Jomphong’s participation in the MOC Faculty Workshop at Harvard Business School places Siam University within the global network of universities teaching and applying Porter’s Microeconomics of Competitiveness — one of the most policy-relevant academic frameworks in modern economics
- The partnership between Siam University’s Thailand Competitiveness Institute and HBS’s Institute for Strategy and Competitiveness (ISC) creates a direct institutional link between Thailand’s national competitiveness research agenda and the world’s foremost centre for competitiveness scholarship
- Dr. Jomphong’s Springer-published book — presented to Prof. Porter himself — demonstrates that Siam University is not simply a recipient of Harvard’s intellectual frameworks, but an active contributor to their application and development in the Thai and ASEAN context
- The MOC network that the workshop convenes is a direct channel for applying competitiveness research to real national and regional economic development strategy — making this engagement directly relevant to Thailand’s pursuit of innovation-driven, high-value growth
- For Siam University’s Graduate School of Business and Thailand Competitiveness Institute, the Harvard connection signals institutional seriousness: the university is building research capacity and international partnerships commensurate with the scale of Thailand’s development challenges
Microeconomics of Competitiveness (MOC) Faculty Workshop, led by Prof. Michael E. Porter, Harvard Business School, Boston, Massachusetts, December 10–11, 2019. Dr. Jomphong Mongkhonvanit represented Siam University and the Thailand Competitiveness Institute. Book presented: “Coopetition for Regional Competitiveness: The Role of Academe in Knowledge-Based Industrial Clustering” (Springer).