Clayton Christensen achieves the difficult feat for a tall, broad man of being at once imposing and humble. When I visited him last autumn at Harvard Business School, he laid out with quiet authority his latest thoughts on disruptive technology, the concept that justly made him famous in the mid-1990s. But he also took time to chat about his son’s college basketball team, a poster of which hangs on one wall of an office full of family photos and memorabilia.
While he places great value on his family and faith – he is a devout Mormon – his research and teaching have dominated his public story. Until now, outside the Acknowledgements section, he has never tried to put his personal and professional lives in the same book.