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Scholarly Ideas
Research puzzles, not literature gaps.
A research puzzle development tool that helps academics develop rigorous research questions grounded in real empirical anomalies.
Cambridge · Entrepreneurship · AI Governance
Innovation, anchored.
I study — and build — the things that keep fast-moving ventures true to their mission. Professor of Entrepreneurship & Sustainable Futures at Cambridge Judge Business School; Deputy Editor of the Academy of Management Journal.
- Cambridge Judge Business School
- Academy of Management Journal
- Entrepreneurship Centre
The field behind this page: ventures in motion, tethered to mission anchors — drift and return. After “Anchors Aweigh” (AMR, 2019).
Research
Twenty years on one question: how do ventures grow without losing themselves?
5,778+ citations across the Academy of Management Journal, Academy of Management Review, Strategic Management Journal, and Journal of Business Venturing.
Responsible entrepreneurship
How high-growth ventures — unicorns included — pursue scale without surrendering responsibility. The "Taming Unicorns" agenda.
Hybrid organisations & mission drift
Why organisations drift from their missions, and the anchors — certification, identity, governance — that hold them.
Entrepreneurial cognition & identity
Founders as people: feedback, authenticity, compassion, and the identity work behind the pivot — and its limits.
AI, scholarship & innovation
How artificial intelligence restructures entrepreneurship, research, and the governance decisions facing boards.
Selected publications
- The limits of pivoting
- Taming unicorns: Toward a new normal of responsible entrepreneurship
- From scarcity to abundance: Scholars and scholarship in an age of generative artificial intelligence
- Anchors aweigh: The sources, variety, and challenges of mission drift
- The pivot: How founders respond to feedback through idea and identity work
- Venturing for others with heart and head: How compassion encourages social entrepreneurship
AI Governance
The question now has a new subject — and it sits with boards.
AI is the fastest-moving governance problem organisations have faced. As Academic Programme Director, I lead Cambridge's executive programme preparing directors and CXOs to oversee it with confidence.
Designed with faculty from five University of Cambridge departments, the programme turns AI uncertainty into accountable board-level decisions — ending in a concrete 90-day oversight plan.
Cambridge Executive Education
AI Governance for Boards and CXOs
Three days, face-to-face in Cambridge
15–17 July 202630 November – 2 December 2026
- The governance problem you cannot define
- Strategic simulation of AI futures
- Corporate governance meets AI
- The OpenAI governance simulation
- Accountability, regulation, and comparative governance
- Audit completion and programme synthesis
Tools
The research doesn't stay on the page.
I build AI tools that put two decades of findings to work — for scholars developing ideas and founders protecting missions. Built, shipped, and used.
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Research Canvas
Structured manuscript feedback, before the reviewers see it.
An AI-powered management research feedback tool that gives scholars structured, developmental feedback on working manuscripts across eight evaluation areas — theoretical motivation, literature positioning, research design, findings, constraints, and more.
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Social Impact Venture Advisor
Pressure-testing ventures for impact that lasts.
An AI advisor for social entrepreneurs, grounded in two decades of research on hybrid organisations and mission drift.
Speaking & Advisory
Where the work meets the room.
Matthew speaks to boards, executive teams, and conferences on AI governance and responsible innovation, and advises organisations navigating both.
Recent rooms: USC Price Center for Social Innovation — Speaker Series · Social Enterprise Summit, Hong Kong · Creative Distillation & Frontiers podcasts
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AI governance in the boardroom
What directors must understand, ask, and decide about AI — from oversight structures to the 90-day plan.
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Taming unicorns: responsible growth
How high-velocity ventures pursue scale without surrendering mission, governance, or legitimacy.
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The pivot, and its limits
What two decades of research on founder feedback, identity, and reinvention says about when to change course.
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Scholarship and knowledge work in the age of AI
From scarcity to abundance: how AI restructures research, expertise, and the institutions built on both.