Sheldon Robert

Biography

Robert Sheldon is an Associate Professor in the Entrepreneurship Department and member of the Jean-Baptiste Say Institute at ESCP Europe. His research deals primarily with three problem areas related to innovation and entrepreneurship. The first is new market creation, or how actors set up consumer and supply side markets for the first time. The second involves new venture creation and looks at the manner in which would-be entrepreneurs obtain and process information about the commercialization process. The third relates to the growth of the firm, where the process and effects of micro-level forms of innovation, like the introduction of new organizational routines, are studied.

Current and recent research projects have used 19th archival data to identify the socio-economic dynamics at play in the creation of a new belle-époque era consumer market; examined the role of planning risk in the decision to undertake a new venture; looked at the effect of institutional structure on the rate of innovation in the horticultural industry, and studied how firms experiencing rapid growth manage the turbulent process of new routine introduction.

Sheldon’s research has practical and strategic implications for firms of any size that are on a growth trajectory or otherwise engaged in product/service innovation, business diversification, acquisitions and internationalization.

Sheldon is also a long-time practitioner of entrepreneurship, having acquired and developed a small firm in the Lot-et-Garonne called SARL Latour-Marliac. The firm was founded in 1875 by Bory Latour-Marliac, who was the creator and supplier of Claude Monet’s famous water lilies.

Areas of pedagogical and applied expertise include commercialization strategy and practice, technology transfer, entrepreneurial acquisition, international business, and growth strategy and management for small- and medium-sized firms.

Prior to joining ESCP Europe Sheldon was an Associate Professor at Novancia Business School where he was Co-Scientific Director of the CCIR Transversal Chair for Research in Entrepreneurship and Innovation (Novancia, HEC, ESIEE, ESSEC, ESCP Europe) and Academic Director of the MSc in International Business Development and Consulting.

He holds a B.A. from McGill University, an M.A. from New York University and an M.B.A. from the F.W. Olin School of Business at Babson College, where he was a Price-Babson Fellow. He holds a Ph.D. in Sociology from Sciences Po Paris, Centre de Sociologie des Organisations (CSO), written under the direction of Michael Storper (Sciences Po, UCLA, LSE).  

Research Interest