---
id: "entity-clayton-christensen"
type: "entity"
entityType: "person"
canonicalName: "Clayton Christensen"
aliases: ["Clayton M. Christensen", "Clay Christensen"]
source_timestamps: ["§ Why Firms Will Resist Change"]
tags: ["authors", "theorists", "disruptive-innovation"]
related: ["concept-innovators-dilemma-consulting", "prereq-innovators-dilemma"]
sources: ["reskilling"]
sourceVaultSlug: "hbr-seg-reskilling"
originDay: 10
articleStem: "hbr-edu-44-ai-changing-consulting-structure"
sourceUrl: "https://hbr.org/2025/09/ai-is-changing-the-structure-of-consulting-firms"
sourceTitle: "AI Is Changing the Structure of Consulting Firms"
---
# Clayton Christensen

**Role in the source:** Cited theorist (not a speaker/author of the article). Author of *The Innovator's Dilemma* and originator of **disruptive innovation** theory.

**Profile:** Harvard Business School faculty. His theory is invoked to explain why incumbent consulting firms will struggle to disrupt their own highly profitable [[concept-consulting-pyramid]] in favor of the leaner [[concept-consulting-obelisk]] — the framing captured in [[concept-innovators-dilemma-consulting]].

**Why he matters here:** understanding his theory is a prerequisite for the article's argument — see [[prereq-innovators-dilemma]]. Enrichment sources (Methus, Strat-Bridge) reach for the same lens to explain incumbents "clinging to billable-hour, junior-heavy models."