Reflecting on 50 Years of MIT CISR— and What We’ve Learned

This briefing celebrates the 50th anniversary of the MIT Center for Information Systems Research (CISR). For 50 years MIT CISR has been a trusted partner of senior IT executives—both learning from them and helping them to create more value in their companies. In the past decade MIT CISR has broadened its engagement to top management teams, digital and data leaders, and boards of directors. Weaving together recollections from long-time business and academic colleagues with responses from a ChatGPT query, we describe the five pillars of MIT CISR’s reputation and include seven lessons learned over the years.