"When the task force was appointed in July it was made very clear that this was a comprehensive review," interim director Richard B. Pagett said in an earlier interview. "I think everyone understood that that meant all possibilities were on the table from the very beginning."

HIID History

Harvard has included international development consulting under a variety of names since the mid-1950s. From 1962 until HIID's birth, Harvard's Development Advisory Service did the bulk of this type of work.

HIID began in 1974 with an annual budget of $3 million. Over the years, its staff has included regular Harvard faculty and full-time HIID specialists.

Since those humble beginnings, the institute's size has ballooned--and at points it has been so big that its budget was larger than that of Harvard's Design, Divinity, Dental or Education schools.

By 1996, the annual budget topped $40 million. This fall, the institute had 20 overseas offices and 25 more international programs headquartered in Cambridge.

According to some former employees, this large size led to management problems that lowered morale in some programs.

The task force's report and officials took care to deny that any management problems had been found. Instead, they blamed the institute's far-flung structure for a lack of communication between HIID staff and faculty and students in Cambridge.