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When Trust Goes Bust, What Happens to Empathy?

Anonymous — Tue, 02 Jan 2024 18:04:38 +0000

When Trust Goes Bust, What Happens to Empathy? Anonymous (not verified) Tue, 01/02/2024 - 11:04

Anneli Gray • Photos by Cody Johnston

As downsizing and economic uncertainty shake up the workplace, employees wonder if ‘empathetic’ leaders are telling the truth.

Tony Kong studies trust in the workplace during times of crisis, such as COVID-19. “Leaders weren’t trained in empathy, trust-building or relationship-building. People needed flexibility and connection, but employers weren’t prepared for this.”

Massive layoffs in 2023 were a wake-up call for over 200,000 employees of tech giants like Amazon, Microsoft and Google, as well as fintech startups. Feelings of shock and betrayal replaced the trust workers once had in their employers—and who could blame them? The tech industry has been notorious for its empathetic culture, perks, and commitment to employees’ well-being.

At Salesforce, many of the 8,000 laid-off workers complained the company’s “touchy-feely” culture was a façade (Fortune, April/May 2023). CEO Marc Benioff, a self-described “empathetic” leader who spent decades developing a we’re-all-in-this-together family culture, was forced to justify Salesforce’s first-ever layoffs to shaken workers.

The truth, and nothing but the truth

From corporate downsizing to a slowing economy, it’s no wonder employees have lost some of the psychological safety they once had. As trust slides, so does their job satisfaction, productivity, creativity and innovation. Employees surveyed in the 2023 Ernst & Young’s Empathy in Business report overwhelmingly agreed that there’s a lot of talk about empathy but not enough follow-through. In fact, over half of employees surveyed (52%) perceive corporate attempts at empathy as inauthentic (an increase from 46% in 2021).

52% of employees perceive corporate attempts at empathy to be inauthentic.

2023 Ernst & Young’s Empathy in Business report

And in Businessolver’s 2023 State of Workplace Empathy report, the number of respondents who believed their company cared about them was at an all-time low: Only 66% believed they worked in an empathetic workplace—a substantial drop from 78% five years ago.

Employees report a lack of consistency when it comes to company promises, and this has a way of breaking down a culture of empathy. For example, recent return-to-office mandates have had a head-spinning effect on workers who relied on the flexibility of previously instituted hybrid models. (In Businessolver’s report, 96% of respondents considered flexible working hours the most empathetic benefit an employer can offer.)

Sensitivity and authenticity

Time and again research has shown that for businesses to be agile and adaptable, company leaders must provide transparency and psychological safety. Rather than focus solely on employee output, empathetic leaders put themselves in employees’ shoes. They listen, they’re approachable, and they’re flexible. As a result, their authenticity improves retention, performance, morale, motivation and collaboration—leading to substantial business outcomes.

“How to be a good leader is how to be a good human,” says Dejun “Tony” Kong, an associate professor of organizational leadership and informational analytics at Leeds. “It’s about how responsive you are to other people’s concerns—the basis of any relationship. People want to be heard and understood.”

Kong teaches Leeds’ Executive Leadership course and challenges students to imagine what kind of leaders they want to be. Strong leadership, he says, comes from self-awareness and reflection on one’s strengths and weaknesses.

His work on trust in the workplace—how it can predict a company’s performance during times of great stress, such as a pandemic, economic crisis or political upheaval—has won the Most Influential Article Award and a Best Paper Award from the Academy of Management’s Conflict Management Division.

Kong is now studying a new model for how companies can build systems and structures that cultivate a trusting culture. He says human resources staff will play a big part in creating systemic change that’s self-sustaining in maintaining an empathetic work environment. This, combined with leadership training, could positively influence the psychology, attitudes and behaviors of employees.

He points out that in recent years, the pandemic’s impact on the workplace has prompted a great need for empathetic leaders who can help employees adapt to the changing business environment. This requires a special skill set, and empathy tops the list.

Indeed, it is what leaders must get right.

As downsizing and economic uncertainty shake up the workplace, employees wonder if ‘empathetic’ leaders are telling the truth.

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ESG Champions

Anonymous — Tue, 05 Dec 2023 17:16:00 +0000

ESG Champions Anonymous (not verified) Tue, 12/05/2023 - 10:16

Joe Arney • Photos by Nathan Thompson

How Leeds alumni are making the case for sustainability.

Working in financial risk management gave Ralph Drabic a larger perspective than, say, what he might consider in doing due diligence on a proposed loan or deal.

“Ultimately, if there’s no planet, there are no financial services,” said Drabic (Fin, Mgmt’07), a vice president and senior manager of the environmental and social impact audit team at Wells Fargo. “If we don’t get this right for our planet, for our environment, none of what we have matters.”

Many professionals feel a sense of urgency and responsibility in adopting better business practices that benefit the environment. But because Leeds weighs environment, equality and sustainability as heavily as finance, marketing and accounting in creating academic programs, alumni often find themselves in corner offices—or just outside of them—where they have opportunities to advocate for practices and policies that create meaningful change.

For Megan Lorenzen (MBA’21), the idea that her work can make a difference brought her to Salesforce, where she’s senior manager of sustainability. Her work involves collaboration with partners in various business units to understand needs and create impact.

“We believe we have a responsibility to help bring the entire community with us,” said Lorenzen, who was named to GreenBiz Badass Women, a power list of key players in environmental justice, in the spring. “If we reach our company targets and get to the finish line alone, we will have failed to actually impact climate change.”

‘Accountants are going to save the world’

The good news, she said, is leaders are listening when it comes to not just setting targets but also the strategies that help companies meet emissions pledges and climate goals.

Megan Lorenzen (MBA’21), Senior Manager of Sustainability at Salesforce

“I always say that accountants are going to save the world,” Lorenzen said. “You are increasingly seeing accountants who are now ESG professionals. And our business partners—legal, government affairs, finance—are critical to our success.”

Lorenzen and Drabic pointed out that a lot of leaders’ actions are being driven by changing regulations, whether from the Fed or SEC. That outside pressure has helped Drabic find a ready audience when he presents ideas to his team and stakeholders.

“It makes it easier for an audit team to have credibility when it comes to what regulatory activities are taking place and what needs to happen,” he said. “When you’re a bank, the last thing you want to do is run afoul of regulators, so their work is pivotal for teams like ours.”

And while Lorenzen said that growing credibility has made now “an incredible time to work in this industry,” that wasn’t always the case. Just ask Kathryn Wendell, executive director of Leeds’ Center for Ethics and Social Responsibility (CESR).

“When I graduated from college back in 2000, I was very interested in corporate social responsibility and sustainability, but there was no clear career path to get there,” said Wendell, whose work experience includes corporate responsibility roles at Chevron and World Bank.

“Today, this whole field is evolving so fast that even people like me are struggling to try to stay on top of what’s happening. But it’s exciting because, as we rethink risk, we’re seeing sustainability take on a stronger focus for private-sector leadership.”

An ESG portfolio

CESR plays a key role in helping prepare students to lead those conversations. In addition to student competitions, the center supports students enrolled in the social responsibility and ethics certificate and CESR Fellows organization for undergrads, as well a new MBA pathway in ESG and sustainability.

Wendell said the center’s programming is an outreach of the clear strength in sustainability and ESG coming out of our faculty research.

“This deep caring about the environment and society is what brings a lot of people here to Boulder—both faculty and students. It’s a shared passion and expertise that cuts across our school and makes us unique.”

David Drake, Associate Professor and Chair of the Social Responsibility & Sustainability Division

In fact, that helped bring David Drake, associate professor of strategy, entrepreneurship and operations, to Leeds. Before moving into higher education, he was a director at Random House, where one of his projects was recommending whether to print books with recycled paper.

It turned into a much more involved project as Drake worked to understand the hurdles with partners—like paper mills and customers—and internal stakeholders. Ultimately, he advised the CEO to use recycled paper, though the economic case was unclear.

“It was a harder sell, at the time, because customers purchase based on the content of the book, not the paper it is printed on—if they want the new John Grisham, they generally want the new John Grisham whether or not it is printed on recycled paper,” Drake said.

Random House went forward with the initiative, he said, because the cost was reasonable, the impact was significant, “and we were a privately held company whose owners cared about doing better. We felt the economic upside—if there was one—was through an improved potential of landing book deals with authors who shared that ethos.”

Drake has brought lessons from that project to his research. He studies innovative business models that improve quality of life through resource preservation and greater access to products and services. His current focus is mobile money, which gives people in rural and underdeveloped areas access to banking services.

“It’s another example, like cases in health care and education, where people innovated in unique ways to bring products and services to people who haven’t had access to them,” Drake said. “If you design that business model well, it can be profitable as well as beneficial for society.”

Even alumni who aren’t yet in leadership roles are finding ways to influence the C-suite. In his role as a deal advisory senior associate with KPMG, Alex Freimuth, CPA (Acct, Fin’18; MAcct’19) has carved out a niche in the energy space; “at first, I was seeing more traditional oil and gas deals, but a couple years later, the majority of my work tends to have a renewable focus,” he said.

Economics, environment ‘can go hand in hand’

Freimuth’s deal book tends to follow larger energy market trends. So oil and gas deals may be more prevalent as prices rise, while renewable energy deals are driven by a favorable regulatory environment and the associated tax incentives for those investments. He’s also seen traditional oil and gas companies spend more time analyzing and executing clean-energy investments.

“Profitability and sustainability do not have to be mutually exclusive. They can go hand in hand.”

Alex Freimuth, CPA (Acct, Fin’18; MAcct’19), Deal Advisory Senior Associate, KPMG

“The main thing for leaders right now is balancing how to make decisions that promote sustainability while still remaining financially responsible to shareholders,” Freimuth said. “This allows executives to address stakeholders and communicate that these decisions are founded in the interest of our business and but that also accomplish something in the interest of the broader community.

“Profitability and sustainability do not have to be mutually exclusive. They can go hand in hand.”

That’s the same hopeful tone Drabic struck when thinking about how his team’s work could help leaders and decision-makers set the course for the future.

“That’s what I like about this audit team—we’re the last line of defense,” Drabic said. “This is the influence we can have on a major bank that ultimately plays a role in driving this transition.”

Leeds alumni are making the case for sustainability. Here's how.

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Growing Pains

Anonymous — Tue, 31 Oct 2023 18:27:25 +0000

Growing Pains Anonymous (not verified) Tue, 10/31/2023 - 12:27

Anneli Gray • Photos by Cody Johnston

Passion and persistence aren't enough to make a founder successful. Self-reflection and humility are essential, according to these veteran entrepreneurs.

The middle stage of a startup is the "teenage phase", says Adrian Tuck, former CEO of Uplight. He explains it's like parenting a teenager—introducing self-reliance and structure at just the right time to avoid rejection.

New ventures can fail for a variety of reasons: a lack of funding, a weak business plan, a poor product-market fit, or a lack of understanding that as a business grows, so must its founder.

The transformation of a founder—from someone with an idea to the leader of a business with hundreds of employees, a board of directors, and a CEO—requires an inward journey of personal and professional growth. While the founder’s company scales up, he or she transforms from a doer to manager to leader—each role requiring a very distinct skill set and perspective.

Jeff York, a Leeds professor and academic researcher who has published numerous studies on entrepreneurship and also hosts a podcast on the subject, says, “Most successful startup entrepreneurs are extremely good at listening, extremely good at evolving their ideas based on feedback, and extremely good at bringing other stakeholders in to co-create the venture with them.”

Those skills are great for getting through the startup stage. But the next stages often bring new challenges and demands. “There are very few who can be good at each stage,” says Erick Mueller, executive director of the Deming Center for Entrepreneurship and adjunct professor at Leeds. A lifelong entrepreneur, he’s learned that his sweet spot is the first stage, in which the fast pace and endless possibilities sync perfectly with his strengths.

Mueller says it’s uncommon for founders to have the skill set needed for every phase of a company’s growth. But Adrian Tuck, the former CEO of Uplight, is an exception. “He created the last unicorn in Boulder—he’s brilliant at transitioning through all the stages,” according to Mueller.

The standout

Tuck’s journey to becoming a self-proclaimed “servant leader” began at the age of 18 as an officer in the British army, where he received leadership training and acquired skills and experiences informed by the army’s motto, “Serve to lead.”

“Being a soldier made me an effective entrepreneur. After the army, I made a bet on a startup and became employee number five and eventually learned I liked everything about it,” he says.

“There’s one type of person who’s only happy in one phase or another. The second type of person is really excited to learn and grow through the phases,” Tuck says, “and I try to be the third type, who knows what the next phase looks like and can help everybody get there.”

“I learned that we have to mourn the loss of the things we used to do and be excited about the ways we’re moving forward.”

Adrian Tuck, Former CEO at Uplight

In Uplight’s early stage, Tuck held weekly in-person pizza meetings—a highlight of the week for employees. But when the company began expanding nationally into new cities, the format in which the staff interacted had to change.

“I learned that we have to mourn the loss of the things we used to do and be excited about the ways we’re moving forward,” he says. “My job was to help everybody see the direction and give them the tools they needed—and then get out of the way.”

This is what he has tried to impart to student entrepreneurs at Leeds. For the past 10 years, Tuck has been a consistent contributor as an instructor of the New Venture Creation course, a guest speaker and panelist, a mentor and coach, and a strong supporter of the Deming Center.

Jane Miller is a food industry veteran and has served as CEO for Lily's Sweets (sold to Hershey's), HannahMax Cookie Chips, ProYo, and now, for a second time, Rudi's Rocky Mountain Bakery in Boulder, Colorado.

The ‘founder whisperer’

Following the startup stage, the buildup is considered the most critical time in the life cycle of a business, explains York. A founder is expected to morph into a growth-stage leader, a process builder, and a delegator with emotional intelligence, communication skills, and a grasp of cultural and organizational dynamics.

“Founders have the skills to start the company and garner the initial resources, but they don’t always have the skills to manage a growing company,” says York. “That’s why oftentimes you’ll see, as these companies are transitioning, the board or investors will bring in a CEO who’s a professional manager.”

They’re sometimes known as “founder whisperers.”

Jane Miller, the current CEO of Rudi’s and past CEO of Lily’s Sweets, has over 35 years of executive experience in the food industry and has worked extensively with founders.

“Founders often turn to an outside CEO, someone who has a network of people and understands the fast pace of an entrepreneurial environment but also understands how to take a founder’s vision and make it bigger and broader and scale it,” says Miller.

However, it’s not always a match made in heaven, as founders and operators both want to be in charge. “I think that might be one of the hardest kinds of transitions for founders—going from doing everything by themselves to turning the keys over to an operator. And the operator may too quickly dismiss the founder with the attitude of ‘Thanks for creating this great brand—I’ve got it from here.’”

“The most important part is continued evolution in one’s own leadership journey.”

Erick Mueller, Executive Director of the Deming Center for Entrepreneurship and Adjunct Professor at Leeds

It’s similar to a marriage, Miller says. “It’s about getting two people to really figure out how to work with one another and respect each other’s skills. Honest communication about goals is critical.”

Miller has been actively involved at Leeds for over 15 years, sharing her wealth of experience with both student entrepreneurs and women graduate students. She also serves on the Leeds Advisory Board.

The founder leader

Scaleup, defined as late-stage expansion, is the final stage, making human-centric skills even more important as the founder becomes a leader at scale. If the management infrastructure and the right people are in place, a founder has the potential to thrive in this stage. By communicating a clear vision and strategy, he or she can set the overall direction and lead the company to success.

This is where one’s leadership style truly emerges.

“I spent time examining what type of leader I was, and I thought of myself as a fairly simple leader whose job is to help everybody see the direction and support them,” says Tuck. “I like to think of myself as empathetic and humble. And I like this concept of ‘servant leadership,’ the idea that my job as a leader is to make other people better.”

When it comes to growing a company, entrepreneurs who have acknowledged their strengths and limitations, have developed the humility to reject a lone-wolf mindset, and are willing to partner with others with complementary strengths have done the inner work needed to position themselves for success.

“The most important part,” says Mueller, “is continued evolution in one’s own leadership journey.”

Passion and persistence aren't enough to make a founder successful. Self-reflection and humility are essential, according to these veteran entrepreneurs.

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Influence At Any Stage

Anonymous — Fri, 04 Nov 2022 17:51:02 +0000

Influence At Any Stage Anonymous (not verified) Fri, 11/04/2022 - 11:51

Anna Bedell (Mktg’25) , Student Contributor • Photos by Patrick Campbell , Nathan Thompson and Lee Stiffler-Meyer

Not everyone will be CEO, but anyone can be a leader. Leeds faculty and alumni share their stories.

What is a leader?

Leadership researchers say a leader is not necessarily someone with a high-level title or position in the hierarchy of a company. A leader is, however, anyone who can influence and inspire a group of people to accomplish a goal.

Leaders aren’t born with this aptitude—they learn it. Leeds faculty and alumni share how they learned to lead at all stages of their careers.

Walking the Talk

Don Oest, Teaching Associate Professor in Organizational Leadership and Information Analytics

Lifelong leadership requires adaptability and a commitment to bettering yourself and others. Those traits came naturally to Don Oest, who led throughout his career at IBM and now teaches leadership to undergraduate students at Leeds.

Growing up in Long Island, New York, Oest planned to follow in his father’s footsteps and become an engineer. But when he realized he lacked passion for it, he switched to computer science instead—a decision that launched a 36-year career at IBM.

Not interested in a management role, he said he was “happy being a programmer, but the director noticed that I liked to work with people and solve problems.” Within three years he was promoted, becoming one of the youngest managers at the company.

He learned much about leadership in that role. Maintaining trust with his team while also developing his own leadership style was a difficult balance. But more challenging than that was laying off good employees. “There were some who were barely getting by,” he said, and there were breadwinners that I had to let go, and that was a really hard lesson.

“There’s no book for when you become a manager,” he said. “You can read all the organizational behavior books you want, but on-the-job training is a must. I didn’t always make the right decisions, but I made the best-informed decisions at the time, and I learned and got better over time.”

What he learned for sure was that the best managers prioritize three core attributes: integrity, authenticity and empathy.

“I would never ask anyone in my organization to do something that I wasn’t willing to do,” he said. “When people see this, they appreciate it and respond to it.”

Then one day, he transitioned from being a leader into teaching leadership.

“IBM really wanted us to give back to our communities since we were so fortunate,” he explained. “I started teaching in New York at an all-girls Catholic school and loved it—I loved teaching business.”

He got a job as an adjunct professor at Leeds, a recommendation from his IBM mentor. Soon after, he received an offer he couldn’t refuse: the opportunity to teach large lecture classes. He retired from IBM the next day.

“I love being able to see students grow,” he said, “not just memorizing theories and words but being able to apply and finally get it.” He tells them, “Love what you do and learn from others along the way. Always maintain your passion, keep an open mind, and be adaptable.”

Growing Fearless of Failure

Eyob Abai (Fin, InfoAnalytics’21), Senior Business Analyst at McKinsey & Company

As a student at Leeds, Eyob Abai always had a lot going on. Not only was he president of the student government, but he was also an active member of Leeds Consulting Group, the Diverse Scholars Program and Alpha Kappa Psi.

“As a first-generation college student, I came into college not knowing how to navigate different dynamics or how to be successful,” Abai said. “It was very important for me to fill that gap.”

Getting involved in extracurricular activities, from organizations to sports, helped him develop leadership skills and discover his passions. “I want to make sure that I am always actively engaged so I can contribute and develop as an individual,” he said.

Indeed, Abai found a cause he felt strongly about. In March 2018, he testified as a representative of CU Boulder for House Bill 21-1067, which removed the requirement for students to submit national assessment scores (SAT/ACT) on college applications. He was thrilled when the bill passed.

“Leadership comes down to what you’re passionate about and acting on it, vocally or silently,” he said.

Coming off that victory and starting his new job as an analyst at McKinsey & Company, his excitement became intertwined with challenges. He was a young professional at a large corporation—imposter syndrome and fear of failure had crept in. But he worked hard to embrace his mistakes and walk away from fear.

Soon, he became a leader on his team. He learned that, for him, the term “leader” meant someone willing to step forward.

“It’s scary to have the spotlight on yourself, especially when you want to be successful in everything you do,” he said. “But getting away from that mindset of constant success and letting yourself lean into failure is so important for your development as a leader. At McKinsey, I know that if I am comfortable enough to share my thoughts and opinions, others will be too.”

Anyone can be a leader, he said. “There’s nothing stopping them but themselves.”

Cranking up the Confidence

Stacie Loidolt (OpMgmt’16, MBA’21), VP of Product Management, Aqua Comms

Stacie Loidolt’s dream was to work for a Fortune 500 company, and right out of college, she did it.

She clinched a job at Level 3 Communications, which later merged with CenturyLink. Working in the field opened her eyes to the potential for growth and global opportunities.

“The international side of telecom made me fall in love with it,” Loidolt said. “I get to go to conferences and meet people from all over the world. I knew I wanted to go into international business—so I just kind of landed in telecom—but it ended up being even better than I’d hoped.”

She’s now the VP of product management at Aqua Comms, based in Dublin, Ireland. She admits that jumping into a leadership position was a new challenge; there was no right or wrong way to approach it.

“Being responsible for others was a big shift, and I had to navigate the nuances of leadership to make my team effective,” she said. “When I was first asked what my leadership style was, my answer was simply ‘doing my best.’”

She did her homework. The book The Leadership Challenge by James Kouzes and Barry Posner gave her knowledge, and emulating the traits of her favorite managers and leaders gave her skills. A caring and selfless leadership style emerged.

Despite her VP title, she believes people can make an impact no matter what position they’re in, as long as they speak up about their ideas and realize they can contribute to a team regardless of experience.

“I think one of the reasons I’ve had success in my career is because I just never shut up,” she said. “When I have an idea, I say it. Just because you don’t have 20 years of experience doesn’t mean you can’t bring something valuable to the table. I hope young professionals will have the confidence to do this from the beginning of their careers.”

She recently received the Under 35 Digital Infrastructure Talent Award from the Tech Capital Global Awards. It acknowledges a young business member of the digital infrastructure community who possesses the skills and personal qualities of a successful business leader.

“I was in a pool with a lot of other incredible candidates,” she said. “It’s amazing how many young people are out there in the industry doing incredible things.”

Getting to the Heart of It

Antonio Papuzza, Teaching Associate Professor in Organizational Leadership and Information Analytics, Leeds School of Business

It’s rare to find anyone with more international experience than Antonio Papuzza. Originally from a small town in Italy, the author, executive coach and consultant traveled and worked in more than 50 countries early in his career after earning a bachelor’s in ecology and, later, a PhD in anthropology.

He describes his leadership evolution as a lifelong commitment, and the path hasn’t been linear in the least. After coming down with a serious illness, he felt he had two options—either wait around without answers for a working treatment or completely change his environment and go on a journey of self-discovery.

“I wanted to really understand what the answers were to some of my fundamental questions: ‘Who am I? Where am I going in life? What do I want, and why?’” he said. “I started to travel around the globe to find those answers.”

While on his quest, he realized he wanted to help others do the same. Teaching would become his path, and he started teaching leadership at Leeds.

“Teaching became this whole new leadership experience for me,” he said. “I teach my classes with an emphasis on competent leadership—a mix of emotional intelligence, neuroscience, and quantum physics—an approach where leadership is learned through developed experiences.”

He believes you cannot be a leader to others without being a leader to yourself first.

And he emphasizes leading from the heart.

“There’s a scientific concept of heart intelligence: When working with people from different countries, it relates to our ability to feel our hearts and use it in any situation,” he said. “Coming back to the heart is probably the most profound experience that a leader can have and can teach others to have.”

Not everyone will be CEO, but anyone can be a leader. Leeds faculty and alumni share how they stepped into their power.

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Exploring (Business) Ecosystems and Forging New Paths

Anonymous — Thu, 03 Nov 2022 18:02:07 +0000

Exploring (Business) Ecosystems and Forging New Paths Anonymous (not verified) Thu, 11/03/2022 - 12:02

Katy Hill • Photos by Daniel Brenner and Cody Johnston

Leeds’ new dean, driven by curiosity and collaboration, envisions the school’s future.

Vijay Khatri values thinking in multiple dimensions. He values the array of interactions that occur within a community working toward a common purpose. That’s probably why he’s a big believer in ecosystems.

Incessant curiosity about Leeds’ various ecosystems

“I like to see how things are connected with each other. Interdisciplinary work is not straightforward, and I’ve found in my own research it’s about connecting the dots in seemingly disparate areas. With an ecosystem approach, we can take an integrative perspective that is at the center of multifaceted challenges that businesses face today,” said Khatri, who took the helm as the Tandean Rustandy Endowed Dean of the Leeds School of Business in July. Khatri holds the first named endowed deanship at CU Boulder, supported by a $5 million gift by alumnus Tandean Rustandy (Fin’87) that will help the new dean create and execute a vision to grow Leeds.

Prior to Leeds, Khatri served as the executive associate dean for strategy, innovation and technology at Indiana University Bloomington’s Kelley School of Business. There, he spearheaded Kelley’s strategic initiatives, taking an integrative view to Kelley’s and the university’s global education initiatives, and leading innovations in schoolwide processes, including the underlying systems for those processes.

Now, after settling into his new position at Leeds, Khatri is developing a framework around a culture of care; enhancing momentum in research; accelerating student-centered education; and engaging alumni, employers and the community. He’s looking at ways to differentiate Leeds from other business schools, including opportunities to grow the graduate program’s portfolio and new ways to approach teaching.

“We are at a great moment in time. We’re making a trajectory-altering impact on students through our interdisciplinary scholarship and research in, for example, sustainability and with values-based leadership,” Khatri said. “We have outstanding faculty and staff who are at the top of their game, and we are really firing on all cylinders.”

Leeds’ cabinet members initiate Khatri into Boulder’s most popular pastime.

Seeking input to drive innovation

Khatri, who graduated from the University of Arizona’s Eller College of Management with a PhD in management information systems and a minor in computer science, has professional expertise in the information economy that includes design, management, governance and use of data repositories.

His academic background paired with key personal beliefs—curiosity, innovation, impact, compassion and balance—as well as a collaborative leadership style often means brainstorming new ideas with many colleagues to gather input and inspire innovation. For example, at the Dean’s Cabinet summer retreat, participants collated their ideas for the future of Leeds using sticky notes, which he used to steer a conversation related to enhancing the school’s culture and business processes.

Steer—but not command. In Khatri’s view, it’s important to let ideas and discussions percolate.

“Being in academics, you have to let it flow; let it be organic. You focus on expansive vision and then bring clarity in execution,” he said.

Khatri excels at uniting diverse teams like the Dean’s Cabinet around a clear vision and common goals, said Jingjing Zhang, associate professor of information systems at Kelley School of Business and co-director of the Institute for Business Analytics (IBA).

“His leadership embodies accessibility, meticulous attention to details and the ability to inspire innovation while promoting unity,” Zhang said. “He consistently fosters an environment of open dialogue, placing genuine value on each team member’s input, thus creating a space where ideas aren’t merely heard but actively cherished and nurtured.”

Tandean Rustandy Endowed Dean of the Leeds School of Business Vijay Khatri

Michael Leeds (Fin’74), who with his family gave CU Boulder’s business school a name and a challenge—to become a leader in ethics, diversity and social responsibility—describes Khatri’s leadership style as values-driven and inclusive.

“The many people who met Vijay during the interview process and since have been struck by his humility and his vision for building a caring and supportive Leeds community and setting an example nationally and internationally,” Leeds said.

The results of Khatri’s approaches speak for themselves. In 2011, he founded Kelley’s IBA and served for 11 years as its co-director. One of the first business analytics institutes in the nation, IBA is a cross-disciplinary initiative that brings together departments, faculty, students, alumni, employers and corporate partners.

Khatri “not only established the IBA from the ground up but also forged enduring traditions,” Zhang said, including seminars, conferences, a speaker series and case competitions.

Multiplying impact through inclusion

Khatri said that being the eighth oldest business school in the country, Leeds has an extraordinary legacy of excellence. He views impact as making a trajectory-altering difference in view of our remarkable legacy.

And when it comes to impact, collaboration and inclusion is just as important to Khatri. He sees Leeds’ diversity mission becoming even more expansive to include not just internal communities but also external communities, including alumni as well as recruiters, the city of Boulder and far beyond.

“I would love for us to talk more about diversity in every sense of the word—having conversations about all aspects of diversity is important—and how we include everyone.”

While he’s a believer in the power of teams, Khatri is also highly focused on individual relationships. In his prior role as the department chairperson at the Kelley School of Business, he oversaw more than 55 faculty members and dedicated time to helping them identify their individual aspirations.

“I’ve always been an avid advocate of people. People know that when they join the team, their well-being and their goals will always be my priority at the end of the day,” he said.

Khatri grew up in India in a competitive academic environment where he was wholly focused on academics and had little time for anything else. As an adult, he’s catching up by pursuing a range of interests, from pickleball to traveling and photography—and especially literature.

“Now I’m reading all the books that I didn’t get a chance to read before,” he said.

In fact, these days, Khatri reads two to three books at a time, although he hasn’t had as much of that during his first months as dean. A recent favorite is An Immense World by Ed Yong.

“I became so intrigued by that book because it’s about how all of us sense the world in a different way. When I look at my dog, for example, I used to be a little impatient when he wanted to smell, but I learned that dogs sense the world with their noses and not their eyes,” he said.

A dog’s best friend, Khatri adopted Max in 2020.

Compassion as the foundational emotion for making connections

Khatri’s first dog, Evart, was diagnosed with brain cancer in 2019 and suffered epileptic attacks for almost a year despite many trips to the vet, radiation therapy, a special diet and plenty of pampering. When Evart couldn’t climb up to the second-floor bedroom, Khatri would set up a sleeping bag downstairs to be near him.

Kyle Cattani, chair of the operations and decision technologies division (ODT) at the Kelley School of Business—a position Khatri held for five years—remembers a walk with his wife, Dana, and Khatri and Evart one day in the summer of 2019 when it became clear that Evart was terminally ill. Khatri stopped to pick up a stick while Evart continued on.

“Vijay explained to us that Evart was a ‘retriever’ and thus was required to pick up sticks. But his health had declined to such a stage that he could no longer pick up the sticks,” Cattani said.

Fortunately, Vijay was there to help him. Whenever there was a stick, Evart would stop, and Vijay would ‘retrieve’ it. Vijay, apparently, was the retriever for the golden retriever.

“Vijay served ODT the way that he served Evart. He quietly picks up sticks for each of us and, in his kind way, supports us in all our endeavors.”

Evart passed away in 2020, and a quilted portrait of the beaming golden retriever, made for Khatri by a friend, Karen, sits on a shelf in his office.

“Evart was a special pup. He inspired me with his positivity, resilience, and showering extraordinary joy on others every day,” Khatri said, his demeanor calm and thoughtful.

He adopted Max, also a golden retriever, in 2020, and has been patiently helping him overcome anxiety and adjust to his new life—and new smells—in Boulder.

Keeping a balanced perspective

Just as Max is adapting to a new environment, Khatri is taking root at Leeds, gathering input, thinking about the future, and “identifying the right places to grow in a balanced way,” he said.

Khatri sees business schools as hubs of innovation that offer a transformative experience. Its purpose is evolving, he said.

“Two decades ago, it was about [teaching] top line and bottom line—enhancing revenue, cutting costs and managing risks. Now it’s integrating those goals to those of our communities. Think about whether we are able to do things in a sustainable manner from a long-term perspective,” he said.

This evolving focus has a catchy name: the “triple bottom line,” which factors in social and environmental impact alongside financial performance.

Top of mind for Khatri is preparing Leeds graduates to address and tackle complex societal issues, including poverty, inequality and climate change, while prioritizing sustainability and using ethics-based reasoning.

“We really need to prepare leaders who will be ready for the future, the next decades,” he said during a recent interview in his sunny office at Leeds adorned with mementos from his life and travels. “The broad and balanced thinkers will not just think about now and their own communities; they will also think about future generations and will be intrinsically connected with our communities near and far.”

With that, Khatri hustled off to his next meeting to collaborate on new opportunities and innovate within this new ecosystem.

Leeds’ new dean, driven by curiosity and collaboration, envisions the school’s future.

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