The Leadership Mission
Since its founding, Yale SOM has trained students to make a difference in any professional setting. For the school’s 50th anniversary, we spoke to faculty and alumni about how they articulate meaningful missions, apply business principles creatively across sectors, and make the hard decisions that can define the course of an organization.
Leadership Lessons from a Lifetime Investing in Tech
Anne Glover ’78 traces her journey from shop-floor foreman to deep-tech investor and discusses the challenges facing the UK and Europe in building homegrown tech giants.
You Probably Need a Mission Statement
Professor James Baron says a genuine mission statement can help organizations of all kinds cultivate thriving internal cultures and credibility in the outside world.
Inside the 25-Year Mission to Give India’s City Dwellers a Voice in Government
Drawing on his experience at Yale SOM, his career in finance, and his first encounter with a New England town meeting, Ramesh Ramanathan ’89 returned to India with his wife, Swati, to help citizens shape the future of their communities.
How Dr. Bronner’s Turned a Soap Company into a Blueprint for Regenerative Business
Darcy Shiber-Knowles ’13 has helped grow Dr. Bronner’s from a cult favorite to a force reshaping how industries think about sustainability.
Mobilizing a System to Treat People with Sickle Cell Disease
Cece Calhoun ’21, medical director of Yale’s Sickle Cell Program, reflects on the challenges of building teams and structures to support patients facing both chronic illness and systemic inequities.
Solving Operational Problems Is the Real Engine of CarMax’s Success
CarMax revolutionized the used car market by implementing a fixed-price retail model. But co-founder Austin Ligon ’80 says the company’s financial success came from developing efficient back-end operations through a long-term focus on process improvement.
How ‘Refounding’ Can Save a Company That Has Lost Its Way
Jon Iwata of Yale SOM’s Program on Stakeholder Innovation and Management found that companies can counter drift by revisiting their history to rediscover their original purpose and capabilities.
