Columbia Bizcast

In this episode of Columbia Bizcast, President and CEO of NVIDIA Jensen Huang joins Dean Costis Maglaras to discuss the future of the AI industry, its potential to unlock innovative opportunities for consumers, and shares insights and lessons from building his tech company into a $1 trillion giant. This discussion was captured during an event organized by Columbia Business School's Digital Future Initiative and the Silfen Leadership Series.

In this episode of Bizcast, Ciamac Moallemi, the William von Mueffling Professor of Business at Columbia Business School, takes us through the basics of the new technology, shares the opportunities and disadvantages it offers, and discusses how CBS is preparing students to be at the forefront of this emerging field.

Director of the Eugene M. Lang Entrepreneurship Center at Columbia Business School Lara Hejtmanek '99 discusses how the School supports students and alumni in their entrepreneurial journeys: from startup idea to launch and beyond.

Listen to a fascinating discussion between Columbia Business School Professors Oded Netzer, Christopher Frank and Paul Magnone as they delve into the ideas and practical applications detailed in their new book Decisions Over Decimals.

Columbia Business School's Bruce Usher discusses his new book, which outlines the risks and opportunities for investors from climate change, and how current students and alumni are addressing major environmental challenges.

Welcome to the first episode of a special season of Columbia Bizcast dedicated to Columbia Business School's new home in Manhattanville! In this episode, we'll take a private tour of the Manhattanville campus with Dean Costis Maglaras. Dean Maglaras shares with us why a new campus is essential for preparing the next generation of business leaders, how spaces within Henry R. Kravis Hall and David Geffen Hall are built to foster connectivity and collaboration among students, faculty, alumni, and the larger business community, as well as his vision for the future of business education. Find us on Instagram and Twitter, where we are @columbia_biz. Subscribe to Bizcast on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher, or wherever you get your podcasts. You can catch up on old episodes in the Bizcast archive.

Vasiliki Petrou founded and now leads the Unilever Prestige division; this last year has offered that division invaluable knowledge and expertise. In this week’s episode, she reviews some of what she’s learned about her already-strong commitment to running a mission-driven brand portfolio. She discusses the nature of prestige retail marketing; the future of brick and mortar; and her team’s unwavering commitment to purpose, for customers and employees alike. And intriguingly, she talks about the effect of having a creative in the C-suite. Petrou is a Columbia Business School graduate, class of 1993. Find us on Instagram and Twitter, where we are @columbia_biz. Subscribe to Bizcast on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher, or wherever you get your podcasts. You can catch up on old episodes in the Bizcast archive.

Like every other industry, the field of impact investing underwent significant change over the last year. This episode investigates some of the new possibilities that this change has opened. Maggie Loo, CBS class of ’05 and Bridges Fund Management partner, discusses how the definition of “returns” may need to be reevaluated, how environmental regulations will transform corporate decision making, and how larger businesses can leverage small changes to produce significant effect. Find us on Instagram and Twitter, where we are @columbia_biz. Subscribe to Bizcast on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher, or wherever you get your podcasts. You can catch up on old episodes in the Bizcast archive.

What happened? What went wrong? Those are simple questions to ask when a company experiences difficulty. In Professor Kathryn Harrigan’s Turnaround Management class, students examine case studies to uncover the often complex reasons why a firm got in trouble and to help plot a way back. On this episode of Bizcast, Harrigan, the Henry R. Kravis Professor of Business Leadership, tells us the story of the decisions made by two very different firms – J. Crew, the famous purveyors of preppy clothes, and Smithfield Foods, the world’s largest pork processor – as they coped with shifts in their fortunes amid the COVID-19 pandemic. In addition to discussing the strategies companies take to recover, Harrigan also explains how the class instills a sense of responsibility that future leaders should feel toward their companies. Find us on Instagram and Twitter, where we are @columbia_biz. Subscribe to Bizcast on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher, or wherever you get your podcasts. You can catch up on old episodes in the Bizcast archive.

We start our new season of Bizcast with a conversation about the challenges of entrepreneurship. Class of 2021 members Pritika Gupta, Gareth Pembroke, and Samuel Hong are co-presidents of the Columbia Entrepreneurs Organization (CEO), a community of students who offer each other support on their entrepreneurial journeys and a network that will continue after graduation.  CEO also plans a number of professional development opportunities and in the coming weeks the group will  host a panel discussion on the future of healthcare startups.  After explaining the benefits of the group, the students tell us what it’s like to study entrepreneurship at CBS as well as the lessons they’ve learned from previous successes and failures they encountered with their own entrepreneurial ventures before enrolling at the School. You can email us at bizcast@gsb.columbia.edu. Or find us on Instagram and Twitter, where we are @columbia_biz. Subscribe to Bizcast wherever you get your podcasts.

What is it like for a journalist to cover the final days of a political campaign, right before an election? Bizcast visits with two MBA students who have had this experience first-hand. Alexis Levinson ’21, a former reporter for Buzzfeed, and Knight-Bagehot Fellow Hannah Levintova ’21, who writes for Mother Jones, give us their perspective on the differences between covering local and national politics; trustworthy ways to stay informed; and whether voters should believe the latest polls. Levinson and Levintova also share their views on the future of the media business and why they felt pursuing a MBA would enhance and focus their respective career paths. Comments? Suggestions? Email us at bizcast@gsb.columbia.edu. Or find us on Instagram and Twitter, where we are @columbia_biz. Subscribe to Bizcast wherever you get your podcasts.

On this special episode of Bizcast, we’re presenting a conversation between Bernstein Center Faculty Director Modupe Akinola and former Senior Advisor to President Barack Obama, Valerie Jarrett, who is now the senior advisor to the Obama Foundation. Ms. Jarrett shares some of the formative experiences in her life: her childhood in Iran, England, and Chicago; her calling to public service; and her time in the Obama White House. She also provides her perspective on the role the business community can play in promoting social justice, and offers advice to future leaders. This conversation is part of the KPMG Peat Marwick/Stanley R. Klion Forum, hosted by the Sanford C. Bernstein & Co. Center for Leadership and Ethics. The series features leaders who are committed to resolving the major ethical, social, political, and economic challenges of our time. It was established in memory of the late Stanley R. Klion, the executive vice chairman and chief operating partner of Peat Marwick International and a longtime executive-in-residence at CBS. This forum is reflective of Mr. Klion’s ethical leadership style, and its goal is to encourage greater awareness of the ethical dilemmas faced by today’s leaders. Comments? Suggestions? Email us at bizcast@gsb.columbia.edu. Find us on Instagram and Twitter, where we are @columbia_biz. Subscribe to Bizcast on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher, or wherever you get your podcasts.

As one of the world’s leading experts on diversity in business environments, the late Professor Katherine Phillips left a remarkable legacy of scholarship and inspiration. For Mariah Celestine ’20 and Camira Powell ’20, the most meaningful way to honor Professor Phillips was to continue the important work of making CBS a more inclusive institution that will empower future leaders to advocate for diversity and equity in their workplaces. As part of a collaboration with Vice Dean for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Gita Johar, the two recent graduates developed the Phillips Pathway for Inclusive Leadership, a new mandatory program for CBS students scheduled to begin in the spring of 2021. In this episode, Celestine and Powell provide an overview of PPIL and share some of their personal experiences that informed the creation of the program. Is there anything you would like to tell us about your experience listening to Bizcast? Please fill out our audience survey at: bit.ly/BizcastSurvey. Subscribe to Bizcast on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher, or wherever you get your podcasts.

On June 26, Gita Johar, Vice Dean for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion spoke with Erika Irish Brown ‘98, the Chief Diversity Officer at Goldman Sachs, about the firm’s internal response to the global protest and reckoning on anti-Black racism in the aftermath of the death of George Floyd. In their conversation, Brown shared some of the practical, actionable steps she’s put into place at Goldman Sachs that address racial injustice and help move the organization toward a place of equity. Brown discussed why it’s crucial to focus on systemic anti-Black racism; she emphasized the importance of storytelling during diversity education, which she said helps create meaningful and impactful dialogue. Is there anything you would like to tell us about your experience listening to Bizcast? Please fill out our audience survey at: bit.ly/BizcastSurvey. Subscribe to Bizcast on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Bizcast is continuing our conversation with Management Professor Dan Wang about the connections between protests and business. Part one examined the skills and leadership abilities protest organizers have in common with CEOs. In this part, Wang explains the relationship that exists between businesses and consumers is analogous to protest movements responding to emerging societal trends. Wang discusses his research on how demonstrations affect the public perception of companies and internal cultures of organizations, and he reflects on the type of self-interrogation needed to bring about changes in company culture. Is there anything you would like to tell us about your experience listening to Bizcast? Please fill out our audience survey at: bit.ly/BizcastSurvey. Subscribe to Bizcast on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher, or wherever you get your podcasts.

In light of the conversation started by the Black Lives Matter movement, we’re starting a series of special edition podcasts focusing on how pro-equity social changes are affecting industries. For the first episode, we’re going to look at the nature of protest itself. On the surface, it might seem that planning an effective protest and running a successful business might not have much in common. But according to Associate Professor Dan Wang, demonstration organizers often have the same skills seen in CEOs: planning, communication, consensus-building, resource mobilization, and ultimately, leadership. In this first half of a two-part episode, the newly tenured Wang, whose research was featured in a recent article in Ideas at Work (https://www8.gsb.columbia.edu/articles/ideas-work/successful-protests-require-diversity-and-focus), explains the similarities between businesses and protest movements and what they can learn from each other. Is there anything you would like to tell us about your experience listening to Bizcast? Please fill out our audience survey at: bit.ly/BizcastSurvey You can also email us at columbiabizcast@gsb.columbia.edu. Or find us on Instagram and Twitter, where we are @columbia_biz.

The COVID-19 pandemic presented the already volatile world of brands with a tough new challenge: How does a brand stay viable, but ensure that it is sensitive to the new financial and societal realities of the “new normal?” On this episode of Bizcast, marketing Professor Elizabeth Friedman and Matthew Quint, the director of the Center on Global Brand Leadership, offer insights on ways companies communicate both that they are open for business, and that they care about the well-being of their customers and employees. Friedman and Quint discuss how heightened emotions affect the way brands are perceived, the importance of setting the right tone, and the opportunities for innovation amid the crisis. Bizcast listeners! Is there anything you would like to tell us about your experience listening to Bizcast? Please fill out our audience survey at: bit.ly/BizcastSurvey  Subscribe to Bizcast on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher, or wherever you get your podcasts.

With the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, the business world and the daily lives of millions have undergone massive disruptions in a short amount of time. The reality of this new normal is what Professor Rita McGrath would define as an inflection point – an external change that causes the underlying assumptions of a business to adjust dramatically in response. On this episode of Bizcast, McGrath, the author of Seeing Around Corners: How To Spot Inflection Points in Business Before They Happen, explains different scenarios that could help firms cope -- and eventually thrive. You can hear her speak about leadership practices that help businesses thrive on this prior episode. How is your business weathering these big changes, and planning for the future? Let us know by emailing us at bizcast@gsb.columbia.edu. Is there anything you would like to tell us about your experience listening to Bizcast? Please fill out our audience survey at: bit.ly/BizcastSurvey

Overall, Dean Emeritus Glenn Hubbard has been pleased with the government response to the economic crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, noting the speed with which Congress and the administration passed the CARES Act. On this episode of Bizcast, however, Hubbard, the Russell L. Carson Professor of Finance and Economics and faculty director of the Chazen Institute for Global Business, offers a critique of the implementation of relief efforts by the Small Business Administration and Department of the Treasury. “Rather than pointing fingers though,” Hubbard says, “can we design something more effective so that we can just turn the switch on, if there is a next time? Hubbard also shares his views on funding state governments, tax reforms after the pandemic, and the future of international relationships in the aftermath of COVID-19. You can find more of Professor Hubbard’s thoughts on the economic impact of the pandemic here: his conversation with Nobel laureate Joseph Stiglitz; his interview with Neil Irwin ‘08 of The New York Times; his discussion on the role of political economy with professors Tano Santos and Ray Horton; and his panel with Japanese Minster Takeshi Komoto and Keiko Tashiro, deputy president of Daiwa Securities Group on the implications of COVID-19 on the US and Japanese economies. Is there anything you would like to tell us about your experience listening to Bizcast? Please fill out our audience survey at: bit.ly/BizcastSurvey Subscribe to Bizcast on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher, or wherever you get your podcasts.

According to a recent Department of Commerce report, retail sales slumped by 8.7 percent in March, as states issued stay-at-home orders and stores closed throughout the nation.  Mark Cohen, the director of retail studies, explains on the latest episode of Bizcast that the retail sector should be prepared for even more dismal numbers in the coming months. “There’s an enormous amount of business being done on food and supplies, but for the most part retail is shut down,” he says.  Cohen provides his view on the changes coming to large retailers, many of whom have already seen declining sales and store closures before the pandemic hit. He also discusses the role of government bailouts for the industry and speculates about when stores will be able to open their doors.  You can read more of Cohen’s insights on the impact of COVID-19 on retailers here. (https://www8.gsb.columbia.edu/articles/ideas-work/will-retail-bounce-back-pandemic) Is there anything you would like to tell us about your experience listening to Bizcast? Please fill out our audience survey at: bit.ly/BizcastSurvey

Like many of his classmates, Dr. Faheem Ahmed started the spring semester, primed to put the finishing touches on his MBA. But after COVID-19 began to spread, he relocated to his home in London to complete his degree remotely and work on the frontline of the crisis. In this special episode of Bizcast, Ahmed -- who has a medical degree from King’s College London and a master’s degree in health systems management from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine -- gives us his perspective on the UK response to the pandemic. Ahmed also discusses his recent article in The Lancet, co-authored with Professor Joseph Stiglitz, which explains how COVID-19 is exacerbating social inequality around the world, especially among those with low incomes and black and ethnic minority communities. Is there anything you would like to tell us about your experience listening to Bizcast? Please fill out our audience survey at: bit.ly/BizcastSurvey

Jacquie Henderson '17 works in strategy and operations for a seven hospital health system that serves communities in New York's Hudson Valley and in Western Connecticut. When the virus hit, her responsibilities quickly shifted. In this episode, Henderson talks about how her CBS experience helped her set up freestanding testing sites and “uptrain” the staff to take on new tasks and assignments. She also describes the precautions she takes to keep her family safe. Is there anything you would like to tell us about your experience listening to Bizcast? Please fill out our audience survey at: bit.ly/BizcastSurvey

We’re pivoting Bizcast. Starting with this episode, we’ll be covering the business impacts of COVID-19 from multiple perspectives. Our first guest is Tommy Hendrix ‘17, who discusses his current work searching gray markets for personal protective equipment to redistribute to healthcare workers. He details how his military and business school backgrounds inform his task, and offers his thoughts on the most important way to combat this virus. Is there anything you would like to tell us about your experience listening to Bizcast? Please fill out our audience survey at: bit.ly/BizcastSurvey

This month, the School welcomed its inaugural group of undergraduate seniors and non-professional Master’s students into the new Deferred Enrollment Program. The program allows accepted students to defer their MBA or EMBA start date for between two to five years, while they are gaining experience in the workforce. On this episode of Bizcast, we visit with CBS Admissions officers Emily French Thomas and Michael Robinson. They explain not only how the DEP works, but also how its students will play a vital role in the overall School community. We’ll also hear stories from Sebastian, Sid, and Phyllis – three students who tell us why they chose the DEP for their futures in business. Is there anything you would like to tell us about your experience listening to Bizcast? Please fill out our audience survey at: bit.ly/BizcastSurvey

In our second episode featuring the School’s UK-based graduates, we visit with Lee Georgs ’03, the Chief Operating Officer of Corporate for the investment consultancy Redington and co-President of the London alumni club. Georgs has held positions with some of the world’s most prestigious investment banks, including Citibank, JP Morgan and Credit Suisse. Her career path has not been a straight line. Since graduating from Columbia, Georgs moved from New York to Hong Kong to London, while taking some breaks from work along the way. She tells us how those periods away from the office changed her perspective -- and created new opportunities. Is there anything you would like to tell us about your experience listening to Bizcast? Please fill out our audience survey at: bit.ly/BizcastSurvey

For the next few months, Bizcast will be bringing you stories and interviews from our recent UK visit, where we met with members of the CBS Alumni Club of London.  We start our journey across the pond with Shai Weiss ’97, who was named CEO of Virgin Atlantic in January 2019. Weiss offers a behind-the-scenes look at the brand’s unique mission to make Virgin the world’s most loved travel company. He also talks about Virgin’s commitment to diversity and the challenge that climate change poses for the airline. Listen in to hear what he’s learned about leadership, risk-taking, and failure from Virgin founder Richard Branson. Is there anything you would like to tell us about your experience listening to Bizcast? Please fill out our audience survey at: bit.ly/BizcastSurvey

In 2018, at the urging of students and faculty, the Business School formed two committees to study issues surrounding diversity, equity, and inclusion throughout the CBS community. In this episode, Gita Johar, Vice Dean for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion and the Meyer Feldberg Professor of Business, tells us about the positive results of the committees’ work: a renewed and keener focus on DEI at the School. Johar explains what diversity, equity, and inclusion means for faculty and students, and also defines its role in curriculum and course materials. Johar is clear that there’s still work to be done, discussing steps the School needs to take to address DEI issues in both the short and long term. Is there anything you would like to tell us about your experience listening to Bizcast? Please fill out our audience survey at: bit.ly/BizcastSurvey

On this episode of Bizcast we’re back in the classroom to learn about Analytics in Action, an innovative masterclass that brings together MBA and engineering students with representatives from companies such as Viacom and Citigroup to solve real business problems in real time.    Now in its third year, Analytics in Action reflects Dean Costis Maglaras’s initiative to bring together a diverse set of thought leaders from across Columbia’s campus. Following a visit to class, we talked with professors Daniel Guetta and Brett Martin about the history and value of the class and with MBA student Michael Rodio and engineering student Sanjana Rosario, who shared their perspectives and the lessons they learned after analyzing problems from each other’s point of view.     

Listen in to some revelations about secrets with Michael Slepian, the Sanford C. Bernstein & Co. Associate Professor of Leadership and Ethics. Professor Slepian researches the effect of secret-keeping on our personal and professional lives. According to his findings, being the lone bearer of a secret not only heightens emotions such as inauthenticity and loneliness, but can also feel physically burdensome.  Fortunately, Slepian’s research hints at a solution: talking to others about your secret.    

In which we kick back and chat with former Rockette and current CBS student, Kristin Jantzie, ’21. Jantzie opens up about the discipline it took to sustain her 13-year run as a member of the world-famous dance troupe. She details lessons from her time with the troupe that are serving her here at CBS, and tells us how business school is preparing her for the next stage of her career.        

First, we speak with Eat Offbeat, the New York-based catering company founded by Wissam Kahi ’04 and his sister Manal Kahi, SIPA ’15. Eat Offbeat hires refugees and trains them to prepare cuisine from their native countries. Next, we check in with April Tam Smith ’10 who, in addition to her day job on Wall Street, opened P.S. Kitchen. This Times Square vegan restaurant donates 100 percent of its profits to organizations that support sustainability, and provides jobs to recent immigrants and the previously incarcerated. Last, we end with some life lessons/business advice from Beyond Meat founder Ethan Brown, ’08, who talks about the benefit of listening to your heart and being patient with what it tells you.  

In honor of Veterans Day, Bizcast is revisiting conversations we had with three CBS alumni, all former service members. All three are working to support veterans in their transition to civilian life. EMBA graduate Brooke Jones-Chinetti ’18 served in the Army for nearly ten years, which included a tour of duty in Iraq. After her commitment, Jones-Chinetti worked for JPMorgan Chase’s Office of Veterans’ Affairs. This inspired her to found Your Sequel, a networking organization designed to help female ex-service members make connections in the business world. Air Force pilot Dan Brillman ’12 and Army veteran Taylor Justice ’14 heard countless stories from their cohort about how complicated it was to access clinical and non-clinical social services. This led to their launching Unite Us, a centralized software platform that streamlines the connection between people and healthcare and other social service providers. As part of our salute to all veterans, here are Brooke, Dan, and Taylor telling their stories of life in the military, at Columbia Business School, and at their start-ups.

On this edition of Bizcast, we welcome the new dean of Columbia Business School, Costis Maglaras, to the podcast. In our conversation, Dean Maglaras shares his vision for the School, the opportunity to innovate the curriculum, and the transformational potential of the School’s move to Manhattanville in two years. Maglaras also talks about his plans for enrichment and other learning opportunities for alumni to help them keep pace with today’s rapidly evolving work environment. Join us on Maglaras’ journey from his native Athens via London and Palo Alto to the Columbia campus.

On this episode of Bizcast, we revisit our conversation with Impact America Fund founder Kesha Cash ’10. Named one of Fast Company’s 100 Most Creative People for 2018, Kesha told us about a point in her career when she needed to reconcile that she was “living two lives.”   Cash grew up in a low-income family, first in rural South Carolina, then in Orange County, California. After graduating from UC Berkeley with a degree in applied mathematics, Cash embarked on a career in financial services that took her to Wall Street boardrooms and aboard private jets. Through it all, Cash never forgot her early life experiences, which inspired her to enroll in the Business School, where she cultivated her passion for impact investing and social responsibility. In 2013, Cash launched the Impact America Fund, which makes investments in companies run by entrepreneurs from low and moderate income communities of color. 

On this episode of Columbia Bizcast, we’re invited to dine with the Polarization Project. Recent EMBA graduates Brianna O’Brien Lowndes ’19, Charlie Kreitler ’19, and Emmett Lamb ’19 founded this discussion series, in which a faculty expert lectures on a global issue and students engage in a lively debate afterwards. At the dinner we attended, the group hosted Professor of Professional Practice Bruce Usher who spoke about the intersection of climate change and business.

Leadership lessons from Jon Snow, Ned Stark, and Professor Bruce Craven. Professor Craven's book, Win or Die: Leadership Secrets from Game of Thrones, offers a trove of leadership lessons for managing groups and implementing change. In this episode of Columbia Bizcast, Bruce Craven, a professor in the Business School’s Executive Education program and director of the School’s Advanced Management Program, addresses the leadership takeaways from this mega-hit series.

“Whatever the big social problem is, I’d like to believe that business people are leading that charge and not just waiting for politics,” Hubbard says in his second appearance on the podcast. With the US government recently emerging from a record-long shutdown, Dean Glenn Hubbard can sound as exasperated as the next person with what he describes as a “feckless” political system. Which is why resilient business leaders are all the more necessary in today’s economic environment, Hubbard says in this episode of Columbia Bizcast. “Whether the issue of the day is climate change, the way we deal with training programs for the less skilled, or whatever the big social problem is, I’d like to believe that business people are leading that charge and not just waiting for politics,” says the Columbia Business School dean. In the podcast’s third season, Hubbard talks about what he’ll miss most about being dean after he steps down on June 30 and why he’s so optimistic about the future for today’s MBAs, despite the political morass. No stranger to Washington, D.C., the dean also gives his take on today’s divided government. “To me, the whole issue of a shutdown is crazy,” says Hubbard, who served as deputy assistant secretary in the Treasury Department under George H. W. Bush and as chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers to George W. Bush. “Obviously, in any negotiation, neither side gets 100 percent of what it wants, rarely in life does that happen, but to me this is a failure of government and both major political parties.”

What makes an idea go viral, a song become a hit, or a startup turn into a stock-listed powerhouse? It often happens, according to Assistant Professor Michael Mauskapf, because of an optimal mix of oldness and newness. Be it a Billboard No. 1 or a blockbuster business idea, the concept catches on because it’s similar enough to be recognizable but different enough to be edgy. “If your goal is commercial success and widespread adoption, you don’t want to be radically different,” Mauskapf says in this episode of Columbia Bizcast, which delves into his widely cited research paper into what makes pop music popular. Featured in the Economist, New York Post, and Quartz, along with Ideas at Work, the paper dissects the sonic attributes of six decades of songs from the Billboard Hot 100 to answer the question, “What makes a hit?” “There’s a trade-off between being similar and being different,” says Mauskapf, who is himself an orchestral trumpeter with dual doctorates in management and musicology; he teaches the MBA course Foundations of Entrepreneurship, an overview of the concepts and skills needed for both entrepreneurs and those who want to act entrepreneurially. “Novel is a necessary but not sufficient condition for being innovative.”

Developing a successful organizational strategy isn’t easy, especially in an unpredictable business climate. Navigating a shifting landscape requires leaders to abandon pre-conceived notions and think differently, according to Rita Gunther McGrath, a professor in the Business School’s Executive Education program. A globally recognized expert on innovation and growth strategy, McGrath argues that to maintain a competitive advantage in times of change, organizations must protect their key resource — personnel. “One of the few sources of advantage left is going to be that core group of people who carry the culture, who carry the norms, who are the secret sauce of the place,” McGrath says in this episode of Columbia Bizcast, which highlights the critical importance for leaders to create a culture where all employees feel safe. “All leaders need to create psychological safety, need to communicate up and down the organization, need to be able to see what’s going on out there, need to be able to hear uncomfortable information and not lash out at the person bringing it and so forth,” says McGrath. “If you think about it, organizations would benefit by that style of leadership becoming more prevalent.”

“Engage,” says the president and CEO of education nonprofit organization Children’s Aid. “Don't sit on the sidelines.” Child homelessness is at a record high in New York City, with one in 10 students in public schools living in temporary housing. Phoebe Boyer ’93 is on the front-line working to prevent these children from falling through society’s cracks. As president and CEO of Children’s Aid, one of the nation’s oldest and largest nonprofits serving children, Boyer is responsible for leading a team of more than 1,200 employees who provide health, education, and wellness services to New York City’s needy and at-risk youths. “Kids who live in poverty, it’s through no fault of their own,” says Boyer, who studied nonprofit management at the Business School and earned the Joanne Martin Academic Award for Public and Nonprofit Management upon graduation. “With the right supports they can achieve anything, and that’s been the motivator, I think, for my entire career.” In this episode of Columbia Bizcast, Boyer discusses her important work in overseeing an organization with 45 citywide sites that provide a gamut of children’s services, from adoption programs to summer camps to after-school education. As the first female CEO of Children’s Aid — a role she took on in 2014 — Boyer has become something of a role model for both her staff and the many single mothers and young women that her organization works with daily. “We are in the opportunity business,” says Boyer. “Our kids, because of the realities of living in poverty, they often face many barriers to the opportunities that I think other people take for granted, whether it’s educational opportunities or opportunities to have high-quality healthcare. Our kids need those opportunities, and that’s what we’re providing them with.”

Any hospital patient basically wants two things: to get well and to get out. Jing Dong is helping that happen faster. An assistant professor in the division of Decision, Risk, and Operations, Dong is at the forefront of research into improving hospitals’ operational and procedural efficiencies, from lowering admittance wait-times to speeding up discharges. “I still see a lot of exciting things to do in the healthcare domain,” Dong tells Columbia Bizcast. “I’m helping hospitals identify the costs of a lot of the operational procedures they’re running and then helping them to say, ‘Okay, if I realize there is a cost and benefit to these procedures, what would be the best way of balancing this?’” In this episode, Dong shares how her parents encouraged her to study math when she was growing up in mainland China and how now, at the Business School, she has elevated her research by partnering with professors from across the divisions. The proliferation of data and analytics is transforming the way businesses operate, she says, which is allowing leaders to make more quantitative-driven decisions. “My research horizon has also been broadened since I came here,” Dong says of joining the Business School. “It has simply improved my whole decision-making process a lot.”

Through the startup Iluméxico, this graduate is bringing solar power to Mexicans who live off the grid. One in seven people worldwide lacks access to electricity, including some 3 million people in Manuel Wiechers’ home country of Mexico. But he’s slowly changing that. Through his startup Iluméxico, Wiechers has installed 13,000 solar power systems servicing 58,000 people in the deepest recesses of rural Mexico, including to homes only available by boat, donkey, and day-long trek. And now, with training from the Business School’s 13-month Entrepreneurship and Competitiveness in Latin America (ECLA) program, which Wiechers completed in 2017, he is eyeing even more ambitious goals: To bring electricity to 50,000 homes by 2020 and to light up all of Mexico by 2025. On this episode of Columbia Bizcast, the Mexico City-native talks about why he launched Iluméxico in 2010, the challenges to convincing Mexicans to move away from pollutive diesel generators, and how he overhauled his company’s operations during the ECLA program with mentorship from senior lecturer Alonso Martinez. “He worked with us for five months on developing our key initiatives for operational excellence,” says Wiechers, whose business restructuring became the basis for a new Columbia CaseWorks study on supply chain strategy. “We formalized, standardized, and structured them in a much more efficient manner. That allowed us to be prepared for growth [and] get a very quick second investment round and boost what we were doing.” A former Ashoka fellow, finalist for the Unilever Sustainable Living Young Entrepreneurs Awards, and participant in the Endeavor entrepreneurship program, Wiechers has also been featured in Forbes and Ideas and Insights. Iluméxico is a certified B Corporation, a designation for social responsibility and environmental sustainability. “I had more opportunities than the average Mexicans,” says Wiechers. “I knew I had to give back.”