February 2004

A Community of Teachers

One of the pleasures of editing a magazine for the alumni/ae of a school of general management is the variety of business experiences to learn from. In this issue, for instance, we have Lisa Nitze, MBA '87, sharing some of her secrets for managing a highly public project with a diverse set of stakeholders. Nitze is involved in saving Ellis Island for posterity, but her management tips apply more broadly to projects with multiple masters.

We also have Loring Knoblauch Sr., Sloan '73, MBA '74, demonstrating how someone with a liberal arts background leads engineers in a venerable American company that must go global. Among the tips we learn from him are the importance of reading body language and not being afraid to ask dumb questions.

Chris McGarry, MBA '00, gives us a welcome perspective on how to retrieve value from a failed startup. Caught with a good idea and bad timing, this entrepreneur converted a for-profit business into a mega volunteer project that fed many imaginations and expanded his own appreciation for community.

Faculty work featured in this issue adds to the diversity of business topics. From marketing faculty we learn why there are so many models of cars and dozens of flavors of yogurt in today's marketplace. In another article, two finance faculty members provide insight into the booming new market in credit derivatives. Their textbook is for the pros in that field, but in our magazine they explain credit derivatives to the rest of us.

The primary goal of this magazine is to keep the GSB community connected, but these examples underscore its related role in providing ongoing education. You can read about business celebrities and those fallen from their pedestals in plenty of magazines. Here we hope you can find not just tidbits of news about your classmates but some general management ideas that you can put to work.

Kathleen O'Toole
Editor

From the Editor

Dean's Column

Kathleen O'Toole
Editor