2014 Business Schools: Who's On The 'Nice' List

Were you naughty or nice?

In the media, we tend to play up the negative angles. To use a holiday term, we stuff coal into everyone’s stockings. Maybe we’re natural grinches. Then again, like most, maybe we take selfless gestures and courageous acts for granted.

So let’s step back today. Let’s recognize those individuals or groups who are so committed to principle that they act on them. Let’s honor their strength. Let’s celebrate their achievements. Most important, let’s follow their example.

If you believe in Santa Claus, you can be assured that b-school alumni, administrators, students, and supporters would make his ‘nice’ list. But ten individuals or groups truly stood out in 2014. Whether they freely gave their talents, inspired their peers, or challenged the status quo, they set a high standard that won’t be easy to match. Here are their stories:

10) Dean Nitin Nohria, Harvard Business School: HBS’ bourbon-soaked SectionX subculture produces plenty of headlines, creating the impression of a campus overrun by dilettantes. What’s more, many female alumni and faculty have admitted to feeling like outsiders at the school. In many organizations, leaders would deny the issue exists, defensively circling the wagons and lashing out at critics. In 2014, Dean Nohria decided to take the road less traveled.

At a January gathering of Harvard alumni and friends in San Francisco, Nohria admitted that there were times when Harvard women felt “disrespected, left out, and unloved for the school.” Then he did something altogether unexpected: He apologized. “I’m sorry on behalf of the business school. The school owed you better, and I promise it will be better.” While the apology – and the school’s efforts to revamp its culture – hasn’t placated some critics, give Nohria credit for airing the school’s dirty laundry and tackling the issues head on.

9) Jon Fuller, Ivan Kerbel, Sandy Kreisberg and Andrew Geller: If you follow Poets&Quants, you know exactly who these people are. For a year or more, they’ve been fielding reader questions related to admissions, career, and GMAT strategy. And they share their expertise at no charge! Known for their quick responses, detail and candor, these men provide guidance and reassurance at a time when readers are making life-changing decisions. They truly epitomize excellence in their respective specialties.

8) School Donors: 2014 won’t go down as the year of big business school gifts. You won’t find any David Booths or Stephen Rosses lavishing nine figure donations. However, waste management magnet Al Warrington dropped another $75 millionon the University of Florida’s College of Business. And investor Thomas J. Barrack Jr. chipped in $15 million to the University of South California’s Marshall School of Business. Don’t forget the $721 million that HBS raised this year, either.

These numbers may seem like a drop in the bucket to the Occupy Wall Street crowd, but they go a long way to funding scholarships, research and better facilities. If the holiday season is a time for gratitude, school donors have earned a big shout out from alumni, students, faculty, and administrators. Over the years, they’ve made so much possible that goes unnoticed.

7) Richard Lyons, University of California-Berkeley (Haas): ‘If you don’t write or speak about something, you probably don’t care about it.’ Well, that’s one explanation. Another is that you fear criticism or retaliation. Worse yet, you might be dismissed as a Pollyanna. Thankfully, Richard Lyons, dean of the University of California-Berkeley’s Haas School of Business, isn’t afraid to speak his mind. And his message – that half of American business schools could shut down in the next decade – is one to heed.

Digital disruption isn’t a futurist fantasy. It has already established a beachhead, if not scaled the surrounding hills. To protect their cash cows, many business schools will need to adjust their delivery and curriculum and differentiate their programs. And that takes leadership, commitment, and sacrifice. If Lyons’ prophecy is fulfilled, schools can’t say they weren’t warned.

6) Haifa AlHumaid, Babson College (Olin): Ever get a rejection from a business school? Just walk in AlHumaid’s shoes, where she was denied the opportunity to even apply. A Saudi national, AlHumaid is a case study in persistence. For four years, she lobbied her protective father for permission to study abroad. Over that time, she built a company’s accounting and compliance operation from scratch before spending a year at a non-profit.

Eventually, AlHumaid’s father relented. In 2014, she earned her MBA from Babson– and is looking to launch her own social enterprise. For AlHumaid, the biggest change wasn’t what she learned in the classroom. “Eight years ago, I was super shy. It was hard for me to mingle and socialize, but after Babson I have a lot more confidence in myself.” Hopefully, AlHumaid can take that same pluck and confidence back to the women of Saudi Arabia.

5) MOOC Pioneers: Yeah, we’ve heard the criticism leveled at full-time MBA programs. It’s just a certification, some say. You’ll lose two years of income and stunt your career. You’re taking on a six figure debt. And you can learn what’s critical just by opening a book. That’s true to an extent, which is why but some professionals are taking their education into their own hands with MOOCs.

Take Laurie Pickard, for example, who created her own thematic curriculum that covers the same content as a standard MBA program. The price: less than $1000. And she’ll complete it in less than three years. Like Pickard, Ankit Khandewal designed his own global business program, often using courses developed by Wharton and Yale. Bottom line: MOOCs may not disrupt the business education model, but they are giving enterprising student other options. Thankfully, they’re creating a template that the rest of us can use.

4) Adlai Wertman, University of Southern California: Going from investment banking to teaching might seem like a step down. But for Adlai Wertman, who heads USC Marshall’s Brittingham Social Enterprise Lab, wanted to do more than feather his nest egg. As a result, he has created initiatives where undergraduates and MBAs can open up businesses that employ the impoverished.

His goal is to create an army of social entrepreneurs. From projects and internships to actual jobs, Wertman is showing how private enterprise can produce social change. And graduates can even earn subsidies to offset income loss for working towards this change. Sounds like a win-win for everyone.

3) Shirzad Chamine, Stanford University: Think business school will be easy, do you? Well, the real challenge isn’t mastering financial models or case studies. It is learning to accept a hard truth: You’re not as special as you think. At this level, everyone is gifted. And any major flaw – impulsiveness, sloth, insularity, or phoniness – will be exposed (publicly and fast).

It’s never easy to face our limitations. That’s why the first year of his Stanford MBA program left a deep impression on Shirzad Bozogchami (now Chamine). In an epic reflection, Chamine wrote a letter to future Stanford first-years outlining the powerful lessons he learned. From the folly of grades to the value of peers, Chamine shared the social and spiritual lessons that students would never gain from the curriculum. Even more, he reminded his successors that everyone feels afraid, isolated, and inadequate in their first year. To truly succeed, they needed to drop their hardened personas and embrace as a community. It was a timeless message that was finally made public after 26 years of being passed between Stanford classes. And the world is a little better today as a result.

2) Road-Tripping MBAs: So where did you spend your vacation time? Did you hit the slopes? Network? Lay around and recharge? This year, several b-school students chose to serve others. Over spring break, for example, eight HBS classmates paid their own way to Las Vegas – but not for poker and the Blue Man Group. Instead, they worked with local community leaders to evaluate urban renewal projects and build apprentice initiatives that pair graduates with area startups.

And they weren’t alone. This summer, eight teams from schools like Babson, Columbia, Ross, Stanford, and Haas took part in MBAs Across America, driving over 40,000 miles to help entrepreneurs in locales like Montana, Arkansas, and Louisiana. Here, they did everything from gathering data to advising on strategy, providing fledgling entrepreneurs with tools for growing their businesses. Not only did they serve others, but they came away with a whole different perspective. “The small business life teaches you to be scrappy,” noted Columbia’s Sam Wollner. “You have to learn to solve problems with all of the resources.”

1) Answering the Ice Bucket Challenge: It was the 2014 version of the Macarena. Only this time, the silliness was for a good cause. By now, you know the drill: You videotape someone dumping a bucket of ice water over their head to promote awareness of ALS (Lou Gehrig’s Disease). In the process, that person challenges a friend or colleague to do the same (while giving $100 to the ALS Association).

Sure enough, business schools were quick to join in the frenzy. Harvard’s Nitin Nohria got the ball rolling in August (boldly challenging Harvard President Drew Faust to do the same…Talk about job security!). Soon enough, you had entire sections at Fuqua, Stanford, Wharton, and Columbia follow suit (with Fuqua, of course, goading Kenan-Flagler into doing it themselves). It was a amazing response that showed real leadership from our future business leaders.