Hansen: I'd like to start back in 1995, when we first contacted you to see if you would be interested in being dean at Tuck. What did you think about Tuck at that point in time?
Danos: I knew Tuck by reputation, but I had only a vague idea of its culture and all the special aspects of its location. I have always kept up on MBA programs, and even then it was pretty clear to me from everything I read that Tuck was special, with outstanding students and very successful alumni. The faculty, though small-scale, had the reputation of having good scholarly standards with outstanding teaching.
H: What was it about Tuck that got you to finally take the plunge?D: Coming from Michigan—a large-scale, high-quality school—I was attracted to the elegance, history, simplicity, and focus of Tuck. It was by far the most focused of the really top MBA schools, and I was convinced that the Tuck story of high-touch and strong standards could resonate more strongly in the world.
H: What about your wife, Mary Ellen? Was it hard to convince her to come to Tuck and to Hanover?
D: Well, she really loved Ann Arbor, but being an avid baker, when she realized that King Arthur Flour was only a few miles away, that really turned the tide. Once she came here and saw the Upper Valley—the quality of life and how nice the people were—it didn't take long for her to fall in love with the place like all of us do sooner or later. But seriously, she came because she wanted to support my career, and when she saw my excitement about the possibilities here she, too, became excited for me.
H: So was there anything that you learned about Tuck in the first few years that was a surprise to you?
D: I think it's always a surprise for anyone coming to Tuck, including students, to see the personal attachment people have to the experience and to each other. It's intense, and it's rare. People here truly have affection for each other.
H: Can you comment on your relationship with the college and how it's changing now relative to earlier years?
D More and more, Dartmouth is working toward access across old boundaries—undergraduates can reach into the professional schools, and professional-school students can reach other professional schools. Tuck already has programs with the medical school and with Thayer, and this year we'll have a social-impact course that involves undergraduates. And we hope to be teaching undergraduates directly in the not-too-distant future. Of course we have our own admissions, alumni, and development offices, our own career development group, and we do faculty and staff hiring quite independently of the college, but at the same time, we have more interaction with the college than we've ever had. The trustees, president, and provost have been very supportive of Tuck's activities.
H: It looks to me like Tuck gets a lot more respect at the college and that they look to us for leadership in some areas.
D: Business schools had to earn the right to be considered academic units, and they've earned it through solid research and the accomplishments of their alumni. Business and the MBA in particular have become synonymous with leadership in society. Tuck also has unbelievable alumni support: there is no doubt that among business schools, Tuck is considered the model for alumni relationships. I think our ability at Tuck to combine high-level students with highly relevant teaching by world-class faculty and our tremendous strides in global recognition is something that many academic institutions look to as a model.
H: What would you point out as your biggest couple of accomplishments in these 12 years?
D: My basic philosophy is that you can't be a top school at our level unless your faculty has academic prestige, but you also can't have an MBA program of our scale and not have the entire faculty teach. Every one of our faculty members is both an outstanding researcher and an outstanding teacher in the MBA program. I think we have shown that the combination of high scholarly standards and openness to students can coexist. That is unusual, and I think it is one of our biggest accomplishments. I'm sure we would have been successful if we had gone toward a high-teaching, high-case writing, high-practice type of program, but I don't think that could have matched the success we've had. You can't truly be in the heart of a great academic setting like Dartmouth College unless you have faculty with real depth, faculty who are discovering new knowledge and leading the way. They should also be teaching at the higher level, and that is our genius: combining the two in a way that very few other schools can match.
H: Amazingly, at least 75 percent of the faculty we have today weren't here in 1995. Yet the Tuck culture is as strong as it was when we had a different scale and emphasis. Some people would say, well, if you expand the faculty and the student body, you're going to change the culture of the place. But while there have been some changes on the faculty and the student sides, there is still that focus and love and care for the institution.
D: One good thing about having a reputation for caring about students is that people who don't share that concern don't apply. Our dual excellence has been accomplished by a combination of self-selection on the part of faculty applicants and our recruiting faculty who have both qualities. Another key is alumni support. Our business model has only 40 percent of our expenses covered by tuition—that allows us to do things differently than can schools that are 60 to 80 percent tuition-based, as are most schools. Our basic model then depends on alumni support. If it weren't for that, we couldn't operate with our level of quality and class. Tuck is also on the right side of the growth curve in its endowment. You can outstrip any endowment if you grow too much, and even though we grew a bit at Tuck, we managed it within bounds. In essence we were able to double the size of the entire operation, and we were able to also grow the endowment proportionately. I don't think we can grow again that way because we would dilute the student body and the endowment's ability to finance a large chunk of the expenses. The one exception to limiting growth is on the faculty side. You can add too many students and administrators, but you can't add too many of the right faculty—the faculty creates the basic resource of the school, so the more you have, the better, within the limits of affordability, of course. We want our students to feast on as much knowledge as possible.
H: Let me put you on the spot a bit. of the things you started at Tuck is the Cohen Leadership Program, which gets students to think about, to develop, and then to evaluate their own leadership qualities. In terms of your own leadership, what would you point to as a characteristic that enables you to get things done here as dean?
D: One thing I can say is that I really do know a lot about how the top schools work and how they finance their operations. And because I was trained as an accountant, I have always been good at sizing up cost structures and five-year plans. But there is a lot more to leadership than the money aspects: understanding people is, of course, key, and more than any other place I've seen, Tuck is great at making you think about the human impact of your decisions. I am much more sensitive to the human side of the equation than I was before I arrived. So just as we emphasize at Tuck, I try to blend the hard and soft skills. I also enjoy exercising my creative energy—always, I hope, within the bounds of practicality, however.
Teaching, Research, and practice
H: There have been a couple of highly publicized critiques of the MBA industry lately. These range from the idea that schools are teaching things that are more like analytical devices rather than management to the idea that the faculty are running the shops and are just doing esoteric research that has no relevance to management. With that as a preface, what do you think are the strengths and weaknesses of the MBA industry, and what is your prognosis for it?
D: I think the great faculties, including Tuck's, teach and research very practical things. Some of this isn't that accessible to nonacademics because it takes a little training to understand the methods and research terms used. But Tuck faculty are experts at translating research findings for students and executives in very practical language. They are able to look at an entire industry or era and see what is coming next. I think the biggest danger I've seen in the last 20 years in the business-school world is the trend toward separation of faculty from teaching and MBA students. At Tuck we keep them together: every faculty member on the roster at Tuck teaches in the MBA program. So we get a direct learning benefit for our students from everything we spend on research support, and I don't know of a single course we have that isn't relevant to a future business leader.
H: When these critics look at research studies and say that they are not relevant for management, where are they coming from?
D: You can find a lot of examples of places where, unlike Tuck, schools are running two shops: one that's a think-tank where the elite research faculty reside, and the other a teaching program that may to some extent be outsourced to adjunct or part-time faculty. I think this separation creates an illusion that faculty are up on one level and students are down on another and that there is little interaction. This research/teaching divide is a dangerous trend, and it's a shame because the students aren't getting the very best learning that way.
I think some of the criticism is valid but not all of it. Every school I know has some faculty who can teach right in the heart of practicality at a very rigorous level. And then there are some great researchers who are not accessible by MBA students. Faculty should be sensitive to students' needs and also know how to translate into practical terms the generalities that come from research. At Tuck, we have people who blend great research and teaching, and that is a big difference. To me, that dual excellence leads to the highest form of education.
H: Part of the problem here is that the economics you mentioned earlier are driving this business, because it is less costly to hire part-time faculty.
D: Well, sure, because part-timers have a full-time job somewhere else and the school pays only for their hours in the classroom, whereas a school like Tuck is paying for the entire cost of a world-class professor. But it is worth it because the research faculty who are also great teachers give special things to the students—how to think about problems, how to evaluate the claims that people make about findings, how to anticipate what comes next. One thing is true: the full-time MBA from the top schools is in more demand by applicants and employers than ever before, and the return on investment has never been higher.
H: Before we move on to the Tuck strategy for the future, I wanted to touch on the international scene for a minute. There are a lot of business schools opening in Europe, the Middle East, China, and India. What is your take on what is going on with the global MBA industry?
D: I'd say the vast majority of MBA programs that have been created in the last 10 years are part-time programs for people who continue to work. They are mostly free-standing without a university affiliation and usually don't have a standing faculty or a real campus. In some areas there has been a growth in university-based full-time programs. Germany, for instance, didn't have many MBA programs 15 years ago, and now they have scores, many at major universities. The demand for business training or some kind of business knowledge is so massive in the world that it's impossible to meet the demand at the established schools, but Tuck and the other classic MBA programs, in my opinion, are still the gold standard of business education, and that is proven out by the escalating demand for admission to our programs from all over the world. Our approach is to give a diverse student body all it takes to lead in the global economy, with ample opportunities to experience business practices around the world. Today, Tuck has more international students and faculty and offers more global experiences than ever before.
Seeing 2012
H: The last strategy review for Tuck started in 1997 and culminated in 2000, resulting in the four-section model, significant expansion, and a new core curriculum that has lasted pretty well intact up to today. The underlying motivation for those changes was a strongly held belief that the scale of Tuck was simply too small or was at risk of being too small in terms of our impact on the world—whether you look at recruiters' ability to hire Tuck students or our ability to attract students—and our ability to have an impact on the intellectual world. Can you talk about the underlying motivations for this strategic review and what you see as the opportunities or threats to Tuck now that would motivate adjusting Tuck's strategy?
D: Ten years ago, as you said, we were underscaled. We didn't have the ability to create the kind of infrastructure we needed for teaching or to support the kind of faculty required for Tuck to continue to compete at the highest levels. But I don't think our MBA program is underscaled today. There are four areas that I think of as the beginning points of our current strategic review. The first is globalization, which is exploding in every way. We really have to look at everything we do and ask, Are we approaching the subject matter from a global perspective? and Is Tuck global enough? Are our students fully prepared to meet the increasing global challenges of the future? Are we selecting the right students? Should we make some non-U.S. experience a requirement? What about a second or third language? Do our courses cover the world's best practices? We have to look at every aspect of the school and make sure that we're up to the global challenges.
The second thrust is the core curriculum, which at a school like Tuck is very important because it comprises most of the first year. It's structured in a certain way, and it's got a certain rhythm, certain inclusions, and certain exclusions. It's like a big clock, and you really have to think carefully before you start messing with its pieces. But it's got to be reviewed again, because it's been about 10 years since we last did it. I think we already have a wonderful model with outstanding features that reinforce teamwork, the Tuck spirit of sharing, the primacy of faculty expertise, and a lot of learning outside of the classroom, but we are not going to take for granted that we have the ideal model. I could make my own prediction of how I think this review will come out, but we have to let the committees look at a wide array of features and interactions before any prediction will mean much.
H: So what is the third thrust we're looking at?
D: The third area is how to integrate our leadership programs. We have a complicated approach to leadership and professional development, and over the past several years we've added several important programs. But we need to study how we can create the greatest synergy among them. We have a teamwork program and the newer Cohen Leadership Program, which involves feedback and coaching; an ethics program; and the Allwin Initiative for Corporate Citizenship, which exposes students to how society and business interact. We have over 50 different student-led clubs and student involvement in research centers. And we have training for the job-search process, led by our Career Development Office. All of these get our students on a steep trajectory in their careers as principled leaders. We've got to keep innovating and refining that leadership process because there is nothing more important in a business school of our caliber. It's now time to consolidate and make sure that the whole is greater than the sum of the set parts.
H: And the final area for study is?
D: The fourth major thrust is perhaps the most fundamental. It concerns student access to faculty, an area Tuck has prided itself on for a long time. Meaningful faculty access requires not just a faculty with the right attitudes and the right stature in terms of their thought leadership but also good faculty-student ratios and the right mechanisms for interacting with students. The personal sharing of knowledge-creation processes with students in MBA programs is not highly developed, and I think it will be the new frontier for the best MBA programs. It touches on areas that most programs are drifting away from because of what we talked about earlier: the separation of the faculty's intellectual life from teaching at most schools. Students need a window into the way faculty tackle the challenges of knowledge creation. I believe that giving our students an intimate insight into that world would be very distinctive for Tuck.
H: So are you envisioning new kinds of courses, whereby Tuck students would interact with faculty more intensively on issues closely related to the faculty's research expertise?
D: I envision this exposure as a new kind of experiential learning, where the knowledge-creation process that takes up so much of our professors' time is the object of study.
H: Like the Tuck Global Consultancy and the First-Year Project, which has faculty as advisors?
D: Yes. But this would be a different dimension to MBA education, a pedagogical approach that would expose students to the deep analysis faculty do to unravel the mysteries of a field. It's analogous to a chemist's doing lab work before going out into the world—exposing people to research in a real way. One possible mechanism could be to have seminars that expose students directly to faculty knowledge creation and have faculty and students working in small-scale groups. This, of course, calls for more faculty members per student. We also have to make sure that such exposure has a practical dimension—I think that bringing alumni into that model would be part of it. We are one of the few schools in the world that has the opportunity to bring students and faculty even closer—it is unusual, and almost nobody is going in that direction. It would be undeniably good for students.
H: So we are undertaking a pretty broad strategy review, but there is no indication that the current model is broken in any sense.
D: No, not by a long shot. Our students are certainly at the very top of employer evaluations, and the demand for our graduates has never been higher. We can't be complacent, however.
H: And the MBA program is ranked very high?
D: Yes, the MBA program is ranked at the very top. But that doesn't mean that you can't make it better. Enzo Ferrari didn't stop developing his fabulous cars in 1968. He kept improving them no matter what, and we have to do that same thing.
H: You're calling these four thrusts Tuck 2012. Five years from now, when the strategy review is completed and implemented, what will Tuck in 2012 look like?
D: There is no doubt in my mind that our review of Tuck's global characteristics will lead to innovations in how we teach global material and that we will have to have more resources to do that. I believe that the core classes will be rearranged to some extent and there will be much more coordination among them. I think our leadership programs will be consolidated and will be more synergistic. And I think that Tuck will be viewed as the place to come if you want to do deep and personalized work with faculty and really learn how they are thinking about their fields. There may be other differences too: our deliberations are quite open-ended, and we don't know exactly what will be proposed or approved. I know for sure, however, that in 2012 Tuck will be populated with serious students who want superior knowledge of how the business world works. For those who want a small scale, a rural environment, a truly interactive and personal MBA program, and who want to be put on the path of principled leadership, Tuck will be the world-class school that provides them all.
Buying Into the Best
H: For a strategy review like this to be successful, you will need buy-in from faculty, in particular, and from overseers, alumni, and other supporters of the school. What is your take on the support and excitement for strategy review up to this point?
D: We have two alumni boards—the MBA advisory board and the board of overseers, each with 30 to 40 senior executives. Over the past year, we previewed this strategic review with them with increasing intensity. The number-one feedback comment that I've gotten is that it is a good thing to challenge the status quo. In the past couple of years, Tuck has broken all the records in the conventional sense in terms of success of a business school, but this process proves that we are thinking about the future and our major constituencies are getting more enthusiastic about the process. We are fortunate to have business leaders who know how dynamic the world is and who realize that we have to be changing to meet the challenges. So on balance, I think we've gotten good buy-in on the process.
H Are there committees or task forces involved?
D We have task forces and faculty committees, with high involvement by faculty, student, and alumni members. I've been through several strategy reviews, and I have learned that it takes time and you can't take shortcuts. You have to let people think about things and grow with the process through participation and involvement. I think there is excitement and enthusiasm from the faculty about Tuck's continuing its momentum on the faculty side. And there is student enthusiasm about having even closer involvement with faculty. Our alumni know that it takes a lot of support to deliver the highest-quality education, and they've proven it over and over with record levels of support.
H: What about your wonderful wife? Is she still happy in Hanover? She's always a great one to have a conversation with, and she has very strong feelings about what's going on in the world.
D: Mary Ellen loves Hanover, and she is as delighted as ever with the environment. She still gets a big kick out of being at alumni and student events, and she travels with me a lot—probably about 40 percent of the time. I'm always happy to see her with a crowd around her; she is a welcoming person with great personality and chemistry. And you are right, she is no shrinking violet when it comes to politics and social movements, so the conversations can get pretty lively. We both enjoy the alumni and student gatherings and so we've had a terrific time at Tuck.
H: Any summary comments?
D: I was very fortunate to be recruited here and to have been the steward of this great school for 12 years because I can't think of any business school that is more sincere about giving students a great learning experience. The faculty, the staff, and the alumni want students to prosper and go into the world to do great things. A dean does a lot of talking about the school he represents, and a Tuck dean has a relatively easy time of it because you can honestly say that everyone is doing their best to make it a great learning experience for the students. It is a rare and beautiful place, and it is an honor to serve it.
H: Thank you, Paul. It has been a great pleasure to work with you for these 12 years.
