1992 Business and the Environment…
In keeping with our goal to remain current with world business topics, the Indiana University Graduate School of Business Administration introduced the 1992 GBC on Business and the Environment. This event proved to be an excellent summit on the environmental responsibilities that accompany business leadership.
Co-Chairs Marty Cross and Eric Hendrix led our debate on this topic, which was introduced by Frank Popoff, President and CEO of Dow Chemical Company. Friday’s highlights included an innovative round-table panel discussion moderated by Harvard Law School professor Charles Ogletree. Ogletree crafted a fictitious developing country/big business environmental scenario and prompted the multi-disciplinary panel of executives to role-play reactions and responses. This panel energized the audience and created a superb catalyst for our ensuing breakout sessions with other top executives.
Friday’s banquet at the Bloomington Convention center featured the second annual Student Leadership Award. Recipient Jeffrey D. Paquette of the UCLA-Berkeley Haas School of Business increased awareness of the Haas Public/Non-Profit program and gave his fellow classmates a sense of the impact of community volunteerism by conceiving and executing a student “public service day”. The Haas Serve-A-Thon. Almost half of the Haas student body volunteered approximately 1,000 hours and executed 14 major projects ranging from construction of an earthquake-proof storage shed for a childcare center to painting new offices for the Sierra Club of Oakland. All this because one leader decided to “get involved”
Our Friday banquet and dancing soon gave way to Saturday workshops. At Indiana, the Graduate Business Foundation pioneered a new workshop and gathered student body presidents to converge on the key leadership challenges shared by most schools…and was a resounding success. Delegates Jean Cusick from NY Stern and Kathy Stanley from Illinois joined the GBF as volunteers.
Hoo! Hoo! Hoosiers!
We could not leave Indiana without experiencing the spirit that has led the Hoosiers to several national championships. And what an opportunity we had! Saturday night featured a dinner and pub-crawl in downtown Bloomington during the NCAA semifinal basketball match up between Indiana and Michigan. The actual event was televised from Minneapolis, but our audience was live! Most delegates had never experience such an occasion; we were literally taken up in a sea of red! As for the contest…better luck next year, Hoosiers. A thousand thanks to Indiana, and onward…
