SAHLMAN: Taking an industry-specific interest in alumni relations.

Photo by STUART CAHILL

As the new senior associate dean for External Relations, Professor Bill Sahlman, an expert on entrepreneurship, brings over thirty years of experience with the HBS community to his latest role. “I’m looking forward to working with the School to develop closer relationships with alumni throughout their careers,” he says. “In my opinion, we could learn more about the paths alumni take when they leave HBS.

“My goal is to gain a better understanding of the industry-specific challenges our alumni face,” Sahlman continues. “How and why do our graduates gain leadership positions? We can track the way alumni progress throughout their careers and use that information to feed into the School’s curricular development. What can we do to affect a person’s career trajectory and effectiveness while they’re still at HBS? How can we better serve our alumni once they’ve left?”

The upcoming centennial celebration in 2008 also presents an opportunity to reflect upon the past and to begin to consider the future, Sahlman notes. “Our alumni will be at the core of that process,” he says. “Over the past 100 years, the HBS faculty has contributed important ideas to the study of business. But the manifestation of those ideas is in what the alumni and the people touched by our alumni end up doing with that knowledge.”

Sahlman (MBA ’75), who assumed his new role July 1, holds a Ph.D. in business economics from Harvard University. A specialist in the investment and financing decisions made in new ventures, Sahlman developed the second-year elective Entrepreneurial Finance and has taught the course to over 4,000 students since its introduction in 1985. In June, he led a faculty delegation to China to meet alumni, government officials, and other members of the entrepreneurial community in the world’s fastest-growing economy. The Dimitri V. d’Arbeloff MBA Class of 1955 Professor of Business Administration, Sahlman succeeds Professor Mal Salter (MBA ’64), who recently retired.

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