Nan Morrison (MBA 1987) is CEO of the Council for Economic Education, based in New York City. In this video, conducted prior to the W50 celebration of women in the full-time MBA Program at HBS in 2013, she explains how her organization teaches school children lessons in making choices and tradeoffs, and how her current role compares with her career expectations when she graduated from HBS.

“I’m the CEO of the Council for Economic Education. We’re a national not-for-profit that teaches little kids about the real world through lessons in personal finance and economics. We do it by training the teachers. We provide professional development to 55,000 teachers across the country.

“I’ve been doing that for about two and a half years, after a long career in the private sector as a management consultant.

“I would say I have a good life; I have the ability to do the things that I want to do with my life. In fact, that’s one of the reasons why I took this job, because I feel like I can impart that kind of outlook and capability to little kids across the country, so that whatever they decide to do in their lives, they can make those choices themselves.

“When we filled out our 25th Reunion questionnaire, I actually finished and I thought, ‘Wow I’m really happy. This is a good thing and I’m a really fortunate person.’ So the expectations were a little fluffy, but it’s all kind of worked out. I would say that now I’m doing something not just that I like, but I love; that it’s much easier to get up in the morning and you just feel joy in the rest of your life.

“Look, all of us who go to HBS are going to spend a lot of our time ‘working,’ whatever that means to you. Doing something that you’re really passionate about and you care about is going to make all of the difference in how well you do, how that projects to the world, and how you feel about yourself every day. So I think that’s important.”

(Published April 2014)

Support the next generation of leaders Make a gift now

Post a Comment