In the middle of her second year at HBS, Ilene Lang sat in the MBA Program Office trying to convince an administrator to let her take a documentary film course at MIT for credit. As she made her pitch, then Associate Dean of Student Affairs Joseph J. O'Donnell (MBA '71), who was already acquainted with the feisty Radcliffe history and literature major, overheard the exchange and popped his head in on the meeting. "Give this woman what she wants!" he exclaimed enthusiastically.

O'Donnell knew that indulging Lang's independent spirit was a good investment - a fact that many of her colleagues have similarly discovered over the past 25 years. By supporting Lang's creativity and unconventional thinking, high-tech startups and established computer firms alike have found their assets turning to gold under her fingers.

"I've always gotten support, no matter how weird my request," says the energetic and upbeat Lang, who has become one of the most successful women executives in the high-tech industry. "What's helped," she says, "has been knowing I've earned a seat at the table because of my previous hard work and accomplishments."

And those accomplishments are impressive. Fresh out of Radcliffe in 1965, the Chicago native began her career as a technical writer for several Boston-area computer consulting companies before deciding to pursue business school. Her entrepreneurial streak emerged the summer after her first year at HBS, when she cofounded Frameworks, the first do-it-yourself picture-framing shop on the East Coast. After graduating, she started a custom photo lab in Cambridge and in 1977 began raising a family. Lang returned to high tech in 1982, when she joined Symbolics, the emerging leader in computer systems for artificial intelligence. "It was the perfect place for someone like me who had 'different' ideas," says Lang, who eventually became vice president of software and marketing. The company was also flexible - and smart - enough to allow Lang, already the mother of two children, to bring her third newborn to the office; in her nearly six years with Symbolics, the supermom helped lift the firm's revenues from $1 million to $120 million.

From there, Lang led a string of turnarounds and product launches with software companies. In 1993 she signed on with Lotus Development Corporation. The company gave her free rein to develop and ship all of its software products outside the United States, which amounted to 50 percent of its entire business. Again Lang made good - under her leadership Lotus's international products outpaced those of all competitors, including industry giant Microsoft, on cost and time-to-market.

In 1995 she joined Digital Equipment Corporation and led the creation of AltaVista Internet Software Inc., an Internet search and software subsidiary. In the first year alone, she grew AltaVista's popularity, brand awareness, and revenues, driving it ahead of competitors such as Lycos and Excite. In the summer of 1997, however, after Digital abandoned plans to spin off the company, Lang resigned. "My vision was to take AltaVista public," she explains. "I don't believe in staying in a job where you can't be passionate about the results."

Lang has spent the past year mainly tending to personal business and chairing her 25th HBS reunion. She has also focused on her children, aged 21, 18, and 15, the oldest of whom won a bronze medal for the U.S. women's short-track speedskating team at this year's world championships. "For the first time in my life it was nice just being a mom,Ó Lang says. In July she became CEO of BasiX.com, the first firm to sell household utilities to homes and small businesses over the Internet. With her break clearly over, this tech trekker is back out blazing trails.

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