DePaul Provided Foundation for CEO’s Success

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Frank S. Ptak (BUS ’65, DHL ’13)

Frank S. Ptak
Frank S. Ptak

My love for the city where I grew up and for DePaul, which came to my financial aid when my father died, will never end.”

RESIDENCE: Boca Raton, Fla.

OCCUPATION: I recently retired as chairman and CEO of Marmon Holdings Inc., a subsidiary of Berkshire Hathaway Inc. My job was to set the overall strategy for Marmon’s vast array of companies and develop sufficient management talent to implement that strategy successfully, and always with high integrity, trust and ethical behavior. Marmon is a highly decentralized, diversified industrial conglomerate with more than $8 billion in revenues in 2018. It comprises more than 100 businesses whose products range from railroad tank cars and platform trailers, to shopping carts and commercial beverage dispensers, to screws and work gloves. Berkshire Hathaway acquired Marmon in 2008, and having the opportunity to work directly for Berkshire CEO Warren Buffett was the delight of my entire career.

EDUCATION: My pursuit of a business career started at Chicago’s St. Rita High School, which offered one of the very few high school business curriculums. DePaul was very attractive to me with its high reputation in accounting and the near certainty of good job placement in the Chicago CPA firm market. This approach worked well for me, as I landed with Arthur Young & Co. immediately after graduation in 1965 and became a CPA.

MY BACKGROUND: I grew up in a highly principled and hardworking family on the South Side of Chicago. My father was a regional manager for the A&P grocery store chain. All of us, including my three siblings, worked hard to help our parents make ends meet in a typical lower middle-class family; I had a paper route starting at age 12. We didn’t have a lot of amenities then, but it was a family full of love and we always tried to have fun.

CAREER HIGHLIGHTS: After a five-year accounting career, I got my first real taste of business working as a stock market analyst and investor for two years. I went on to a series of management jobs during five years with Sara Lee Corp. Then I got my greatest career break with Illinois Tool Works, one of the most highly regarded American operating companies. I spent 30 wonderful years learning and growing, and retired as its vice chairman at the end of 2005. I joined Marmon as CEO in January 2006 after a two-week retirement. In retrospect, I guess I just enjoyed running industrial companies too much to give it up. I relished the opportunity to build something financially strong enough to take good care of a company’s three constituencies—its employees, customers, and owners.

I have watched many employees grow and develop into outstanding contributors to this cause, and I am very proud of the fact that I had something to do with their success. This is my ultimate joy and sense of accomplishment. I am very active in many Chicago philanthropic activities, including DePaul (as an Executive Committee member of the Driehaus College of Business Advisory Council) and Junior Achievement of Chicago. My love for the city where I grew up and for DePaul, which came to my financial aid when my father died, will never end.

Advice for Recent Graduates

  1. Do something you love.
  2. Don’t be afraid to take a chance.
  3. Strive to work with strong mentors who give you your chance to really take off.
  4. Never compromise on your integrity and ethics.
  5. Never forget to give back as you achieve your own success.

A Leader for Career Access

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Bevon Joseph
Bevon Joseph

The whole motto of Greenwood is you can’t be what you can’t see. These kids come to us with almost no social capital.”

An immigrant from Trinidad, graduate business student Bevon Joseph has forged his own path in tech, finance and nonprofit management since coming to the United States at 18 years old.

Joseph is founder and CEO of Greenwood Project, a nonprofit he launched three years ago to help academically talented youth from underresourced Chicago communities gain access to the finance industry. Thanks to Joseph’s connections with firms in New York and Chicago, the Greenwood Project has collaborated with about 30 financial and tech companies, including Goldman Sachs, NASDAQ, Google and LinkedIn.

Joseph joined the world of finance in 1996 when he began working as an IT services provider on a New York trading floor, and later worked for some of the city’s largest Wall Street exchanges and financial services firms. He moved to Chicago, eventually working his way up to be a chief technology officer for a hedge fund—all with just an associate’s degree in computer electronic technology and a high school diploma from Trinidad.

Fascinated by the passion he witnessed on trading floors, Joseph noticed the lack of diversity among employees. “Most of the time I would be one of (a few) or the only person of color at a firm,” says Joseph, who runs the Greenwood Project with his wife, Elois. “I was always curious why other students who look like me weren’t given that opportunity.”

In 2014, Joseph enrolled in DePaul’s School for New Learning and became the first in his family to earn a bachelor’s degree. Joseph developed the idea for the Greenwood Project through a class assignment that challenged him to create a social media campaign around a social cause. After his professor encouraged him to pursue the idea, Joseph approached top-level financial executives he knew to gauge their interest in funding internships for students from low-income communities. His nonprofit began taking shape as interest from companies grew.

“They (students) are smart, they’re doing well in school, staying out of trouble, getting good grades, but they don’t know anyone who works in finance,” says Joseph, who now is enrolled in the Driehaus College of Business’s combined bachelor’s and master’s in entrepreneurship program. “The whole motto of Greenwood is you can’t be what you can’t see. These kids come to us with almost no social capital.”

The nonprofit works with high school juniors through recent college graduates. High school students attend, free of charge, the Summer Financial Institute, a six-week program that helps them build soft skills and financial literacy. The students also visit a different company each day of the program, in both New York and Chicago. In addition, Greenwood hosts Women in Wall Street student networking events in Chicago that feature panel discussions by female executives at top firms.

To help fund the nonprofit, Joseph manages a for-profit arm of Greenwood that charges companies to have access to recruit students who have been involved with the Greenwood Project.

“Running your own business, whether it’s nonprofit or for-profit, is a 24/7 job,” Joseph says. “But for me it doesn’t feel like work, just because we see the results and the impact that it’s having. And it’s changing the lives not just of the students, but their family and community. So I think that’s my motivation to keep doing this.”

More student leader profiles:

A Leader on Campus

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Olena Cruz
Olena Cruz (Photo by Kathy Hillegonds)

I love building excitement among people and bringing them together to do more than they would have been able to do individually. I am a big believer that together we can succeed even more than on our own.”

Marketing, chess and salsa dancing are disparate talents Olena Cruz pursues with the diligence and boundless curiosity that has made her a force to be reckoned with.

Cruz, who graduates in June with an MBA in marketing, has been instrumental in turning the Kellstadt Marketing Group (KMG) into one of the most active student organizations in DePaul’s business school. During her one-year tenure as KMG president, the organization sponsored 16 events that collectively attracted participation from more than 1,000 students, faculty members and Chicago marketing professionals.

She is most proud of convincing Microsoft to work with KMG to create a new case competition at DePaul. “Our idea was to get a real-world business scenario that would allow students to pitch their strategic recommendations and apply business concepts they have learned in class,” she says. “We had such great engagement. Microsoft came to campus, and students, professors and the president of the university all came together to support this event, which showcased the talent of students here at DePaul.”

Cruz says her drive comes from her mother, Lubov, an immigrant from Ukraine. “She helped build my work ethic. She started her own cleaning business in Chicago, not knowing the language or many people. She’s not only an entrepreneur; she put me and my brother through college as first-generation graduates in the family. I am very proud of my mom.” Cruz’s father died of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis when Cruz was 20, and every year since she has participated in fundraising walks to find a cure for the neurodegenerative disease.

Olena Cruz and Associate Professor of Marketing Zafar Iqbal
Olena Cruz served as president of the Kellstadt Marketing Group, one of the most active student business groups on campus. Cruz helped organize the annual 2018 KMG Symposium, which was also attended by Associate Professor of Marketing Zafar Iqbal (right). (Photo by Kathy Hillegonds)

During her undergraduate years at Northwestern University, Cruz, who speaks four languages, studied international relations. “Originally, I thought I would go into diplomacy. But I soon realized that I can apply those skills to business, because now every company has a global presence.” After graduating, she worked as a sales strategy coordinator at Beam Suntory, a premium spirits company. At DePaul, her curiosity led her to the field of big data analytics. She now works as a solutions analyst at IRI, which uses predictive analytics to help clients develop customer strategies.

Cruz knows how to make the right moves not only in her career, but also on the chessboard and the dance floor. She played chess competitively in high school and won the National Girls Chess Championship in 2006. A semiprofessional salsa dancer, Cruz won first place with her partner at the Chicago International Salsa Congress two years ago.

Cruz uses her dancing talent to empower others as a founding member of Inspiración Dance Chicago, a Latin dance organization that seeks to enrich the lives of young people through dance. “We teach youth to express themselves in a healthy way, to collaborate in teams, and to find creative outlets for mentorship and development.”

Of her wide-ranging success as a leader, Cruz says, “I love building excitement among people and bringing them together to do more than they would have been able to do individually. I am a big believer that together we can succeed even more than on our own.”

More student leader profiles:

A Leader in the Community

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Kevin Felisme
Kevin Felisme (Photo by Kathy Hillegonds)

That’s what inspires me and drives me—not just to be a leader, but to work with people and support them. That’s what we’re called to do as humans— support each other, love each other and be better people.”

MBA student Kevin Felisme has been living in Chicago for just four years, but his passion for improving the community in his adopted hometown runs deep.

A native of Manchester, N.H., Felisme delivered the TEDxDePaul talk “Reimagine Chicago: Power to the People,” in which he proposed using economic development to revitalize the city’s low-income communities. He hopes to develop programs, supported by either public or private dollars, that will allow neighborhood residents to own and operate businesses within the community.

“When I look at low-income, African-American communities in Chicago, I see a lack of economic development and businesses that are owned by the people within those neighborhoods,” Felisme says. “I believe that if we have the ability to control the economics in our communities, they should have businesses that are run by us, who cater to us and who will inspire people to start somewhere and say, ‘Hey, this is our foundation.’”

Growing up in a single-parent household where money was tight, Felisme first visited Chicago in 2014 during an alternative spring break trip as an undergraduate student at American University. The trip took students to tour various organizations, including Mercy Home for Boys and Girls, a therapeutic residential facility for youth. Despite having a full-time job waiting for him in Washington, D.C., Felisme was moved by the organization’s mission and decided to relocate to Chicago and work for the organization as a youth care worker.

Kevin Felisme, an MBA student, presents his talk, “Reimagine Chicago: Power to the People,” at TEDxDePaulUniversity in the Lincoln Park Student Center.
Kevin Felisme presents his talk, “Reimagine Chicago: Power to the People,” at TEDxDePaulUniversity in the Lincoln Park Student Center. Through the theme, Reimagine, 11 diverse presenters provoked stimulating conversation on powerful topics that invited the audience to consider questions and subjects in a new light. (DePaul University/Jamie Moncrief)

“I’ve always thought that it was important that if you want to work with people in the community, you actually have to live there,” says Felisme, who lives in one of the city’s South Side neighborhoods. “It’s important to know who your neighbors are, not just to come in and help and then leave. You should get to know people because you’re in kinship.”

Now, Felisme is a coordinator for Mercy Home, where he manages the nonprofit’s volunteer program. In 2016, he launched an open basketball gym program through the Port Ministries, a nonprofit on the South Side that serves those in need. He’s also one of the basketball coaches for Mercy Home’s Hoops to Homework League, which partners with the Chicago Bulls to boost young men’s sportsmanship.

DePaul’s Vincentian values and connection to the city inspired Felisme to enroll at the Kellstadt Graduate School of Business in the fall of 2017. Earning an MBA degree in entrepreneurship and management moves him closer to his goal of creating businesses in low-income Chicago neighborhoods, he says.

“That’s what inspires me and drives me—not just to be a leader, but to work with people and support them. That’s what we’re called to do as human —support each other, love each other and be better people.”

More student leader profiles:

A Leader on the Court

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Rebeca Mitrea
Rebeca Mitrea (Photo by Kathy Hillegonds)

By being a leader, you really have more avenues to help people. As long as it’s reflected in helping others and making an impact in the community, I think really that’s what inspires me.”

When Rebeca Mitrea moved to the United States to play on DePaul University’s women’s Division I tennis team, she was thousands of miles away from home. Mitrea was born and raised in Romania, where she began playing tennis at just five years of age. At 16, she was the No. 1 ranked tennis player in Romania and ranked 22nd in Europe.

After she joined DePaul on a full tennis scholarship, her list of accomplishments quickly grew. Mitrea became the all-time DePaul record holder for most overall tennis wins, most singles wins and most singles wins in one season. While serving as the team captain for two years, she earned several awards, including the Intercollegiate Tennis Association Cissie Leary Award for Sportsmanship, which is given to an NCAA Division I women’s player who displays inspiring dedication and commitment to her team.

Mitrea originally majored in health sciences but then transferred to the Driehaus College of Business to study finance. In 2016, she graduated summa cum laude with an undergraduate finance degree, and last year she completed her DePaul MBA in finance and international business. She now works as a credit risk analyst at HSBC Bank in Chicago and is active in its employee group, Balance, which advocates for the recruitment, development and engagement of a gender-balanced workforce.

Rebeca Mitrea playing for DePaul University’s women’s Division I tennis team
Romania native Rebeca Mitrea was ranked the No. 1 tennis player in her home country. At DePaul , she became the all-time DePaul record holder for most overall tennis wins, most singles wins and most singles wins in one season. (Photo courtesy of DePaul Athletics)

Despite living far away from her family, Mitrea says DePaul came to feel like home. “It would help that I would go home to Romania in the summers and the winters during the breaks, but for me DePaul was family,” she says.

Mitrea credits the Athletics Department with fostering a welcoming and supportive environment for its student- athletes to become leaders. Staff members, who knew all of the athletes by name, would frequently ask Mitrea how she was doing. The department also offered a team of academic advisors, as well as other resources, to help student-athletes balance their academic workload with the demands of playing tennis.

“One of the greatest things that tennis has helped me achieve is being a higher performer, doing a number of things at the same time and doing them to the best of my abilities—not just doing 70 percent of one thing, but giving it my all with everything I did,” says Mitrea, who graduated valedictorian from high school in her home country. “It really forces you to do your best.”

Mitrea now plays tennis whenever she can and hopes to help DePaul’s tennis team as much as possible. She also plans to become a mentor in DePaul’s Alumni Sharing Knowledge Network, which connects DePaul students with alumni.

“By being a leader, you really have more avenues to help people,” she says. “As long as it’s reflected in helping others and making an impact in the community, I think really that’s what inspires me. As long as I could help all of the other girls on my team, that’s what really made me feel fulfilled and happy with all that I was doing.”

More student leader profiles:

From Student to Scholar of Work-Life Balance

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Grace Lemmon
Associate Professor Grace Lemmon. (Photo by Kathy Hillegonds)

 

I try to make students see how my research is relevant to their own lives. I advise students, if you have a particular vision of what work-life balance should be, that absolutely needs to be part of the conversation when you are interviewing for a job to make sure there’s a good fit.”

It was “a disagreement with American work culture” that led Grace Lemmon (BUS ’06) to choose the intersection of work-life balance and employee engagement as her academic specialty.

“The culture we’ve established in the U.S. is go, go, go, and there’s no time for recovery or adequate stress management,” says Lemmon, an associate professor who teaches courses in management and leadership. “It’s become the default to be overwhelming busy at work, and it’s frustrating that that’s the default.”

Lemmon’s most recent research focuses on low-skill workers, a population often ignored in discussions of work-life balance and engagement. “The big issue is that employers tend to treat low-skill, low-wage workers as if they have a problem if they are disengaged at work. Yet, there’s often nothing about their work that would engender engagement,” she says. “My suggestion is that organizations with low-skill workers not only pay them enough, but also have clear paths for building additional skills on the clock. If organizations truly believe in the up-by-the-bootstraps (American) dream, then they need to provide the kind of support that white-collar workers take for granted.”

Lemmon is clearly passionate about shaping leadership practices through her award-winning scholarship and teaching. But back when the Glenwood, Ill., native was deciding where to go to college, an academic career wasn’t even on her radar.

“I had no idea that those avenues would be open for me,” she recalls. “My family culture was not one where there was a lot of education. It seemed like that was what other people do—wealthy people, in particular—but not me.”

Lemmon applied to only one college—DePaul—after visiting the Lincoln Park Campus to attend a concert. She majored in marketing, but soon realized it wasn’t her calling. She did notice, however, that her professors “were immersed in their classrooms and energized by their jobs,” she says. “It made me curious about academia as a whole.”

A faculty mentor convinced Lemmon that her curiosity could lead to a rewarding career. “I was lucky enough to work as a research assistant for management faculty member Patrick Murphy, and he brought me on to an academic paper,” she explains. “He gave me some data, academic papers to read and a small section to write. He made me co-author of the paper, which opened the door to graduate school—literally. He took me over to UIC (University of Illinois at Chicago), knocked on doors of professors he knew and got them to talk with me. Patrick took me under his wing and championed me in a way that I hadn’t experienced before. It was incredibly touching and meaningful, and completely changed the course of my life.”

Lemmon earned a PhD in business administration from UIC, and in 2012, she jumped at the chance to return to DePaul as a faculty member. She feels a strong connection to the student body because of DePaul’s commitment to educate students who come from less-privileged backgrounds.

Lemmon is now the one taking students under her wing, including future academics enrolled in DePaul’s Doctorate in Business Administration program, for which she serves as an associate director. She also shares her work-life balance research with her undergraduate and graduate students to help them make good career decisions.

“I try to make students see how my research is relevant to their own lives,” she says. “I advise students, if you have a particular vision of what work-life balance should be, that absolutely needs to be part of the conversation when you are interviewing for a job to make sure there’s a good fit.”

By Robin Florzak

Professor Shares Out-of-This-World Advice for Leadership

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Neal Outland
Neal Outland, a DePaul management and entrepreneurship faculty member. | Photo by Kathy Hillegonds

Like NASA, the business world operates in team-based environments. Whether these business-team environments are competitive, volatile or uncertain, they share many similarities with space crews.”

Captain Kirk of the Starship Enterprise was mostly a good leader, according to Neal Outland, a DePaul management and entrepreneurship faculty member who has researched the leadership qualities of real-life astronauts. While not a Trekkie himself, Outland says from what he has seen on the television show, Captain Kirk exemplifies traits shared by successful leaders. Kirk understood the strengths of his crew members (e.g., Scottie in engineering, Dr. Spock in science) and how their expertise could help the team succeed, although the captain occasionally put his team in danger because of his own brashness.

Outland, the winner of a 2017 Illinois Space Grant Fellowship, has worked on two NASA-funded studies with DePaul faculty to understand the individual qualities needed by future astronauts. His current research focuses on the organizational effectiveness of workplace teams and is inspired by his exploration of how astronaut teams develop shared understanding.

“Even though NASA teams operate in some of the most solitary, stressful and extremely dangerous environments, like outer space, the NASA research relates to the business world in many ways,” says Outland. “Like  NASA, the business world operates in team-based environments. Whether these business-team environments are competitive, volatile or uncertain, they share many similarities with space crews.”

These similarities involve having strong leadership roles, defined task structures and team self-management, he says. NASA and business teams also face communication issues (or, in space, a lack of immediate communication) that force leaders to make important decisions affecting the group’s success. Based on his research, Outland identifies the following qualities and tips that can help any type of leader and team blast off.

Qualities of Good Leaders

  • Self-management. This is the No. 1 quality of a good leader, according to Outland, because it’s difficult to lead or inspire others if you cannot lead yourself. His advice: think critically about yourself and your actions to understand your strengths and weaknesses.
  • Ability to share the vision. Good leaders task people with assembling smaller pieces of the puzzle while motivating them to see their part in completing the full picture.
  • Intelligence. Higher intelligence generally affords a leader the ability to make sense of situations and quickly process large amounts of information associated with a particular decision. Leaders must have a deep understanding of decision outcomes and how they contribute to achieving the vision. Leaders also are continuous learners, taking time to develop their skills and remain up to date on best practices.
  • Excellent soft skills. Leaders don’t do all the work themselves; they get work done through others by communicating their vision and motivating individuals to work together to achieve it. Effective communication skills, tailoring interactions to the individual and managing relationships well are essential for leaders.

Assembling an Effective Team

Team success depends upon how and why the team was formed, Outland says. Based on his research, factors that are important for forming teams include:

  • Understanding the context of the team’s work. The amount of work a team may have to do, the complexity of that work and how often the work situation may change are important factors to consider when forming teams.
  • Selecting people who will fit well together and in the work context. Choose people who can handle the work and effectively interact with others.
  • Creating a supportive environment. Teams need coaching to uncover effective and ineffective patterns of interaction. Leaders need to facilitate discussions about conflicts that may diminish team effectiveness, as well as ensure that teams have all the resources necessary to accomplish their work.

Getting Past the “Third Quarter Phenomenon”

In their NASA research, Outland and his colleagues noticed a pattern affecting some missions in which team performance started to decline once the mission passed the halfway mark. Performance lagged when team members knew they would soon be free from the close quarters and crew members they had been interacting with for months. This change in team behavior is called “third quarter phenomenon.” For teams in the business world, third quarter phenomenon can go in either direction— triggering a slowdown or a flurry of positive activity.

Whether you are flying to the moon or managing a terrestrial work project, Outland’s advice for managing third quarter phenomenon includes:

  • Ensure that your team knows success is an option. Teams and individuals need to know that what they are working for is worthwhile. When feeling down, many will look for reasons to not continue, especially if they believe success won’t happen. The leader’s job is to ensure that the team knows that success is still an option.
  • Reinstill the vision. Reconnect the team to the ultimate goal of the project. Replay the motivations that sold the project or task to the team in the first place.
  • Boost confidence. Remind team members of previous successes, lessons learned and progress toward the ultimate goal. This is important, Outland believes, because it is rare for anyone or any team to do this reflection on their own.

By following this guidance, teams have an opportunity to boldly go where no one has gone before.

By Andrew Zamorski

Faculty Books Offer Tips for Building Relationships and Service-Oriented Work Cultures

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The Relationship Diet book cover and author Jim MoureyThe Relationship Diet: How to Create Happy, Healthy, and Valuable Relationships (At Home, At Work, and Everywhere You Go)

By James A. Mourey, assistant professor of marketing
(James A. Mourey, 2018)

Synopsis:

Mourey combines 50 years’ worth of social psychology research with more than a decade of corporate consulting experience “to provide a novel relationship framework that will change the way you think about and engage in relationships with others.”

Three Takeaways

  1. The same variables predict all healthy, successful relationships, whether they are professional, romantic or friendly.
  2. Successful relationships depend on four core “flavors”: direct communication, interdependence, enduring commitment and trust. Fifteen “ingredients,” including amiability, confidence, honesty and openness, build these relationship flavors.
  3. The word “diet” in the book’s title comes from the Greek word diaita, meaning “a way of life.” Your way of life, including your career, can be improved significantly by building relationship skills, Mourey writes.

“The Relationship Diet includes a diagnostic tool, sort of a ‘strengths finder for relationships,’ that reveals your relationship-building strengths and weaknesses, so you know what to leverage and what to improve,” Mourey says. “It provides a useful way for managers to create high-functioning teams based on knowledge about how team members are likely to relate and where teams are most likely to have relationship problems.”

By Robin Florzak

Dan Sachs and The Million Dollar Greeting: Today's Best Practices for Profit, Customer Retention, and a Happy Workplace

The Million Dollar Greeting: Today’s Best Practices for Profit, Customer Retention, and a Happy Workplace

By Dan Sachs, instructor, School of Hospitality Leadership
(Apollo Publishers, 2018)

Synopsis

Sachs travels across the United States and Canada interviewing leaders of consistently profitable large and small companies who tie their success to exceptional customer service and employees who rank their organizations among the top places to work in North America.

Three Takeaways

  1. Creating a great customer service culture begins with your employees—be accountable and authentic with them. It goes a long way toward building a team that prioritizes the customer experience.
  2. Great service experiences start with empathy and the ability to put ourselves in another’s shoes and then act on this understanding to change somebody’s day.
  3. Exceptional leaders understand that having a vision is not enough. Leadership requires turning a vision into a culture that engages both the employees and the community.

“When I started teaching at DePaul, I couldn’t find a book that integrated a philosophy focused on hospitality as a tool to create great customer service experiences, so I decided to write it myself,” Sachs says. “Products and processes can be duplicated, but the way you treat people, the type of culture you create and the values you champion are unique. Building a business that lasts is all about creating emotional connections with customers through hospitality.”

By Andrew Zamorski

What Will Be Your Legacy?

jlansber Giving Back
Susan Coe Heitsch
Susan Coe Heitsch (Photo by Kathy Hillegonds)

 

Susan Coe Heitsch (BUS ’80) learned a few life lessons during the seven years she worked in the trust marketing group at a major financial institution.

“If you don’t have a will, the state determines how your property will be distributed—and it’s not necessarily what you’d have chosen,” says Heitsch, a communications executive in the financial industry. “And if you do have a will, you really should update it every five years because I guarantee that something in your life has changed.”

While discussing their future, Heitsch and her husband, Gary, decided to incorporate philanthropy into their plans by making a substantial planned gift to benefit future marketing students at DePaul.

“If you went to college in the ’80s or ’90s, now is the time to think about the legacy you’re going to leave,” Heitsch says. “If DePaul helped to get you where you are today, maybe there’s a way you want to give back.”

Heitsch has been giving back ever since she graduated. She was active in Delta Mu Delta, the business honor society, as a student. After graduation, she organized the society’s annual membership drive and induction ceremony for several years until her daughter was born.

In 2009, Sue Fogel, then chair of the Department of Marketing, invited her to be an inaugural member of DePaul’s Marketing Advisory Council. Heitsch accepted.

“I did so because DePaul was like family to me, very encouraging and very nurturing,” says Heitsch. “Even as an evening student, my professors were accessible and truly cared about their students. I got to know several of my teachers and maintained contact with them over the years.”

“Serving on a council is another good way to give back to the university while making some great connections,” Heitsch says. “To network with people online is one thing. To spend two or three hours with them several times a year, brainstorming ideas and making them come to life, is a far more meaningful way to connect.”

Learn more how you can making a lasting impact at DePaul.

Richard H. Driehaus Honored as an Influential Leader

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Richard H Driehaus
Richard H. Driehaus

Richard H. Driehaus (BUS ’65, MBA ’70, DHL ’02) is among 33 business school graduates worldwide named to the 2019 Class of Influential Leaders by the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business (AACSB), the international business school accreditation organization.

Each honoree was chosen for being a “shining example of how AACSB accredited business schools prepare their graduates to create lasting impact in their communities, industries and around the world,” AACSB says on its Influential Leader website, which features profiles of the leaders. Driehaus, founder of Driehaus Capital Management and a philanthropist, was praised for his role as a momentum investing pioneer, his generosity to DePaul’s business college and his philanthropy benefiting arts, culture and economic empowerment programs, primarily in Chicago.

“AACSB’s honor is a tribute to Richard Driehaus’ transformational role as a finance industry visionary and generous benefactor for our business college and community,” says Misty Johanson, dean of the Driehaus College of Business. “We’re proud that Richard is a Triple Demon alumnus of our college.”

Read more about Driehaus and the 2019 Class of Influential Leaders at aacsb.edu/influential-leaders.