Three new endowed chairs
for Stanford Business School; four other faculty named to
fill current chairs
Three new endowed chairs
have been created at the Stanford Business School. In
addition, four faculty members have been named to
existing endowed chairs.
The Jeffrey S. Skoll
Professorship was created with a gift from the Internet
executive who received his MBA from the Business School
in 1995. First recipient of the chair is Professor Garth
Saloner, who was instrumental in creating the school's
Center for Electronic Business and Commerce and who
serves as codirector.
The first of three Adams
Distinguished Professorships in Management was
established with a gift from the Adams Family Foundation,
founded by Stephen and Denise Adams of Santa Barbara.
Stephen Adams is a 1962 Stanford MBA graduate. Professor
Robert Wilson, who has created successful auction systems
used by the state of California and the Federal
Communications Commission, is the first to hold an Adams
chair.
The David S. and Ann M.
Barlow Professorship in Management was established with a
gift from David and Ann Barlow of Wellesley, Mass. David
Barlow is a 1985 MBA graduate of the Business School. The
first chair holder is Professor David P. Baron, a leading
scholar in the field of political economy.
Michael Spence, an
economist who stepped down last fall after nine years as
dean to return to teaching, has been named to the Atholl
McBean Professorship. He is the second faculty member to
hold the chair.
In addition, three other
faculty members have been named to chairs for the first
time. They are Anat Admati, a professor of finance and
economics who has been named to the Joseph McDonald
Professorship; Roderick Kramer, a professor of
organizational behavior named to the William R. Kimball
Professorship; and Joel Podolny, a professor of strategic
management and organizational behavior named to the
William R. Timken Professorship. All the appointments
will be effective in September 2000.
Dean Robert L. Joss
announced the new chairs and the chair holders at a
faculty reception on Feb. 29. "These chairs are an
important acknowledgment of the academic work done at the
Business School," said Joss. "In presenting the
gifts that created these chairs, the donors honor the
school with their generous support for the research and
teaching done here. The school's 43 endowed chairs allow
us to give special recognition to the outstanding work of
specific faculty members who are leaders in their fields
and whose work shapes the world's understanding of
important issues."
In creating the endowed
chair that bears his name, Jeffrey Skoll asked that it go
to a faculty member whose accomplishments and research
focus on entrepreneurship, business innovation and/or the
significance of electronic technologies in business
practice. The first chair holder, Garth Saloner, who will
be known as the Jeffrey S. Skoll Professor of Electronic
Commerce, Strategic Management and Economics, was a
founding member of Stanford's successful Computer
Industry Project. During Winter Quarter, Saloner and
colleague Michael Spence successfully introduced a new
course on electronic commerce that included preparing 14
new cases illustrating the effects of electronic commerce
on business in areas such as logistics, auctions,
pricing, alliances and global strategies.
Skoll founded two
companies in Toronto before attending the Business
School. He later became the first employee of eBay Inc.,
a firm that has created a new market for one-to-one
trading in an auction format on the Web. Skoll is among
the youngest graduates to support the university with a
major gift. He also pledged an additional gift to cofound
the Center for Electronic Business and Commerce.
The gift from the Adams
Family Foundation will be used to create three Adams
Distinguished Professorships of Management that will be
awarded to the school's most eminent scholars,
individuals of unusual stature who have distinguished
themselves at Stanford, nationally and internationally
through contributions to their academic disciplines and
their teaching.
Denise Adams is an artist.
Stephen Adams is chairman of Affinity Group Holdings of
Ventura, Calif. One activity connected to Affinity is the
million-member Good Sam Club for recreational vehicle
owners. Affinity Group Holdings also includes brokerage,
insurance, thrift and loan, and retail companies. One of
Stephen Adams' four sons received his MBA from the
Business School in 1991.
Robert Wilson, who will be
the first to hold an Adams chair, has been a major
contributor to auction designs and competitive bidding
strategies. He was one of the creators of the innovative
auction system used by the Federal Communications
Commission to sell radio spectrum licenses for wireless
technologies and also the auction system used by the
state of California as it deregulated its electric power
industry. He is a principal of the Stanford Center on
Conflict and Negotiation and an expert on game theory and
its applications to business and economics.
The third new chair was
created by David S. and Ann M. Barlow. David Barlow has
had a distinguished career in the pharmaceutical
industry. He spearheaded the turnaround of the Armour
Pharmaceutical Division of Rhône-Poulenc Rorer before
joining Sepracor to lead its Pharmaceutical Division's
growth into a fully integrated company. In late 1999 he
left Sepracor, where he had served as president of
pharmaceuticals. Ann Barlow is involved in several
projects concerning education for children. In creating
the Barlow Professorship, the couple expressed a
preference that the chair go to a faculty member involved
in work in strategic public policy -- the non-market
environment.
The first faculty member
to hold the chair, David Baron, was instrumental in
creating the school's interdisciplinary doctoral field of
political economics. He received the doctoral students'
first Faculty Distinguished Service Award in 1999. Baron
has conducted research in the decision sciences, finance,
economics and political science. Writing extensively on
economics of regulation and on political economy, he has
published several books and more than 60 articles in
scholarly journals.
Michael Spence, who will
fill the Atholl McBean Professorship, served as dean of
the Business School from 1990 to 1999. He holds the John
Bates Clark Medal, which recognizes contributions to
economic thought, and is a fellow of the American
Economic Association and a member of the American Academy
of Arts and Sciences.
The first-time chair
holders represent the academic disciplines of finance and
economics, organizational behavior and strategic
management. Anat Admati is a finance theorist whose
research involves market microstructure and trading with
asymmetric information. She has received a National
Science Foundation grant, an Alfred Sloan fellowship and
a Batterymarch fellowship.
Roderick Kramer is a
leading international figure in the social psychology of
organizations. His work includes research on trust and
cooperation in social systems, the origins and dynamics
of conflict, entrepreneurship in organizations, and
identity and decision making.
A professor of strategic
management and organizational behavior, Joel Podolny is
codirector of the Global Organization of Business
Enterprise (GLOBE) Initiative, investigating the
organizational structures and practices used by large
firms to meet the challenges of the globalizing economy.
With Professor John Roberts, Podolny created the MBA core
course "Managing in the Global Economy." He
also has served as interim faculty director of the
School's Global Management Program. SR
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