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Leeds Business Insights Podcast: Embracing AI and Student-Led Innovation with Dave Allen

Kelsey Cipolla — Wed, 29 Jul 2026 14:33:27 +0000

Leeds Business Insights Podcast: Embracing AI and Student-Led Innovation with Dave Allen Kelsey Cipolla Wed, 07/29/2026 - 08:33

CEO of Pure Fishing for Sycamore Partners, Leeds alumnus and Dean’s Advisory Board member Dave Allen discusses how business and students can take advantage of AI.

On this episode of the Leeds Business Insights podcast, host Claire Stewart talks with Dave Allen about his career path, from landing his first job with Unilever to leading turnarounds and seismic shifts he's seen—most recently, AI.

He details a CU internship partnership that paired business and engineering students to solve marketing and efficiency use cases with AI, generating major gains and $1.9M savings that the organization used to hire full-time AI staff to continue these trends. Dave and Claire also discuss the outdoors industry and what makes it unique.

Listen now

Episode transcript

Claire Stewart: Today's LBIdea is to think about AI as a tool that can drive efficiency and innovation for businesses and help current students stand out in the job market.

Our guest today is Dave Allen. Dave is the CEO of Pure Fishing for Sycamore Partners, as well as a Leeds alumnus and Dean's Advisory Board member. He's a turnaround specialist for middle-market private equity portfolio companies and has been in the consumer products industry for over 30 years.

Thank you so much for joining us today, Dave.

Dave Allen: Oh, my pleasure. Thank you, Claire.

Stewart: Awesome. Well, we know you're obviously here at Leeds because you are a great part of the continued work on our board as well as a high-impact alumnus. But for those that don't know you, we'd love to do a little bit of an introduction. So, could you tell us about your background and career trajectory?

Allen: Yeah, of course. I graduated Leeds, I guess before it was actually Leeds, in 1993. So, like a lot of CU students, I came from Southern California, fell in love with �ֲ��ý, and went out there. I did not get into the Leeds School of Business originally, so I had to make grades my freshman year to be able to transfer in. But I've spent the first 18 years of my career with Unilever. That took us, sort of, across the globe. And then the last 15 years, I've spent turning around sporting goods companies.

So, we've moved about 14 different times. We've been really fortunate to live in some cool places like New York, LA, London, Park City, and now Charleston. But CEO has always been a really important part of, sort of, my career journey. I got my job originally from the Career Center. So, like a lot of students that were business students in the day, I spent a lot of time in the Career Center interviewing, and I was fortunate enough to be able to get a job with Unilever.

So, I sold soap to independent grocery stores in the state of Colorado, northern New Mexico, and western Kansas, and I think, still to this day, that's the most difficult job that I've ever had. But I definitely owe my career trajectory to my start through the Career Center at Leeds.

Stewart: Amazing, yeah. So, in terms of the role that Leeds and CU �ֲ��ý played, it really that Career Center was, kind of, connected you with Unilever originally, right?

Allen: Yeah, 100%. So, I've used a lot of different companies from a lot of different industries that came on in. They do flights, I think, of either 13 or 26 interviews, sort of, per day. I went in, was fortunate enough to get a couple of different offers, like the Unilever offer, and they ended up being just a great employer, and were wonderful to me and my family, and gave me a lot of good experience that I was able to build on for what I do now with turning around companies.

Stewart: Absolutely. So, like you mentioned, you've, kind of, become a specialist for this turnaround work for middle-market private equity companies. When you take the helm of a company that needs a strategic pivot, what are the first few things that you evaluate to determine what's working and what isn't?

Allen: From a strategy perspective, the thing that we're always taught at Unilever was, sort of, three things, cut costs, build brands, and then develop culture. So, if you take each of those, sort of, independently, cut costs, people always look at costs as a real negative, whereas I look at it as a positive.

So, it's we try and take costs out that are invisible to either the consumer or our customers. So, how do we do things more efficiently? We then take that money, and then we dump it right back into the brand. So, typically, the things that I go and turn around are brands that are wonderful brands that have just been underloved for a while, so that means either they haven't had much innovation, or they haven't had much marketing support. And so, then we dump that money back into brand building and innovation.

And then lastly, culture is very much part of our strategy. So, we want to make it a great place to work, a great place for people to go and build their careers. And so, we spend a lot of time on really defining our values, what makes us different, because ultimately, people can copy our strategy, but it's really difficult to be able to copy our culture, so we spend a lot of time there.

And then the last thing is really, sort of, talent assessment. Typically, when I go in, as I mentioned, they're quite often businesses that are in pretty dire need, so I'll typically replace most of the senior leadership team. The thing that's really interesting, usually what I find is, sort of, below that level, people at the director, people at the VP level, you know, are there, and they've been there during successful times, and it's really just about listening and asking them, "Hey, what did you used to do when this was so successful?"

And usually, it was a person that told them, "Stop doing this," or "Stop doing that." And so, oftentimes it's actually quite easy. It's just being able to listen about what made these brands and businesses so great in the past and then bringing those things back. And the beauty of what I do is, if you do the right things with these great brands, is that consumers will come running right back to you and give you a big bear hug and almost act like they haven't left, so you can turn them around pretty quickly, which is fun.

Stewart: Yeah, that's awesome. So, having 30 years in consumer products industry, what are some of the biggest industry shifts that you've seen, and how have you approached them and integrated any of those into your organizations?

Allen: Yeah, far and away the biggest shift that we've seen, at least in consumer products, is really the advent of social media. So, if you think about before how we reached people, it was really through, sort of, endemic media. So, if we were trying to reach somebody in a specific industry, we'd typically do that through TV. We'd do it through things like magazines, periodicals. You could really reach a pretty concentrated audience at that point.

Now, that audience is really fractured through social media, which is both good and bad. So, if you think about the business that I'm in now, you know, we have a lot of fishing brands. We own about 35 different fishing brands. Fishing is hyper-local, so how you go, and fish and what you fish for in Colorado is quite a bit different than what you fish for here in South Carolina.

So, we leverage our combination of our pro staff, all of our captains, and then what we call our select anglers to be able to go and then address all those specific fisheries, and then stay very, very local, because scale, like, has its positives and its negatives for us, we have to stay really nimble, because the barrier to entry on social media is so low. Like, if you have a cell phone, you know, you can have a voice. And so, it forces us to be very nimble, and if you think about how we deliver to different audiences, the audience for TikTok is quite a bit different than an audience for Facebook, using probably the two most opposites.

So, for that, we need to be able to go and then reach those people, but it allows us to be able to reach really small, like very micro-targeted niche audiences. So, for us, it's very, very effective. But it has caused a really big shift in terms of how we go to market with all of our brands.

Stewart: That's awesome. Well, talking about changes in the market, obviously AI has been a huge change for all businesses, and we're seeing how each business and each business leader is evolving with that. So, how are you thinking about AI as a business leader, and what are the challenges and opportunities that you see?

Allen: Yeah. So, AI is a huge seismic shift in terms of everything that we're doing. Initially, when we really thought about AI, I thought it would really replace a lot of jobs. That was a lot of the hype and the buzz, sort of, 18 months ago, that it would go in, replace all these jobs, and just lead to all these SG&A savings. And it's really turned out not to be the case. And instead, what we found is that, you know, it drives a lot of efficiency, so that our people can really focus on tasks that are more meaningful, where they can add more value, which is wonderful to be able to go and see.

Stewart: That's awesome. Yeah, so what would your advice be to current students and graduates? I know you've worked closely with some Leeds students, which I want to ask about in a minute. But for current students right now that may be intimidated by AI and the implications on their industry, what advice would you give to them?

Allen: Yeah, somewhat similar. Probably 18 months ago, I think students thought, "Oh no, we're really, sort of, screwed because AI's going to take all of our jobs, and then it's definitely going to take entry-level jobs." And that hasn't been the case. You know, and instead, I would encourage people to think about AI as a real gift.

So, they've grown up with AI in a way that, you know, you and I haven't, right? So, they've thought about AI in terms of how they approach everything, probably since even the tail end of high school, for the batch of seniors that we have right now. And if you take a look at it, you know, if you're probably over 26 or 27 years old, you might as well be 50, because you really haven't used the tool that often.

And so, I think their ability to be able to take it, solve problems, but also be able to go and then teach a whole generation of people within an organization how to use it, how to leverage it, will give them a huge competitive advantage in the marketplace. So, I think it's a real gift. I think they have to look at it to be able to say, "Hey, how can I get experiences to be able to demonstrate my ability?"

And hopefully some of the experiential learning and some of the opportunities that we've been able to provide through our internships have been useful in that regard.

Stewart: Yeah, absolutely. So, how do you think others should be thinking about AI and business leaders? Is there any advice that you might give to businesses that are, kind of, intimidated by AI, and they don't know how it's going to impact things?

Allen: Start. Just start. You know what? Some things will work, some things won't work. You'll find your own rhythm. I think where we started, you know, it was really around efficiency. How do we go and save money? And I think where we've evolved is, you know, to be able to push it more towards growth.

So, how can we leverage it to be able to be, you know, drive faster innovation, better innovation, and drive more sales across more channels? So, our journey has, sort of, taken us through efficiency and now into growth, but I think the most important part is just get started.

Stewart: Yeah. So, you are one of the wonderful employers that has employed Leeds students for an immersive experiential learning project. And I'd love for you to share that decision and what that took to, kind of, make the decision to use those Leeds students, to help solve some challenges with AI, and what did they do?

Allen: Yeah. Our journey was an interesting one. So, we didn't start with interns and with the University of Colorado, but we started with a couple of consultant partners that we have. And as we asked them probably about two years ago to be able to take a hard look at AI and what we should go and do, I was looking for somebody that could come in and really give us a, sort of, a full solution to our business. And what I found was they didn't really know either. They were trying to figure it out, and more importantly, they were, sort of, figuring it out on our dime, which didn't necessarily feel great.

And so, we have two daughters. We have a daughter that's 22 and a daughter that's 25. One is in finance, one's in consulting. And with talking with them, they used AI all the time. Their friends used AI all the time, and did a lot of learning from them. They both had very positive internship experiences. One had done an externship experience as well. And so, it led me back to Carolyn and Vijay to be able to say, "Hey, I think we can leverage students to be able to help us get started with our journey. So, where should we start?"

They introduced me to Al Pisano, who was helping lead a group of students start the AI Club at CU. And it was great because it was a combination of engineering students as well as business students and some arts and science students as well. And so, as Al and I sat down and, sort of, said, "Hey, here's what we're thinking about, these are some of the use cases we have," he was like, "That's perfect. I think those are great."

And basically, what we agreed was, we'd really prioritize going fast over doing this perfect, and that we'd, sort of, learn on this thing together. And that's what we did. So, we started, and we had 18 interns about a year and a half ago. And so, we solved, sort of, six different issues that we had primarily around marketing efficiency.

So, the way that we structured the teams was we had three interns. So, it would typically be a combination of business students and engineering students. So, think computer science, data science, and then a combination of, you know, whether they'd be finance or marketing or other business majors, and then we had one mentor from our team to be able to go and lead each of those projects.

And we just had an amazing experience with them. So, we run a 12-week program. Al and I developed, sort of, the process to be able to go and have, sort of, a standardized approach to the internship. And the first one, we focused on some really cool things like YouTube optimization. So, it looked out at all the YouTube videos, and then it would say, "What are the common characteristics of the YouTube videos that are most successful?" And it'd look at a combination of copy as well as the thumbnail, and then we could go and basically take a video that could be 30 minutes, and it could pick out the one thumbnail that we should go and use to be able to increase the effectiveness of that video. And we saw increases of 300, 400% in terms of views. I mean, it was just crazy. We had another project that delivered video storyboarding.

So, the way that we used to go about storyboarding was if we were going to go and brief our captains or an influencer on how we wanted to capture some content, we would go and you'd have somebody from the brand or the product team go and then brief somebody from creative, and then they would go do storyboards and say, "This is how we want to capture the scene. This is the picture from the back of the boat. We want the sun to be going up, and this is how you go out to fish," and all those things so that the person knew how to capture that image. We're able to then go and take that and then do that all through, like, video storyboarding, all that was AI-generated.

So, it almost looks real. We don't use any of it online, but we use it internally. But it makes it so that somebody really understands exactly what you're trying to go and capture. So, some really cool stuff that we did there. But from there, that gave us the confidence to be able to say, "Hey, we can do this and do it, A, at scale, and we can go do some other things."

And so, then the next round of interns we had, we had another 18 interns. We really focused on efficiency. So, basically, the objective then was, how can we leverage this to be able to go save money so that we can go and self-fund hiring people full-time? So, the thing that was wild was we ran these six groups of interns, and they saved us $1.9 million.

Stewart: Wow.

Allen: Which was amazing. We used that then to be able to go and hire four to five full-time students, to be able to go and lead our AI efforts, which has been fantastic. So, it has been a huge success. The people that we've had on our team that have been the mentors have learned a lot, and then we get people that are really just, sort of, evangelical about, sort of, AI, taking that back into the business, which is great.

Hopefully, we've given people a lot of, or the interns, sort of, this great experiential learning where they've been able to take something that was a really ambiguous issue that we had in the business and then go and work together and be able to go and solve it. So, it's been wonderful. It's been a great partnership, and hopefully it's something that we can go and scale, and they can leverage across other businesses in the Colorado community as well.

Stewart: Yeah, it's awesome. I mean, it's incredible experience for the interns themselves, and being able to put that on a resume and say the cost savings they created and the kind of innovation that they were able to do before they were even in the workforce. So, yeah, I love the impact of that story.

How have you seen this program, kind of, bridge the gap between business and engineering in how these students are working?

Allen: Yeah, it's been really fun. So, we naturally put them together in, sort of, mixed teams. So, they were either, sort of, two engineering students and one business student or vice versa. And the thing that we found on each is that, you know, if you were to generalize, the engineering students had to learn some soft skills, right?

So, they had to learn, sort of, okay, what's the issue? How do we go solve it? How do we communicate it? How do we get support for this idea? And then how do we sell it in? Whereas the business students had to learn the hard skills. So, almost every single business student had to learn some coding, right? So, they weren't the ones that ultimately did all the coding, but they had to have a working knowledge of it.

And so, it was great. I think it really pushed them to be able to say, "Hey, how do I take AI even further?" But I think most importantly is that it forced them to go and work together, that they realized the best solution is, sort of, the three of them working together to be able to go and solve something. So, I think for both sides, at least, the feedback that we've gotten is that it's been a really positive experience, sort of, working with the other school.

Stewart: Yeah, absolutely. It's a great experience. So, as a Leeds alumnus and advisory board member, when you look at the current crop of business students coming out of CU �ֲ��ý today, what skill outside of technical AI knowledge, which we've talked about, do you think is the most critical for them to possess to succeed today in modern business?

Allen: I think about it in terms of, sort of, the what and the how. We'll teach you all the what, so we'll give you all the hard skills, right? So, unless you're an accountant coming out of business school, everything else we'll go and teach you, functionally. So, then, really, it comes down to what are the soft skills, right?

So, what's your EQ, or emotional intelligence, that you go and bring to the table? And I think, you know, a couple of things are really important. So, as you think about presentation skills, right? Somebody's ability to be able to take a ton of data, to be able to synthesize it, take it down to a couple of meaningful points that are really actionable insights. That's a big one.

Another one is just communication skills, right? So, that's storytelling with data. Can you take all that data and tell a really high-impact story to be able to influence somebody or persuade someone? And then lastly, you know, really good listening skills as well. And I think one other one to me is just have a great, can-do attitude. If you really look at people that are successful, I think they do two things. They work really hard, and that's a combination of consistency and then some grit, and then they have a great attitude. And I think if you can do those two things and work hard and have a great attitude, in my experience, you get really, really far.

And I know it sounds like a massive oversimplification, but people that are really hard workers that have great attitudes, get really far in organizations. And so, I think part of the beauty of CU, I think, is not only the in-class experience, but it's all the other things that CU and �ֲ��ý has to offer.

And so, I think, you know, I find a lot of those students are really high on the EQ side, and that's a huge differentiator and really important for people in terms of how far they can go, sort of, in their career.

Stewart: Yeah, absolutely. So, from Coleman to Igloo and now Pure Fishing, you've led businesses with really strong ties to outdoors. There's huge interest in the outdoor industry, obviously, here in Colorado. What makes that sector of business unique in your experience, and what attracts you to it?

Allen: Yep. So, a couple of things. It's a huge, huge industry, so it's about $1.3 trillion a year-

Stewart: Wow.

Allen: ... in the outdoor industry, so it's about 2.4% of the GDP. So, there's 5.3 million jobs that are in the outdoor industry. So, it's a huge, huge industry. There's also 183 million Americans that participate in outdoor activities, right? Whether that's hiking or skiing or biking or playing golf or fishing, right? Any of those type of things.

But for me, it's really the combination of, the outdoor industry provides not only, sort of, physical benefits, but also emotional benefits. And so, I think, you know, a lot of students are at CU. I know I was because of the outdoors and all the things that �ֲ��ý and the community offered. So, it's just a wonderful industry to be part of. And one of the things I find a little bit unique is that oftentimes the businesses that are run in the past have been founder-led, and they're people that are really passionate about a given sport, and they're wonderful, and they've driven great innovation. Oftentimes, they're not the greatest business people.

And so, then, you know, when we go and lay some professional management on top of that and then continue to support it with innovation, and then some spend behind it, we can do really great things on some of these businesses. But for anybody that's considering, you know, working in an outdoor industry, I'd highly encourage people to do it because it has been a fantastic place. Anytime you can, sort of, marry, you know, what you really enjoy doing outside of work, with what you do with work, that is something really special.

Stewart: Yeah, absolutely. So, what does innovation look like to you in the outdoor space and recreation space right now, and just in the future when you take a look at other companies?

Allen: Yeah. Innovation's fascinating. If you think about one thing all day long, you can have an endless stream of innovation. I think about it at Igloo, you know, in the coolers, when we looked at sustainability and said, "What can we go and do?" We launched the world's first biodegradable and fully compostable cooler. You know, it was a fantastic piece of innovation.

When I look at our business now, we have a brand like Berkley that, you know, through science studies all six senses of fish. And then we leverage, sort of, that science and those insights to be able to develop bait that is just more efficacious for people. And ultimately, it's about creating products that help people have more fun or do their hobby more effectively. And so, for us, it's really fun to be able to help, sort of, bring a little bit more joy to people's lives through innovation.

Stewart: That's awesome. Yeah. It sounds like such a fun space to be in. I love hearing all the examples of innovation in the space, as well as your experience with these different groups and, kind of, how you look at them differently every time you take over a new organization.

So, wonderful stuff. We want to thank you so much for joining us today, Dave, and we really appreciate your insights and all you do for CU and the Leeds community. So, thank you again for joining us.

Allen: No, thanks for having me, Claire. Much appreciated.

Stewart: Thank you again for listening to Leeds Business Insights. Make sure you're one of the first to hear every episode by subscribing to the show wherever you get your podcasts. The Leeds Business Insights Podcast is a production of the Leeds School of Business and produced by University FM. We'll see you next time.

CEO of Pure Fishing, Leeds alumnus and Dean’s Advisory Board member Dave Allen discusses how business and students can take advantage of AI.

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Beyond the Resume: Summer Impact Interns Reflect on Lessons That Last

Jane Majkiewicz — Tue, 28 Jul 2026 17:48:31 +0000

Beyond the Resume: Summer Impact Interns Reflect on Lessons That Last Jane Majkiewicz Tue, 07/28/2026 - 11:48

Jane Majkiewicz

Through the Center for Ethics and Social Responsibility’s Impact Internship program, Leeds students spend their summers applying business skills with mission-driven organizations. This year's six Impact Interns reflected on the experiences that broadened their perspectives and shaped the way they think about business as a force for good.

From left to right: Peter Murry, Bennet Burton, Lauryn Simon, Sydney Bihm, Maren Clay and Patrick Mahoney.

Sydney Bihm (SustBus’27) Minor: History
The Nature Conservancy (TNC), Conservation Finance Intern

Real progress is rarely simple or immediate. It comes from being willing to work through complexity, collaborate across disciplines, and make steady improvements that create long-term benefits for both people and the environment.

Bihm was drawn to The Nature Conservancy because of its unique approach to conservation, combining environmental impact with economic development. As a conservation finance intern, she built financial models for mud crab farming systems in Indonesia, helping evaluate practices designed to support both local livelihoods and mangrove restoration. Through the experience, she gained a deeper understanding of how conservation, economics, policy and community interests intersect to create lasting change.

Read Sydney’s Reflection

What initially drew me to the Impact Internship program was the opportunity to contribute to real-world issues while also developing my career in a field I could see myself pursuing after graduation. What drew me to TNC specifically was the chance to work on international development projects that uniquely combine financial incentives and economic development with meaningful environmental impact.

One of the main projects I worked on during my internship was building financial models for three different mud crab production systems in Indonesia. The goal is to compare each model for long-term viability and profitability to better support farming practices that protect and restore mangrove ecosystems. One of the biggest challenges has been the limited financial data available, since this type of farming is done on a small scale and requires coordination across a complex network of partner organizations. At the same time, that challenge made the project especially rewarding because I had the opportunity to engage with a wide range of stakeholders, from local community members to scientists and international organizations.

Working at TNC has shown me that the world of conservation finance is deeply interconnected across communities, policy, economics and the environment in ways I had not previously understood. I love being part of an organization that treats these aspects of development as interdependent rather than competing priorities.

This project will stay with me because it taught me that ambiguity is a constant in this field. More importantly, TNC showed me how valuable an interdisciplinary approach can be to conservation, not only for gathering data, but also for building conservation and economic development initiatives that have lasting impact.

Through my internship, I have seen how market incentives and economic growth can support meaningful conservation initiatives. I have also gained a deeper appreciation for the challenges involved in creating lasting change. Sustainable impact requires considering every stakeholder across a value chain and investing the time to build solutions that strengthen both communities and ecosystems, rather than focusing only on short-term relief.

Bennett Burton (Bus, Fin, SustBus’28)
Boys and Girls Clubs of Metro Denver (BGCMD), Program & Operations Intern

Watching club leaders realize they had actionable, localized insights showed me the direct impact I could have on their important frontline work.

Burton was drawn to the Impact Internship program by a lifelong appreciation for mission-driven organizations and the opportunity to contribute valuable skills to an organization focused on serving youth. During his internship with Boys & Girls Clubs of Metro Denver, he supported programming and operations projects ranging from enrollment logistics to data analysis and automation tools. One project in particular demonstrated how business and technology can strengthen community impact: building a dashboard that helped club leaders identify safety trends specific to their individual locations.

Read Bennett's Reflection

Growing up volunteering biweekly instilled in me a respect for mission-driven organizations, many of which struggle for resources due to a focus on service compared to profit. This is exactly what drew me to the Impact Internship: the opportunity to contribute expertise at no cost to an organization like the Boys and Girls Clubs.

Throughout my time interning at the BGCMD, I held on to something I was told during my first week: "In nonprofits, you'll never spend more than a day doing the same thing." That rang true throughout. Whether I was handling Salesforce enrollment logistics one day, writing Python scripts the next, or handling chaotic varieties of busy work like most interns, I could not be more grateful for the people I met and the learning experiences.

My responsibilities included: assisted in running Pinewood Derby and ‘Techzilla’ STEM day; reworked Operations & Programming’s SharePoint; created Model Context Protocol (MCP)-enabled, Python-based software to parse student surveys for trends; manually unenrolled students weekly with overdue balances on Salesforce; improved skills in Excel, Salesforce, Power BI, Python and MCP integrations in automated workflows.

One project especially stood out. While analyzing raw incident data, I noticed patterns that could inform staffing and supervision decisions. What I discovered was crucial: incident trends were highly individual to each club, not organization wide. So, I built an interactive dashboard to help 100+ club leaders visualize their location's specific hotspots. Presenting that finding showed them each club's unique safety picture, revealing that one-size-fits-all safety approaches miss the mark.

Maren Clay (Acct, SustBus’27)
Colorado Enterprise Fund (CEF), Operations Intern

Seeing firsthand the businesses that CEF funds, and the positive impact they have on the people and environment around them, was exhilarating. It has inspired me to continue working toward a future where all organizations use the power of business for good.

Clay was drawn to CEF’s focus on the intersection of social responsibility and finance, and how mission-driven lending can actively change the community. She used the experience to ask as many questions as possible to learn about the industry and understand how to creatively solve problems.

Read Maren’s Reflection

I made it a priority to ask about anything I was curious about, and it allowed me to learn about aspects of CEF’s business model (and the wide nonprofit lending business environment) that I would not have otherwise learned about. Additionally, asking questions and learning from my coworkers at CEF exposed me to decades of experience, advice, and new perspectives for how to approach business.

One specific project from my internship that really captured this experience was when I was tasked with creating from scratch a canvas for part of CEF’s CRM system. I had never worked with CRM prior to this internship, nor did I have any experience with canvas design. I had to get creative with learning and understanding a new program, while also figuring out functional requirements from different departments, many of which had differing requests. This experience will stay with me because it taught me how to tackle multiple problems at once, and how to get creative with understanding the underlying issue to fix it.

This internship has further reinforced my belief that business is the ultimate power to create good in the communities around us.

Patrick Mahoney (MBA’27, with a concentration in Real Estate and Finance)
Thistle Community Housing, Resident-Owned Communities division, Real Estate Finance Intern

Resident ownership is a powerful tool for affordable housing, especially in rural areas, but it isn't a fit for every community. That contradiction—ownership as both the cure and the burden—is what will stay with me.

Mahoney came to Leeds after teaching through Teach For America, where he learned that responsibility often arrives before people feel fully prepared for it. In his internship with Thistle, he worked on feasibility studies, financing applications and development planning for resident-owned communities. The experience deepened his understanding of affordable housing and reinforced his interest in creating ownership opportunities that can build long-term economic stability and opportunity.

Read Patrick’s Reflection

Before Leeds, I taught through Teach For America, managing students and teaching multiple courses as an undergrad. That taught me that responsibility comes with the job, not after you're "ready" for it. I wanted that same accountability again, this time building tangible real estate skills, because good intentions alone aren't enough.

This summer, I worked on a feasibility study, writing development and acquisition loan and grant applications, and drafting requests for proposals (RFPs) for a manufactured home community in Colorado, where residents are considering buying their land from a private owner. Rents have climbed for years while the community's water system, contaminated at the source, has gone unfixed. Resident ownership is possible, but it means asking residents who are already financially stretched to oversee and finance a million-dollar infrastructure overhaul to get clean water.

The experience reinforced why I returned to school for my MBA. Teaching underserved students showed me that the roots of inequity run deeper than any one classroom can reach. Real estate shapes where and how people live, which means it shapes opportunity itself.

This internship has been invaluable in showing me how cooperative ownership structures could work across other asset classes, lowering the buy-in for people locked out of ownership and giving them a real stake in something that appreciates. I believe these structures can help build a middle class in America, rather than watch the one we have disappear.

Peter Murry (MBA’27)
Mad Agriculture, Graduate Conservation Finance Fellow

Durable solutions are the ones that work for everyone involved, and the most climate-positive option is often the one with the strongest, most lasting business case.

Murry spent the summer working on Mad Agriculture’s Wilding Bond initiative, exploring how innovative finance tools can support biodiversity, water quality and agricultural resilience. The experience reinforced his interest in using business and corporate engagement to drive positive environmental outcomes.

Read Peter's Reflection

I'm working with Mad Agriculture on the Wilding Bond, a novel conservation finance tool that scales on-farm prairie plantings in Wisconsin’s Driftless Region. My focus is corporate engagement: identifying which types of companies have a business case to support the water quality and biodiversity outcomes the bond delivers and building the rationale for why. It's been a great opportunity to apply my MBA studies to work that feels genuinely meaningful for my career.

Having built a career before graduate school, I came in with a clear sense of where I wanted to go next. The Impact Internship appealed to me because it let me design a hyper-personalized experience around content directly relevant to that next step. My biggest takeaway so far has been confirmation of my interest in driving positive biodiversity and nature outcomes through corporate levers.

I had the chance to attend an event hosted by Mad Agriculture and the Environmental Defense Fund that brought together ranchers, researchers, storytellers and agricultural leaders. The gathering explored how lasting climate solutions emerge not just from technology and management practices, but from the people, relationships and landscapes that shape our food system. It was a microcosm of sustainable agriculture as a whole, and a clear illustration of why durable solutions require a seat at the table for every stakeholder.

Lauryn Simon (Fin, BusAna’27)
Greenhouse, Program Management Intern

I have always seen the potential for good in business. In fact, the sole reason I chose the major I did was to study how business could be used to fuel systemic change, and this internship allowed me to see my vision in action. It also showed me that real change is incredibly complex, and solving one issue almost inevitably creates another one.

Simon was drawn to Greenhouse by her passion for community building. She applied her analytical skills to initiatives supporting students, entrepreneurs and professional development programs. Through the experience, she saw firsthand how business can be a powerful tool for change while gaining a deeper understanding of the complexity behind creating lasting solutions.

Read Lauryn’s Reflection

With this Impact Internship I knew I would be working toward the one thing that I am most passionate about: community. I knew this internship was designed not only to advance my professional skills, but to encourage real systemic change. And I have taken away exactly that. I have had the opportunity to perfect my analytical skills in a way that gives back to the community. I’ve been able to watch as my time working on Excel transformed into helping under-resourced students in their startup journey, organizing an event that promotes professional development and community growth, and opening doors for low-income and first-generation students to make connections that shape the rest of their lives.

As soon as I accepted this position, I did what they teach you to do in business school: post on LinkedIn. Not even a few hours later, I was contacted by a Greenhouse alum, a current scholar, a past intern, and a regular volunteer, all congratulating me for the role and sharing their stories. I met with several of these individuals before starting my internship in the hopes of learning more about the organization. Through their stories, I was able to understand just how deep of an impact this organization has had on so many people. The bond I now have with colleagues will always stay with me.

This year’s Impact Interns show how real-world work gave them the chance to put their business skills—and values—into action.

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Leeds Hosts The 13th Triennial Invitational Choice Symposium in Vail

Jane Majkiewicz — Thu, 23 Jul 2026 16:16:13 +0000

Leeds Hosts The 13th Triennial Invitational Choice Symposium in Vail Jane Majkiewicz Thu, 07/23/2026 - 10:16

Jane Majkiewicz

From the psychology behind everyday decisions to the economic and cultural forces that shape consumer behavior, the Choice Symposium brings together leading scholars from across disciplines to chart the future of decision-making research.

This August 12–15, the Leeds School of Business will welcome approximately 500 scholars from around the world to Vail, Colorado, for the 13th Choice Symposium, one of the leading conferences focused on human decision-making and consumer behavior. This year's event is co-chaired by Leeds faculty members Alix Barasch, Nicholas Reinholtz, Amit Bhattacharjee and Phil Fernbach.

Leeds caught up with Reinholtz (pictured right) to learn more about the symposium and what it means for the school to host it for the first time.

Tell us a bit about the symposium.

The Choice Symposium happens every three years, and the first one was hosted in 1989 by Duke University. The idea behind it is that research on human decision-making is inherently interdisciplinary, including psychology, economics, marketing, management, sociology and more. The event brings together interdisciplinary experts on specific topics to synthesize current research and establish an agenda for future research. The confluence of scholars is exciting and the hope is to generate new ideas that will shape our field for years to come.

There are more than 30 workshops across four days. Can you describe the typical format and goals?

Workshops are centered around a specific theme, such as “The Cognitive and Cultural Roots of Lay Economic Misperceptions.” Groups of 12–18 experts convene around each theme, bringing a specific perspective on the topic. Workshop participants gather in the same room for sessions across three days. Workshop chairs can structure their time however they best see fit, with the goal of allowing each participant time to present and ample time for group discussion. Many groups choose to write a paper summarizing the current thinking on the topic and then proposing a research agenda moving forward. As this year’s co-chairs, we will serve as guest editors for the journal Marketing Letters, where the best of these papers will be accepted for publication.

What makes the Choice Symposium distinct from other academic conferences in this field?

Most academic conferences in our areas are structured around paper presentations, and conference participants typically attend whatever presentations they find most interesting. This symposium is about convening small groups of people with a common interest, allowing them to come together to generate new ideas.

What does it mean for Leeds to host this symposium?

I think I can speak for all of the co-chairs and say that we are proud of Leeds. I believe that being selected to host this conference reflects our reputation for thought leadership. Many influential people are coming to the event, and I think that’s a testament to the quality of Leeds, the broader CU community, and the amazing state of Colorado.

From August 12–15, Leeds will host 500 scholars from around the world for the 13th Choice Symposium, a premier conference on consumer decision-making.

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Running the Show: The Business Strategy Behind Tulagi Fest’s Transformation

Jane Majkiewicz — Mon, 20 Jul 2026 17:37:57 +0000

Running the Show: The Business Strategy Behind Tulagi Fest’s Transformation Jane Majkiewicz Mon, 07/20/2026 - 11:37

Photo from Caruso Ventures.

Jane Majkiewicz

Organizing a festival spanning more than 20 venues and 800 performers requires far more than a love of music. Leeds alumni from Caruso Ventures are using skills in finance, negotiation, marketing and operations to build a complex event with a simple goal: to elevate �ֲ��ý and connect the people who love it through shared experiences.

A crowd-pleasing performance at last year's �ֲ��ý Roots Music Festival, captured by Caruso Ventures. The beloved event returns this year with a new name: Tulagi Fest.

As vice president of Caruso Ventures, Cody Moore (MBA’19) oversees the newly rebranded Tulagi Fest (formerly the �ֲ��ý Roots Music Festival), a four-day event Aug. 27-30 expected to draw 6,000 visitors to downtown �ֲ��ý. He credits fellow Leeds alumni Bryan Golombik (Bus’21) and Connor Reuter (Bus’22), along with current CU �ֲ��ý computer science student Liam Ford, as key members of the team behind the festival. At Caruso Ventures, producing an event of this scale is truly an all-hands-on-deck effort. After taking over the festival last year and significantly expanding its scope, the team expects it to continue growing in the years ahead.

While attendees experience dozens of performances, organizers are coordinating hundreds of moving parts and aligning the interests of artists, venues, volunteers, sponsors, city partners and attendees. For Moore, the festival is a real-world exercise in applying the business fundamentals he developed at Leeds to create community impact.

The generalist advantage

Photo from Cody Moore.

Moore came to Leeds with a background in analytics, but the MBA program prepared him for the range of responsibilities he faces today.

“I go from negotiating contracts to running the financials for the festival to finding insurance to planning logistics,” he said. “You can't be one-sided on anything to get a festival done.”

One course has remained especially relevant. “I took a negotiating class during my MBA—not something offered in every MBA program—and I use it every day,” said Moore.

“One of the great things about the Leeds MBA program is that it takes a generalist approach,” he said. “I was working while doing it. So, what I learned in class I could immediately take to work the next day.”

Evening MBA students like Moore bolster one another through their shared responsibilities. “We have kids, obligations, and jobs to get home to. Everyone’s trying to figure it out, and trying to fit it in. So, we bond through that.”

Managing complexity

For Moore, producing a festival of this scale is monumental. “From a project management standpoint, this is as complex as it gets,” he said. Success relies on understanding what project managers call the critical path, he explained: identifying which tasks must be completed on schedule to keep everything else moving forward.

“I need insurance done by this date. I need merchandise ordered by this date. I need people contracted by this date,” Moore said. “It’s really, really challenging to piece it all together.”

Another factor compounding the complexity: Festivals often see most ticket sales arrive in the final weeks before an event, Moore explained. “You might have exceptional marketing efforts, but there is still a seasonality component that we need to factor in when analyzing the data,” he said. Meanwhile, organizers have already committed to major expenses months in advance, making revenue forecasting, cash-flow management and risk assessment essential.

Data as a decision tool

Moore’s analytics background plays a major role in how the festival is run. “It’s one thing to do what you say you’re going to do," he said. “It’s another thing to capture all the information and make it understandable.”

Caruso Ventures recently launched a custom-built customer relationship management system. Developed with support from student Liam Ford working full-time, the platform gives team members access to information that previously lived across multiple systems. “It creates an environment where everyone is a computer scientist,” Moore said. “Now with the AI tools we have, it's completely turbocharged."

Analytics, for example, have revealed that the festival’s email newsletters this year have generated more ticket sales than social media or traditional marketing. “I think we'll close to sell out before day one of the festival, while last year we sold about half the tickets to people walking down the street,” Moore said. “AI-based and analytics tools help us do the work of a 10-person marketing team with two to three people," he noted.

Community impact in action. Source: �ֲ��ý Roots Music Festival.

Aligning stakeholders

“Above all else, the festival is about relationship building," said Moore. Because the festival spans downtown �ֲ��ý, organizers work closely with local venues and vendors. Rather than asking local businesses to financially support the event, the festival organizers aim to bring customers through their doors and create benefits for the broader downtown ecosystem.

They also rely on more than 100 volunteers, whose contributions are essential, said Moore. “We have three events leading up to the festival to get volunteers together to show the logistics as well as to thank them,” he said.

“From a general nonprofit standpoint, �ֲ��ý does a really good job in terms of people donating their time.” It’s part of the area’s ethos, Moore said. “Across all nonprofits, they never complain about finding people to help them.”

As a 501(c)(3) nonprofit, emphasized Moore, the festival isn’t about making money. “It’s about building community.”

Building for scale

Caruso Ventures’ interest in community-building events grew partly through its participation in efforts to bring the Sundance Film Festival to �ֲ��ý. Moore said those experiences reinforced the organization's mission. “We are continually inspired by the community-building aspect of hosting events. Our mission is to be the most catalytic investor in Colorado, with the goal of cementing Colorado’s position as the No. 1 innovation ecosystem in the world.”

The long-term vision for Tulagi Fest extends beyond a single weekend, scaling it into a multiweek international event featuring diverse arts. The organization is already securing venue commitments through 2027. “You want people to think, ‘I wish I lived here,’” said Moore.

Bottom line? Running a great show is just smart business.

To get tickets to the Tulagi Fest >>

To volunteer >>

Three Leeds alumni are helping transform Tulagi Fest into a broader community festival, combining business strategy with a mission to bring people together.

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How the GDPR Reshaped Europe’s Digital Economy

Kelsey Cipolla — Thu, 02 Jul 2026 19:36:21 +0000

How the GDPR Reshaped Europe’s Digital Economy Kelsey Cipolla Thu, 07/02/2026 - 13:36

What really happened to Europe’s digital economy when the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) went into effect?

Leeds Associate Professor Scott Shriver traces the digital footprints to uncover the real economic impact of Europe’s privacy law. Using billions of pageviews and significant e-commerce data, the research shows measurable declines in traffic, revenue, and personalized marketing performance, with smaller firms hit the hardest.

Video Transcript

Scott Shriver: Modern websites thrive on personal data. It powers analytics, marketing and personalization. But in 2018, the European Union's General Data Protection Regulation, or GDPR, changed the rules. Its goal?

Protect consumer privacy by limiting how firms collect and use personal data.

So what happened when privacy regulation met the digital economy?

My name is Scott Shriver, and along with my fellow researchers from Boston University and Stanford University, we examined how privacy regulation has reshaped the economics of the internet.

In this study, we asked, how did the GDPR affect online firms performance?

To answer this, we analyzed data from 1084 diverse websites using Adobe Analytics, spanning industries from retail and travel to finance and media.

Our data set included 4.4 billion page views and $750 million in weekly e-commerce revenue from EU users. Our findings indicate that the GDPR has had a substantial effect

following the enactment of the GDPR. Average website pageviews declined by approximately 12%, and e-commerce revenues experienced a comparable reduction of nearly 12%.

These estimates underscore the magnitude of the regulations impact on digital engagement and commercial performance within the European Union.

These declines occurred immediately after the GDPR enforcement deadline.

But here's the nuance. Was this just missing data from users who refuse consent, or did real economic activity suffer?

We disentangle these effects using a bounding analysis. We estimate that between 4 and 13% of users do not consent to data processing, reducing firm

ad revenues between 0.3% and 6% due to inefficient targeting.

After accounting for these non consent rates, we estimate that the GDPR also reduced average page views in e-commerce revenue by at least 0.4%, presumably through increased website frictions and additional reductions in marketing effectiveness.

Personalized marketing channels like email and display ads were hit hardest, with traffic from these sources declining by almost 25%. We found that smaller sites suffered more than large ones, raising concerns about competition and market concentration.

So was GDPR a success? It empowered consumers with privacy choices and reduced data sharing. But it also imposed costs for companies, lower revenues, higher compliance expenses, and potential advantages for big firms. Our research shows that privacy regulation isn't just a legal issue.

It reshapes the economics of the web.

Understanding these trade offs is critical as more regions consider adoption of GDPR style privacy laws.

More Leeds research >>

Leeds Associate Professor Scott Shriver traces the digital footprints to uncover the real economic impact of Europe’s privacy law.

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Designing Tomorrow’s Societies: How Leeds Students Created Real-World Solutions in Japan

Jane Majkiewicz — Wed, 01 Jul 2026 18:52:48 +0000

Designing Tomorrow’s Societies: How Leeds Students Created Real-World Solutions in Japan Jane Majkiewicz Wed, 07/01/2026 - 12:52

Matthew Brady , Assistant Teaching Professor of Organizational Leadership and Information Analytics

In spring 2026, 20 Leeds students participated in a two-week program in partnership with Ludus Labs. In Tokyo and Nagoya, they visited startups, hospitals, research centers, rural communities and universities to understand how AI and automation can strengthen healthcare, mobility, caregiving and community resilience.

Most AI courses begin with technology.

At Leeds, AI & Automation for Tomorrow’s Societies (BAIM 3300) begins with people.

Offered through the Management Information Systems program, the course asks students to explore a question that will shape the next generation of business leaders: How should technology serve societies facing urgent challenges?

Through the course’s “Build in Japan” initiative, CU �ֲ��ý students work alongside peers from Nagoya University to examine one of the world's most urgent demographic challenges—Japan's rapidly aging population. Rather than building generic AI applications first, students conduct field research, collaborate across cultures and develop venture concepts designed to address real human needs. The result is a learning experience that feels less like a traditional study abroad program and more like a global startup studio.

In spring 2026, 20 Leeds students participated in the program in partnership with Ludus Labs, an innovation education company that connects students, universities and industry to solve real-world challenges through tech, entrepreneurship and international experiential learning. During two weeks in Tokyo and Nagoya, they visited startups, hospitals, research centers, rural communities and universities to understand how AI and automation can strengthen healthcare, mobility, caregiving and community resilience.

Students consistently described the experience as transformative. One participant summarized the approach this way: “Professor Brady does a great job teaching in a lifelong learning style and how to leverage tools to learn cutting-edge technology while incorporating a strong ethical perspective.”

Learning from tomorrow’s society

Japan offers students more than an international destination—it provides a preview of challenges that many advanced economies will soon face. Labor shortages, healthcare demands, rural depopulation, social isolation and aging populations are already reshaping Japanese society. By studying these issues firsthand, students gain insight into how AI and automation can address complex societal problems while remaining grounded in ethics and human needs.

Rather than asking, What can AI build? the course asks, What should AI build?

A startup studio inside a business school course

The Course Architecture

FOUNDATION
Japan's historical, institutional, and demographic transformation
↓
TECHNOLOGY PRIMER
TCP/IP, OSI, workflow systems, automation, AI, LLMs, AI agents
↓
DESIGN SPRINT
Ideation, product sketches, venture development
↓
GLOBAL COLLABORATION
CU �ֲ��ý + Nagoya University teams
↓
FIELD VALIDATION
Hospitals, startups, robotics labs, elder care facilities, rural communities
↓
VENTURE PRESENTATION
Final pitches at Nagoya University “Idea Store”
↓
REFLECTION & MICROCREDENTIALS
Portable credentials, professional portfolios, future learning

The AI & Automation course combines historical context, technical skills, design thinking, entrepreneurship and international collaboration into a single learning experience. Students first explore Japan's demographic and institutional progression before learning about AI models, automation, SaaS platforms and emerging technologies. They then work in international teams to identify problems, conduct research, develop prototypes and validate their ideas with stakeholders across Japan. This progression ensures technology serves the problem—not the other way around.

The 15-day experience immerses students in Japan's innovation ecosystem. Instead of learning about entrepreneurship through case studies alone, students engage directly with founders, clinicians, researchers, caregivers and public-sector leaders. Visits to organizations such as Google for Startups, Techstars Tokyo, Nagoya University Hospital, the university's xR Center and rural healthcare facilities expose students to the realities of innovation in aging societies.

Those experiences shape the ventures they ultimately build.

A visit to the xR Center (short for AR/VR/MR), for example, challenged students to think about immersive technologies not as novel gadgets but as tools that could improve medical training, patient communication and clinical teamwork. Rural healthcare visits in Nakatsugawa brought demographic change into sharp focus, revealing how declining populations affect healthcare access, local economies and community life.

Throughout the experience, AI remains a tool for augmenting human capability rather than replacing it—a principle that defines the program's human-centered approach.

From field research to venture concepts

Working in international teams, students transformed their observations into startup-style ventures addressing the challenges of shrinking societies.

Student Venture Portfolio

Project	Core Concept	Primary Users
Kizuki Care	AI-powered clinical documentation and care intelligence	Hospitals and healthcare providers
Akira Care	Knowledge-sharing platform for medical professionals	Healthcare institutions
Kizuna Village	Marketplace connecting corporations with rural communities	Businesses and local governments
Anshin Care	Smart medication adherence system	Older adults, caregivers and families
Kizuna	Robotics- and sensor-enabled elder-care safety network	Elder-care facilities

Although each team tackled a different challenge, common themes emerged. Students designed solutions for entire systems rather than individual users, using AI to support clinicians, caregivers and communities—instead of replacing them. The strongest ideas were grounded in firsthand observation, demonstrating how field research can lead to more thoughtful innovation.

Not every concept is intended to become a company. The deeper goal is to help students think like entrepreneurs and intraprenuers: identifying meaningful problems, testing assumptions, defining an addressable market, working across cultures, and communicating ideas with clarity and purpose.

Career-readiness beyond the classroom

The experience gives students tangible evidence of what they have learned. Through microcredentials and venture portfolios, students can demonstrate competencies in global entrepreneurship, design thinking, AI and automation, primary market research, venture pitching and cross-cultural collaboration—credentials that extend well beyond a course grade.

Theme	Student Reflection
Human reality of aging	"The resilience of Japanese elderly and their care workers."
Personal growth	"The presentation had the biggest impact on what I thought I could personally achieve."
Prototype development	"This program gave me the tools to create a usable prototype and present it in front of a board."
Cross-cultural collaboration	"I learned the most about working with a new culture and their way of thinking."

Building the future of business education

Most study abroad programs introduce students to a new culture. Most AI courses introduce new technologies. Most entrepreneurship courses teach startup frameworks. “Build in Japan” combines all three.

By treating Japan as a living laboratory for demographic change, the program prepares students to navigate complex systems, collaborate across cultures and apply AI responsibly to real-world challenges. Students leave not only with technical skills, but with a deeper understanding of how innovation can improve people's lives.

As AI continues to reshape business and society, the leaders who stand out will be those who can pair technological fluency with empathy, curiosity and responsible decision-making. At Leeds, AI & Automation for Tomorrow's Societies gives students an opportunity to begin building those capabilities today.

Student Perspectives

Students shared their reflections on LinkedIn.

Dylan Kyle (Mgmt’26)

“What stayed with me most was Japan itself. You can ride a bullet train at 200 miles an hour and step off into a neighborhood that hasn't changed in centuries. Technology is everywhere and completely absent, sometimes within the same block. Studying AI and automation in a country where the future is already here, and the gaps in it are just as visible, made every conversation land differently.”

Louis Stempfer (BusAna, Mktg’26)

“Our interdisciplinary and international team worked through the full venture creation process, from problem discovery and field research to prototyping and pitching. What made this experience especially meaningful was the opportunity to explore AI implementation through an ethical and human-centered lens, balancing innovation with the realities of care, trust, and accessibility.”

Giselle Wipper (Fin’26)

“Beyond the competition results, the most valuable takeaway was seeing how innovation happens at the intersection of technology, culture, policy, and human need. The conversations with entrepreneurs, healthcare professionals, researchers, and community leaders reinforced that the best solutions are built by deeply understanding the people they serve.”

Students visited the autonomous vehicle lab at Nagoya University.

René Budeck, program manager at Techstars Tokyo, shared on LinkedIn>: "The absolute highlight? The sheer energy, curiosity, and drive of the students. They aren't just studying business; they are actively developing tech startup concepts focused on solving massive macroeconomic challenges, such as Japan’s aging society."

Students enjoyed mentoring sessions at Tokyo American Club.

Conor Hruby (BusAna’26) shared a post on LinkedIn about his team's pitch for Anshin Care, which won first place. "Our goal was to restore independence to elderly patients by giving them an easy way to manage their medication, while reducing the burden on the medical system by giving doctors and family caregivers insight into adherence behavior. I couldn't have done it without my teammates. We put in hours, doing everything from presentation prep to building a 3D model mockup of how the device might look in the real world, and it paid off."

Nagoya University and CU �ֲ��ý students pitched their startup ideas at Nagoya University.

The track to tomorrow: Students had the opportunity to ride Japan's bullet train (Shinkansen)— one of the world's most advanced railway systems, which connects the country and allows travel at speeds up to 200 miles per hour.

What does experiential learning look like in the age of AI? Through Leeds’ AI & Automation for Tomorrow's Societies course, students apply AI, automation and entrepreneurial thinking to develop solutions for society’s urgent challenges.

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Global Lessons in Compassionate Leadership

Jane Majkiewicz — Wed, 24 Jun 2026 18:11:36 +0000

Global Lessons in Compassionate Leadership Jane Majkiewicz Wed, 06/24/2026 - 12:11

Jane Majkiewicz and Emily Brew • Photos by Vishan Singh

Ten Leeds School of Business and Crown Institute students and fellows traveled to Dharamshala, India, to join a global cohort exploring how mindfulness, compassion and interdependence help leaders navigate complexity and increase impact.

From Leeds and the Crown Institute to India, the Dalai Lama Fellows attending the assembly in Dharamshala included new graduates, and rising juniors and seniors. Bottom row, from left to right: Mia Rosado, Maya Marder, Lekha Siddhartha, Charlie Misraje, Brett Bolton and Nasana Ranjit. Top row, left to right: Emily Madden, Piper Adamo, Aneesh Indukuri and Alex Radz.

Fellowship supporters Jeremy May (Acct’92) and Toni Shottenkirk explore the practice of values-driven business leadership with Saif Malhem, a Dalai Lama Fellow from Jordan/Canada.

Dalai Lama Fellows from Leeds and the Crown Institute share their appreciation for Shubham Sapkota, Dalai Lama Fellowship mentor and co-lead, as the fellowship's former director Marty Krasney looks on.

Brett Bolton (Fin, Acct’28) shares a moment with a couple of Dharamshala residents.

From the left, Charlie Misraje, Brett Bolton, Alex Radz and Nasana Ranjit share their community project—a business plan for an applied project they worked on—with fellow John Chukwubuikem Onuigbo from Nigeria.

Half of the fellows in Dharamshala had just completed the one-year program. The other half were just starting. The two cohorts closed their time together in a shared circle.

Piper Adamo (Fin, Acct’29) and other fellows visit a small prayer wheelhouse in Dharamshala, where a large golden mani khorlo invites reflection and circumambulation.

The fellows gather at the Tsuglagkhang Complex, the spiritual heart of the Tibetan community-in-exile and the residence of His Holiness the Dalai Lama.

Rising juniors Aneesh Indukuri and Maya Marder are in the newest cohort of Dalai Lama Fellows. The Crown Institute accepts new fellows each year who apply for the program in December.

Asked to describe the Dalai Lama Fellowship in a few words, fellows offered “community,” “joy,” “beautifully reflective,” “a vibrant mosaic of love,” and “a loving hand along your journey.”

The yearlong Dalai Lama Fellowship, operated at CU �ֲ��ý through the Renée Crown Wellness Institute, helps young leaders and changemakers develop leadership skills grounded in compassion, empathy and community engagement. Through projects in their local communities and immersive experiences abroad, fellows explore how mindfulness and an understanding of interdependence can inform leadership, strengthen decision-making and help business leaders navigate an increasingly complex and interconnected world. This spring, fellows traveled to Dharamshala, India, where they met the Dalai Lama and connected with peers from around the world. This was the first time the fellowship’s annual gathering was held outside of the United States.

For Charlie Misraje (Mgmt’26), meeting the Dalai Lama was awe-inspiring. “It wasn't so much an experience, but a feeling that’s hard to explain,” she said. “As soon as I caught a glimpse of him and realized I was in his presence, I instantly felt at peace, almost as if time stopped.”

Founded with the support of the Dalai Lama and facilitated in partnership with the University of Virginia’s Contemplative Sciences Center, the CU �ֲ��ý program launched in 2022. It expanded in 2023 to include Leeds students, focusing on cultivating compassionate, contemplative leaders and advancing leadership excellence. Jeremy May (Acct’92), CEO of Paralel Technologies and a CU Foundation trustee, helped envision the expansion and made it possible—providing both partnership and financial support to the program. Students first traveled to India in 2024.

Shubham Sapkota, research associate at the Crown Institute and co-leader of the Dalai Lama Fellowship, and Sebastian Villa Betancur, assistant professor of Strategy, Entrepreneurship and Operations at Leeds and a Crown Institute faculty fellow, reflected on the travel experience and its relevance for future business leaders.

What is the purpose of the Dalai Lama Fellows trip, and how does it expand students’ thinking?

Sapkota: The Dalai Lama Fellows assembly brings together students, community-engaged fellows and young professionals from around the world to deepen the program’s core values of contemplation and community. Participants engage with these themes throughout the year, then gather in person to broaden their understanding.

This year was especially significant because it marked the first assembly where fellows from different cohorts could meet the Dalai Lama. Being in Dharamshala enriched the program through collaboration with local community leaders and organizations, including site visits and informational engagements. These experiences complemented the program’s academic and research components with the lived perspectives from Tibetan and Buddhist communities.

What makes this trip uniquely valuable within a business education?

Sapkota: Students learn alongside peers engaged in community work through businesses, NGOs and education. They gain a global perspective on how practices, teachings and knowledge of compassion, meditation, interdependence and mindfulness—rooted in South Asian traditions—connect to and complement the academic learning and research contexts at CU �ֲ��ý.

Continuing the Journey

Based on the success of the past two trips, program leaders see strong value in connecting mindfulness and education with lived experiences in South Asia.

“Holding an international assembly for the first time reassured us that different cultures offer forms of wisdom that are impossible to fully grasp in the classroom alone,” said Sapkota.

Building on that momentum, the Crown Institute and Leeds piloted a summer course in Nepal focused on contemplative leadership in business. “This is one more step toward giving students the full depth and breadth of mindfulness, its impact on well-being, and its relevance in lived experiences,” he said.

Charlie Misraje (Mgmt’26) was one of four fellows who participated in the Nepal program. “The global seminar was a life-changing experience,” she said. “I learned more in one week of living the experience than I would have any other way. Nepal is incredibly rich in culture, and being fully immersed in that community was a gift.”

Brett Bolton (Fin, Acct’28) echoed that sentiment. “Being surrounded by fellows from around the world who are passionate about creating positive change gave me a broader perspective on leadership and service. Through discussions, workshops and cultural experiences, I was challenged to think beyond traditional measures of success and consider how compassion, ethics and purpose can guide both personal and professional decisions.”

Villa Betancur: The trip moves leadership beyond a purely technical or analytical endeavor. In Dharamshala, we encounter traditions that place compassion at the center of meaningful action—not as merely a sentiment or corporate values statement, but as a discipline brought deliberately into every decision. The challenges our students will face will require leaders who can see the humanity in those affected by their choices and who are motivated by more than personal gain. Contemplative practice provides exactly that foundation.

What leadership lessons are most relevant in today’s global business environment?

Sapkota: We want students to understand the importance of interdependence and compassion as sustainable values in the global business environment. Business is often stigmatized as purely profit-driven, but we aim to show a more balanced approach. We are not suggesting steering away from profit-making but rather illustrating how value is interconnected and shared across communities.

Villa Bentancur: Two lessons stand out. As Shubham said, the first is interdependence. As the Dalai Lama teaches, no organization, no leader and no community exists in isolation. In business, we talk about stakeholder ecosystems, supply chains and global markets. Interdependence as a lived leadership value means recognizing that decisions ripple outward in ways we may never fully see. Students who internalize this begin to ask not just “What is the return?” but “What is the impact, and on whom?”

The second is inner stability amid uncertainty. Contemplative traditions emphasize cultivating a stable, grounded inner life—not as a retreat from the world, but as the foundation for engaging it effectively. Today’s business environment is defined by volatility and ambiguity. Leaders who remain clear-headed, emotionally regulated and values-driven under pressure are exceptionally valuable. Mindfulness and contemplative practice are not soft extras; they are competitive advantages.

How do you hope students carry these lessons forward?

Sapkota: Students described this trip as one of the most meaningful experiences of their lives. The setting, engagements and trust built during the assembly made the lessons uniquely tangible. Concepts like compassion and interdependence were no longer abstract but rooted in lived experience and the teachings of community and religious leaders.

We hope these experiences and lessons stay with students throughout their time at Leeds and beyond. When they think about interdependence, it won’t only be an intellectual understanding of systems thinking, but a knowledge of how the concepts permeate all aspects of life, rather than being limited to a market, economy or business.

Villa Betancur: I hope students carried back a different understanding of what it means to perform well both professionally and as human beings. The traditions we encountered teach something business culture rarely pauses to say: that lasting happiness does not come from external achievement but from the quality of one's inner life—managing the mind, cultivating emotional awareness and building genuine equanimity. These are not indulgences; they are disciplines as rigorous and important as anything in the curriculum. Investing in inner development strengthens one’s ability to help others. The world needs leaders who are well from the inside out.

Student Voices

My biggest takeaway was that leadership begins with self-awareness. The experience deepened my appreciation for the power of the community. It was inspiring to see people from different countries and disciplines come together around a shared commitment to making a positive difference. I left the trip with new friendships, a stronger sense of purpose, and a renewed commitment to leading with compassion in my academic, athletic and professional pursuits.—Brett Bolton (Fin, Acct’28)

It’s a unique one-year program where you get to be a part of something that’s bigger than yourself. You can both improve the communities around you, as well as grow with a group of like-minded people.—Alexander Radz (Fin, Mgmt’26)

The most impactful experience for me was meeting His Holiness the Dalai Lama. His central message is one that I will take with me forever: compassion for one another is first cultivated within ourselves, then extended outward into the world. My week in Dharamshala has changed me, and I am incredibly grateful for the opportunity to attend this assembly.—Piper Adamo (Fin, Acct’29)

Watch students meeting His Holiness the Dalai Lama >>

Ten Dalai Lama Fellows from Leeds and the Crown Institute deepened their leadership skills through meaningful exchanges with the Dalai Lama, the Tibetan community, and a worldwide network of peers.

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How Leeds MBA Students Gave Big B’s a Boost

Jane Majkiewicz — Tue, 16 Jun 2026 18:53:11 +0000

How Leeds MBA Students Gave Big B’s a Boost Jane Majkiewicz Tue, 06/16/2026 - 12:53

From brand work to classroom insight, consultant Eli Marx-Kahn (MBA’27) brought Big B’s story to MBA classmates, unlocking ideas to grow marketing and improve operations.

Jane Majkiewicz

By bringing a real company into the classroom, Eli Marx-Kahn (MBA’27) turned coursework into measurable growth, helping a beloved Colorado brand scale while sharpening skills in business innovation.

From brand work to classroom insight, consultant Eli Marx-Kahn (MBA’27) brought Big B’s story to MBA classmates, unlocking ideas to grow marketing and improve operations.

Eli Marx-Kahn (MBA’27), a High Growth Venture Fellow with the Deming Center for Entrepreneurship, arrived at Leeds already running his own consulting practice, with experience launching (and sunsetting) a startup. That hard-won experience helped him identify the gaps he wanted to fill in his skill set.

An MBA at Leeds offered the right next step, and the timing couldn’t have been better. Marx-Kahn had been working with Big B’s, a legacy Colorado beverage company, for about six months when he started the program at Leeds. As his role at Big B’s grew from consultant into brand manager, he recognized a unique opportunity: bring the company into his coursework and collaborate with classmates to solve real business challenges.

Making that direct connection helped Marx-Kahn broaden his expertise in go-to-market strategy to gain a better understanding of operations, finance, marketing and management, while helping expand Big B’s distribution channels across Colorado and the Mountain West.

From classroom to company

In Operations Management, a team tackled inventory and production capacity, trekking to Big B’s facilities in Hotchkiss to identify opportunities for more efficient transportation, expanded warehousing and scalable growth. In Marketing Management, he and his classmates created a comprehensive roadmap for a brand that had historically done little formal marketing.

“I’ve been able to touch multiple aspects of the business with the MBA skill set,” Marx-Kahn said. “We’re taking what we learn and integrating it directly into how Big B’s operates.”

A campus partnership with a sustainability focus

One of the most visible outcomes has been bringing Big B’s products to CU �ֲ��ý. Marx-Kahn helped build relationships with campus dining, retail, and catering, creating a partnership that benefits both the university and the brand.

“It’s been incredible to build relationships with stakeholders right here on campus,” he said. “I can walk from Leeds to meet with our contacts—it feels like doing business in a small town.”

The partnership also aligns with CU �ֲ��ý’s sustainability priorities and efforts to support local business. Big B’s is introducing glass bottles to comply with the university’s ban on single-use plastics, positioning the brand for similar opportunities at ski resorts, other universities and health-focused retailers that are making the same shift.

Building skills beyond strategy

Along with other experiential learning opportunities at Leeds, this project has helped Marx-Kahn reframe his perspective of consulting. Early in his career, he approached companies with ready-made solutions and a focus on fixing inefficiencies. But the MBA program has transformed his mindset.

“No amount of strategy matters if the organization isn’t ready to adopt it,” he said. “Now I focus on embedding within a team and understanding where change will actually take hold.”

“No amount of strategy matters if the organization isn’t ready to adopt it. Now I focus on embedding within a team and understanding where change will actually take hold.”

—Eli Marx-Kahn (MBA’27)

That shift reflects a larger career goal. “Much of my work has focused on strategy, but my goal is to build companies from the ground up,” he said. “That requires an operator’s skill set—and that’s why I came to Leeds. The work with Big B’s fits directly into that.”

Part of what makes the Big B’s work especially meaningful to Marx-Kahn is the company itself. Founded more than 50 years ago, Big B’s has nostalgic appeal.

“The product is really just a medium that evokes memories of being on Big B's Orchard out on the Western Slope, which, for a lot of Coloradans, is a really special place,” he said.

Learning at the speed of business

For Marx-Kahn, Big B’s project is a through line of his MBA experience. “It's been an interesting process to go from an MBA-style report to meaningful change inside of a small, family-owned, family-run business,” he said. “I’m now touching everything from packaging to manufacturing and distribution. It’s exactly the kind of hands-on experience I was hoping to gain.”

From orchard rows to data rows, Leeds MBA students took a deep dive—tracing the full Big B’s journey from field operations and warehouse logistics to data-driven insights.

The ability to apply coursework directly to a real company has accelerated both his learning and the company’s growth. He expects to continue working with Big B’s after graduation, building on that momentum.

Big B’s has already implemented several of the team’s recommendations, contributing to double-digit growth compared to 2025—a substantial acceleration compared to their norm, Marx-Kahn said.

“That’s huge for a company like this,” he added. “But it also raises important questions, like how fast should we grow, and what does sustainable growth look like?”

For him, those are exactly the kinds of business decisions that make the MBA experience meaningful—not just analyzing growth but also managing it.

“If I were in the classroom and just read the cases and did all the thought experiments, it would be great. But to be able to directly port my newfound knowledge into a real business means the feedback cycle is so quick. It's incredible,” he said.

An added bonus: "Saying I'm a Leeds MBA student is a wonderful way to introduce myself to people who might otherwise not be open to talking with me. It’s a real door opener.”

Boots in the orchard, eyes in the warehouse, and minds on the data—Big B’s operation delivered experiential learning to Leeds MBA students from harvest to insight.

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Career Paths: How Mark Lewis (MBA’11) Is Fueling a Food Revolution

Jane Majkiewicz — Fri, 12 Jun 2026 21:24:18 +0000

Career Paths: How Mark Lewis (MBA’11) Is Fueling a Food Revolution Jane Majkiewicz Fri, 06/12/2026 - 15:24

Jane Majkiewicz

Mark Lewis is co-founder and managing partner of Trailhead Capital, a mission-driven investment firm advancing innovation in food and agriculture by connecting established global players with disruptive startups. The firm invests in solutions that support human, soil and planetary health through regenerative agriculture. Leeds first heard Lewis speak at an ag-tech panel for �ֲ��ý Climate Venture’s speaker series, where his career journey and insights on the future of global food systems inspired this Q&A.

Trailhead Capital Co-Founder Mark Lewis at the Stone Barns Center for Food & Agriculture.

What drew you to pursue your MBA at Leeds, and how did it shape your career path?

My parents met at CU in the ’60s and I've been a lifelong Buff. I was particularly drawn to the entrepreneurship track and the ability to take a few courses in the law school and other graduate programs to round out my experience. I am grateful for the professional network and lifelong friendships forged at Leeds. The MBA program very much put me on the career path I'm on today, accelerating the path I was already on by equipping me with new tools and insights.

Tell us about founding Trailhead Capital. What does mission-driven investing mean in practice?

My partners and I came together during the pandemic in 2020 and saw an opportunity to create an early stage venture capital firm dedicated to building a better food and agriculture system. While the current system has done an incredible job of creating calories for 9 billion people, it has come with negative consequences for human health, water stewardship, biodiversity, climate externalities and rural livelihoods.

We saw an opportunity to build a bridge between the old and new food system using our collective business experience, global network, innovation ecosystem, and passion for creating a better world for future generations—while also recognizing that the system is largely made up of wonderful people trying to do the right thing.

Agriculture is one of the most analog industries remaining on Earth, and we saw a generational opportunity to use technology and innovation to drive better practices and outcomes throughout the supply chain. Our Fund 1 now has 30 portfolio companies and Fund 2 will add to that portfolio.

Prior to founding Trailhead, you worked in farming. What led you there, and what has stayed with you from that experience?

I was raised in the oil and gas industry and previously worked in biodiesel, environmental nonprofits, solar energy financing, lobbying and policy work, and running a small local business. I was consulting for a local food group after my MBA, which led me to try my hand at managing a farming business.

In 2013, I convinced my family to buy a farm near Hoyt, Colorado, and we spent 10 years trying to build soil health and grow clean, regenerative and organic food. We spread truckloads of compost our first year and then experimented with cover and perennial cropping, livestock integration, strip tilling, and intensive crop rotations to invest in the soil with an eye toward improved financial, social and environmental stewardship of our land.

We made nearly every mistake you can make, and the biggest thing that stayed with me is a deep and enduring respect and admiration for the farmers who feed the world. It’s hard and risky work—with slim margins and many factors outside of one’s control. I like to think that experience gave me a different perspective than the average Silicon Valley venture capitalist investing in food and agriculture technology.

Imagine the world we could create if our brightest minds and most impassioned hearts were able to pursue the work they know will create the future we want.

—Mark Lewis (MBA’11), Co-Founder and Managing Partner of Trailhead Capital

How does the hands-on perspective of farming influence the way you evaluate investments?

To be clear, I don't consider myself a farmer. I was more of the desk jockey coming up with plans and buying seed and inputs, paying bills, doing organic certification paperwork and selling crops. I did spend one backbreaking summer trying to cultivate a hemp crop, which wasn't a financial success.

One of my favorite experiences was keeping bees on the farm. When you study how a hive works and see the incredible coordination and shared mind of our pollinators, it blows you away. I keep those lessons with me as we evaluate potential investment opportunities at Trailhead.

You spoke on a panel for �ֲ��ý Climate Ventures. What role do initiatives like this play in advancing climate innovation and opening new career pathways?

�ֲ��ý Climate Ventures is a fantastic initiative that more people should dive into. We need more forums like that where folks from all walks of life can convene, learn and build things together. I met students and other professionals working on amazing projects and driving positive change. This is what being part of a university and business community is all about, and we need more of that collaboration and innovation.

What are some of the key lessons you’ve learned along the way about following your passion when building your career?

I've been extremely blessed and have a strong conviction that those blessings come with a huge responsibility to give back and be a good steward of your resources—whether financial, intellectual, social or otherwise.

I'm convinced there is unrealized potential in all of us, and there is no better way to cultivate it than by following your passion and finding and doing the thing you’re meant to do. Imagine the world we could create if our brightest minds and most impassioned hearts were able to pursue the work they know will create the future we want. Sometimes that will come with sacrifice, but it can lead to fulfillment, meaning, stewardship, and a sense of community that make life beautiful.

Innovation in Action

Trailhead Capital Co-founder Mark Lewis believes there is “incredible opportunity with advancements in AI and robotics to digitize the physical world. Some are calling this ‘Physical AI,’ where we move from software and LLMs to apply machine learning and AI to things like seeds and soil for a more regenerative form of agriculture," he said.

To provide examples, he explained:
“Our portfolio company Avalo is doing this in next-generation seed breeding, where they use Large Genomic Models to speed up and improve plant development for outcomes like drought-tolerant cotton and reducing or eliminating chemicals in the cultivation of crops like sugarcane, corn and fruit.

“Our other portfolio company, Funga, is decoding the soil microbiome with machine learning and AI to understand what creates particularly fertile soil and then making a biological innoculant to spread that fertility into the root balls of loblolly pine tree saplings."

What advice would you give students interested in careers in sustainable food systems or regenerative agriculture?

Welcome to perhaps the most important, fun, challenging, rewarding and delicious industry in the world! What is more important than good food grown in a way that honors the dignity and—dare I say sanctity—of fresh water, biodiversity and rural communities? There are enormous and myriad challenges facing our agriculture system, which means there are gigantic new businesses to be built in our lifetime to solve those problems. Food is also a major driver of culture throughout history. We are what we eat!

What motivates you day-to-day, and what do you find most rewarding about running your own company?

General industry statistics suggest that 74% of Americans are overweight or obese. The majority of Americans have chronic diseases, which we can connect to the food we eat.

Industry estimates also indicate that agriculture accounts for 34% of all greenhouse gas emissions and 70% of all freshwater usage and is the leading cause of biodiversity collapse worldwide.

There is compelling evidence now that the chemicals we spray on crops in the form of herbicides, pesticides and fungicides are harmful to humans.

By recent global estimates, there are 1.4 billion farmers worldwide. Improving their livelihoods is perhaps the greatest poverty alleviation and social justice opportunity available today.

Having the privilege and responsibility of running Trailhead Capital is the greatest honor of my professional life. Finding a path where my skills and passions are aligned with helping to solve some of our most pressing problems is incredibly rewarding.

If nothing else, I know I'll be able to look my two young daughters in the eye and tell them I did everything I could to help build them a better world. I'm forever grateful for the opportunity.

Leeds offers a Master’s in Sustainable Business. Learn about how you can lead organizations toward a future where business drives positive environmental and social impact. >>

Mark Lewis (MBA’11), co-founder of investment firm Trailhead Capital, sees the generative agriculture industry as one of the most important and rewarding industries in the world.

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Tony Kong Earns Fulbright U.S. Scholar Award to Research Trust and Human-Centered Workplaces

Jane Majkiewicz — Tue, 02 Jun 2026 20:12:49 +0000

Tony Kong Earns Fulbright U.S. Scholar Award to Research Trust and Human-Centered Workplaces Jane Majkiewicz Tue, 06/02/2026 - 14:12

Jane Majkiewicz

How can we enable people to be more prosocial—and how could human prosociality make organizations stronger?

That’s the kind of question Professor of Organizational Leadership and Information Analytics Dejun “Tony” Kong is passionate about and has built his career on. Known for his research on trust/relationships, humor, gratitude, leadership, and organizational practices, Kong has explored how seemingly small human moments—like laughter or appreciation—can shape organizational culture and human sustainability in meaningful ways.

Now, that work is gaining international recognition.

This spring, Kong received a prestigious Fulbright U.S. Scholar Award, which will take him to Ireland in 2027 for three months of research on trust and human-centered workplaces. The award will support his mixed-method research and new global partnerships as he examines how organizations can better support and develop people and foster their trust.

The honor, he admitted, was a pleasant surprise to him.

“I guess both the U.S. and Ireland see the value of trust and employee development. That’s encouraging to me,” he said.

“I feel deeply humbled and grateful to those who have supported, mentored, and believed in me,” he shared on LinkedIn. “The Fulbright mission—fostering mutual understanding and learning across cultures—aligns closely with my research on how to cultivate individuals’ positive experiences and foster good organizational systems (leadership, HR practices, and culture) in various countries.”

The human factor

For Kong, trust is an entry point into a broader question: What makes organizations and the employees that fuel them thrive?

In Ireland, he plans to explore that question firsthand through qualitative research with companies, focusing on workplace culture as well as employee trust and development. Afterward, he will translate those qualitative insights into a quantitative study, identifying measurable ways human-centered organizational practices and employee trust and development influence organizational success.

To Kong, these issues are closely related to human sustainability and organizational sustainability. He sees those as closely linked to Ireland’s focus on human-centered values and human development.

“The Fulbright mission—fostering mutual understanding and learning across cultures—aligns closely with my research on how to cultivate individuals’ positive experiences and foster good organizational systems.”

—Tony Kong, Professor of Organizational Leadership and Information Analytics

Why Ireland?

Kong sees Ireland as a compelling example of human-centered systems and policies.

“Ireland is particularly interesting to me because as a country, it is humane and cares about people and their sustainable development,” he said, pointing to the country’s investments in education, workforce skills, and community well-being. These national efforts, he believes, shape how organizations in Ireland prioritize employee well-being and development and leverage technology to achieve these goals. “After all, people are the most valuable asset in any organization,” he said.

The Fulbright will provide him with opportunities to engage directly with business leaders, HR professionals and academic partners. He was also invited to keynote a conference in Dublin this September, laying the groundwork for his in-country research.

A global perspective on work

Kong’s interest in workplace dynamics across cultures is deeply personal. Having grown up in Shanghai and lived in various regions of the United States, he has long observed how cultural norms shape views of work, success and identity.

“American and Chinese cultures have similar expectations of people’s diligence,” he said. “Both cultures have high expectations for people’s hard work, and we are so busy that sometimes we forget to thank people—and appreciate others for what they do. We shouldn’t take others’ diligence, kindness and generosity for granted.”

That has motivated Kong to study gratitude and appreciation at work for many years, generating evidence-informed insights.

In contrast, many European countries emphasize work-life balance. These differences shape how individuals define themselves and perceive work ethics.

“Interestingly, when you ask people in the U.S. to introduce themselves, the first thing many people think about is their occupation,” Kong explained. “Many people tie their identity to what they do for work first rather than things like hobbies or what they’re passionate about outside of work. I am guilty of doing that myself.”

For Kong, that fuller identity would include his passion for singing—a reminder that work is only one part of a person’s life.

Rethinking training in the age of AI

Another dimension of Kong’s research will be understanding how organizations approach training and development as artificial intelligence (AI) reshapes the modern workplace.

“A lot of people complain that employee training is very dull and outdated,” he said.

“It’s not only about training and development,” he explained. “It’s also showing people their value and that there’s a channel for their contribution and promotion within an organization.”

““It’s not only about training and development. It’s also showing people their value and that there’s a channel for their contribution and promotion within an organization.”

—Tony Kong, Professor of Organizational Leadership and Information Analytics

This philosophy aligns with Kong's teaching at Leeds, where he emphasizes a strengths-based approach. “When you narrow down what people are good at and enjoy doing, then you can leverage that. We can assign employees to different roles based on what they love to do or are good at."

Too often, he argues that organizations rely on one-size-fits-all models that overlook individual differences or unique personal journeys. And even well-designed programs can fall short if they are implemented inconsistently across teams and departments, he said. “Perhaps AI can help us do a better job in employee training and development.”

Building human connection in a changing world

Kong sees his research as part of a broader conversation about the future of work.

“On a societal level, we hear so many stories of layoffs and graduates not finding jobs,” he said. “Then we start questioning the value-add for going to college.”

While technical skills are important, Kong believes they’re only part of the equation. “We also need to learn more human skills, like how to build stronger human connections, and that’s important to the future of work,” he said. Technology can facilitate human communication and augment human capabilities, but it cannot replace the depth of face-to-face interactions or human connections, he believes.

For Kong, the challenge ahead lies in balancing performance with empathy to create workplaces that are not only efficient and innovative, but also human-centered and meaningful. To him, that’s the key to sustainability.

Workplaces that bring out our best selves

Despite the seriousness of his scholarship, Kong approaches his work with a sense of playfulness.

“I don’t want to take myself too seriously, even though I take work seriously,” he said. "Life is short; I want to have fun with what I do and who I am. I learn a lot by traveling and having diverse experiences. I also want to help the workplace be more lighthearted.”

As he prepares for his Fulbright experience, that philosophy remains central to his work: organizations are at their best when they make room for both performance and people—when people are valued not just for what they produce, but for who they are.

Professor of Organizational Leadership and Information Analytics Dejun “Tony” Kong is headed to Ireland next summer to study human-centered workplaces.

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