It’s Always Better in Napa…

Last week, I was proud and delighted to sit on a Catholic University Busch School of Business panel discussion in Napa, California. Held in conjunction with the Napa Institute annual conference, our panel examined the “how and why” a non-academic (like me) would want to transition from the professional world to the world of teaching. I’ve had the honor to teach two courses at CUA for the last two semesters: geopolitical Risk, Leadership, and strategy, and a class on Business Intelligence. 

Our extraordinarily talented Dean, Andrew Abela (left), moderated. What made this particularly fun was to sit with Andreas Widmer (a former Vatican Swiss Guard for St. John Paul II who went on to be a highly successful entrepreneur),  Harvey Seegers (who was CEO of GE’s Electronic Commerce Division and then went on to become President of homedepot.com), me, and Mark Webber (a legend of the software industry, having served in senior roles at NetApp, Sun Microsystems, and Hewlett-Packard).

The conversation revolved around Arthur Brooks latest book, From Strength to Strength - a marvelous guide to understanding how happiness and success in later life are found by accepting your gifts and talents and sharing them with others, especially the next generation. 

Listening to my colleagues and true friends (and true mentors as I build Fulcrum Macro Advisors LLC), I was inspired by the courage, the vision, the hard, hard work each undertook to achieve extraordinary success only to turn around and share with students. The joy and satisfaction these guys have is beyond infectious. I am a blessed man to know them.

Left to right: Dean Andrew Abela, Professor Andreas Widmer, Professor Harvey Seegers, me, and Professor Mark Webber.