Top executives from Citi, Kaiser, Whirlpool, and Infosys will be among the impressive slate of business leaders coming to the Haas School this spring to participate in a variety of conferences and speaker series.
The Dean’s Speaker Series continues into 2012 with Deborah Hopkins, chief innovation officer and chair of Venture Capital Initiatives at Citi, on Jan. 31. Whirlpool CEO Jeff Fettig speaks on Feb. 6, followed by FICO CEO Mark Green on March 1 and Kaiser Permanente Chairman and CEO George Halvorson on April 12.
Together with the MBA and Undergraduate Marketing clubs, the series also co-sponsors an annual talk by Marketing Professor Emeritus David Aaker on Feb. 15. Aaker's latest book, Brand Relevance: Making Competitors Irrelevant, was just named one of the three best business books of 2011 in the marketing category by the influential management magazine strategy+business.
Another speaker series for MBA students, the CMO Insight Series, begins Feb. 8 with a talk by Richelle Parham, chief marketing officer of eBay. After that, students enrolled in the course will hear from the CMOs from a broad range of companies, including Salesforce.com, Wells Fargo, Genentech, and Clorox.
The Center for Nonprofit and Public Leadership will kick off the new year for its Schwab Charitable Philanthropy Speaker Series on Jan. 26 with “A Roadmap for Social Impact Investing,” a panel discussion followed by a Q&A. Panelists TBA.
The Education Leadership Case Competition, organized by the Haas Education Leadership Club, will bring together students from up to 10 of the country's leading business schools on Feb. 17 and Feb. 18. Teams of four students each will compete to provide the best solutions to an urban school district facing a significant challenge. This year’s school district has not yet been named.
The Lester Center for Entrepreneurship sponsors two additional business plan competitions in the spring: the marquee Berkeley B-Plan Competition April 23-24 and the Global Social Venture Competition March 22-23 (regional finals) and April 19-21 (global finals and conference).
There are also a number of high-profile student-run conferences happening at Haas in the spring. The Latin America and Hispanic Business Association Business Conference on Feb. 24 will feature keynote speakers Walter Schalka, CEO of Votorantim Cimentos, and Stelleo Tolda, COO of MercadoLibre.
That same day, the Business of Health Care Conference takes place in downtown San Francisco for the first time in its six-year history, at the Westin San Francisco Market Street.
The longest-running student-organized conference at Haas, the Women in Leadership Conference, will be held on March 3. This year’s theme is “Beyond Mentorship: Women Championing Women.”
The annual Asia Business Conference (whose website is under development) will take place March 17 at Haas. The theme will be "The Emerged Market – Epicenter of Growth, Consumption, and Innovation?"
The following week, on March 9, the Finance Conference explores the complexity of investing in an increasingly uncertain financial marketplace. Confirmed speakers and panelists include Allan Holt, co-head of U.S. Buyout, Carlyle Group, and Tim Recker, private equity/real assets/cross assets, UC Endowment's Investment Team. Moderators will include Anupreeta Das, an M&A reporter with the Wall Street Journal and Jason Kelly, a private equity reporter with Bloomberg BusinessWeek.