Alumni Profiles

Naomi Kelman, MBA ’83, head of the OTC division at Novartis Naomi Kelman is sitting in the pilot’s seat of her single-engine Beech Bonanza preparing to land. Visibility is close to zero, but she’s unfazed. “I’m an instrument-rated pilot,” says the new head of Novartis’s over-the-counter healthcare products division. “That means I’m qualified to fly […]

The answers are blowin’ in the wind by Irene Kim Steve Kropper sells wind data. His company, WindPole Ventures, leases over 12,000 broadcast towers, each taller than the Statue of Liberty. When wind developers are prospecting a new site, WPV mounts sensors and instrumentation on a tower near the project and records wind-speed data — […]

Live like you mean it! by Irene Kim Ever know someone who could zig and zag with life’s curve balls, who seemed to have nothing but good luck? According to Beverly Sastri, anyone can be like that. The basic tenet of her peak-performance training: By letting our core truth guide our intellect, and by attuning […]

Jim Goldman, MBA ’85, President and CEO , Godiva Chocolatier Like many successful leaders, Jim Goldman thinks outside the box. For the aptly-named Goldman, the box in question is a 14-carat icon — Godiva Chocolatier’s gold-toned ballotin. As one of the world’s best-known packages, that box confers a strong advantage, says Goldman, president and chief […]

Gaye Tomlinson, MBA ’05: CMO, Vaha Solar and Green Consulting by Irene Kim As oil reserves shrink, environmental concerns grow, protests fly over hydraulic fracturing, and electricity costs skyrocket, Gaye Tomlinson is betting that the time is finally right for renewable-energy solutions. She and her husband, Geoffrey — a former Wall Street analyst turned green-technologies […]

Daniela Peiser, MBA ’00: Founder and managing director, Bold Aspirations by Irene Kim In 2007, when Daniela Peiser mentioned to her colleagues at Deloitte Consulting that she was thinking about taking a six-month vacation in her native South Africa, her leadership offered to arrange for her to work out of the company’s Cape Town office. […]

Owen Jobson, MBA ’94: Owner/founder, Blue Rock BBQ by Irene Kim With a solid work history in systems integration at Andersen Consulting, in operations and finance for United Airlines, and in finance at Cisco Systems, Owen Jobson isn’t someone you’d expect to see dishing out baby back ribs. But he has made good on his […]

Rick Cleary, MBA ’98: COO and co-founder, Sharpridge Capital Management, L.P. by Irene Kim When asked about Sharpridge Capital, the investment firm he cofounded, Rick Cleary speaks not about himself, but about the strength of his rope team — the interconnected relationships that enable his firm to navigate through what he terms “the slings and […]