Ex-CEOs launch CEO Academy in KC to cultivate next generation of leaders | Preview

By Leslie Collins – Specials editor, Kansas City Business Journal
Aug 19, 2024

Access the full article with your Kansas City Business Journal subscription. Preview the article below.

Retired CEOs Bill Zollars and Dan Hesse talked fondly about the business community support they received when they moved to Kansas City years ago.

In 2005, Hesse had only been in town a week when David Lockton of Lockton Cos. invited him to a dinner party at his house with other local CEOs. A few weeks later, JE Dunn Construction’s then-CEO Terry Dunn invited Hesse to dinner with another group of local executives.

“It was, ‘Welcome to Kansas City, and you’re part of our community,’” former Sprint Corp. CEO Hesse said. “I got so much value from that as a new CEO in town.”

But through the years, that tight support network that existed for rising leaders has experienced an “obvious decline,” said Zollars, former CEO of YRC Worldwide Inc. He credits part of the reason to companies being acquired, going out of business or moving out of town.

“But the fact is, we’ve still got a lot of really good talent in Kansas City,” Zollars said.

He wants to cultivate that talent, building the next generation of strong CEOs. That desire sparked the idea for CEO Academy of Kansas City, an educational program led by retired CEOs that’s tailored for aspiring, new and developing CEOs. The “faculty” includes 9 local powerhouse executives: retired CEOs Hesse, Zollars, Beryl Raff (Helzberg Diamonds), Dave Dillon (The Kroger Co.), Greg Graves (Burns & McDonnell), Brent Shafer and David Feinberg (Cerner Corp.), and Brent Stewart (United Way of Greater Kansas City), along with Mark Donovan, current president of the Kansas City Chiefs.

The program kicks off Oct. 17 with a two-day event in Kansas City at the Henry W. Bloch School of Management, which is providing administrative support. Registration and an application is required.

The event includes speakers and panel discussions covering topics such as owning the strategy, how to become a CEO, personal characteristics of the most successful CEOs, succession planning, and transforming the board into an asset.

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Leadership in Digital Music

In May of 2014, Dan joined CNBC’s Market Makers to discuss Sprint’s push for mobile, high-fidelity music on wireless devices. Watch this insightful conversation below.

Discussing digital music and wireless with Bloomberg Market Makers
May 2014

The Zorich Podcast: Conversations with Leaders & Legends

Dan talks with Chris Zorich, former defensive tackle for the Notre Dame Fighting Irish, the Chicago Bears and the Washington Redskins. Zorich was also the athletic director at Chicago State University.

The video podcast covers Dan’s journey to Notre Dame, adventures on the crew team, lessons learned from Dan’s Dad, experiences as the CEO of both AT&T Wireless & Sprint, the importance of Culture & Leadership and much more.

Watch the interview below, or listen on Spotify.

American Capitalism and the COVID-19 Response

The COVID-19 outbreak has shaken many companies and organizations around the world, spurring an outpouring of thoughtful insight and guidance from business leaders.

The CEO Forum Group is curating these thoughts and ideas in a collection of real-time CEO insights on leading through Coronavirus.

Dan was featured earlier this week. You can find his quote and more information below.

“This pandemic could become the 'tipping point' for our country moving from shareholder-driven to stakeholder-driven capitalism, as how a company supports its people, customers and communities has never been more important or evident. There are so many great initiatives that CEO’s and their companies are taking. The Just Capital Covid 19 Response Tracker provides many inspiring examples. It makes me optimistic of how American capitalism will emerge from this crisis.”

Learn more about JUST Capital’s intiative tracking corporate actions and policies, the shifting views of the American public, and the best practices from organizations leading the way on their website: JUST Capital COVID-19 Response Tracker.

Dan Talks #JUST100 with Jim Cramer on CNBC's Mad Money

Democrats and Republicans agree on something: the behavior they wish to see exhibited by US corporations.

On Tuesday, non-profit JUST Capital released its rankings of America's 100 largest companies based on how "JUST" they are. JUST Capital surveyed tens of thousands of Americans about the behaviors they want to see from companies they buy from, invest in and work for. The results between Democratic and Republican respondents were remarkably consistent.

In a nutshell, Americans believe that American companies put too much emphasis on only one stakeholder: shareholders. They believe that shareholders are important stakeholders, but workers, customers, the environment and communities are even more important. JUST capital used the American people's definition of JUST and collected hard data from a variety of sources to determine how US companies are performing with respect to these criteria.

For more on the JUST 100, watch below. Jim Cramer of CNBC's Mad Money interviewed Dan about the JUST Capital rankings.

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To read the rest of Dan's thoughts on the #JUST100, clickthrough to Dan's LinkedIn post. 

What President Trump's Election Can Teach Us About Managing Our Human Resources

Vital Speeches of the Day

May 2017 - No. 5

Below, Dan offers perspective on managing human capital in the coming years. This keynote speech was delivered at the Conference Board's 17th Annual Talent Management Conference in New York City.

Visit Vital Speeches of the Day online.

How Creative Destruction Transformed Telecommunications

Dan sits down with CEO Forum Magazine to discuss how the Internet and digital world were formed, as well as the direct impact this development will have on the telecommunications industry moving forward. The following was featured in the April edition of CEO Forum Magazine. 

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Robert Reiss: Prior to becoming CEO of Sprint, you were CEO of AT&T Wireless and witnessed firsthand the formative years of digital. Can you share some inside-the-scenes historical perspective?

Dan Hesse: You mentioned AT&T. It was back in the early 80’s and our main business back then was voice telephony. That was the core business – remember “reach out and touch someone?” But during that period, we were given two new technologies to start using ourselves. One was email. This was long before the internet – an “intranet” called AT&T Mail. The second was voicemail, but not from the point of view of you call somebody, miss them, and get their answering machine.
The primary new application of voicemail was allowing the user to record a message and send it through the network. These new applications were moving us away from analog, using digital bits, both email and voicemail, to disrupt the core business. The first big “aha moment” was the ability to shift time. If I wanted to send somebody a message at midnight or 1 o’clock in the morning, I didn’t have to worry about waking them up. I could send and receive messages whenever I wanted to.
Time shifting is now a big deal in all types of media. For example, it has changed cable television. If you have a DVR or you get your programs over the internet or overthe-
top, you watch when you want to watch. You create your viewing schedule, not the schedule of the TV networks.
But what was so instructive for me very early in my career was the notion of “creative destruction.” Our primary business was real-time voice telephone calls. We were coming up with new concepts that were going to compete directly with the core business. What made these time shifting tools even more useful was mobility, where place, which had been so important in our landline world, lost relevancy. As soon as I got a car phone in the mid-80s, I learned how much more powerful voicemail could be because place was no longer important. I used voicemail to send and receive messages, while in my car (hands free, of course!). It used to be time and place were critically important. Now, time wasn’t important and with mobile phones, place wasn’t important either. The real game-changers I learned about early on were time shifting, place shifting, and the power of creative destruction.

The Growing Demand for More Just Capitalism

Dan discusses the mission of JUST Capital and why he joined their team in this reposted interview with Fidelum Partners. The following was published on Fideulm Partners Insights portal on January 1, 2017.

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Dan, why did you join the Board of the JUST Capital Foundation?

“I’m a huge proponent of capitalism, I think capitalism is the best system in the world, the best that’s ever been tried, but it can be improved. Over the last couple of decades, the focus has been too much on the short-term versus the long-term, and focused only on one stakeholder, the shareholder, versus a broader set of stakeholders which include the employees, communities, customers and the planet.  I was at the Business Council meeting almost a year ago when Paul Tudor Jones and Martin Whitaker of JUST Capital were presenting their ideas to this large group of CEOs and I said to myself, “Bingo.  If American consumers had an easy way to find out which companies acted responsibly in the areas most important to them, like a ‘Consumers Reports’ for corporate behavior, I believe they’d direct their spending to those companies.”

How are JUST Capital’s efforts different from those of others advocating for socially responsible capitalism?

“JUST Capital is focused on finding out what is most important to the American public from a social justice standpoint.  For example, their research with over 43,000 Americans indicated that employee compensation and treatment are the most critical issues.  Other important issues include product safety, human rights and the environment.  They also want companies to make a profit and reward shareholders.  Based on these criteria, Just Capital utilizes dozens of independent data sources to identify the JUST 100 companies.

“Their approach is data driven and easy to use, so consumers can vote with their wallets, which I believe is vastly superior to regulation to get companies to behave better.  It’s more efficient and effective for companies that do good to be rewarded in the marketplace.  If they are, other companies will follow their lead.  So, I’m very enthusiastic about what JUST Capital is doing. ”

If you were leading a public company today, would you find the JUST 100 rankings helpful? 

“I absolutely would, there’s no question about it.  JUST 100 rankings are not only a tool for consumers, but also a great tool for companies.  It provides companies with a road map of what customers are looking for, and it gives them ways to improve.  They can see the companies that are at the top and what they have done to achieve their positions, and from that build an improvement plan.”

Have you previously had success using external rankings to improve company performance?

“At Sprint, I found the J. D. Power ratings and the American Customer Satisfaction Index very helpful because they provided goals for the company to rally around and offered independent third party verification that our customer satisfaction efforts were working.  I remember standing in front of the Care team at Sprint in 2008 and saying that within two years we’re going to win a J. D. Power award.  Many looked skeptical because we were not only last, but last by a mile.  But by 2012, Sprint had won multiple J. D. Power awards and was number one among wireless carriers in the American Customer Satisfaction index.  By focusing our efforts around a common goal based on external ratings, we went from losing customers to the Sprint brand having the highest growth rate in net new customer additions among the major wireless carriers.”

Click here for more details on JUST Capital and their JUST 100 Index of companies.

...Click for full interview.

Why Excellent Customer Service Costs Less

Reposted coverage from Dan's career-spanning conversation with Fidelum Partners. topics focused on customer service goals for business. The following was published January 1, 2017.

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When Dan Hesse joined AT&T as a 23-year-old management trainee 1977, he never imagined he was embarking on a career journey that would eventually lead Fierce Wireless to name him one of the five “Best Turnaround CEO’s of All Time“.  In addition, Entrepreneur magazine would recognize him as one of “10 Inspirational Leaders who Turned Around Their Companies“.  While his accomplishments at AT&T were substantial, including launching the Digital One Rate service plan in 1998, it was the remarkable turnaround Hesse led as CEO of Sprint that left an indelible mark on the wireless industry and business world more broadly.

....click for full interview.

A Company’s Stakeholders Include More Than Shareholders [Podcast] | Overland Resource Group, NPR

Steve Kraske of The Overland Resource Group and NPR spoke with Dan on topics of empowering employees and leading creatively in an interview recording July 12, 2016. Please find an excerpt from the interview below. You can listen to the entire conversation at ORG's website here. 

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STEVE KRASKE: Well, Dan Hesse, welcome.

DAN HESSE: Hi, Steve. Great to be here.

STEVE : You had an interesting response recently when you were asked what book on business leadership had the most influence on you. What was it?

DAN: Forbes called me and asked me, and I had interestingly just been interviewed for another book on the books that most impacted my life, and it was Plato’s Republic.

STEVE: That’s going to surprise people.

DAN: Absolutely. And it was really my first book on leadership. I was a college undergraduate, actually a liberal arts undergraduate, and reading a philosophy book, and it was about why you should be good. And it talked about what characteristics leaders should have, because it was a discussion about why—who should be king, who should be leader, who should be ruler, between Socrates and a bunch of learned Greeks.

STEVE: You make a point on your website, DanHesse.com, that conscience-driven, ethical leaders can make a very positive impact on the world. What are you talking about there? Because I gather you're not necessarily referring to the bottom line.

DAN: I’ve always viewed business leadership as a vocation akin to the clergy, teaching, parenting, public service, because you can affect so many lives. You affect the lives and livelihoods of your employees, your shareholders, the communities, your suppliers, your customers. So for example, a company like Sprint—millions and millions of people—by not only what you do and how you do it. So it’s not necessarily — the bottom line actually is helpful, because as the company does better, the company has more resources to do good.

STEVE: More options.

DAN: And more options. So for example, look at Sprint here in Kansas City. Almost every fundraiser event, Sprint's sponsoring it, buying tables, supporting the community and wouldn’t be able to do it if the company wasn’t successful. So it doesn’t mean — it’s not in lieu of the bottom line, but it’s — the bottom line helps to do good. Purpose-driven.

STEVE: Plato once said, going back to him, that the best leaders often don’t seek to be leaders – they don’t seek power. What do you make of that?

DAN: Well, I think it’s almost human nature. The people you trust are those who aren’t looking for power. That’s why you’re willing to give them power. You trust them to use it wisely. And Plato actually talks about the leaders that are the best leaders actually care more about their subjects than they do themselves. So I think those people — a lot of leaders, people who are natural leaders don’t seek the position of leader, and that’s, quite frankly, why we’re attracted to them.

...You can listen to the entirety of the conversation here.