General Session Speakers

Jim Collins
Student and Teacher of Enduring Great Companies

Jim Collins has spent his life studying great companies – how they grow, how they attain superior performance and how good companies can become great companies. Having invested over a decade of research into the topic, Mr. Collins has authored or co-authored four books, including the classic Built to Last, which has been a fixture on the Business Week best seller list for more than six years.

Mr. Collins book, Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap … And Others Don’t, attained long-running positions on the New York Times, Wall Street Journal and Business Week best seller lists, has sold 3 million hardcover copies. His most recent book, How the Mighty Fall: And Why Some Companies Never Give In, was published in May 2009.

Sponsored by

Molly Corbett Broad
President
American Council on Education (ACE)

Since becoming the 12th president of ACE in May 2008, Molly Corbett Broad has sought to make ACE a unifying voice for higher education, while fostering greater collaboration and new partnerships to help institutions face the challenges of the 21st century and contribute to a stronger nation and a better world.

Broad came to ACE from the University of North Carolina (UNC), where she served as president from 1997 to 2006. Prior to her tenure at UNC, Broad held a number of administrative and executive positions at sev­eral universities.

Broad has written and spoken widely on strategic planning for higher education, K–16 partnerships, information technology, globalization and biotechnology.

Sponsored by

Alan Simpson
Former Co-Chair
National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform

A trusted bi-partisan leader, Alan Simpson served from 1979 to 1997 as a U.S. senator from Wyoming. While serving in the Senate, Simpson held numerous leadership positions, including committee chair and majority whip.

Since retiring from the Senate Simpson continues to teach part-time with his brother at the University of Wyoming in Laramie and has con­tinued his public service as a member of the Continuity of Government Commission and as co-chair of the Americans for Campaign Reform. In 2010 Simpson was appointed to co-chair President Obama’s National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform. During his tenure Mr. Simpson provided candid views on politics, the economy, and the hard and tough choices that lie ahead for America’s leaders.

Sponsored by