Hanna Renaldi's Blog: Glenn Hubbard to Step Down as Columbia Business School Dean

Dean Hubbard of CBS to Step Down

After serving 15 years as Dean of Columbia Business School (CBS), Glenn Hubbard will step down at the end of the 2018-19 school year. Hubbard began his tenure at Columbia in 1988, and was selected as Dean in July 2004. When Hubbard steps down from the deanship on June 30, 2019, he will return to his position as the Russell L. Carson Professor of Finance and Economics, and as Professor of Economics in Columbia’s Department of Economics in the Faculty of Arts and Sciences. According to a Poets & Quants article, Hubbard did not state why he has chosen this time to leave his post. No replacement has been found yet, and a worldwide search will begin without delay.

Columbia is not the only prestigious business school searching for a new dean. Other extremely selective schools looking for leadership include Northwestern Kellogg, Yale SOM, Cornell Johnson, UCLA Anderson, and Notre Dame Mendoza. The number of business schools looking for deans (28 through the beginning of June 2018) is almost 50% higher than the same time last year, points out an article on the subject in The Wall Street Journal.

In making the announcement of Hubbard’s decision, Columbia University President Lee C. Bollinger stated, “Dean Hubbard succeeded repeatedly in seizing opportunities for transforming and modernizing Columbia Business School through times that were often turbulent and challenging. The most powerful symbol of this progress will become fully visible four years from now when the doors of the Henry R. Kravis Building and Ronald O. Perelman Center for Business Innovation are opened, and Columbia Business School occupies its new home at the center of the Manhattanville campus.”

Hubbard said, “Today, as I reflect upon the last decade and a half, I am humbled by the progress made toward achieving our mission to innovate, connect, and lead, and our strategy to bridge theory and practice…I have every confidence that the School will continue to be a global innovator in both management education and in how business is practiced in the 21st century. I look forward to supporting that vision as a member of its faculty.”

Hubbard has had many noteworthy achievements in both the academic and financial spheres during his time at CBS. He has led the growth of three new extensions of CBS’s Executive MBA program, started four new master’s degrees, and backed the improvement of the curriculum. By the time he leaves his post, Hubbard will have raised more than $1 billion for CBS. The amount of financial aid distributed to CBS students went up 600% during the 2004-2018 period.

Hubbard’s career spanned the academic, private, government, and nonprofit worlds. After receiving is PhD in Economics from Harvard University in 1983, Hubbard taught at Northwestern, Harvard, and the University of Chicago, as well as at Columbia. He has written widely used textbooks and more than 100 academic articles in economics and finance, and has appeared regularly in major newspapers, and on TV and radio. President George W. Bush appointed him as chairman of the U.S. Council of Economic Advisers in 2001, where he served for two years.

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