DMSB Day 2025

Clayton Christensen (2010) frames personal strategy as resource allocation across life “businesses,” advocating consistent principles across domains. However, I argue this unitary approach proves inadequate when institutions themselves are fracturing. Instead, I propose a “corporate strategy for the soul” framework that imagines we live through a variety of character role identities—professional, political, familial, civic—each with distinct responsibilities, principles, and world views.

The key insight is that integrity in turbulent times requires not rigid consistency of principles across roles, as Christensen suggests, but rather dynamic congruence. Success depends on fluid adaptation rather than compartmentalized thinking. I conceptualize these connections between character identities as “clutch plates”—mechanisms that enable (or, when broken, prevent) the transfer of values and information across our different identities (see next page). Functional clutch plates allow managers to recalibrate their life worlds fluidly, sometimes radically; broken linkages create dangerous rigidity that undermines the health of the soul—and society.

Quality, I argue, serves as the crucial clutch plate that enables this integration by facilitating poise and adaptation. While Porter's competitive strategy marginalized quality as merely operational and the quality movement fixated on product quality, I argue that managers should look to four dimensions of quality: purpose quality (to motivate excellence), process quality (to create value), product quality (for customer satisfaction), and profit quality (to reflect quality through sustainable enterprise). The magic of quality is naturally tapping into everything, transcending worlds and thus driving towards congruence of strategy and action. Asking “do we have quality in our process?”, for example, contemplates not only internal production processes but also the impact of those processes on community and planet. Quality does not admit of compartmentalization. 

This expanded conception of quality provides managers a practical mechanism for achieving congruence across character identities. Rather than viewing personal values as interference (per Friedman), or pursuing consistency of principles (per Christensen), managers can use quality as a north star for navigating institutional turbulence in ways that reinforce their own corporate strategy for the soul.

This framework offers business leaders a path beyond compartmentalization or naive consistency, enabling them to lead effectively while maintaining personal integrity. As institutions continue fragmenting, this integrated approach becomes not just ethically preferable but strategically necessary for sustainable leadership in an era of profound disruption.

Now in its sixth year, the project brings Northeastern University's co-op model into a nearby correctional facility, where incarcerated individuals preparing for reentry participate in a four-part career design workshop series. Using generative AI tools, participants gain access to resources often unavailable in correctional education: personalized resume writing, interview practice, career exploration, and entrepreneurship development. In the entrepreneurship sessions, participants created logos, business slogans, and draft business plans with AI, sparking excitement, inspiration, and renewed confidence in their capacity to build futures beyond incarceration. 

At the same time, 25 undergraduate students each semester engage in a scaffolded experiential learning course, receiving training before joining faculty to facilitate the workshops. Students report transformative learning experiences as they practice empathy, leadership, and professional adaptability in a real-world setting. 

This initiative demonstrates how universities can bridge academic, corporate, and community spheres to deliver meaningful societal impact. By integrating AI into carceral education and extending the co-op model to new contexts, the Prison Project inspires hope, expands opportunity, and offers a replicable framework for higher education's role in advancing equity and reentry success. 

Understanding this distinction is crucial for shaping the profession's future, as AI rapidly transforms accounting education, training, and practice in the field of financial analysis.  

The research I envision is a collaborative effort between university, professional organizations, and industry partners. Its aim is not just to generate theoretical insights on the offloading-scaffolding dimension, but to deliver tangible outcomes to support professional development. These include a dedicated app on accountant's dilemmas, content and structure to teaching modules, and HR selection instruments.  

By ‘mapping accountants' AI mindsets', the project will identify which personal, educational, and organizational factors foster productive scaffolding rather than unreflective offloading. Ultimately, this trajectory helps the accounting profession to navigate the opportunities and risks of AI, in responses to some current trends that might distract from AI's fascinating promises for the profession at large.  

Prior research finds that accountability shapes judgments, but we know little about how accountability responds to contextual pressures such as fatigue, stress, and AI-mediated task performance. We also lack understanding of how professionals resolve competing accountabilities. For example, do auditors feel more accountable to management, who is psychologically closer and influences their hiring, or to investors, who are more distant but are the ultimate beneficiaries of audits? The rise of AI introduces further complexities. While AI increases efficiency, it may foster overreliance, blur responsibilities, and reduce personal ownership of judgments. These factors can erode accountability when it is most needed. My research program integrates insights from psychology, physiology, and neuroscience to examine how accountability is experienced under conflicting accountabilities, psychological distance, fatigue, stress, and AI mediation. A central goal is to advance accountability theory by incorporating these contextual factors. An improved theoretical understanding will accompany experimental studies intended to improve the design of accountability systems that preserve independence, foster trust, and ensure reliable decision-making in an AI-driven world.

Current primary care interventions leveraging “Food Is Medicine” (FIM) to address diet-related chronic conditions such as diabetes, obesity, and hypertension remain limited. Most healthcare practices operate FIM programs in a standalone fashion and (1) rely on an outdated, static definition of FI, (2) impose burdensome screening and referral processes on already constrained patients, and (3) fail to incorporate healthcare utilization information, which varies in a predictable manner according to the patients' social needs. Our innovation integrates clinical outcome and utilization data from healthcare providers with social service utilization data from partnering food banks and member pantries to (1) refine FI classification and (2) predict FI-related drivers of chronic disease management. This learning model offers the potential to improve healthcare service design and delivery for patients experiencing FI.

Yet these stories may also create unintended barriers to product adoption. In our current idea, we ask: How does founder identity and storytelling shape consumer perceptions of product relevance? Under what conditions do these narratives strengthen versus weaken product adoption?  

We propose that founder narratives could enhance authenticity through emotional resonance. But they could shape perceptions of product appeal, determining whether consumers see the product as broadly relevant or as serving founder identity–specific needs. In other words, while personal narratives can differentiate a brand and humanize its offering, they may simultaneously constrain perceptions of universality, leading some consumers to conclude “this isn't for me.”  This duality highlights a paradox for entrepreneurs: the very stories that make their brand compelling can also limit its reach.  

By systematically examining this tension, we aim to clarify when storytelling serves as an asset and when it becomes a liability. This new work would advance the understanding of narrative persuasion by identifying conditions under which storytelling backfires. It would also extend identity signaling research by examining how founder identity shapes consumer self-relevance judgments. Managerially, we would provide a framework for reframing founder stories to preserve authenticity while broadening appeal, offering start-ups actionable strategies to maximize both resonance and market potential. 

Odom proposes that the future of work centers on trust rather than technology alone. His research introduces the Human-Centered Future of Work Framework, built on three pillars: Adaptive Leadership (modeling learning and flexibility), Talent Elasticity (enabling internal mobility and role reimagining), and Psychological Safety (fostering innovation through interpersonal risk-taking).

Through case-based research and practitioner interviews, Odom demonstrates that maximizing technology investment ROI requires starting with people. His proposed solution involves redesigning his Management Consulting course into a Practitioner-Informed Research Collaborative, where students pilot diagnostic tools with partner organizations, conduct executive interviews, and co-author thought leadership pieces.

Odom's research addresses executive concerns about building adaptable cultures, unlocking creativity amid uncertainty, and leading for commitment rather than compliance. The goal is to create a sustainable transformation that benefits people, businesses, and society as a whole.

There are countless AI applications. Which AI applications should a company invest in?

A company cannot afford to implement all of them. In fact, a company doesn't need all of them. The key is to be strategic about AI selection. Selection of AI initiatives needs to be focused, manageable, and critically aligned with the company's broader strategy. 

Every business has different goals, customers, strengths, and constraints. A company focused on high-touch customer service will use AI very differently from one prioritizing automation and cost reduction. For example, a luxury fashion brand might use AI to enhance personalized styling, while a logistics company might focus on route optimization and predictive maintenance. Even within the same industry, companies can have vastly different strategies—and their use of AI must reflect those differences. Copying another company's AI playbook without considering your own context can lead to poor results and missed opportunities. Without alignment with company objectives, AI initiatives can become fragmented, underutilized, or even disruptive. AI is also expensive, and financial investments cannot be squandered. Selection of AI must be deliberate and targeted.

This study looks at the critical factors involved in firm AI selection and how they drive – and should drive – that decision.

Drawing on proprietary banking data, we build a novel longitudinal dataset that enables analysis across multiple geographic dimensions—urban versus rural, coastal versus interior, and north–south corridors. This granular perspective reveals how banking regulation shapes credit

allocation, highlighting which regions enjoy preferential access to capital and which face systematic penalties that may suppress local entrepreneurship and innovation.

Our research centers on three questions: How do regulatory frameworks constrain or facilitate capital mobility, and what does this mean for startup financing and small business lending? Which regions benefit or lose under current banking structures? What mechanisms link spatial credit allocation to economic development, business dynamism, and the geography of innovation?

By integrating bank-level financials with county-level demographics, economics, and business formation data over time, the dataset uncovers the hidden geography of American finance and its implications for regulation, FinTech, and entrepreneurship.

We find that AI exposure has a positive impact on employees' future salary and promotion: After controlling for other factors, employees being exposed to AI is, on average, associated with a roughly 50% increase in salary and a 1-level increase in seniority in 5 years. More importantly, we find a diverged impact of AI exposure on employees with different seniority levels. For employees whose seniority level is high when exposed to AI, their future salary and seniority will increase compared to those not being exposed, while for junior employees, these will decrease. Our mechanism tests show that although AI in the workplace can benefit senior employees by complementing their domain knowledge, AI may also hinder junior employees from picking up domain knowledge. These results provide new implications for the digital divide in the AI era. 

Leveraging granular FX trading data and forward-looking expectations, we present three results. First, currency investors increase their dollar holdings when expecting US dollar appreciation or improved US macroeconomic fundamentals. Second, cross-sectionally, investors rebalance more heavily from high-risk to low-risk foreign currencies into dollars following an expected dollar appreciation. Third, responses to professional forecasts diminish during periods of higher uncertainty and forecaster disagreement. Our findings demonstrate that long-horizon macroeconomic expectations accurately predict dollar demand across spot, swap, and forward currency markets.

Stacey Agretelis is an investment executive with over 20 years of experience spanning investment management, compliance, and sustainable finance. Throughout her career, she's focused on delivering exceptional results while maintaining rigorous compliance standards and embracing sustainable investment practices. 
 
As a CFA charterholder, Ms. Agretelis successfully managed multi-billion-dollar portfolios across public and private markets, consistently achieving strong returns while ensuring strict adherence to regulatory requirements. Her approach combines deep financial analysis with robust risk management and compliance protocols. 
 
In recent years, she's taken a leadership role in sustainable finance, heading investment sustainability initiatives for major financial institutions. As Head of ESG for Manulife's General Account and later Head of Investment Sustainability at Aflac Global Investments, she developed ESG risk management frameworks, integrated sustainability into investment strategies, and built reporting capabilities to meet evolving regulatory requirements. Ms. Agretelis collaborated with cross-functional teams across finance, risk, and compliance to align climate goals with financial and operational realities, ensuring that net-zero commitments translated into accountable action.  
 
Her expertise spans the full spectrum of investment management, from fundamental analysis and due diligence to risk management and regulatory compliance. She developed and implemented robust compliance protocols across various investment strategies, ensuring adherence to SEC regulations while maintaining strong portfolio performance. 

Joseph Aube has built a career distinguished by leadership roles within investment management and entrepreneurial ventures spanning finance, real estate, and agriculture.

From 2002 to 2013, Mr. Aube was a senior member of Artio Global Investors (formerly Julius Baer Investment Management), where assets under management grew from $2 billion to a peak of $80 billion. During his tenure, he oversaw execution across North America, APAC, and EMEA, while spearheading the firm's equity capital markets activity. He led investments in more than 200 IPOs and played a central role up until the firm's acquisition by Aberdeen.

In 2015, he joined Kayne Anderson Rudnick, where he institutionalized the equity trading desk and established the firm's equity capital markets function. As a Senior Director of Equity Capital Markets, he spearheads the sourcing of late-stage private equity investment opportunities, where the size of investments has ranged from $15 million to more than $150 million. Since joining, Kayne Anderson Rudnick has grown from $9 billion in assets under management to a peak of $75 billion.

Beyond his institutional investment career, Mr. Aube has also pursued entrepreneurial ventures. From 2006 to 2020, he served as Managing Partner of Tri-State Properties LLC, co-managing the development of various real estate projects across Connecticut, New York, and New Jersey, along with a portfolio of rental properties. He currently serves as Managing Partner of an agricultural company in Portugal, where he is developing a 150+ acre berry and nut farm.

Scott Dolan is a senior executive in investment management and asset management with over 35 years of experience leading and scaling fixed income businesses for some of the world's most respected financial institutions. At UBS Asset Management, he served as Managing Director and Head of Multi-Sector Fixed Income and Securitized Products, where he drove business growth from $16bn to over $30bn AUM while reducing costs and rebuilding the team after the global financial crisis. Mr. Dolan's career also includes senior leadership roles at Citigroup Alternative Investments, Bear Stearns Asset Management, and Deutsche Asset Management, where he consistently turned around underperforming businesses and built high-performing investment teams. His expertise spans global markets, including structured products, rates, derivatives, and multi-sector strategies, with clients ranging from sovereign institutions to UHNW investors. Mr. Dolan holds an MS in Finance from Boston College and a BS in Business Administration from Northeastern University.

Rick LeBlanc is the President and Chief Executive Officer of NELCO, the global leader in industrial and medical radiation shielding solutions. He served in the U.S. Marine Corps and holds a BA from the Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts and an MBA from Northeastern University.

Rick began his career at NELCO by introducing and automating finance, operations, and sales systems. He quickly moved into sales leadership, ultimately building a global sales and marketing organization. Over the years, he held roles including CFO, Executive Vice President, and President/COO, before acquiring NELCO in 2000 to become majority owner and Chief Executive. Under his leadership, the company expanded its product offerings, global markets, and workforce, transforming from a small, family-owned business into an international leader with a presence in 48 countries across six continents.

Rick credits his international study at Northeastern with shaping his global perspective and influencing his strategic decision-making at NELCO. Beyond NELCO, he is a multi-level entrepreneur with investments spanning healthcare, food and hospitality, manufacturing, and real estate development. He serves on the boards of several business and academic organizations and is also the Chair of the CEOs Against Cancer Northeast Chapter for the American Cancer Society, where he brings business leadership to the fight against cancer.

Steven Rinn is a Commercial Real Estate executive who has successfully negotiated and closed millions of square feet of office, industrial, and retail brokerage deals encompassing leasing, acquisitions, and dispositions. He has also played key roles in land acquisitions and development projects for a broad spectrum of clients. Mr. Rinn received a BS degree from the D'Amore-McKim School of Business at Northeastern University and an MBA from the Lubin School of Business at Pace University.

Bill Seibel was born and raised in a small coal mining town southwest of Pittsburgh. From the time that he turned 12, he knew that he wanted to be an entrepreneur—even though he wasn't entirely clear on what entrepreneurship was, how to accomplish it, or how to pronounce it correctly. It took Bill 25 more years to join his first startup, after earning a degree in engineering from Penn State, an MBA from Carnegie Mellon, and working 12 years at Air Products, a Fortune 100 company, along the way.

At Air Products, Mr. Seibel held a number of executive positions, including Director Materials Management and Director Information Technology. But he longed for a chance to impact business more than he believed he could at a Fortune 100 industrial gas and chemical company. He hoped he would find that opportunity in the world of startups and left to join McCormack & Dodge (M&D) as general manager of one of the enterprise software company's businesses. In less than a year, he was running engineering worldwide.

Next, Mr Seibel joined Index Technology as Executive Vice President Operations. The software tools startup reached revenue of $44 million and merged with Sage Software to create a business with 100,000 users in 10,000 accounts across the world. Soon after the merger, he joined Cambridge Technology Partners (CTP) as a member of the founding team. CTP became a public company and was named the #2 IPO of 1993. After successfully building their international operations, he returned to the US as Executive Vice President Operations. During his tenure, the company had grown to over $800 million in revenue, with 4,000 employees in fifty offices and a $5 billion market cap.

After CTP, Mr. Seibel raised $100 million to launch ZEFER. As Chairman and CEO, he grew revenue to $136 million in the startup's first 18 months in business—setting the record as the fastest-growing professional services firm ever. ZEFER's growth led to Red Herring awarding it Top Company to Watch, and its delivery track record resulted in Gartner naming it Magic Quadrant Leader.

Next, he joined Demantra as Chairman and CEO and restarted it as the leading predictive analytics software company. That led to being named Best Business Turnaround, and a successful acquisition by Oracle soon afterwards.

Mr Seibel followed that by launching Gumball, a consulting firm that worked with more than 30 startups to help them scale their businesses. After that, he was Chairman and CEO of a security and network performance software startups —leading both to successful exits.

Next, Mr. Seibel founded Mobiquity. Under his leadership, the startup was named the Fastest Growing Company in New England, one of the Top Mobile Firms in the World (Forrester), One of the Five Coolest Tech Vendors on the Planet (Gartner), and a finalist for MassTLC Company of the Year. Mobiquity was recently acquired by Hexaware for $182 million.

Among Mr. Seibel's awards, he has been recognized as Tech Luminary, Technology CEO of the Year, Penn State Outstanding Alumni, Canevin Ring of Honor, and as CEO of both New England's Top Small Business and Fastest Growing Business.

Forbes featured him in an article entitled ‘Mobiquity's Founder and CEO Bill Seibel Is Unstoppable'.

Charlie Baker, former Governor of Massachusetts, officially recognized Mr. Seibel for his “many entrepreneurial contributions to the Commonwealth,” and he is a ‘Marquis Who's Who in America' Honoree.  He was also selected by the Charles River Museum of Industry & Innovation for their ongoing oral history project on Massachusetts Tech Pioneers.

Learn more about Mr. Seibel on his website.

Tieisha Smith brings to TIAA an expansive background in technology, strategy, continuous improvement, service delivery, and thought leadership. She has invested the majority of her career at Marsh McLennan (MMC) where she spent 18 years across the global operating companies including Marsh and Mercer. In her most recent role as Chief Administrative Officer (CAO), she provided strategic direction to the Chief Technology Officer (CTO) and assisted with planning, management, and execution excellence of the global function. She has a proven track record in leading and accelerating large-scale and global initiatives in highly matrixed and complex environments. Prior to MMC, Tieisha worked at Prudential Financial. 

Ms. Smith is a strong advocate for diversity, equity, and inclusion in technology and has developed strategic technology partnerships from the ground up with organizations including Year UP, Girls In Tech, and Blacks In Technology. She is currently a member of the advisory board for Thrive Scholars. Additionally, she is a co-chair for the TIAA Women In Tech resource group and mentor for the 30% Club with the goal of increasing gender diversity at board and senior management levels to a minimum of 30%. 

Ms. Smith holds an MBA in High Technology Management from Northeastern University and several industry certifications, including ITIL, Applied Project Management, Six Sigma green belt, and Executive Management. 

Tom Stanford is an entrepreneur and business builder with more than 35 years of experience starting, scaling, and successfully exiting technology and software companies. His career spans multiple industries and technology cycles, with a proven track record of identifying emerging opportunities, building high-impact teams, and creating lasting enterprise value.

Mr. Stanford's leadership has shaped the growth trajectories of some of the most respected technology firms in the enterprise software and infrastructure space, including SkyTel, Greenwich Technology Partners, BlueCat Networks, Eden Technologies, and, most recently, Nuvolo. Over the last 11 years, he founded and scaled Nuvolo into a global enterprise SaaS platform, built on ServiceNow (NYSE: NOW), leading to its strategic acquisition by Trane Technologies (NYSE: TT) in December of 2023.

Today, Mr. Stanford is the Founder and CEO of FuzionX, a bold new venture focused on providing a better, smarter, and more sustainable venture development models for early-stage entrepreneurs.  The company is committed to helping technology-oriented founders achieve product and commercial viability using an innovative co-build and viability enablement platform and strategy. FuzionX embeds operating support, platform technology, and seed capital to its portfolio companies. Under his leadership, FuzionX is pioneering a new model of innovation enablement, with a focus on improving early-stage success rates and accelerating pathways to viability and growth.

Mr. Stanford is proud to represent a three-generation legacy at Northeastern University. His father, Joseph V. Stanford, served as a faculty member for over 25 years, starting in University College. He earned both his BS in Finance and MBA in Marketing from Northeastern University.  Tom's son, Jacob Stanford, is a graduate of the Class of 2024 with a BS in Mechanical Engineering. This enduring connection to Northeastern is an important consideration in Tom's commitment to helping to shape the next generation of founders, innovators, and leaders