Yale SOM Dean ‘Ted’ Snyder To Call It Quits

To the Yale SOM Community,

I write to update you on my plans, which, as I explain below, are to continue my service as dean in the 2018-19 academic year and then transition to faculty status on July 1, 2019.

Before proceeding, I want to comment on what many others have recognized about Yale SOM’s remarkable progress during this year when I’ve done a good job of staying out the way. Our involvement and integration with all of Yale University continues as do our efforts to be distinctively global. We have strengthened our people and programs, recruited and retained superb faculty, and attracted terrific students. Staff across the school have fostered an environment for superior learning, research, and practice. The Global Network for Advanced Management (GNAM) continues to prove its value as a platform for innovative programs that connect our community to member schools throughout the world. The launch of our new M.M.S. degree is another important step in our multi-year work to develop a strategic and well-scaled portfolio of degree programs. And our vibrant non-degree programs, many of which feature greater use of technologies, are dramatically increasing access to Yale SOM’s intellectual capital. I am, therefore, deeply grateful to all in our community and especially appreciative of our best-in-class leadership team – Anjani, David, Edi, Jeff, Joel, and Molly.

Given that next year will be my last year as dean, the following priorities will deserve special attention:

i. Supporting a successful transition to the next Dean. (President Salovey will make relevant announcements about the search process in the months to come.)

ii. Fostering yet more effective community-wide efforts to represent Yale SOM well;

iii. Working closely with colleagues to reinforce our connectedness with Yale and GNAM;

iv. Engaging our important advisory boards; and

v. Strengthening our financial position.

These priorities do not, however, constitute the whole of our agenda. I would benefit from your views on what is most important at this juncture in SOM’s history and welcome your answers to this question:

What are the most important objectives for Yale SOM over the next 16 months?

Please provide me with your thoughts via email (tsnyder@yale.edu) and during our discussions in various forums over the next several months. In return, I’ll provide a synthesis of community views.

Let me now explain more about my decision and plans going forward. Deciding to complete my service as dean after next year was difficult. With time away from the school, I experienced what many others have – yet greater appreciation of our purposeful school and mission, the value of our rigorous approach, and the importance of Yale SOM to the world. I’ve also reflected on how our alumni body – small relative to peers but superior in so many ways – has stepped forward to make a huge impact: They’ve provided valuable advice, supported our students, connected us around the world, and been among the most generous alumni anywhere.

I have come to realize, however, that it will soon be the right time for someone else to embrace the opportunities ahead and to have the great privilege of being dean of Yale SOM. Given our mission to educate leaders for business and society and our connectedness to Yale, all sectors, and all regions, I’m confident that the next chapter in the school’s history will be a great one.

With the transition to the next dean, I will transition to the faculty and in that role I will continue to connect our compelling students, our amazing faculty, and our dedicated staff. I look forward to teaching and putting more energy into my research agenda. I am also very excited about my work with GNAM.

In closing, I wish everyone the best for the balance of the academic year and, if I may, offer early congratulations to those who will graduate this spring.

Sincerely, Edward Snyder

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Edward A. Snyder

Indra K. Nooyi Dean, Yale School of Management