Stanford GSB Dean Sarah Soule On AI, Leadership & Why Human Skills Matter More Than Ever

Artificial intelligence is remaking business at a breathtaking pace. Few schools sit closer to that frontier than Stanford Graduate School of Business, where students, faculty, founders, and investors operate inside the world’s most influential innovation ecosystem.

The person now charged with steering Stanford through that moment is Sarah Soule, who became the school’s first woman dean in June of last year (see The New MBA Arms Race: How Stanford Is Winning On AI).

A professor of organizational behavior since 2008, she has been a longtime insider whose career has spanned scholarship, teaching, and senior leadership. Soule previously served as senior associate dean for academic affairs, led Stanford’s Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences, and became widely known on campus as a thoughtful architect of cultural change and student-centered leadership. Trained as a sociologist at Cornell University after earning her undergraduate degree from University of Vermont, she brings an unusual mix of academic rigor, institutional memory, and people-first management to one of the most coveted jobs in business education.

But for Soule, the AI moment is not just about teaching students how to use the latest tools (see It is also about doubling down on what machines cannot replicate: judgment, leadership, communication, perspective-taking, and contextual awareness.

In a wide-ranging conversation with Poets&Quants Founder John A. Byrne, Soule discussed Stanford’s student-led AI@GSB initiative, why business schools must rethink leadership development, the school’s surging investing focus, and the values shaping her deanship: excellence and community.

Poets&Quants: Everyone in business education is talking about AI. How are you thinking about it at Stanford GSB?

Sarah Soule: A couple of things are important. Yes, it’s moving fast. The latest releases of these models have been incredible, and it’s accelerating. But this didn’t start yesterday. (Former GSB Dean) Jon Levin saw this coming years ago. Back around 2018, he was already thinking about how AI would matter here. That early thinking led to faculty collaborations and courses that were exploring AI well before the current frenzy. So while the pace has changed dramatically, the mindset was already here.

P&Q: So Stanford had a head start?

Soule: In many ways, yes. We had faculty already experimenting. We had students pushing for more. And we’re in a region where many of the people building these technologies live and work nearby. That matters. You can bring industry leaders into classrooms and workshops because they’re right here. You can feel where things are headed because it’s in the air around you.

P&Q: One of the most interesting developments at Stanford is the student-led AI@GSB initiative. How did that happen?

Soule: It came together quickly, and it came from listening to students.
Before I officially started, students were already telling me they wanted more AI. We began asking: What should we offer? How do we create co-curricular opportunities? How do we move faster than traditional curriculum processes sometimes allow? So we launched AI@GSB as a dean’s initiative. That meant giving it resources and institutional support. But I also knew that if students were organizing it, other students would be far more likely to engage. That has absolutely proven true.

P&Q: What makes it different?

Soule: It’s hands-on. Students are teaching each other how to build with tools like Codex and Claude. They’re hosting workshops. They’re bringing in leaders from industry. It’s practical, energetic, and highly relevant. And honestly, I haven’t seen anything quite like it. Others have told me the same thing.

P&Q: There’s another notable detail: many of the leaders of the initiative are women.

Soule: Yes, and I love that.
There’s a stereotype about AI being dominated by bro culture. But here, many of the student leaders are women, and they’re exceptionally strong technically and strategically. That says something important about who gets to shape the future of this technology.

P&Q: Is AI changing the curriculum as well?

Soule: Absolutely. Faculty are experimenting all over the school.
You saw Amir Goldberg’s class. Jennifer Aaker has been doing fascinating work in this area. We have courses connecting AI to startups, organizations, investing, sales training, leadership development, and more.
One of the joys of this place is that many ideas bubble up from faculty who get excited about something and build it. It’s a very entrepreneurial academic culture.

P&Q: But if AI can do more and more, what becomes the role of an MBA?

Soule: I think the answer is both technical depth and human depth.
Students need to understand how these systems work, where the opportunities are, and how to use them responsibly. But they also need the skills organizations may no longer have time to teach through traditional apprenticeship models.
If companies hire fewer people at the bottom of the pyramid, there may be fewer chances to learn leadership gradually. So students need to arrive ready to lead teams, give difficult feedback, communicate clearly, navigate conflict, and exercise judgment.

P&Q: In other words, AI raises the premium on human skills?

Soule: Exactly. We should be doubling down on the things AI cannot do well: creativity, wisdom, judgment, empathy, listening, perspective-taking, and understanding when not to use AI.
That’s why I’m optimistic. If we get this right, the MBA becomes more valuable, not less.

P&Q: You’ve spoken about a five-part model of leadership at Stanford. What is it?

Soule: We studied what alumni kept telling us: “Stanford changed my life. It made me a better leader.” So we asked why. That work led us to five core dimensions: self-awareness, perspective-taking, decision-making, communication, and contextual awareness.
That last one matters enormously. Great leaders understand the complicated systems around them — the economy, politics, technology, natural resources, shifting incentives. They understand context and can act within it.

P&Q: Contextual awareness sounds a lot like situational awareness.

Soule: It is. We use both terms. And it’s an area where we think we can lead.
Too often when people talk about soft skills, they focus only on interpersonal behavior. But leadership also requires reading the environment accurately and responding intelligently to change.

P&Q: You’ve also launched a major investing initiative. Why now?

Soule: Because the numbers were too compelling to ignore. Roughly 20% of our students come in from investing backgrounds, and about 30% go into investing careers. That’s nearly as large as entrepreneurship for us. So the question became: Why aren’t we treating this as a major strategic strength?

P&Q: What have you done so far?

Soule: We started with a free online investing course for incoming students. More than half the class signed up. Then we held an investing boot camp.
After that, we launched our inaugural Investing Summit. We thought maybe 60 or 70 people would come. We had 600. We were at capacity. We had to tent outdoor areas. It was extraordinary.

P&Q: What does that tell you?

Soule: That there is tremendous energy around investing at Stanford — among students, alumni, and faculty. We’re now expanding courses in venture capital, private equity, real estate, and public markets. My hope is that students leave here as investors, entrepreneurs, and leaders.

P&Q: What values are shaping your deanship?

Soule: We spent time as a leadership team asking what should guide our decisions. We landed on two words: excellence and community. At first those sound obvious. But together they’re powerful. You can have excellence without community. You can have community without excellence. But when you have both, they multiply each other.

P&Q: How does that show up in practice?

Soule: It affects everything: how we support faculty, how we think about student experience, how we design executive education, how we engage alumni.
We want people to leave here not just having learned something excellent, but feeling connected to a community that lasts for life.

P&Q: Final question: What’s your biggest challenge right now?

Soule: Getting the AI moment right. I have hypotheses about what we need to do. But it’s changing every day. Ask me next week and there will be a new release, a new capability, a new question.
That’s the challenge. But it’s also what makes this moment so exciting.

DON’T MISS THE NEW MBA ARMS RACE: HOW STANFORD IS WINNING ON AI

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