Developing Leaders at NYU Stern with Mindfulness in Business

NYU Stern’s Leadership Development Program is part of the business school's focus on supporting MBAs to deepen their self-awareness as a component of their continual evolution as effective leaders. The program's focus on developing a deeper self-awareness is facilitated by introducing and teaching mindfulness in business to better equip students for the modern workplace. Launched in 2009, the program runs alongside regular MBA coursework and typically accepts about three-quarters of the quarter of students who apply each year from Stern’s full-time MBA program. Director of the program, Connie Kim, an MBA alumna herself (Cornell, 2001), shares the benefits of the program in the context of her own background in finance and her involvement in helping MBAs develop leadership skills – that is, by teaching them to become more self-aware so that they can have a more positive impact on business and society.

What is the main goal of the Mindfulness in Business (MiB) initiative at NYU Stern, and more specifically, the Leadership Development Program for MBAs?

The Mindfulness in Business initiative was founded through NYU Stern’s Leadership Development Program (LDP), in partnership with the Global Spiritual Life of NYU. The overall objective of MiB is to introduce mindfulness early in MBA students’ lives, helping them with tools to become more self-aware, to positively impact others while taking a more fulfilling and balanced approach to their lives. The invitation to students to explore mindfulness as a potential tool comes with the hope that students see this as a way to further build their skills as future managers and leaders, but also enhance their emotional intelligence and manage their often stressful lives.

Self-awareness is a key characteristic of being a good leader, and NYU Stern’s Leadership Development Program aims to support those MBA students who are keen to deepen their self-understanding in their endeavor to have a positive impact. In addition to introducing MiB (i.e., theory and techniques of meditation, mindful practices, reflective listening and other mindfulness practices), NYU Stern’s LDP also delves into different frameworks on leadership capabilities by offering various seminars, experiential learning engagements, leadership coaching, etc.

Is the Leadership Development Program limited to just MBAs at Stern?

We currently have two programs, one positioned for the full-time MBA students, and one that launched earlier this spring for the executive MBA students. The two carry the same idea, in terms of the core foundations that we introduce within the programs, but are positioned differently because our EMBA students have more years of work experience, on average. 

Why ‘Leadership Development’?

The way that we define leadership development is really the intersection between knowing one’s context - so, their environment, which is satisfied by taking a number of academic classes - in partnership with really understanding who you are as a person - so self-awareness and EQ. We define leadership as the intersection between those two circles - and as an opportunity for the individual to make a positive impact, both for themselves and for society.

For example, when professors reference the fact that you have to have a good understanding of yourself so you can more effectively manage stakeholders in an organization, many students just nod their heads in agreement. However, this approach may not always be enough for students to be confident in actually applying the learnings in practice.  This is where the Leadership Development Program may be a helpful experience and resource for the students who are motivated to deepen their self-awareness through more ‘experiential’ tools, so to speak.

What do you think is contributing to what appears to be a growing interest in this “new paradigm for leadership excellence” (as Stern refers to it)? In the context of having been an MBA student yourself in the late 1990s, and having pursued finance after graduation, is mindfulness more relevant now than it was?

Today, there’s more external stimulation so we can more easily lose focus and a sense of our true feelings, particularly with technology advancement and inclusion of it in everyday life. Back then, in the late 90s, when I went to school, I recall the introduction of the Blackberry into mainstream Wall Street. Given that there’s more perceived opportunity now for students - this activity of ‘there are so many beautiful balls in the air and I want all of them’ is a challenge. Perhaps we can’t change the world we live in, but we can change how we experience and react to it. We try to introduce mindfulness as, at the very least, a tool to consider in gaining more clarity about what we want.

Mindfulness, then, seems like as good a practice for learning to be a better manager or leader in a business as it is for learning to better manage and lead one’s own life and career.

Yes. I remember, when I graduated, things came to a head when I was in investment banking and thought: I’m stressed. That’s when I started to get introduced to yoga and meditation - to take a step back and ask, “What is it that I really want?”

For the program aimed at full-time MBAs, what are some of the biggest challenges you notice when introducing students to the program?

The common one I’ve experienced is there are certain perceptions about what mindfulness is. Many times, they think it is religious. And their initial reaction is “I’m not Buddhist. I can’t do this.” That is something we try to talk about right away in the form of ‘myth busters’ [laughs] and try to explain that yes, it may have come down through the generations from the Buddhist practice, but in essence, this tool is very much about the actual neuroscientific impact. Often, students aren’t aware of the increasing scientific research about the benefits of meditation or mindfulness.

So, what are some of those neuroscientific aspects of such a practice?

We talk about what one’s ability to be in the present does to one’s brain in terms of really ameliorating or really dampening the ‘fight and flight’ aspect of the brain. Really highlighting the fact that it enhances one's ability to think with more clarity, not having as much emotional reaction, with the ultimate goal of having that individual really understand the difference between a reaction versus a response.

I can see how this would play into more effective management of people and of an organization. How does mindfulness play into the journey of a student, though, before they go out into the workplace?  

I imagine that by being encouraged to be more present in every moment, students will be better able to absorb content in their coursework - like handwritten notes, synthesize it more deeply than by, say, passively typing. At least, that’s my hope.

I haven’t measured it, but from the interactions I’ve had with students, I’ve noticed that those students in the program are also the ones asking the hard questions of themselves – are the ones trying to push the shape of who they are and, ultimately, get to a point where they can deepen who they are and articulate it externally. This leads into the backbone of the program: What is your leadership statement? This particularly resonates with the executive MBA students.

Is the suggestion, then, that everyone taking an MBA should aspire to be a leader?   

Being a ‘leader’ is not really about the title or a position. Going back to how we view leadership - and the importance of what the definition assumes - taking ownership. It’s about the impact that starts with you, through learning self-awareness and the positive ripple effect that comes from it. It’s about what your impact is and taking ownership of that. Opportunities to make such an impact are immediate, at the level of course group work and how one works with fellow students, not necessarily just in what we think of traditionally as positions of leadership in the workplace.  

Mindfulness can be perceived as a soft skill, which is something that MBA employers really value. How does it show up more visibly as a hard skill in how we perform at work?

When I was a banker, there was a mindset of “let’s just get this done. Emotions don’t matter.” Now, for example, I personally have discovered that in communicating with people, I am able to focus on the person I am speaking with. This goes beyond just listening actively, but picking up on their physical movements, and linking how they act and what they’re saying for better understanding of the full situation at hand. I also don’t let things overwhelm me.

The Leadership Development Program has been around since 2009. How has the response been from students over the years?  

We run surveys of outgoing classes and the rating is consistently positive, however, it is certainly not perfect [laughter]. We take more open feedback from a subset of students, who we also consult with directly, to make sure we aren’t working in a vacuum to make changes and/or further refinements. I also regularly meet with an advisory board of professors from NYU Stern’s management and organizations department (i.e., faculty who teach ‘Leadership in Organizations’, among others) and key senior administrators. They are my sounding board and working with them helps me ensure that student feedback trickles into the program curriculum and complements the more ‘experiential’ aspects that are taught.

How about the response from MBA employers? Are there particular employers who are more receptive to the value of the skills gained from such a program?

Having been a talent management person and a banker, I know from experience the cost of hiring talent. Recruiters look for technical expertise; but what is that added thing that they see in a person? It’s the potential to grow into a leader. Our students do put this on their résumé and I believe companies notice - particularly those that may already have an internal leadership program.

Last but not least, how do you assess the eligibility of an MBA student applying to enter into the Leadership Development Program?  

Approximately 75 to 100 students are accepted into the program each year. We look for three things in an applicant: Someone who is very motivated and committed to being part of the program, who wants to develop self-awareness and enhance self-reflection for personal transformation, and who has a desire to build a community within the program and beyond.