Imran Mouna 

Hey everyone, welcome back to Visions for the Future of Higher Ed. Today, we are looking at episode two out of three for the mini-series we are running with American University. Today, we have the Dean of the Kogod School of Business, David Marchick, joining us today at American University, who's leading some major initiatives in AI and sustainability, as well as entrepreneurship. David, thanks so much for making time for this conversation today.

David Marchick 

It's a pleasure. Thanks for having me.

Imran Mouna 

I want to share a couple of pieces of background information on your journey, where you've come from. Part of that being that David was the former COO of the US Development Finance Corporation under the Biden administration, which is an incredible piece of experience, I think, you're bringing to the team at AU. But on top of that, spent 12 years as managing director of the Carlisle Group and served in multiple other senior roles. Across federal agencies, including during the Clinton administration. Such a wealth of knowledge and experience, I think you're bringing to the role of as Dean at Kogod, David. And the first question I always like to ask folks is what made you want to pursue a career in higher education? And especially with your background, I'm excited to hear why and how you made the segue from the work you've done previously into the role you're in now.

David Marchick

Well, thanks for having me. My career path has been eclectic and I would say unplanned. I started my career in government working for President Clinton for seven years in various roles. I was a lawyer and a partner to law firm, and then I was one of the senior people at the Carlisle Group, which is a private equity firm. I got lucky there, and we took the company public, and then I retired early. I was 52 and had some flexibility and didn't really know what I wanted to do with the rest of my career. So I really was focused on spending the last years of my productive career doing something mission oriented. So I started teaching at the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth. I would fly up there Mondays, teach, back Tuesdays. And then American University called and said they were looking for a dean, and I said, well, I'm not really qualified to be a dean. I've not really done anything in academia. And they said, "Well, we're looking for someone non-traditional." And I live a mile away. I knew the former president of AU, Sylvia Burwell. And I thought it would be a good, fun, interesting challenge where I could spend this period of my professional career helping young people and hopefully help to put a really good business school on the map globally.

Imran Mouna 

I always think it's exciting when someone comes from industry into a role like this, Dave, and I'm sure the students and faculty appreciate it as well, because having someone non-traditional in a position like this brings an entirely different perspective to the team. So I'm glad you're in the role. I'm sure the team appreciates it. And I have to thank Maddie Sherriff for actually making this introduction because she shared with me a little bit about the work that you've been a huge part of at AU. And so the next question I always like to ask is about what's giving you hope in higher education right now? What sorts of projects and initiatives are you excited about? In your case in particular, what is AU doing that is exciting you right now?

David Marchick

The thing that is exciting me the most right now at AU is our focus on a few areas to be truly world-class. So in my view, every organization has to be great at something. At Carlyle, we had a fantastic private equity business. Blackstone has the largest and perhaps best real estate practice in the world. Apollo is great at credit restructuring. So every organization has to pick its spots. At Kogod we've really picked three areas: AI, entrepreneurship, and sustainability. You know we're good in finance, we're good in marketing, we have a lot of other strengths, and all the foundational and fundamental areas of any business school, but we're picking those areas to really be best in class.

In AI, we are humbly ahead of almost every university or business school in the world. And don't ask me, ask OpenAI or Brad Smith, who's the president of Microsoft. They've said that we're way ahead. And what we've done is we've infused AI throughout our curriculum under the view that the job market for young people is going to change dramatically during the next few years. If you're an incoming freshman, by the time you graduate, AI will have dramatically changed the workforce and the workplace. So our strategy has really been to give our students the tools to succeed in an AI economy. So in high school, they're told don't use AI because it's cheating. When they come here for orientation, we tell them you're using AI on day one. And by the time they graduate, we want them to know how to underwrite an investment using AI, to write or read a balance sheet using AI, to design and execute a marketing campaign using AI. We want them to infuse AI into everything they do because that's going to be what's expected of them when they take their first job or their first internship. So that's giving me hope, and it's really exciting, and students are very excited. Our applications are up 40%. So the market has responded positively, and I think we're doing very innovative work.

Imran Mouna 

Yeah, that's an incredible stat there because I can imagine students looking for that guidance around what the expectation in industry is. And it's been incredible how rapidly you've been able to roll this out at the school. I was just speaking to one of your professorial lecturers, Angela Virtue, who was talking about what the rollout has been like and really highlighted your leadership as something that was key to being able to adopt this so quickly and how this trial and error mindset at AU has been pivotal in trying to figure out what works and what doesn't. And I've spoken to many leaders over the past few months of running this podcast, Dave, that are trying to figure out how to provide leadership in this extremely rapidly changing space. So the next kind of question I have for you is, what sort of tips do you have for leaders who are really trying to provide this guidance to a large team? And how have you kept yourself up to speed on what these changes mean and what kind of tools are out there?

David Marchick 

So let me start with the latter. I'm obsessed with learning about AI. I'm not a technology person. I joke with my kids that I just got Pong, which is that old game with the two paddles. ⁓ But I try to read or listen to everything I can on AI so I can be up to speed. I subscribe to three or four AI podcasts, newsletters.

Imran Mouna 

Yeah. The OG. Yeah.

David Marchick 

I would say everybody is kind of making it up as they go along. And what I've tried to do in my leadership role is encourage faculty to understand that nobody really knows the answers and just make it up as you go along. Try. It's okay to fail. Partner with your students and say, hey, we're going to try something that nobody's ever done or I've never done in my class. If it works, that's great. We can continue to invest in it. If it doesn't work, that's a lesson learned. One of the biggest questions is what tools and technologies to use. And here I actually asked Brad Smith of Microsoft that question when he came to campus because I wanted to get his advice. And he said, well, obviously, we want you to use Microsoft products because they're the best. But he said more important than that is. 

Imran Mouna 

They're great.

David Marchick 

If you have a freshman coming in, by the time they graduate, the world of AI is going to change, and we don't know what the best product is going to be. So the key thing is for them to be AI fluent in multiple applications and have the intellectual curiosity and confidence to try new things. So right now we're very focused on, you know, there's the foundational models, OpenAI, Perplexity, Anthropic. We have a partnership with Perplexity where every student, staff, and faculty gets Perplexity Enterprise on their desktop, laptop, and mobile device. But over time, just like in the other world of software technology, there's going to be specializations and specialty software. So, you know, the same way that architects, you know, use Autodesk or AutoCAD, marketing professionals are going to use a marketing AI. Lawyers are going to use Harvey or one of the others. PR professionals are going to use a firm like Clipbook or others. So these right now with the infrastructure layer is being developed, but in the next two or three years, we're going to see the proliferation of applications, and we're just going to need to learn how to use them in the same way that, you know, I'm 59, turning 60 next year. You know, I remember moving from WordPerfect to Word and thinking my life was going to end because I learned how to use WordPerfect. We just have to be adaptable because the world's gonna change, but change rapidly.

Imran Mouna 

That's an extremely tangible approach to this, Dave. I think that's what more and more people are starting to recognize and embrace: this mentality that it's gonna be okay to fail. We need to have a trial-and-error mindset around these tools because they are new. And I think there's a tendency to wanna wait till it's perfect or have this sense of security that it's going to work before you try it. But things are changing too quickly now to wait for that, and that's gonna lead to people falling behind, students especially. So I think that's a very valuable lesson to share that it's okay. And I think that encourages students in a positive way as well, that they sort of recognize that lead by example approach that we're gonna be asking them to try things and encourage them that it's okay to fail. And if that's coming from the top down, I think that's why people have highlighted your leadership as so influential, because you're doing what you're recommending people. So thanks for that insight there. And for the recommendation on specific tools, that's another question I was gonna ask you. So it's helpful to know about the perplexity partnership. Angela had mentioned that as well. And she also mentioned kind of the two facets of this approach. You know, the AI sage area and the AI artisan approach. And I think that artisan approach is something that usually takes a backseat to the technical use of AI. But this concept around when is it a good time to use it? What do we need to think around creating art using AI? That's interesting as well. Do you have any thoughts to share on how you came up with these two areas or where that originated from?

David Marchick 

So, reflecting back on your last question and then your, I think, very interesting commentary, I think the essence of any good leader is to find people that are smarter than you in different areas and empower them. So in this case, Casey Evans, who you're going to talk to, she's the associate dean for undergrad, she's brilliant, and she is one of the great experts on curriculum. So she led an effort to redesign our curriculum and infuse AI sustainability and professionalism into the curriculum. Those so-called soft skills, which we actually call power skills, because teamwork, oral communications, presentations, the ability to think on your feet, those are going to be the distinguishing skills in an AI economy when technology can make the bottom decile writer a median writer or the bottom decile coder. And Angela is brilliant at AI; she'll forget more than I'll ever learn. So my real role has been to empower them.

In the same way we empowered a committee to come up with a plan for AI. So the original idea came to infuse AI from two speakers. We had the president of Google come, who basically said AI is going to be as profound as fire or electricity. And then we had a fellow named Brett Wilson, who's CEO of AI venture capital firm, and a student asked him, am I going to be replaced by AI? And Brett said, you won't be replaced by AI, but you could be replaced by someone who knows AI if you don't. So that moment, a light bulb clicked, and I said, we have to do something to drive AI throughout a curriculum. So I went to our senior associate dean, and he said, let's create a committee. And I kind of rolled my eyes thinking, this is going to be an academic committee that's going to take two years and write a 300-page report that nobody reads. And I said, okay, the committee has six weeks and can give me no more than five pages for a plan. And they did it, and they presented a plan. And one of the elements of the plan was artisan courses, which have a touch of A, I, and then Sage courses, which are deep, deep 50% plus. And I basically said, great, run, don't walk. And so honestly, they weren't my ideas. They were other people's ideas. And I just empowered them to be creative, and then I just empowered them to run, and our faculty has been great.

Imran Mouna 

I always have a ton of respect for that approach to leadership, David, is that sense that to surround yourself with people who are smarter than you, I think it's an incredibly useful mentality. And for the leaders that are looking for advice around this, I'm really glad you mentioned that. And I appreciate your kind of attitude towards the policies or the committees. Whenever I hear a committee is forming, I get a little worried as well that we're going to look at a lot of red tape. But setting that kind of six-week expectation, I had heard that about American University, and I'm really glad you added some more context for it because that's incredible. I think again, providing that leadership that hey, we're gonna run into this, we're gonna get it done, and start seeing what works. Two years from now, that work is not gonna be as relevant. It's gonna be needing to adapt as we go. So I think that's a fantastic approach. The other thing that's coming to mind for me is how many incredible industry partnerships you've formed to keep the AU team at the forefront of what's happening and what kind of recommendations industry experts have. Do you have advice on how to forge those relationships? How do you get folks from Google, Microsoft, Perplexity, and these other four running companies to engage with the school and provide that insight? know a lot of other leaders would. Be curious to know your approach there, how that kind of thing can be done.

David Marchick

So here again, I think the goal is to create a culture where failure is okay. So I'll just email someone, or reach out to them, or find someone that I know that knows someone and try to start a conversation. And sometimes I get blown off. Sometimes people don't respond, but sometimes it sticks. And so actually Casey and Angela and Gwanhoo, and one other person and I went out to Silicon Valley. In January of this year, we met with OpenAI, Perplexity, Google, Brett Wilson of Swift Ventures, we met with LinkedIn. And honestly, we have found ways to collaborate with every single one of those organizations. OpenAI, we do a lot with, they just featured Angela on a podcast or a video about how to create an AI culture at an organization, and it's been watched, I think, almost 20,000 times. Google they're very interested in the subject of how do you measure learning outcomes with AI, which is something that we honestly don't know. And they asked us the question, well, how do you measure learning outcomes? And I kind of stumbled through an answer, and then one of my colleagues stumbled through an answer, and then I said, you know what, we're making this up as we go along. We don't really know. Can we work with you to figure that out? And they said, yeah, let's try to do something. And then with Perplexity, we've run a partnership with LinkedIn. We're doing a lot with them around AI and jobs. So LinkedIn has the best; they're the largest professional network in the world. They have the best data on job trends in the world. And obviously, AI is going to have a big impact. And there's a fellow there named Anish Raman, who is the chief opportunity officer. And he just wrote a piece in the New York Times. It was very influential, talking about how they're seeing the bottom rung of the career ladder break a little because of AI. And he highlighted some ideas for how to address this from a societal perspective. And one of things he said is to do what American University's Kogut School of Business is with AI. And so he and I we're collaborating on some stuff. We're doing some writing. We actually have an op-ed coming out in the next couple of weeks addressing AI, jobs of the future, and these kinds of what we call power skills. And so there, again, I think that the goal is to find folks that are smarter than you, that are experts, and then listen, learn. And that's all we're doing.

Imran Mouna 

It's an attitude I'm seeing a pattern in across AU. It's a very humble and tangible approach, I gotta say, Dave, to send an email and some hit and some don't. That's something everyone can do. You know, it's not necessarily about anything other than putting it out there. And then making the effort to go out in person to meet people, that does have an impact. And I'm glad to hear about this shift from soft skills to power skills, because I agree. You could have an incredible idea and if you can't share it with a team, you're going to struggle. So I think that's incredibly valuable to highlight those as, as not secondary skills, but very useful human skills. And the last question, I think I might have time for you today. These conversations always go quicker than I expect would be, are there things you're hoping AI might be able to help with in the future? Are there areas that you're excited to see it expand its capability?

David Marchick 

So I mentioned that we're very focused on being good in the fundamentals across the business discipline, finance, and marketing. But we're really focused on three areas: sustainability, AI, and entrepreneurship. And I think AI can be a catalyst for a good in entrepreneurship and also sustainability. Let me give you an example on sustainability. Obviously, there are negatives associated with AI, including the...dramatic increase in demand for power. Plus the fact that a lot of the data centers are being located in water-scarce economies or locations. So since 2022, two-thirds of all of the data centers have been located in areas that are water scarce, Arizona, Texas, places like Spain, and Israel.

On the other hand, AI can be an incredibly powerful tool for improving sustainable outcomes. And I'll give you an example. We partner with a company called Xylem, which is a water technology company. They help water systems and water utilities all around the world improve water efficiency, reduce leaks, having sensors. And AI can be an incredibly powerful tool to help a firm like Xylem serve their customers better. So if there's a leak in a huge water system, they can identify the location faster. If there's going to be a huge storm or a microclimate issue, they can identify that using AI. And so I think there's going to be a lot of opportunities for AI to improve sustainable outcomes, and that's an area where I hope we can drive in the future.

Imran Mouna 

Yeah, that's an extremely interesting angle to take there. And I see hope in that side of things as well, that we can leverage it to actually solve one of the problems that people are trying to address right now. It's an incredible use of the technology to actually address the concerns it itself is causing. So I see that being something that changes very soon in the future. And I just want to again thank you for the time today, David. I was about to ask you another question, but I can see we're coming up on the end of the time I asked you for today. So I hope you'll come back in the future to continue this conversation because I'd love to hear about the continued work you're doing with the school. And thank you again for setting an example as an institution. think there's a reason many people are looking to AU as an example for advice and insight. And so I really appreciate the time today to learn a bit more about what you're doing.

David Marchick

Thanks, and I'm glad you're talking to Casey and Angela too. They're better and smarter than I am, so you'll enjoy that.

Imran Mouna 

Well, I'm off to Casey next here, so I'm looking forward to putting part three of this mini series together and looking forward to sharing this with everyone.

David Marchick

Thanks very much.