History
The Yale School of Management has its origins in efforts in the 1950s and ’60s to expand the University’s training in the management of businesses and other large, increasingly complex organizations.
In 1971 the University received a bequest from the estate of Frederick W. Beinecke, Ph.B. 1909, for the creation of a program in management. Two years later, the Yale Corporation approved the creation of a School of Organization and Management, which would confer a master’s degree in public and private management (M.P.P.M.). The first class arrived in the fall of 1976.
The new school offered a two-year program designed to train managers who could be effective in the business, government, and nonprofit sectors, and who would have the skills, understanding, and perspective to move among those sectors effectively. “Business and government are growing more interrelated,” an early admissions catalog said, “requiring effective managers in each sector, public and private, to understand in depth the goals and operations of the other.”
In 1994 the School changed its name to the Yale School of Management. In 1999 it began offering a master of business administration (M.B.A.) degree, while maintaining its multi-sectoral focus.
In 2005 the School launched an executive M.B.A. program with a focus on healthcare leadership.
In 2006 the School introduced an integrated core curriculum, designed to train leaders for the cross-functional environment of contemporary organizations. In multidisciplinary, team-taught core courses, students learn to draw on a broad range of information, tools, and skills to develop creative solutions and make strategic decisions.
In April 2012 Yale SOM convened the Global Network for Advanced Management, a consortium of business schools in both established and developing economies.
Also in 2012 the School created the master of advanced management (M.A.M.) degree, originally open to those who have earned or are earning an M.B.A. or equivalent degree from member schools in the Global Network for Advanced Management and later opened to graduates of other international business schools.
In 2014 the School expanded its executive M.B.A. program to include three focus areas: asset management, healthcare, and sustainability.
In 2017 the School created the one-year master of management studies (M.M.S.) degree and the Systemic Risk track of the M.M.S., which trains early- and mid-career employees of central banks and other major regulatory agencies with a mandate to manage systemic risk.
In 2018 the School created the Global Business and Society track of the M.M.S., open to those who have earned or are earning a master’s degree in management or equivalent degree from member schools in the Global Network for Advanced Management.
In 2020 the School created the Asset Management track of the M.M.S., which gives early-career students a deep understanding of the application of data science and quantitative techniques to investment decisions, while emphasizing fiduciary responsibility, ethics, and investment performance.
Also in 2020 the School announced the launch of the Broad Center at the Yale School of Management, which aims to strengthen the leadership of major public school districts. The Broad Center is home to the Public Education Management track of the M.M.S. and the Fellowship for Public Education Leadership. These rigorous programs are driven by the Broad Center’s commitment to equity and excellence and fit squarely with the distinctive mission of Yale SOM to educate leaders for business and society.
In 2023 the School announced the expansion of its Executive M.B.A program, giving students the option to pursue general management or one of three areas of focus: asset management, healthcare, or sustainability.
Deans of the Yale School of Management
| 1975–1980 | William H. Donaldson |
| 1980–1981 | Geoffrey Hazard, Jr., Acting Dean |
| 1981–1987 | Burton G. Malkiel |
| 1987–1988 | Merton J. Peck, Acting Dean |
| 1988–1992 | Michael E. Levine |
| 1992–1994 | Paul MacAvoy |
| 1994–1995 | Stanley J. Garstka, Jr., Acting Dean |
| 1995–2005 | Jeffrey E. Garten |
| 2005–2008 | Joel M. Podolny |
| 2008–2011 | Sharon M. Oster |
| 2011–2019 | Edward A. Snyder |
| 2017–2018 | Anjani Jain, Acting Dean |
| 2019– | Kerwin K. Charles |
Mission
The mission of the Yale School of Management is to educate leaders for business and society. We seek students who care deeply about the problems afflicting our world, and we equip them with the knowledge, the resources, and the networks to pursue positive and ambitious change.
Boards and Councils
The dean and leadership of the Yale School of Management receive ongoing counsel from its Board of Advisors, Greater China Board of Advisors, Mexico Board of Advisors, West Coast Advisory Board, Alumni Advisory Board, and Council of Global Advisors. All are composed of accomplished Yale School of Management and Yale University alumni and other supporters of the School’s mission. The names of chairs and members of the boards are available at som.yale.edu/boards.
Facilities
The School is located in Edward P. Evans Hall, designed by Lord Norman Foster, M.Arch. 1962, and named in recognition of a generous gift made by Edward P. Evans, B.A. 1964. The 225,000-square-foot building, which opened in January 2014, is located at 165 Whitney Avenue opposite the Peabody Museum of Natural History. It features a glass facade, an interior courtyard, and sixteen state-of-the-art classrooms.
Centers and Programs
The Broad Center
The Broad Center at the Yale School of Management (TBC at SOM) fosters the ideas, policies, and leadership to help all students—particularly those from underserved communities—to learn and thrive. TBC at SOM works in three core ways to cultivate U.S. public school systems that drive excellence and equity:
- Preparing and supporting transformational leaders from diverse backgrounds
- Developing essential research on effective public education systems
- Informing education policy conversations to advance decisions that support great leaders and the students, families, and communities they serve
TBC at SOM’s work is bolstered and enriched by the Broad Network, a nationwide community of nearly 900 dedicated and diverse leaders who are alumni of TBC programs.
Center for Business and the Environment
The Center for Business and the Environment joins the strengths of the Yale School of Management and the Yale School of the Environment. The center provides a focal point for research, education, and outreach to advance business solutions to global environmental problems.
Center for Customer Insights
The Center for Customer Insights facilitates interaction between marketing executives and academic scholars from many disciplines who share an underlying interest in understanding the evolving dynamics of customer behavior.
Chief Executive Leadership Institute
The Chief Executive Leadership Institute brings together top business leaders and policy makers, as well as leading academics, to foster candid, off-the-record exchanges among participants. It features applied research and peer-driven learning through lively exchanges—candid, confidential discussions of timely global business leadership challenges and compelling societal concerns.
China India Insights Program
The China India Insights Program seeks to be the world’s leading research-based program delivering insights on business issues relating to China and India and emerging markets more generally. Program initiatives include academic research conducted by faculty fellows, collaborative research with leading corporate and academic partners, a flagship annual conference, and a speaker series.
Initiative on Leadership and Organization
The activities of the Initiative on Leadership and Organization are aimed at advancing research into leadership and organizations that is academically rigorous and addresses important questions for business and society. In particular, the initiative supports work that uses multidisciplinary approaches to investigate topics of pressing interest to contemporary organizations and leaders.
International Center for Finance
The International Center for Finance provides active support for research in financial economics by its fellows and disseminates their work to the world’s academic and professional communities. The center’s fellowship is composed of leading scholars in and outside of the Yale School of Management who work on key empirical and theoretical problems in financial economics.
Program on Entrepreneurship
The Program on Entrepreneurship supports entrepreneurs throughout Yale University by connecting students with mentors, providing working space for student ventures, hosting events, and developing courses for the entrepreneurship curriculum at the School of Management.
Program on Financial Stability
The Program on Financial Stability seeks to bridge gaps in the current research on financial stability and to build a community of study and discussion, including both scholars and regulators, around these issues. Conferences and seminars bring together leading academics and regulators from around the world, while a series of case studies will examine in detail how firms respond to regulation in order to better inform regulatory decision-making.
Program on Social Enterprise
The Program on Social Enterprise (PSE) supports scholars, students, alumni, and practitioners interested in exploring how business skills and disciplines can be harnessed to most effectively and efficiently achieve social objectives. PSE facilitates work on nonprofit and public sector social entrepreneurship, as well as initiatives in private sector social enterprise.
Program on Stakeholder Innovation and Management
The mission of the Yale Program on Stakeholder Innovation and Management (Y-SIM) is to develop new thinking that helps leaders become expert in creating long-term value for the stakeholders who matter to the success of their organizations. The program supports relevant academic research; develops case studies; works to infuse principles of stakeholder innovation and management into education for students, executives, and entrepreneurs; and convenes faculty, students, and leaders from all sectors.
Swensen Asset Management Institute
The Swensen Asset Management Institute furthers the study and practice of effective, principled, and values-based investment by supporting research, convening thought leaders, and funding scholarships.
Thurman Arnold Project
The Thurman Arnold Project (TAP@Yale) brings together Yale faculty, students, and scholars from other institutions to collaborate on research related to competition and competition policy as well as antitrust enforcement. The goal of the project is to generate discipline-based, rigorous scholarship and disseminate it through multiple channels to impact competition enforcement and policy around the world.
Yale Center Beijing
Yale Center Beijing aims to further constructive dialogue about pressing issues and the forthright exchange of ideas and knowledge among decision makers and thought leaders, by leveraging Yale’s wealth of resources as a global research university and its historically strong ties to China. Located in the Chaoyang District of Beijing, the center enables the University to expand existing activities and form new partnerships with organizations in China, supports research and study from each of the University’s schools and divisions, and serves as a gathering place for alumni from throughout Asia. Yale Center Beijing is managed by the Yale School of Management on behalf of Yale University.