Indra K. Nooyi ’80 and Daniel H. Weiss ’85 Honored by NYC Alumni Chapter

Indra K. Nooyi ’80 and Daniel H. Weiss ’85 are the 2018 recipients of the Leadership in Business and Society Awards presented by the Yale School of Management New York City Alumni Chapter in recognition of their professional achievements. Nooyi and Weiss accepted their awards during the chapter’s awards banquet on November 1 at the Yale Club of New York City. The event was hosted with support from the Yale SOM Office of Alumni Relations.

Nooyi recently stepped down as CEO of PepsiCo and will stay on as chairman until early 2019. She led the company for 12 years, nearly doubling PepsiCo’s annual revenue during her tenure. She also established a new governing philosophy known as Performance with Purpose, the company’s commitment to delivering top-tier financial results while being responsive to the needs of the world around us. Healthier foods now make up half of the company’s portfolio, up from 38% at the time of Nooyi’s appointment as CEO. In 2016, Nooyi made a landmark gift to Yale SOM to endow the school’s deanship and inaugurate the Fifth Decade Innovation Fund. 

In her remarks to the NYC Alumni Chapter upon accepting her award, Nooyi urged her fellow Yale SOM graduates to continue to embrace the roles Yale SOM prepared them for as leaders for business and society:

I’ve long believed that business leaders have a role to play in tackling today’s larger societal issues—and that’s an increasingly common view among a wide range of stakeholders, particularly the young. In fact, research shows nearly half of millennials believe CEOs have a responsibility to speak up on moral issues. Our employees, our consumers, and the American people are all imploring us to lead with purpose. To embrace tolerance and mutual respect, diversity and inclusion, compassion and love. So tonight, I’m urging each and every one of us: let’s use our positions, use our companies and organizations, to advance this mission. To illuminate the world with the light of goodness and hope. To help train our focus on the many things that unite us, rather than what divides us. That’s the only way we will rise to meet this moment, and uphold the values not only of this nation, but also this school we all hold so dear.

Weiss was named president and CEO of New York City’s Metropolitan Museum of Art in 2017. Prior to that, he served as the Met’s president and COO beginning in 2015. Before joining the Met, Weiss was the president of Haverford College from 2013 to 2015 and the president of Lafayette College from 2005 to 2013. After graduating from Yale SOM in 1985, he worked for the consulting firm Booz Allen Hamilton. He received a PhD in art history from Johns Hopkins University in 1992, and then taught and held a series of administrative positions there.

Weiss said that he was grateful to the NYC Alumni Chapter for the award:

It was a great honor to receive this award, perhaps especially so because it came from fellow graduates of SOM. Those of us who attended the dinner are all deeply committed to the important work that SOM does. I chose to attend SOM because I believed deeply in the importance of its mission, and I am even more committed to the school today. It was also great fun seeing old friends and reflecting on what a journey it has been for us all. I am very grateful.

The Yale SOM New York City Alumni Chapter’s mission is to foster a community of alumni in the New York metropolitan area, helping to advance their careers and interests in business and society.

Learn more about the recipients:

Indra Nooyi on Yale Insights: Can a Positive Impact be Profitable?

Daniel Weiss on Yale Insights: What Makes a Museum Successful?