New Focus: Allison wants to help students grow

John Allison is trading the boardroom for the classroom.

Allison, the chairman and retired chief executive of BB&T Corp., announced his plans to retire last August at age 60. He joined the bank in 1971 and served as its chief executive for nearly 20 years. At that time, Allison said he wanted to continue to pursue two passions -- the role of values in effective leadership and the evolution of the financial system in the United States -- through writing and speeches at colleges and universities participating in BB&T's Moral Foundations of Capitalism program.

Allison recently accepted a teaching role in the business schools at Wake Forest University. He will begin his association next month and teach his first class in the fall.

The university said that Allison will serve as a distinguished professor of practice, helping to prepare students for the work force. He also will work with the professional-development programs and professors in the Babcock and Calloway business schools.

The association between Allison and Wake Forest won't be without some criticism.

Allison and the bank's value system draw inspiration from a conservative philosophical theory called objectivism, which extols rational individualism, creativity, independent thinking and a limited role for government as a protector of peace. Objectivism is most often associated with Ayn Rand, who also wrote The Fountainhead and the nonfiction book The Virtue of Selfishness.

Some professors have criticized the BB&T program because of the stipulation that Rand is required reading.

Allison took time out Thursday to talk about his new challenge. An edited version follows:

Q. What will it mean to you to run a classroom after so many years running a boardroom?

A. That's an interesting question. I have always been interested in teaching as part of my own learning experience. Teaching other people is an education for you. Over the years, one of my strengths is in helping other people learn and grow.

While there is a difference in the classroom setting and a business, the same kind of skill sets will be helpful. BB&T is long invested in education. We have our own university, and one of the real strengths in our organization has been that focus on learning.

Q. What will be the main points/pieces of advice from your "real-life" presentations to your students?

A. My general goal is to focus on the issue of leadership.

What I would bring to add value to the students is being able to integrate the various disciplines and talk about the impact on the human beings in a business. In business school, you tend to learn finance and marketing, skill sets that you need.

But as a CEO, one of your main roles is as an integrator and a motivator. I hope to help the students think about their role in business from an integrated perspective, I think I have a unique experience having grown in a small business that became a large business, so I have seen different kinds of environments, yet the same basic skill sets apply.

A lot of people who view themselves as managers don't spend enough time coaching the people working for them. That's a skill set that tends to get a little underdiscussed in an academic environment.

Q. Will you teach more from the textbooks or the front page/business pages of that day's issues? Do you expect to do any monologues about the federal bailout plan?

A. I hope not to do any monologues.

What I hope to do is integrate theory and practice. One of my hobbies is studying philosophy, and one of my hobbies is studying economics. I'm little different from some CEOs in that I hopefully am involved in the practical world, but I have studied the theoretical aspects more than some other people have done. That's a special attribute that I can bring to the classroom.

Q. Is this your way of staying active outside of retirement without being enticed back into the corporate world?

A. It is. I am a high-energy person. I said this several times while at the bank that I really loved my work, but I wasn't retiring in the sense of quitting. I was retiring only in the sense of changing jobs. I had a lot of other things I wanted to do related to education and that has been my secondary love over the years, so this is more like a career change.

Q. How much of objectivism and the writings of Ayn Rand will factor into your lessons?

A. Obviously to the degree that objectivism has influenced my own philosophy and my own thinking, it will be embedded in the material that I introduce.

But I am a very strong believer that students need to hear all different perspectives and make their own judgments.

I think that for two reasons. I don't think it's appropriate to attempt to indoctrinate students on any sets of belief. And second, I don't think it works. If people don't arrive at their own conclusions based on their own thinking process, then they don't have any commitment to whatever it is they think they are committed to.

My goal is to really help students become more critical thinkers. If you think about the world we're in today, every job is changing like crazy. Technology and industry are changing like crazy. You've got to have some technical background, but what you really need to come out with a really good university education is the capacity to think critically.

Only to the degree that objectivism is very supportive of critical thinking will it be something that influences what I have to say.

Q. Why Wake Forest, other than it's close to home? Will this decision further strengthen the ties between the bank and the university, or are you acting independently of the bank in this endeavor?

A. I'm doing this independently, but I hope it strengthens the relationship between BB&T and Wake Forest, which is already great, including a summer program for a number of years there for our managers and the university professors. I know a number of the professors.

But I am particularly sold on the vision of Steve Reinemund (the dean of the Wake business schools). He sold me on doing this more than anyone else. I'm really impressed with his thinking process and what he wants to do with the business-education process at Wake.

While at Wake, I hope to do some mentoring. And an academic atmosphere is probably a good place for writing a couple of books as well.

■ Richard Craver can be reached at 727-7376 or at rcraver@wsjournal.com.