Rich Klein will take over as the dean of the Stuart School of Business at Chicago’s Illinois Institute of Technology on January 1, 2025. Illinois Tech photo

Chicago’s Illinois Institute of Technology has a new business school dean — again.

Thirteen months after naming longtime economics professor Liad Wagman to the top job, and about five months after Wagman’s departure to take the deanship at another B-school, the Stuart School of Business this month announced the hiring of Rich Klein as its new dean. Klein’s deanship begins in the new year.

Unlike his predecessor, Klein does not have a deep connection to Illinois Tech, coming to Chicago from the University of Nebraska at Omaha, where he has been vice chancellor since January 2022. What he does have: significant experience in industry and as a consultant for major corporations.

BIG SHOES TO FILL

Klein’s predecessor Wagman joined the Stuart School in 2009 as an economics professor after earning his Ph.D. from Duke. He was a 2015 Best 40 Under 40 Poets&Quants honoree who assumed the interim deanship of the B-school in June 2022 — and proceeded to oversee a 140% surge in enrollment across all programs.

Under Wagman’s interim deanship, the Stuart School overhauled its curriculum, offering new programs in analytics, finance, economics, management, marketing, and more — including, notably, five new Tech+ majors, interdisciplinary degrees that blend core principles from fields such as business, engineering, psychology, information technology, policy, and cybersecurity. The curricular makeover helped to position Stuart as a destination of choice for students at a time when demand for graduate business education was fluctuating nationwide.

His interim deanship portended great things, but Wagman left Illinois Tech in June 2024 to take on the deanship at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute’s Lally School of Management.

A FORMER CONSULTANT FOR UPS & THE U.S. ARMY

Klein joins Illinois Tech from the University of Nebraska at Omaha, where he serves as vice chancellor of institutional effectiveness and student success. He also holds dual faculty appointments in UNO’s College of Business and College of Information Science and Technology. He will become the Stuart School’s dean on January 1, 2025.

Prior to UNO, Klein was the associate dean of the R. Kirk Landon Undergraduate School of Business at Florida International University’s College of Business, as well as interim director of the college’s School of Accounting. He also has more than a decade of industry experience with Automatic Data Processing and First Data Corporation, as well as consulting experience for Fiserv, General Electric Healthcare Systems, Sage Health Management Solutions, United Parcel Service, and the United States Army.

He earned his doctorate in computer information systems from Georgia State University, a Master of Science in Technology Management from Mercer University, and both a Master and Bachelor of Arts in Economics from Boston University.

STUART ‘A PIONEER IN MEETING STUDENTS WHERE THEY ARE’

Among his predecessor’s accomplishments, Klein applauds the Stuart School’s recent partnership with Coursera to offer a tech-focused MBA program that allows students to take core courses in finance, marketing, and digital transformation, as well as electives in artificial intelligence, data science, cybersecurity, and more. Since last year the Stuart School’s enrollment is up 73%.

“I am incredibly honored and excited to join Illinois Tech as the dean of Stuart School of Business,” Klein says in a report on Stuart’s website. “Higher education stands at a crossroads, facing unprecedented challenges that demand bold, innovative solutions. I’m eager to join Stuart, which is already a pioneer in meeting students where they are, ensuring the enduring value of their degrees, and providing a quality education that prepares them for the world today and in the future.

“I look forward to working with the faculty, staff, students, and alumni to lead the charge in redefining higher education.”

DON’T MISS AFTER 140% ENROLLMENT BOOM, THIS B-SCHOOL GAVE ITS INTERIM DEAN THE TOP JOB and THIS CHICAGO B-SCHOOL IS LAUNCHING 4 ONLINE PROGRAMS — WITH PERFORMANCE-BASED ADMISSION

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