Women's Leadership Seminar: Leading with Vision and Purpose: What's Your Story

Michelle Buck

Clinical Professor of Leadership

Kellogg School of Management

Michelle Buck is Clinical Professor of Leadership at the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University.  She previously served as the School's first Director of Leadership Initiatives from 2006 to 2013, designing and coordinating opportunities for personal leadership development to complement the School's academic curriculum.  She has also served as academic director of numerous Kellogg executive programs, including partnership programs with Fundacao dom Cabral in Brazil, programs for Latin American executives with Seminarium, as well as customized, company-specific programs.

Professor Buck's courses focus on the ways that leaders maximize their own performance and unleash the potential of others by addressing 1) how self-reflection and self-awareness of one's identity, values and purpose serve as foundations of effective leadership; and 2) how leaders engage and inspire others and set them up for success.  She teaches modules on leadership narrative and storytelling, creating cultures of courageous conversations, and the dynamics of leading and following.   She uses the arts, including music, photography and dance, for experiential learning in leadership.  Professor Buck also teaches Negotiations as a process of effective communication and creative problem solving, helping people to transform perceived differences and conflict into new opportunities.  In 2014, Professor Buck co-led an international MBA course and trip to East Africa, including a private meeting for MBA students with President Paul Kagame.   

In executive teaching, academic direction, and consulting, Professor Buck has worked with private, public, family business and nonprofit organizations including Banco de Mexico, Boise Cascade, Canadian Council for International Cooperation, CDW, Chicago Public Schools, Ernst & Young, the FBI, HP, Mitsui & Co., Petro Canada, The Coca Cola Company, Whirlpool Corporation, YPO Latin America and Zurich Insurance.  She has presented her work in North and Latin America, Europe, and Japan.

Professor Buck previously taught at Washington University in St. Louis, and at McGill University in Montreal and Tokyo.  She won "Professor of the Year" awards in the MBA programs at both schools.  While at McGill University, she served as Module Director in the McGill-McConnell Program for National Voluntary Sector Leaders, an executive-level leadership development program for senior leaders of the non-profit sector in Canada, designed to facilitate leaders in creating a "more compassionate, sustainable society." 

Professor Buck has a PhD and MA in Social Psychology from Princeton University, and a bachelor's degree in Psychology from the University of Michigan. 

Michelle's commitment in all of her work is to inspire and empower others to unleash new possibilities for themselves, for others and the communities in which they find themselves.  Her work focuses on designing innovative, inspiring, and important learning experiences that transform lives by providing purpose, passion, and possibility.  In addition to her professional activities, Michelle enjoys dance, music, photography, and travel, with strong interests in Latin America and Africa.