Dennis Bakke, '68 featured speaker at Puget Sound Business Breakfast 2007
February 6, 2007
Tacoma, Wash.—Imagine a company where people love coming to work and are highly productive on a daily basis. Imagine a company whose top executives, in a quest to create the most “fun” workplace ever, obliterate labor-management divisions and push decision-making responsibility down to the plant floor. Could such a company compete in today’s bottom-line corporate world? Could it even turn a profit?
Well, imagine no more. Attend the Puget Sound Business Breakfast on March 21, featuring Dennis W. Bakke, '68, philanthropist, author of the best-selling book Joy at Work, co-founder and longtime CEO of the AES Corporation. Bakke will tell the true story of this extraordinary company—a worldwide energy giant with 40,000 employees in 31 countries and revenues of $8.6 billion—and how, as CEO, he challenged the business establishment with revolutionary ideas that could remake America’s organizations.
Attendees will hear a remarkable tale told by a remarkable man: Bakke, a farm boy raised in Saxon, Wash., was shaped by his religious faith, his years at Harvard Business School, and his experience working for the Federal Energy Administration. He rejects workplace drudgery as a noxious remnant of the Industrial Revolution. He believes work should be fun, and at AES he set out to prove it could be. Bakke sought not the empty “fun” of the Friday beer blast but the joy of a workplace where every person, from custodian to CEO, had the power to use his or her talents, free of needless corporate bureaucracy.
Bakke will tell how he helped create a company where every decision made at the top was lamented as a lost chance to delegate responsibility—and where all employees were encouraged to take the “game-winning shot,” even when it wasn’t a slam-dunk. He also offers a model for the 21st-century company that treats its people with respect, gives them unprecedented responsibility, and holds them strictly accountable—because it’s the right thing to do, not just because it makes good business sense.
WHAT: Puget Sound Business Breakfast 2007 featuring Dennis W. Bakke ’68
WHEN: Wednesday, March 21, 7–8 a.m.
WHERE: Bell Harbor International Conference Center Pier 66, Seattle
COST: $25 per person; RSVP by March 14 by calling 253.879.3451, or register online at www.ups.edu/psbb2007.xml.
More on Dennis Bakke:
Bakke was raised in Saxon, Washington, and graduated from the University of Puget Sound, Harvard Business School, and the National War College. He co-founded The AES Corporation in 1981 and served as its president and CEO from 1994 to 2002. He is now president and CEO of Imagine Schools, a company that operates elementary and secondary (K-12) charter schools in 10 states. High-resolution images of Bakke are attached and are also available here. Visit www.DennisBakke.com to watch an interview with the author.
More on the Puget Sound Business Breakfast:
Sponsored by the University of Puget Sound Alumni Association, this annual event gives dynamic business leaders a forum to share their insights and strategies for success with other members of the business community. University of Puget Sound is a 2,600-student, independent, nationally ranked liberal arts university in Tacoma, Wash.
CONTACT
mediarelations@ups.edu
253.879.2611
Subscribe to Puget Sound RSS Feeds
