Evelyn Williams

Bio and Featured Works

Professor Williams is currently the founding Academic Director of the Master of Science in Management program at the McDonough School of Business where she also teaches courses in leadership, innovation, and high performance teams. Prior to joining the McDonough School of Business as a Teaching Professor in the Management Group, Professor Williams was a Professor of Practice for the Business School at Wake Forest University for five years, teaching leadership and organizational behavior courses in the graduate and undergraduate programs. She was also the Associate Vice President of Leadership Development for the University and in this role taught courses in the areas of leadership, developing high performance teams, communication and design-thinking for the College and Medical School. Before teaching at Wake Forest, Professor Williams was the Founding Director of the Center for Leadership Development and Research (CLDR) Leadership Laboratories, Leadership Fellows, and the Executive Challenge at Stanford University, Graduate School of Business. Over her five year tenure, she taught some of the Schools most popular electives and required leadership coursework. Prior to joining Stanford’s faculty in 2006, Professor Williams was the Faculty Chair of the Leadership Effectiveness and Development program (LEAD) and a Clinical Associate Professor of Management at the University of Chicago, Booth Graduate School of Business. A professor at Chicago GSB for six years, she taught in both the full-time and evening/weekend MBA programs and student evaluations consistently ranked her courses in the top tier at the School. Prior to teaching full-time, Professor Williams spent over 15 years in a series of executive and leadership development positions within Fortune 500 firms. She designed and implemented leadership and management development programs for executives at firms in the United States, Europe and Asia. She continues to consult with companies on developing leaders for senior management/C-Suite positions. Professor Williams holds a B.A. from the University of California at Los Angeles and an M.A. in Education from the University of Chicago. She and her husband are empty-nesters now and the proud parents of two adult daughters.

Expertise

• Communication Skills Training, Design Thinking, Large Group Intervention, Organization Gap Analysis, Strategic Planning, Leadership Team Development, Executive Coaching

Education

• University of Chicago - M.A., Education
• University of California-Los Angeles - B.A., English