Empowerment: Jeff Conant’s Leadership Legacy
The Texas A&M community lost one of the best professors on campus today as Dr. Jeff Conant, the department head and professor of marketing at Mays Business School at Texas A&M University passed away unexpectedly.
As I learned of the news via an email from a Former Student while at work , I stopped and said a prayer for his family and spent a few moments thinking about what a wonderful person Dr. Conant was. This led me to write about the leadership legacy that Dr. Jeff Conant left on me: Empowerment
Dr. Jeff Conant
I’m motivated to create good leaders who are persuasive communicators and analytical thinkers and are ethically sensitive…The exciting moment for me in the classroom is when students exceed their own expectations and I get to be a part of it. – Dr. Conant upon receiving the 2007 Sherwin-Williams Distinguished Teaching Professor Award
Dr. Jeff Conant was an intense professor -creating an atmosphere in the classroom where the students had to take responsibility for their education. All the while, he challenged the status quo and provided quick, immediate feedback to students. I can remember literally being exhausted just from the preparation for his classes. Dr. Conant was uniquely able to empower his students to push themselves outside of their comfort zone consistently. This translated into a highly engaged participant in the learning process where the student was only limited by themselves. No one wanted to let him down!
I think we can all learn from Dr. Conant. Tonight, I pulled out an old MBA Program syllabus from our introductory Marketing Management class (MKT 613) and even in the class syllabus Dr. Conant highlighted the importance of empowerment.
Empowerment is an important leadership principle. People want to feel empowered to take control of their education, take control of their careers and even take control of their personal lives. Every individual has untapped potential and if we, as leaders, don’t allow them to tap that potential, we are only limiting ourselves. People want to do great things!
Dr. Conant practiced empowerment on a daily basis. It is because of his leadership legacy that I stayed in contact with Dr. Conant after business school as he also took on the roles of leader, friend, and mentor in my life. He was on my short list of people who I called when I wanted business advice, a good book recommendation, or just wanted to share good news like a promotion at Lowe’s. I will miss him dearly.
7 Responses to “Empowerment: Jeff Conant’s Leadership Legacy”
Comments
Read below or add a comment...
Leave A Comment...
Let’s Connect:
Jeff was the best of the best. Correction: Jeff is the best of the best. There is no past tense with Jeff. He is not a historical figure…he is present NOW!
We were best friends…and probably 1,000 people could say that…maybe 10,000. The man is a gift…..May God continue to bless the Conant family and all whom they touch.
I met Jeff in 1987, when I was a doctoral student at A&M. He isn’t on my list of best people I ever met…he is the list….others are on it…but Jeff was the most inspirational person I ever met. I would follow him down the barrel of a canon, and I hope I follow him into heaven someday..where he is surely rests now.
Chuck Tomkovick
Marketing Prof
University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire
I spent most my days at A&M in a haze of late nights and live music and rarely did a professor know my name or recognize my face but Dr. Jeff Conant was the only professor in 5 years that got to know me and gave a damn about where I ended up. My parent’s neighbor went to college with Jeff so when they found out I went to A&M they told Dr. Conant to look me up. My junior year I met Jeff and he told me to enroll in one of His marketing classes. The first day in a sea of 300 students Dr. Conant walked up my row during His lecture and called me out by name in front of the entire class. Dr. Conant actually remembered me and asked me some crazy question about what sets A&M apart from other schools and I looked up with a blank stare and began quoting some brain washed crap I’d heard 1,000 times about traditions and outside looking in blah blah blah. After that day I never missed Dr. Conant’s class and I actually got my first B+ because I started to understand motivation. I met with Dr. Conant about twice a semester after that to get advice and career ideas but most of all to feel like I mattered in a huge school where most professors care more about publishing or weeding you out if you can’t swing a 4.0. That time in my life was very, “wheels off” and the advice I got form Dr. Conant was priceless. I remembered right before graduation I went to see him one last time to try and get some direction in my life and to get a better idea of where a kid with a C average should go to try and stake his claim in the real world. I had no interviews lined up and I was really scared about my future at that point but Dr. Conant sat me down and gave me some fatherly advice and talked me off the ledge. I left his office that day a proud graduate and ready to take on the world, (I took a job with a rock band because he told me to follow my dreams and do what I was passionate about) Now the rock band thing ran its course but his words of wisdom stayed with me and I never got to go back and thank him. To a young man in his early twenties trying to find himself, a prof like Jeff is one and a million. I’ll always regret never getting to go back and tell Jeff how much he truly meant to me, but I hope if you’re reading this you’ll take a look back at your life and make the time to go back and tell an old prof or teacher or coach how much they meant to you. Jeff had tons of awards and made his way up to become the Marketing head at A&M and he didn’t need me to tell him how great he was but maybe he needed an old student to tell him how great he made me and that in all my days at A&M no professor ever knew me by name after I left except Dr. Jeff Conant. R.I.P. Jeff you will be missed old friend………………………………………
Romans 8:28
Dr. Conant was one of the first faculty members I met while working at the Center for Teaching Excellence that truly empowered me to be a better support professional. He respected the work that I did for the Faculty Teaching Academy and praised me often. I respect him for his teaching and administrative abilities and will miss him both personally and professionally.
Beautifully stated, Thomas …
I’m glad to hear about how many lives Dr. Conant has touched…I am sure it is too many to count.
Dr. Conant will truly be missed. I enjoyed the class that he taught during the MBA program and also his continued involvement with the MBA students during the rest of the program. Being part of the DVM/MBA program, my fellow veterinary students and I sometimes felt like outsiders in the program and that we didn’t quite belong with the other superstar business students. Dr. Conant made it a point to get get our “virgin” perspectives during case discussions and even tailored a few case discussions to our particular expertise. Come to find out, Dr. Conant was raised in a farming community in Northern New York and was a country boy at heart. I value his teaching everyday in practice and hope to soon leverage that experience into starting my own veterinary practice. Many patients and clients will indirectly benefit from his teaching of this veterinarian and novice businessman. RIP Dr. Conant.
Sincerely,
Daryl P. Mensik, DVM, MBA
Mays MBA class of 2007