Compass.Executive in Residence

Beyond the Western Hemisphere

The purpose of the Executive in Residence (EIR) program is to equip our students with the tools to navigate beyond their Western experience. Successful alumni and friends of the college are invited to share how they have charted successful careers. The Executive in Residence Program was initiated through the generosity of Drs. Jim and Carolyn Tripp, professors in the Department of Marketing and Finance at Western Illinois University.

Mike Litwin, Managing Director of Merrill Lynch Capital piloted the first EIR experience in 2005. View the executive in residence archive.

February 4, 2008

Gene Poor.Gene Poor
Founder, LifeFormations

Bowling Green, Ohio

Gene Poor received the 2004 Ernst and Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award for Northwest Ohio for his vision and leadership in founding LifeFormations, an animatronics studio in Bowling Green, Ohio. The company designs and makes both static and animated figures for museums, theme parks, retail operations, and even restaurants. Recent projects completed by LifeFormations include creating and installing 50 characters for the Lincoln Library in Springfield, Illinois, and others for an African-American museum in Detroit; producing the characters for a “dark ride” about the biblical Solomon for a religious theme park in Israel; working on the new animated representative for the soft drink 7-Up, and making animated figures of Jekyll and Hyde for a new, themed restaurant in New York City.

Gene Poor also is the Ernest and Dorothy Hamilton Endowed Professor of Entrepreneurship at Bowling Green State University and a professor of Visual Communication Technology at BGSU, a program he conceptualized in the late 1970’s.  His career has been a combination of university teaching, administration, research, and program development coupled with intense entrepreneurial innovation, product creation, training, and consultation within the private sector. During his career as both educator and entrepreneur, Gene has worked with over 400 companies, museums, theme parks and retail organizations. He has written numerous articles and eight books on several technology topics, and has made over 200 presentations throughout the United States, Europe, and the Middle East.

Gene is a very creative business and academic leader who has succeeded by bringing business, technology, art, and education together.  He is “the chief imagination officer” for LifeFormations.

October 16, 2007

Eric Gleacher.Eric Gleacher
Chairman

Gleacher Partners, LLC
New York, New York

A preeminent leader on Wall Street, Mr. Gleacher is chairman of Gleacher Partners LLC, the international investment banking firm that he founded in 1990. 

In his early years on Wall Street, Mr. Gleacher started the mergers and acquisitions (M&A) department at Lehman Brothers before managing global M&A at Morgan Stanley. In 1988, he advised the $26.4 billion purchase of RJR Nabisco by Kohlberg Kravis Roberts – then the largest takeover in history. 

With offices in New York, Atlanta, and Connecticut, Mr. Gleacher’s firm provides strategic advice to corporations throughout the world – primarily related to mergers and acquisitions, restructurings, strategic alliances and financing. To date, Gleacher Partners has advised clients on more than $200 billion in M&A transactions. Gleacher Partners' investment management unit (through several subsidiaries and affiliates) is active in hedge funds, private equity, mezzanine investments, and other investments with over $1 billion in assets under management.

Mr. Gleacher is a Trustee of The University of Chicago and New York University. He is Chairman of the Institute for Sports Medicine at the Hospital for Special Surgery in New York and is also Chairman of the Ransome Scholarship Trust for St. Andrews University in St. Andrews, Scotland.

Mr. Gleacher received an MBA from The University of Chicago and a BA from Northwestern University and served as a U.S. Marine infantry officer in the 1960s.