DR. ANNE JARDIM, FOUNDING DEAN Activist, politician, author, educator, and consultant, Dr. Anne Jardim is a pivotal figure in the history of women’s management education, especially as it relates to Simmons. A former lecturer at Harvard Business School, Dr. Jardim and Dr. Margaret Hennig were founding deans of the Simmons School of Management. In 1977, they co-authored what is regarded as the first book on women in business, The Managerial Woman. Their research made the distinctive and competitive difference in the core curriculum for the Simmons MBA program. Dr. Jardim was a political activist in her native British Guiana (now Guyana) during the 1960s. After Guyana gained independence from the United Kingdom, Dr. Jardim served as the country’s first ambassador to the United Nations, and later as ambassador to Brazil, Venezuela, and Chile. Dr. Jardim studied at the London School of Economics and Harvard Business School, where she was the first woman to receive the school’s doctoral degree.
DR. MARGARET HENNIG ’62, FOUNDING DEAN Through her career as an educator, author, and consultant, Dr. Margaret Hennig encouraged and empowered thousands of women, including students and executives. Her vision and leadership, together with that of Dr. Anne Jardim, led them to found the Simmons graduate program in management offering the first MBA program designed specifically for women. Dr. Hennig – and Dr. Jardim – retired as deans of the School of Management in 1997. Dr. Hennig graduated from Simmons College in 1962 and earned her MBA from the Harvard Business School in 1964. At Harvard, Dr. Hennig was one of 13 women among 700 men in the School’s first MBA class to admit women. She and Dr. Jardim met at Harvard as doctoral candidates. Dr. Hennig’s dissertation was the foundational work for The Managerial Woman, the pioneering best-seller she and Dr. Jardim co-authored; it was first published in 1977. Dr. Hennig passed away in 2004.
Center for Gender in Organizations (CGO) launched
SOM Alumnae Scholarship Fund established
Elizabeth J. McCandless Professorship in Entrepreneurship established
1998
1999
2001