Kenan Sahin

Dr. Kenan Sahin is a highly successful entrepreneur, as well as a scientist, educator and philanthropist. Born in Turkey, Sahin earned science and management degrees at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in the 1960s. His doctoral research led to worldwide patents in areas relating to computer communication networks and massively parallel computation. He taught at Harvard, MIT and the University of Massachusetts before he started his own company, Kenan Systems, with $1,000 of his own money in 1982. Kenan Systems soon became the leading provider of software for billing and customer service. In 1999, Sahin sold his company to Lucent Technologies for $1.5 billion, but rather than resting on his laurels, he signed on with Lucent as president of the new subsidiary, and as a vice president of software technology for Bell Labs. In 2002, Dr. Sahin took over the Technology and Innovation division of Arthur D. Little company, and transformed it into TIAX, a laboratory-based technology development company with headquarters in Lexington, Massachusetts and offices in both Northern and Southern California. As Sahin's business ventures have prospered, he has contributed generously to education, making a record-setting $100 million contribution to MIT, where he has continued to teach, and to serve on the board of trustees. Sahin has published widely on the technology and practice of management. He is in constant demand as a lecturer at universities and as a speaker at industry conferences, where he is well known for his energy, insight, charisma and down-to-earth style. In this podcast, recorded at the Academy of Achievement's 2000 gathering in Scottsdale, Arizona, Dr. Sahin discusses fundamental lessons he has learned from his experiences in academia and business. He shares his theory of leadership, emphasizing imagination, collaboration, and the willingness to learn and teach.