Matter Ventures Co-Founder, Corey Ford, To Lead Columbia’s Sulzberger Leadership Program

Columbia Journalism School selects Corey Ford, Matter Ventures co-founder, as the new director of The Sulzberger Executive Leadership Program. As director, Ford — who taught at Stanford’s famed “d.school,” and is known for launching new media start-ups — will be responsible for implementing the program’s renewed executive leadership curriculum focused on empowering rising leaders in media and journalism to solve strategic challenges in a rapidly changing landscape.

“We’re excited to welcome Corey to lead this renewed effort for the school’s leading executive training program,” said Dean Steve Coll. “Those enrolled in the program will benefit from having an instructor and coach who brings a wealth of expertise on how to design, test, and launch products and business strategies quickly.”

Rising executives and senior managers at the world’s top news organizations face an ever-more challenging business environment that demands agility to deal with anything from internal decentralized information systems to global audiences. The revamped Sulzberger program helps those enrolled meet these challenges by using design thinking processes and mastering core business concepts to determine a project’s feasibility, viability, and desirability.  The Sulzberger fellows will have an educational experience modeled after competitive MBA programs, and will work on real-world media-specific problems without the strenuous time commitment required by traditional MBAs.

“I’m excited to lead the redesigned Sulzberger Program at Columbia Journalism School.  I know that through this work I will be able to continue to impact leaders within journalism,” said Corey Ford. “It ensures that the transformative experience that I offered at Matter not only has the opportunity to continue in a new form but also leverages the world-class community at Columbia, the Sulzberger alumni network, and the NYC media ecosystem.”

Read Ford’s blog post to learn more about his vision and the program’s complete redesign.

Ford will partner with Raju Narisetti, director of the Knight-Bagehot Fellowship in Economics and Business and professor of professional practice, as well as other faculty at Columbia School of Journalism in delivering the program.

The program’s new 16-week curriculum is centered on:

• Leadership & Team Building
• Skills Assessment & Development
• Design Thinking Innovation Process
• Audience & Trends
• Product & Marketing
• Business Models & Strategy
• Managing Through Change

The Sulzberger Executive Leadership program was founded in 2005 by the sisters of the legendary New York Times publisher, Arthur Ochs (“Punch”) Sulzberger, to honor their brother by investing in a program they hoped would encourage innovation and sustainability in the news business. In collaboration with Columbia Journalism School, they envisioned a program that would focus on solutions and would provide the leaders of the industry with the tools they need for sustained success. The Sulzberger Program launched its first class of Fellows in 2007.

Applications for the Sulzberger Executive Leadership Program are now open. 

To apply visit: journalism.columbia.edu/sulzberger