Former Haas Dean Rich Lyons named UC Berkeley Chancellor
Richard K. Lyons, former dean of the Haas School of Business and current associate vice chancellor and chief innovation and entrepreneurship officer, has been selected to become UC Berkeley’s next chancellor. Lyons will assume his new role on July 1, 2024, when current Chancellor Carol T. Christ retires.
University of California President Michael V. Drake announced his selection and the UC Board of Regents approved the appointment during a special meeting held today at UCLA. The appointment follows an extensive national search that engaged various campus stakeholders, including representatives of students, faculty, staff, alumni and Regents.
“No institution has come anywhere close to Berkeley in terms of shaping my life,” Lyons told UC Berkeley News. “There’s this favorite phrase of mine: ‘You can’t be what you can’t see.’ Neither of my parents had a four-year degree when I arrived at Berkeley. For so many reasons, in so many ways, I could have never seen the life I have lived were it not for my undergraduate years at Berkeley.”
Lyons, who will be Berkeley’s 12th chancellor, will succeed Chancellor Carol Christ, who announced last year that she’d step down as chancellor on July 1.
“I am both thrilled and reassured by this excellent choice. In so many ways, Rich embodies Berkeley’s very best attributes, and his dedication to the university’s public mission and values could not be stronger,” Christ said. “I am confident he will bring to the office visionary aspirations for Berkeley’s future that are informed by, and deeply respectful of, our past.”
Lyons first arrived on the Berkeley campus as an undergraduate, earning his bachelor’s degree in business and finance in 1982. He went on to earn his Ph.D. in economics from MIT in 1987. After six years teaching at Columbia Business School, Lyons returned to Berkeley to join the faculty as a professor of economics and finance in 1993.
In 2006, Lyons became the chief learning officer at Goldman Sachs — a period of time that he has said instilled in him an appreciation for leadership and the importance of organizational culture.
Lyons returned to Berkeley in 2008 to serve as dean of the Haas School of Business. During his tenure as dean, Lyons oversaw the construction of Connie & Kevin Chou Hall, a state-of-the-art academic building that opened in 2017 and helped establish two new degree programs, linking Berkeley Haas with both the College of Engineering and the Department of Molecular and Cell Biology.
While leading Haas, Lyons is perhaps most well-known for his creation of four distinct defining leadership principles that spurred a sweeping culture initiative at the school that stands out in the minds of many. Those values — question the status quo, confidence without attitude, students always, and beyond yourself — became a creed of sorts for new students and alumni alike.
In January 2020, Lyons became Berkeley’s first-ever chief innovation and entrepreneurship officer. In that role, Lyons has worked to expand and champion Berkeley’s rich portfolio of innovation and entrepreneurship activities for the benefit of students, faculty, staff, startups and external partners, including helping launch the Berkeley Changemaker program in 2020.
The campuswide program with some 30 courses helps undergraduates to see innovation and entrepreneurship in action. Berkeley Changemaker started as an idea and its courses have quickly become among the most popular academic offerings on campus.
To learn more about Lyons and his appointment as chancellor, read the announcement from President Drake and the full story on Berkeley News.
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