Francesca Cornelli, deputy dean at the London Business School, has been named dean of Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management, starting Aug. 1.
“We’re proud to welcome Professor Cornelli,” NU President Morton Schapiro said in a statement. “She’s uniquely suited to take our Kellogg School to the next level — and to continue building a genuinely global model for business education and scholarship.”
A professor of finance, Cornelli’s research interests include corporate governance, private equity, privatization, bankruptcy, IPOs and innovation policy.
Cornelli joined London Business School 25 years ago and has held positions or taught at some of the top business schools in the world including the Wharton School, the Fuqua School of Business at Duke University, The London School of Economics, the Indian School of Business in Hyderabad and the New Economic School in Moscow. She has also served as an independent board member of several global corporations including financial institutions.
Cornelli will succeed Kathleen Hagerty, who has served as interim dean since September 2018, and Sally Blount (’92), who served as dean of Kellogg from 2010-18.
Cornelli received her bachelor’s degree from Università Commerciale Bocconi in Milan, Italy, and her master’s degree and Ph.D. in economics from Harvard University.
Schapiro has pushed a more global focus for Northwestern after a billion-dollar-plus investment in building out the Evanston campus that included a new home for the business school.
The spending has led to a string of budget shortfalls that Thursday led S&P Global Ratings to join Moody’s Investors Service in changing the schools outlook to “negative” from “stable,” based on weaker operational results.