John Hillen

The Honorable Dr. John Hillen is a Board Chairman, Director, and popular College Professor and speaker He also teaches strategy and leadership at Duke University, Hampden-Sydney College, and in the MBA program at George Mason University – where he has won several teaching awards.  A former public company CEO who has built and sold four mid-sized companies, he is also an award-winning leadership author, a former senior US government official, a decorated combat veteran, an experienced company director, and an executive coach.

John’s newest book, best-seller The Strategy Dialogues, is a critically acclaimed guide to thinking and acting strategically.  Called by Patrick Lencioni “practical as it is entertaining…John Hillen makes strategy actionable and understandable” and by Marshall Goldsmith “a must-read for anyone looking to get clarity and bring these tools to their businesses.”   John uses his decades of strategic leadership experience in several fields to reveal for  audiences the secrets of strategic thinking and how to shape the future for their organizations – a skill that every executive needs to master.

An experienced speaker, facilitator and teacher, he moderates leadership seminars for The Aspen Institute and wrote a column on leadership and strategy issues for Washington Technology magazine and Forbes.  His last book, What Happens Now: Reinvent Yourself As a Leader Before Your Business Outruns You (co-authored with Mark Nevins) was named one of the top 30 business books of 2018, and is in its third printing.

Unanimously confirmed by the Senate in 2005, Hillen served as the Assistant Secretary of State for Political-Military Affairs in the second half of the Bush administration and in that capacity spent much of his time with U.S. and allied troops in war zones from Iraq to Afghanistan to the southern Philippines. He has written or edited several books on international security affairs and has published articles in dozens of journals and newspapers, including Foreign Affairs, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and The Washington Post. He has appeared on every major television network and was an on-air commentator for ABC News for a number of years.

Hillen, who served for 12 years as an Army reconnaissance officer and paratrooper, was awarded the Bronze Star for his role in the Battle of the 73 Easting during Operation Desert Storm. He recently spent nine years on the Chief of Naval Operations Executive Panel, the federal advisory committee supporting the head of the U.S. Navy, and received the Navy’s Meritorious Public Service Award in 2017. He was the military advisor on the original Call of Duty video game series set in World War II.  In 2020 he was inducted into the US Army ROTC Hall of Fame.

Dr. Hillen graduated from Duke University with degrees in public policy studies and history and was awarded a Fulbright Scholarship after graduation. He holds a master’s degree in war studies from King’s College London, a doctorate in international relations from Oxford University, and an MBA from the Johnson School of Management at Cornell University.   He was awarded an honorary Doctor of Laws from Hampden-Sydney College in 2019.

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