David Audretsch has built a career filled with honors bestowed upon him from around the globe.
He is a distinguished professor, Clarivate Citation Laureate, the Ameritech Chair of Economic Development, a member of various editorial boards, the editor-in-chief of several journals, and a widely sought-after advisor and consultant.
His latest challenge—that of serving as the interim dean at the Paul H. O’Neill School of Public and Environmental Affairs—holds a special place in his heart.
“It’s an honor and a privilege to be able to serve the school and Indiana University as interim dean,” Audretsch said. “It really means a lot to me. The school is special. I’ve been around a lot. I’m not young. I’ve been to a lot of different universities and a lot of different types of organizations, and the O’Neill School in both Bloomington and Indianapolis is a special place.”
When he arrived at the O’Neill School in 1997, Audretsch realized immediately that he was stepping into a great situation.
“It’s all about culture,” Audretsch said. “A big part of our school is public management, and one of the founding fathers of the field, Peter Drucker, acknowledged that you need a good strategy, but he also famously said, ‘Culture eats strategy for breakfast.’ It’s people. And when I arrived, I was blessed to have a mentor, Chuck Bonser, the founding dean of the school, who set the original roots for the school. Those roots gave it a certain culture and tone, and I feel privileged to be able to really devote some of my time trying to help us achieve our destiny.”
Audretsch is widely considered one of the world’s top economists. He is a coauthor of The Seven Secrets of Germany, published by Oxford University Press, the cofounder and editor-in-chief of Small Business Economics: An Entrepreneurship Journal, and he’s been awarded the Global Award for Entrepreneurship Research by the Swedish Entrepreneurship Forum (Entreprenörskapsforum).
Audretsch has received honorary doctorate degrees from the University of Augsburg and University of Siegen in Germany and Jonköping University in Sweden, as well as the Lappeenranta-Lahti University of Technology in Finland. Audretsch was also awarded the Schumpeter Prize from the University of Wuppertal in Germany. Additionally, he was recognized in 2009 as the world's eighth-most prominent economist by the Handelsblatt Economic Ranking and was named among the 60 "Most Influential Economists of All Time" in the 2007 book Die Wichtigsten Wirtschaftsdenker.
He spent more than a decade working in Germany prior to coming to IU, and he has felt at home ever since.
“When I set foot on campus and started to meet and talk to people, I found it was a community that felt about education, ideas, and community roughly the way that I do,” Audretsch said. “I felt at home right away, and I still do.”
Audretsch also feels a deep responsibility to steward the school toward a brighter future.
“We’ve got a high ceiling on our potential, and we’re on our way toward it,” Audretsch said. “I’d like to help us achieve that potential. We’ve already accomplished so much, but as somebody once said, it’s like riding a bike. If you don’t move forward, you fall off. I’m going to make sure we keep moving forward and continue the tradition we’ve built to this point.”