Rich Lyons, giving a talk on stage at the GCVI Summit 2022

Rich Lyons became UC Berkeley’s inaugural chief innovation and entrepreneurship officer in January 2020, having previously been dean of the Haas Business School for a decade. For the past two and a half years, he’s been tying the ecosystem together in a way that makes everyone want to participate rather than forcing them to sign up.

Lyons tells us about the Berkeley-affiliated funds, which uniquely all donate a share of their profits back to the institution, and talks about how he helped create a programme teaching entrepreneurship, Berkeley Changemaker, that’s fast turning into one of the university’s most successful minors.

He also ponders why entrepreneurs often don’t even realise that’s what they are – with an example out of his own family home – and discusses the lessons he learned during his time as chief learning officer at Goldman Sachs.

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