ABOUT
US
OUR LEADERSHIP MODEL
We’ve built a leadership model over decades that has taken proven business practices — from our own businesses — and put them in real-world, practical applications. In other words, you can take what you learn today and execute on it tomorrow.
This process has developed thousands of broad thinkers and strong leaders who have gone on to change lives and positively impact their organizations and communities.
HOW WE ADD VALUE
We are relationship people with the passion, context, agility and reliability you'd expect from a team member. Our programs build exclusively through the lens of real-world experience aimed at real-world impact, and we are focused on delivering relevant education that is immediately applicable.
As a Center for Leadership partner, we have the dedication, expertise and passion to get it right. When you're a Center for Leadership Partner (meaning, when we're working with you to conceptualize, design, customize, deliver or analyze (or maybe all of the above!) a solution to your goals), we're literally a phone call, email, text or video-chat away. You can put time on our calendar without being afraid of "scope creep". You can change your mind when the strategy shifts. We've got your back. We're business people. We know the balance can be more complicated than it seems and, since we strive to be a pleasure to work with, we avoid the common pitfalls of outsourcing like potholes on a freeway. No matter the road we're on, there are no unexpected costly setbacks from us.
As a student, we offer you one-on-one, individualized coaching before, during and after our programs free of charge. We allow you to choose your schedule, class format and pace that works for YOUR needs- not ours. We know you're working professionals - we designed our program the way we did for you! Our Business Leader Faculty can be the mentors you need, connections you could use or consequence free opinion you can ask. We stand with and for you as allies, mentors, advocates and, frankly, like family. If you're having trouble with Accounting, we'll figure it out. If you're not sure about which format is best for you, we'll walk you through it. If you're downsized out of the company you thought you'd retire working for, we'll connect you, build a resume and advise you on where your skillset would fit.
OUR HISTORY
For over 75 years, we’ve been partnering with corporations to build strong leaders who are broad thinkers within their organizations.
In 1946 Lake Forest College launched the Industrial Management Institute (IMI), a continuing education program initially aimed at updating people returning from the service to the rapidly changing fields they had left a few years earlier for wartime service. The IMI aimed to develop the technical and management skills of employees of member companies who wished to advance in their careers. Lake Forest College founded the program with the support of several Lake County area manufacturing companies, among them Abbott Laboratories (North Chicago), Fansteel Metallurgical Corporation and Johns-Manville (Waukegan). They introduced a revolutionary educational approach incorporating a practical business model taught by Business Leader Faculty®.
In 1965 Lake Forest Graduate School of Management became an independent, non-profit organization and has continued to build its high-performance, results-oriented, leadership approach to learning. After 2000 Lake Forest Graduate School of Management left the Lake Forest College campus for a new state-of-the-art campus near the tollway in west Lake Forest to shorten the commute by twenty minutes for students coming from their companies in the evenings.
Lake Forest Graduate School of Management is uniquely positioned at the intersection of business and education. We are fully accredited by the Higher Learning Commission (HLC), an organization authorized by the US Department of Education to rigorously evaluate and endorse degree-granting educational institutions. Lake Forest Graduate School of Management is also licensed by the Illinois Board of Higher Education.