Dan Dougherty
Cultivating Future Leaders
Dan Dougherty (HCB MBA, ’00) was headed toward law school when he stumbled on a love for business. After earning an undergraduate degree in political science and communication, Dougherty got a job at a small telecommunications company where he grew up in rural Virginia to save money for law school. “My primary job there was managing a public access cable channel, from filming to broadcasting and selling advertising,” Dougherty says. “I gained a multi-faceted view of all the different pieces of running a business.”
Dougherty came to the Haslam College of Business as an MBA student in 1998, and landed an internship at agriculture machinery giant John Deere the following summer. The internship gave him the opportunity to apply what he was learning in the Haslam MBA program in a real business setting.
When Dougherty graduated, John Deere hired him full-time. He’s been there ever since, starting out in supply chain and moving into different roles in operations, new product development, and business strategy. Since 2015, he’s led sales, marketing, and program management for John Deere’s electronic solutions business, based in Fargo, North Dakota. “I credit my education at Haslam for preparing me for a varied career at John Deere,” he says. “All these cross-functional experiences in the MBA program positioned me for success.”
Dougherty is quick to shift the focus from his own success to the achievements of his teams. “I believe in servant leadership, trying to support the team and remove obstacles in their way,” he says. “I love seeing people that work for me get a new opportunity or promotion based on what they bring to the table.”
Looking back on his 25-year tenure at a global company, Dougherty is grateful for the opportunities he’s had to travel the world and experience different geographies and cultures. “When I started working at John Deere in my 20s, I’d only been on an airplane twice,” he recalls. Since then, he’s traveled around the world, throughout locations from rural African jungles to Hong Kong skyscrapers. “Not everyone from a small town in southwest Virginia has these experiences, and I try to never take them for granted. It’s given me an understanding that people are pretty much the same anywhere-an awareness that has helped me negotiate in business and made me a more understanding person.”
Dougherty brings his extensive experience back to Haslam as a classroom guest speaker, a member of the Marketing Department Advisory Council, and a mentor for students. He also enjoys judging practice cases for undergraduate students on case competition teams. “I was on a case team as a student, led by Eddie Armbrister, and it was one of the most impactful experiences I had as an undergraduate,” Dougherty says. “Case competitions really prepare students for real-world business challenges and give them a head start for their first job.”
Recently, Dougherty created the Mary, Jack, and Daniel H. Dougherty Faculty Award Endowment in honor of his parents, who have both now passed away. “My parents instilled in me the importance of learning,” he says. “I don’t have children of my own, so it’s meaningful to me to pay forward the successes I’ve achieved, help other students succeed-and to extend my family’s values to future generations.”
