Management as a Liberal Art Research Institute

Michele Buck: Pioneering Management as a Liberal Art at Hershey

Robert Kirkland Ph.D.

PUBLISHED:

March 20, 2024

Michele Buck’s ascension to the role of CEO at The Hershey Company represents a significant milestone, not only as the first female to hold this position in the company’s storied history but also as an embodiment of the principles of management as a liberal art (MLA). Her leadership journey combines the practicality of business management with the broad, humanistic perspectives of the liberal arts, offering a blueprint for modern corporate leadership that is both effective and ethically grounded.


Early Life and Career Development

Buck's narrative begins in the humble settings of central Pennsylvania, where her early life shaped the principles she would later apply in her corporate journey. Her upbringing, characterized by modesty and hard work, laid the foundation for a leadership style that values integrity, humility, and the contribution of each individual. Buck’s educational and career journey also offers valuable insights into her grounding in principles aligning with management as a liberal art (MLA). Her academic path took her through Shippensburg University for her undergraduate degree, followed by an MBA from UNC Chapel Hill, a choice influenced by the institution's emphasis on teamwork. While her education may not be in the liberal arts directly, the values and skills emphasized in her MBA program—teamwork, ethical leadership, and holistic problem-solving—mirror the multidisciplinary, human-centered approach central to MLA. This background, rich in lessons of resilience and tenacity, directly influenced her approach to navigating the complexities of leading a global corporation like Hershey.


Leadership Innovations and Internal Change

Upon assuming the role of CEO, Buck introduced significant leadership innovations at Hershey. One notable strategy was her initiative to tap into internal change agents, a move that underscores the MLA principle of recognizing and harnessing the intrinsic value and potential within an organization. This approach not only facilitated transformative growth within Hershey but also fostered a culture of empowerment and creativity, aligning with the liberal arts tenet of encouraging diverse and critical thinking.


Steering Through the Pandemic: A Community-Focused Approach

During the COVID-19 pandemic, Buck's leadership at Hershey exemplified the MLA principle of considering broader societal impacts. One specific instance was the company’s decision to prioritize employee well-being while also ensuring product availability to consumers seeking comfort during uncertain times. Hershey quickly adapted its production lines to ensure safety and meet changing consumer demands, notably shifting focus to products like Twizzlers and S’mores kits that were more suited to home consumption. This not only kept the business resilient but also supported the community by providing familiar comforts during lockdowns, demonstrating a balance between business acumen and societal empathy.


Empowerment of Women in the Workforce

Buck’s advocacy for female progression in the workforce reflects her broader vision of an inclusive and diverse corporate culture. Under her leadership, Hershey has been recognized as a female-friendly employer, a testament to the company’s initiatives to promote gender diversity and equality. Buck's efforts in this area are indicative of the MLA philosophy, which promotes fairness, inclusivity, and the development of environments where diverse talents and perspectives can thrive.


Vision for the Future: The New World of Work

In her interview with Adi Ignatius in the Harvard Business Review, Buck articulated her vision for the future of work, characterized by adaptability, innovation, and a deep understanding of societal changes. Her strategies for Hershey’s growth and transformation are imbued with MLA principles, emphasizing the need for foresight, ethical decision-making, and a holistic approach to business challenges. Buck's leadership philosophy aligns with the notion that success in the new world of work requires a blend of traditional business strategies and the nuanced, ethical, and human-centered approach of the liberal arts.


Transformative Strategies and Corporate Growth

Under Buck's leadership, Hershey embarked on significant transformative strategies that catalyzed corporate growth. A prime example is the acquisition of healthier snack brands like SkinnyPop and Pirate’s Booty, reflecting Buck’s vision of Hershey as an innovative snacking powerhouse. This strategic expansion beyond traditional confectionery into the broader snacking market capitalized on consumer trends towards healthier options, showcasing Hershey’s adaptability and Buck’s forward-thinking leadership.


Cultural and Ethical Considerations

A distinctive aspect of Buck’s leadership is her focus on cultivating a corporate culture that aligns with ethical and societal values. This emphasis on culture and ethics resonates with the MLA framework, which advocates for organizations to operate in a manner that is not only economically viable but also socially responsible and ethically sound.


Global Perspective and Community Engagement

Buck's approach extends beyond the confines of Hershey, demonstrating a global perspective and a commitment to community engagement. Her leadership in initiatives aimed at sustainable practices and social responsibility projects reflects an understanding of the interconnectedness of global business operations and their impact on communities and the environment.


Challenges and Opportunities in the Modern Business Landscape

In navigating the modern business landscape, Buck has confronted challenges such as the COVID-19 pandemic, supply chain disruptions, and the evolving expectations of employees and consumers. Her responses to these challenges, grounded in MLA principles, highlight the importance of adaptive leadership, strategic foresight, and a commitment to the well-being of all stakeholders.  Hershey faced supply chain disruptions during the pandemic, as did many global companies. The company navigated these challenges by leveraging its strong relationships with suppliers and by increasing inventory levels to buffer against disruptions. Hershey's proactive approach ensured a steady supply of raw materials, minimizing production delays and maintaining product availability. This strategy not only mitigated the immediate impact of supply chain issues but also reinforced Hershey's reputation for reliability and operational excellence.



The Role of Education and Continuous Learning

Buck’s emphasis on education and continuous learning, as evidenced by her own journey and her initiatives at Hershey, underscores the MLA principle that ongoing personal and professional development is crucial for effective leadership. Her support for programs that foster learning and skill development aligns with the liberal arts tradition of cultivating well-rounded, critical thinkers who are equipped to navigate complex challenges.


Conclusion

Michele Buck’s leadership at The Hershey Company epitomizes the application of management as a liberal art. Her journey from humble beginnings to the helm of a global corporation, her innovative leadership strategies, her commitment to ethical and inclusive practices, and her vision for the future of work collectively illustrate how the principles of MLA can be effectively integrated into corporate management. Under her stewardship, Hershey has not only achieved impressive business success but has also advanced a model of leadership that is ethical, humanistic, and forward-looking, setting a benchmark for others to follow in the evolving landscape of global business.


Sources:


5 CEOs who Champion Corporate Social Impact,” Everfi, accessed at:  https://everfi.com/blog/community-engagement/5-ceos-who-champion-social-impact/


“Cocoa for Good,” Hershey Company, accessed at:  https://www.thehersheycompany.com/en_us/home/sustainability/sustainability-focus-areas/cocoa.html


“Hershey’s CEO Knows How to Get Americans to Indulge,” The New York Times, October 10, 2019, accessed at:  https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/10/business/michele-buck-hershey-corner-office.html?searchResultPosition=1


“Hershey CEO Michele Buck on Empowering Internal Change Agents,” Harvard Business Review, April 29, 2022, accessed at:  https://hbr.org/2022/04/hershey-ceo-michele-buck-on-empowering-internal-change-agents

A Tribute to Charles Handy (1932-2024)

By Karen Linkletter Ph.D. • January 6, 2025
On December 13, 2024, we lost a seminal management philosopher and theorist: Charles Handy. Like Peter Drucker, Handy was a social thinker and management theorist who emphasized the human side of work as more important than profits and valued individual growth and development in organizations. Handy was born in Ireland and studied at Oxford. In 1956, he went to work for Shell, working in Borneo, where he met his future wife, Elizabeth Hill. Disillusioned by corporate life, Handy left Shell in 1962 to study management at MIT in their executive program. Inspired by their humanistic approach, he returned to London in 1967 to start the London Business School. Handy knew Drucker and was a regular keynote speaker at the Global Drucker Forum in Vienna. The two men had much in common in terms of their approaches to management and social theory. Like Drucker, Handy became an author (although, unlike Drucker, Handy was a corporate executive before he turned to writing). Handy wrote not just on business but also society, serving as much as a social ecologist as Drucker was. In his pivotal book, The Age of Unreason (1989), Handy argued for the disruption of discontinuity – resulting in a new world of business, education, and work that was highly unpredictable. He rejected shareholder capitalism and saw the organization as a place for human purpose and fulfillment, based on trust. Like Drucker, Handy advocated federalism in organizations, disseminating authority and responsibility to the lowest possible levels. He also saw “the future that had already happened.” Handy coined the term “portfolio life,” where knowledge workers would increasingly work remotely and for multiple organizations. In the 1980s, he posited that society consisted of “shamrock organizations”: those that had three integrated leaves: full-time employees, outside contractors, and temporary workers. Handy thus foresaw the new “gig economy” and increasingly autonomy of knowledge work. Finally, like Drucker, Handy had a life partner who not only supported his career but was an independent woman with her own interests. Liz Handy, like Doris Drucker, was an entrepreneur who ran an interior design business, and later was a professional photographer and Charles’s business agent.  Minglo Shao, founder of CIAM, remembers Handy as a warm man who made several important contributions to what we see as the fundamentals of Management as a Liberal Art. We are thankful for Handy’s contributions to management theory and social thought, and for his legacy at the Global Drucker Forum in the form of the Charles and Elizabeth Handy Lecture Series.

Treasures from the Charles Handy Drucker Forum legacy

By Richard and Ilse Straub with the Drucker Forum Team • December 29, 2024
For 15 years, Charles Handy did us the enormous honor of choosing the Drucker Forum as a privileged platform for delivering his message to the world, and particularly to the younger generation in which he had such faith. Following up on our initial announcement of Charles’ passing Charles Handy (1932–2024) , we are honored to share a selection of his key contributions to the Forum with our wider community. Charles’ brilliant keynotes at the Drucker Forum have become legendary. Normally accessible only to members of the Drucker Society, from today they are available as recordings to the wider public for a period of 30 days. At the first centennial Forum in 2009, Charles talked about his debt to Peter Drucker while outlining his own fundamental management concepts that he had developed over the years. Two years later, he touched on the ideas of Adam Smith and demonstrated how much more to them there was than the celebrated “invisible hand” of self-interest. In his landmark closing address in 2017, pursuing a thread developed in his 2015 book The Second Curve, he called for a management reformation that would turn it into a tool for the common good – thus drawing the first contours of what we would announce six years later as the Next Management . We took to heart his exhortation not to wait for great leaders but “to start small fires in the darkness, until they spread and the whole world is alight with a better vision of what we could do with our businesses”. Management’s "second curve" will be the focus of the “Charles and Elizabeth Handy Lecture Series” in 2025. Following the loss of his beloved wife Elizabeth in 2018 and a severe stroke, Charles was much reduced in mobility in his last years – but not in his determination to continue spreading his message of hope to the world. He couldn’t participate in person in the Drucker Forum 2022, but he participated in a moving online interview with his son Scott, who directed young actors in a short performance of Beckett’s Waiting for Godot by Beckett to illustrate some points.  Charles also contributed valued digital articles for our blog and for Drucker Forum partners. Even during the most difficult period of his life he continued to write and develop his ideas in weekly columns for the Idler magazine. This entailed first memorizing the article, then dictating it and finally reviewing it by having someone it re-read to him – a remarkable feat of memory and determination. The article is a jewel and most appropriate for Christmas and the season of self-reflection. Have a wonderful Christmas, happy holidays and a healthy and prosperous New Year.

The Future of Knowledge Work: What Drucker can teach us

By Karen Linkletter Ph.D. • November 19, 2024
Interview with Karen Linkletter at the 16th Global Peter Drucker Forum 2024  Video Interview
Show More
Share by: