BYU Marriott Welcomes Its New Dean

PROVO, Utah – Jan 07, 2019 – After six months of anticipation, Brigham Young University finally welcomes its newest dean. On 1 January 2019, Brigitte C. Madrian began her tenure as dean of the BYU Marriott School of Business.

Madrian returns to her alma mater after previously serving as the Aetna Professor of Public Policy and Corporate Management and chair of the Markets, Business, and Government area at the Harvard Kennedy School.

Since the announcement of Madrian’s BYU appointment in May 2018, she has been fulfilling her teaching commitments at Harvard and making regular visits to Provo in preparation for this new role. While it was hard to leave behind her friends and colleagues at Harvard, Madrian expressed great excitement as she began her work in the Tanner Building.

“I’m both thrilled and humbled for this incredible opportunity to be dean of BYU Marriott,” Madrian says. “I look forward to working with our faculty, staff, and students as we build on the legacy of great women and men who have made BYU Marriott an outstanding institution.”

Madrian replaces Lee T. Perry, who served as dean from July 2013–July 2018, and Michael P. Thompson, who had been serving as interim dean since July 2018.

Madrian received a PhD in economics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and master’s and bachelor’s degrees in economics from BYU. Before arriving at Harvard in 2006, she was on the faculty at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania (2003–2006), the University of Chicago Graduate School of Business (1995–2003), and the Harvard University Economics Department (1993–1995).

Madrian is an expert on behavioral economics and household finance, with a particular focus on household saving and investment behavior. Her work in this area has impacted the design of employer-sponsored savings plans in the United States, and has influenced pension reform legislation both in the US and abroad. Madrian also uses the lens of behavioral economics in her research to understand health behaviors and improve health outcomes.

As a result of her work, she has received the Retirement Income Industry Association Achievement in Applied Retirement Research Award (2015) and is a three-time recipient of the TIAA Paul A. Samuelson Award for Scholarly Research on Lifelong Financial Security (2002, 2011, and 2017).

Madrian is a research associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER), where she recently stepped down from her role as co-director of the Household Finance working group. She is also a member of the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) Board of Governors, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau Academic Research Council, and numerous additional advisory boards.

“I look forward to this tremendous opportunity to serve, to learn, to grow, and to work together with the BYU Marriott community to develop women and men of faith, character, and professional ability who will become outstanding leaders and positively influence a world we wish to improve,” Madrian says.

The BYU Marriott School of Business, named for benefactors J. Willard and Alice S. Marriott, is located at Brigham Young University, the largest privately owned, church-sponsored university in the United States. BYU Marriott has four graduate and ten undergraduate programs with an enrollment of approximately 3,300 students.