The director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation visited Northwestern’s Kellogg School of Management on Thursday to speak about the changes the agency has undergone since the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001.
Robert S. Mueller III, who became director one week before the attacks, gave a lecture called “Leading Strategic Change.”
The speech, co-sponsored by Kellogg’s Leadership Initiatives program and the Kellogg Veterans Association, took place at 12:15 p.m. in the Donald P. Jacobs Center, 2001 Sheridan Road.
Mueller himself asked if he could speak to students at Kellogg, said Joseph Hannigan, the school’s associate director of executive education. Mueller has spoken at NU twice before.
“He’s had such a good experience here that, this time, he initiated,” Hannigan said.
Students were required to pre-register for the event, which was reserved for Kellogg students, faculty and staff. So many community members wanted to attend the talk that the event was simulcast in two rooms, and some would-be attendees were waitlisted. No backpacks, cameras or food were allowed into the event.
At least two Chicago police department vehicles and several Northwestern University Police Department members were on site providing security. Officials would not comment on the necessary security measures surrounding the event.
Peter Chmielewski, a first-year graduate student, said Mueller also discussed how he himself had changed the organization since becoming director.
Chmielewski said he attended the talk because of “the accessibility to someone of that stature” as well as general interest.
Following 9/11, the FBI was forced to make many changes to address national security issues, and Mueller detailed those issues in his talk, Hannigan said.
“They needed to not just be a law enforcement agency,” he said. “What 9/11 required was that they also increase the size of the national security part of the operation.”
Apart from two previous appearances at Kellogg, the school is also connected to the FBI through Hannigan, who completed a sabbatical as a special advisor to Mueller in 2008. Hannigan said that Donald Packham, the FBI’s executive assistant director of the human resources branch, was impressed by the students, both undergraduate and graduate, who attended the event.
He expressed that the attendees appeared to be “serious students.”
It is important that students attend such events, Hannigan said, to realize their potential to impact a variety of organizations.
“Kellogg has an opportunity to contribute to the success of a lot of organizations,” he said. “Most people focus almost exclusively on corporations … The opportunity we have to contribute to [the FBI] is an opportunity that may save lives.”
