Len Jessup, PhD - Board Member

Len Jessup, Ph.D. is a co-founder and serves as Board Member and Advisor to the Xecutive Advisory Partners. His passion for educating the next generation of business leaders and entrepreneurs is matched only by his commitment to creating more efficient pathways for commercialization of breakthrough university-generated technologies. Indeed, his deep desire to develop strong partnerships between university researchers, entrepreneurial executives and early-stage investment led to his involvement with creating the Xecutive Advisory Partners commercialization acceleration model.

In May 2011, after 10 years in various leadership positions at Washington State University (WSU), Len joined his alma mater, the Eller College of Management at the University of Arizona, as Dean and Halle Chair in Leadership. In 2000, Jessup was recruited from the Kelley School of Business at Indiana University to head the Department of MIS at WSU. During more than a decade at WSU, he served as the Markin Endowed Chair in Business Leadership, the Kays Distinguished Professor in Information Technology, Chair of the MIS Department, Director of the Center for Entrepreneurial Studies (CES), Dean of the College of Business, Vice President of University Development, and President of the WSU Foundation.

During his tenure as dean of the WSU College of Business, Jessup led a significant elevation of the school’s reputation, successfully oversaw its re-accreditation by the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business, and developed and launched an ambitious strategic plan focused on entrepreneurship and innovation. Len was instrumental in developing WSU’s CES Business Plan Competition into one of the nation’s leading competitions. It was their involvement in that program that led the founders to forming the Xecutive Advisory Partners. In his role at the WSU Foundation, Jessup also led the transformation of the university’s fundraising efforts, which resulted in doubling its overall fundraising totals, achieving record numbers of donors and securing a commitment for the largest gift in its history. Before leaving the Foundation post to return to the College of Business, Len initiated its largest-ever comprehensive development campaign.

Dr. Jessup completed his doctoral studies at the University of Arizona in the late '80's in management and MIS, and was selected as the outstanding doctoral graduate by the Eller College.