Fouad Dagher works for National Grid where he serves as Director of Customer Innovation. His work is focused on energy innovation to add comfort and convenience to people’s lives and help them reduce their carbon footprint.
We caught up with Dagher recently while he was attending the Marketing Innovation program and close to completing the requirements for the Advanced Certificate for Executives (ACE), which he has since earned.
Dagher took his first MIT Sloan Executive Education course two years ago. However, he didn’t begin his MIT journey with the intention of earning his ACE. Initially, he simply wanted to take one innovation-themed program. “I thought, this is cool, let me enroll in another,” says Dagher. That course led to three more, at which point he earned an MIT Sloan Executive Certificate in Strategy and Innovation.
“I enjoyed the classes and of course the many interactions with people from around the world and the examples they bring to the classroom discussions. You learn so much from their global perspectives and also discover that most of us are confronting the same kind of situations.”
Fouad explains that, like most companies, National Grid is trying to invest in their future by bringing new ideas, new thinking, and new products to meet their customers. “I thought the programs at MIT might help us get more squarely on that path. I also thought being associated with MIT, where innovation is happening every day, would be beneficial.”
But at first, he was skeptical. “I wasn’t sure if there was simply a lot of hype around the MIT name or if the Executive Education programs were the real thing. It proved to be a very real experience and provided me with useful skills and tools that are useful to my work. Regardless of what industry you are in, these tools and techniques are relevant.”
When Fouad earned his first Executive Certificate, he did so by completing three courses in the Strategy and Innovation track and one elective in the Management and Leadership track.
“I realized this track was also appealing to me, so I took the Entrepreneurship Development Program with Bill Aulet. Then I was hooked. That was a phenomenal class focused on creating a Minimum Viable Product. The bonding among participants from all over the world was incredible, and there was so much diversity of thinking and backgrounds represented. In this concentrated effort, you meet people who are like you but not like you. This diversity made that class so effective for me. And that’s when I decided to take more programs and go for my ACE.”
Of the two-day courses he took, Fouad said Negotiation for Executives, taught by Jared Curhan, was by far his favorite. “That was a phenomenal class that is not only applicable at work but also in our everyday lives. I even applied some of the negotiation techniques in Home Depot and TJ MAX! I was just testing the concepts but didn’t actually expect them to work in those settings—and it did!”
At this point in his career, Fouad said the ACE is for his career but also for his own edification and satisfaction. “These programs enhance my capabilities … and there is also the benefit of being associated with a brand that is recognized around the world. The MIT brand is a very powerful thing. But most important is the usefulness of the content, and that’s why I will continue to take programs.”