"The mission of FRED is to better understand the whole concept of leadership. And if we can crack the leadership code, I think we can actually help our organizations grow faster and create more jobs."
–Vijay Govindarajan, Tuck School at Dartmouth University
Founders
Jim Bolt
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Jim is a leading innovator, expert, and author in executive/leadership development, who was named by The Financial Times as one of the top experts in the field.
Bolt co-founded FRED Inc., a non-profit dedicated to elevating the quality of leadership in the world. FRED addresses the need for leaders with the skills to succeed in a time of global uncertainty and change, and to create organizations that excel in traditional business terms and that help create a better society.
Prior to FRED, Bolt was Founder and Chairman of the firm, Executive Development Associates (EDA), a leader in executive/leadership development programs and consulting. Additionally, Jim served as Chairman Emeritus of Executive Networks, the world's leading operator of peer networks for senior executives in the overlapping areas of human resources, talent development, and learning.
Earlier in his career, Jim spent more than 16 years at Xerox Corporation including executive positions in marketing, operations, and in human resources where he headed up executive development, talent management and learning for Xerox worldwide.
Jim’s groundbreaking article for the Harvard Business Review titled Tailor Executive Development to Strategy, introduced the concept of using executive development to execute business strategy. His book Executive Development: Strategy for Corporate Competitiveness, chronicled how CEOs use executive development to achieve their strategic agenda. Jim's other books include, The Future of Executive Development and Strategic Executive Development: The Five Essential Investments.
Jim has been an online columnist for Fast Company Magazine and is the editor of a Pfeiffer Leadership Development Annual. He also is co-founder of Community Action Professionals, an organization dedicated to volunteer work to improve people’s lives and the communities they live in.
Richard (Rocky) Kimball
Richard O. Kimball, Ph.D., is a social psychologist, executive coach, and educator with a distinguished record of coaching CEOs to build alignment and strategic unity within global enterprise leadership teams.
Rocky co-founded FRED Inc. to help foster great leadership in the world, drawing on his extensive experience with dynamic, learner-centered teaching methods balancing active participation, meaningful reflection, and commitment to future action.
As a social psychologist, Rocky is particularly interested in social and emotional intelligence and continued lifelong learning. His coaching practice is aimed at teams at the top and preparing C-level executives for the CEO role.
Rocky consults in the areas of individual, team, and organizational development for a global clientele in many different industries. He has worked in over 27 countries to design and deliver customized global leadership development programs.
He currently is teaching in global leadership development programs for Thomson Reuters, Mitsubishi, BMW, Hasbro, Dow Chemical, Anglo American, Tetra Pak and the National Australian Bank.
Additionally, Rocky teaches executive education for a variety of university business schools including Dartmouth's Tuck School, and in South Africa at the University of Pretoria's Gordon Institute of Business, where he was appointed a GIBS Fellow in 2009.
In the late 1980s, Rocky was a consultant and action-learning coach for General Electric during GE's Workout and the GE Change Acceleration Program. He was also a faculty member at the Center for Creative Leadership in Colorado Springs.
In 1989, The International Association for Experiential Education recognized Rocky with its highest honor, the Kurt Hahn Award, for his lifetime contributions to the practice of experiential learning.