HBR's 10 Must Reads on Nonprofits and the Social Sectors (featuring "What Business Can Learn from Nonprofits" by Peter F. Drucker)

AEI’s President on Measuring the Impact of Ideas

by Arthur C. Brooks

IN THE SUMMER OF 2008 I was happily working as a professor at Syracuse University when I received an unexpected phone call. For the previous year the American Enterprise Institute—one of the oldest and best-known think tanks in the country, where I had a part-time affiliation—had been searching for a new president. Was I willing to be considered for the job?

The think-tank industry is very small, so it has no established pipeline for leadership. Boards are never exactly sure what type of people should lead these organizations, and executive searches frequently prove challenging. I happen to know I wasn’t the first choice—or the second or third. For years I’d taught and written ...