London Daily

Focus on the big picture.
Thursday, Jul 10, 2025

Rishi who? Sunak says Stanford business school changed his life, but few remember him

Rishi who? Sunak says Stanford business school changed his life, but few remember him

Teachers at Tory leadership contender’s alma mater say they have no recollection of the man who would be prime minister
Rishi Sunak has said going to California’s Stanford business school changed his life. Stanford “teaches you to think bigger”, he told a venture capital podcast last year. In place of a “more incremental mindset”, studying at the heart of Silicon Valley encouraged him to embrace “a slightly bigger, more dynamic approach to change”, said the former UK chancellor.

While Stanford clearly made its mark on him, it’s less clear whether Sunak made much of a mark at Stanford, one of the highest-ranked business schools in the world. After receiving a Fulbright scholarship to study in the US, he graduated from its two-year MBA programme in 2006.

Stanford is a busy place, and a dozen professors and lecturers from that time told the Guardian they had no memory of teaching the man vying to become the UK’s next prime minister.

These included teachers on some of the school’s signature courses: Irv Grousbeck, an expert on entrepreneurship; Andy Rachleff, who holds classes on innovation; Charles O’Reilly, who runs courses on leadership; and Carole Robin, one of the teachers of interpersonal dynamics, a popular elective students refer to as “touchy-feely”.

When he delivered a prestigious business school lecture in London last year, Sunak, now 42 and also a University of Oxford alumnus, cited one of his “inspiring” Stanford professors, the Nobel prize-winning economist Paul Romer, and described the impact of Romer’s lecture on innovation. “I have no recollection of ever interacting with him,” Romer told the Guardian.

Jeffrey Pfeffer, who teaches a renowned course called The Paths to Power, posted on LinkedIn that Sunak had been among his students and that he hoped they learn lessons about power to “rise to positions where they can have the leverage to make a difference in the world”.

Asked for any recollections of Sunak, Pfeffer said he did “not have the bandwidth to respond to this query” as he was about to travel.

Another professor, James Van Horne, initially said he had not taught Sunak but later found a record of him enrolled in one of his corporate finance classes. “He was a good student and participated well, but beyond that I do not have a lot of recollection,” Van Horne wrote.

Robert Joss, the dean of the business school at the time, said he barely remembered Sunak but vaguely recalled a “very bright and a very good student”. “My impression of all of our students was that they’re great,” said Joss, who retired in 2009.

With roughly 400 students in each business school graduating class, Joss said, it was not possible to get to know everyone deeply and, as administrators, “you remember the students that get in trouble or the students that won the big prizes”.

Sunak was not listed among the students in his 2006 MBA class awarded prizes at graduation for being among the top 10% academically, for service to the university, or for contributing to the school’s social culture and sense of fun. Dozens of his classmates did not respond to a request to share memories, or declined to comment.

Joss said he did have a stronger memory of another MBA student in Sunak’s year: Akshata Murty, his future wife, whom he recalled as “very bright, very smart”. The dean knew her parents because NR Narayana Murthy, her father and the billionaire founder of Infosys, was a member of Stanford business school’s advisory council.

It is common for Stanford classmates to meet and marry, a trend that he sees clearly in the alumni magazine, Joss said.

Four years after Murty and Sunak wed in Bengaluru in 2009, they made a “generous” donation to Stanford’s business school to fund a fellowship in social innovation. A university spokesperson declined to comment on the amount donated.

The couple also gave $3m to Claremont McKenna, a small private liberal arts college outside Los Angeles, where Murty majored in economics and French. She has been a member of Claremont McKenna’s board of trustees since 2011.

Their 2018 donation funded the college’s Murty Sunak Quantitative and Computing Lab. The couple said the gift was inspired in part by a favourite motto of Murty’s father: “In God we trust. And everyone else must bring data to the table.”
Newsletter

Related Articles

0:00
0:00
Close
Severe Heatwave Claims 2,300 Lives Across Europe
NVIDIA Achieves Historic Milestone as First Company Valued at $4 Trillion
Declining Beer Consumption Signals Cultural Shift in Germany
Linda Yaccarino Steps Down as CEO of X After Two Years
US Imposes New Tariffs on Brazilian Exports Amid Political Tensions
Azerbaijan and Armenia are on the brink of a historic peace deal.
Emails Leaked: How Passenger Luggage Became a Side Income for Airport Workers
Polish MEP: “Dear Leftists - China is laughing at you, Russia is laughing, India is laughing”
BRICS Expands Membership with Indonesia and Ten New Partner Countries
Weinstein Victim’s Lawyer Says MeToo Movement Still Strong
U.S. Enacts Sweeping Tax and Spending Legislation Amid Trade Policy Shifts
Football Mourns as Diogo Jota and Brother André Silva Laid to Rest in Portugal
Labour Expected to Withdraw Support for Special Needs Funding Model
Leaked Audio Reveals Tory Aide Defending DEI Record
Elon Musk Founds a Party Following a Poll on X: "You Wanted It – You Got It!"
London Stock Exchange Faces Historic Low in Initial Public Offerings
A new online platform has emerged in the United Kingdom, specifically targeting Muslim men seeking virgin brides
Trump Celebrates Independence Day with B-2 Flyover and Signs Controversial Legislation
Boris Johnson Urges Conservatives to Ignore Farage
SNP Ordered to Update Single-Sex Space Guidance Within Days
Starmer Set to Reject Calls for Wealth Taxes
Stolen Century-Old Rolls-Royce Recovered After Hotel Theft
Macron Presses Starmer to Recognise Palestinian State
Labour Delayed Palestine Action Ban Over Riot Concerns
Swinney’s Tax Comments ‘Offensive to Scots’, Say Tories
High Street Retailers to Enforce Bans on Serial Shoplifters
Music Banned by Henry VIII to Be Performed After 500 Years
Steve Coogan Says Working Class Is Being ‘Ethnically Cleansed’
Home Office Admits Uncertainty Over Visa Overstayer Numbers
JD Vance Questions Mandelson Over Reform Party’s Rising Popularity
Macron to Receive Windsor Carriage Ride in Royal Gesture
Labour Accused of ‘Hammering’ Scots During First Year in Power
BBC Head of Music Stood Down Amid Bob Vylan Controversy
Corbyn Eyes Hard-Left Challenge to Starmer’s Leadership
London Tube Trains Suspended After Major Fire Erupts Nearby
Richard Kemp: I Felt Safer in Israel Under Attack Than in the UK
Cyclist Says Police Cited Human Rights Act for Riding No-Handed
China’s Central Bank Consults European Peers on Low-Rate Strategies
AI Raises Alarms Over Long-Term Job Security
Saudi Arabia Maintains Ties with Iran Despite Israel Conflict
Musk Battles to Protect Tesla Amid Trump Policy Threats
Air France-KLM Acquires Majority Stake in Scandinavian Airlines
UK Educators Sound Alarm on Declining Child Literacy
Shein Fined €40 Million in France Over Misleading Discounts
Brazil’s Lula Visits Kirchner During Argentina House Arrest
Trump Scores Legislative Win as House Passes Tax Reform Bill
Keir Starmer Faces Criticism After Rocky First Year in Power
DJI Launches Heavy-Duty Coaxial Quadcopter with 80 kg Lift Capacity
U.S. Senate Approves Major Legislation Dubbed the 'Big Beautiful Bill'
Largest Healthcare Fraud Takedown in U.S. History Announced by DOJ
×