As president of Michigan State University, Dr. Kevin Guskiewicz is shaping the future of one of the nation's top research institutions - helping students excel, attracting the best talent, and expanding MSU's impact in Detroit. In this episode, Bob Riney and Kevin talk about the transformative 30-year partnership with Henry Ford Health and MSU, highlighted by a brand-new research center that will span nearly 350,000 square feet and feature seven stories of advanced laboratory space. They also explore the important role of free speech on campus, the evolving landscape of diversity, equity & inclusion, and the university's commitment to driving innovation through collaboration. Kevin shares colorful anecdotes about his roots in a town known for Arnold Palmer, Rolling Rock, and Mr. Rogers, topped off with some savvy advice from his daughter.
As president of Michigan State University, Dr. Kevin Guskiewicz is shaping the future of one of the nation's top research institutions - helping students excel, attracting the best talent, and expanding MSU's impact in Detroit. In this episode, Bob Riney and Kevin talk about the transformative 30-year partnership with Henry Ford Health and MSU, highlighted by a brand-new research center that will span nearly 350,000 square feet and feature seven stories of advanced laboratory space. They also explore the important role of free speech on campus, the evolving landscape of diversity, equity & inclusion, and the university's commitment to driving innovation through collaboration. Kevin shares colorful anecdotes about his roots in a town known for Arnold Palmer, Rolling Rock, and Mr. Rogers, topped off with some savvy advice from his daughter.
:15- Bob Riney introduces The BOBcast and welcomes Kevin Guskiewicz, President of Michigan State University.
1:26- Kevin shares his initial impressions of Michigan, the unpredictable Michigan weather, and the partnership with Henry Ford Health and Michigan State University.
2:12- Kevin emphasizes the importance of talent attraction and having a good roadmap for recruitment
2:48- Kevin compares the role of university president to Wayne Gretzky's strategy on the ice, predicting where the puck is going to be.
2:58- Kevin talks about the importance of sports as one of many avenues into the university and the world-class faculty and coaches at Michigan State.
3:50- Kevin mentions the competitive juices between MSU and the University of Michigan and the importance of partnering with other universities in the university research corridor.
5:00- Kevin pitches Michigan State as the pioneer land-grant university, built around agriculture, engineering, and education.
5:22- “We have to become a more contemporary university” ~ Kevin Guskiewicz
5:32- Kevin highlights the university's medical colleges, nursing school, and supply chain management program.
6:05- Kevin mentions the largest incoming class in the university’s history and the high percentage of Michigan students and graduates staying in the state.
6:33- Bob leads the discussion of the importance of maintaining safety on campus while allowing free speech.
7:10- Kevin Guskiewicz talks about the need to engage with students and faculty on issues like the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and mentions the review of policies to ensure clarity and communication of expectations.
7:52- Kevin emphasizes the importance of modeling and promoting free speech through programming on public discourse.
8:02- Bob talks of Henry Ford Health and MSU being purposeful with diversity, equity, and inclusion.
8:27- Kevin defines diversity as a fact, equity as an aspiration, and inclusion as a non-negotiable choice.
9:00- Kevin mentions the joint research enterprise with Henry Ford Health to address health disparities.
9:14- Bob and Kevin discuss the early stages of the 30-year partnership between Henry Ford Health and Michigan State University.
9:32- Kevin expresses excitement about the partnership elevating both institutions.
9:45- Kevin highlights the research center in Detroit as a game-changer for research in key areas like cancer and neuroscience.
10:32- Kevin mentions the Nick Gilbert Neurofibromatosis Research Institute and the advanced technology to recruit top researchers.
11:08- Bob asks Kevin about his vision for Michigan State University in five years.
11:33- Kevin Guskiewicz envisions an MSU- Henry Ford Health campus
11:55- Kevin talks about developing the Fisher Building with retail, restaurants, and other amenities, the potential for a high-end grocery store and a boutique hotel to benefit patients and the research community.
13:09- Bob asks Kevin about his personal interests and hobbies.
13:25- Kevin shares his hometown upbringing, love for golf, being a lifelong Pittsburgh Steelers fan, and his appreciation for James Taylor and Chris Stapleton.
14:49- Kevin jokes about his daughter's request to avoid being recorded while dancing.
15:17- Bob asks what Kevin’s dream headline would be in five years.
16:36- Bob talks about being surprised by Kevin’s confidence as campuses being an epicenter of free speech in a way we’re securing the physical and mental safety of all
17:15- Bob thanks listeners and hopes they’re being motivated by guests on The BOBcast
18:13- Bob appreciates how MSU has a “secret sauce” of agriculture that could move us to food being our source of wellness
Kevin Guskiewicz 00:00
My 17 year old daughter has said, please, I've seen your dance moves, and so let's not let anybody with a cell phone and video tape that, so.
Bob Riney 00:13
Once again, welcome to The BOBcast. I'm your host, Bob Riney, President and CEO of Henry Ford Health, and I'm thrilled to have you joining us today, The BOBcast is where Detroit's future comes into view. It's where you'll hear the big ideas, bold voices and crucial conversations shaping our city, our region, and beyond. Real and unapologetically focused on creating a stronger, more vibrant future. With grit and grace, the podcast introduces you to relentless visionaries who are driving change and tackling some of the biggest challenges we face today. Joining me on today's episode is Kevin Guskiewicz. Dr Guskiewicz is the president of Michigan State University. Kevin is an amazing leader that I've just been thrilled to get to know he's not only leading the university, but he is the emerging partner in the next journey of Henry Ford Health and our partnership story. Really thrilled to have you here, Kevin, but before we get into the partnership, I want to ask you, as someone who relocated to the great state of Michigan, what are your impressions? What has surprised you, positively or negatively? I'm going to ask you a question before we get into the partnership about your role and how the role of a president of the university is changed over the last 10 years. What's different now in terms of how you spend your time versus perhaps what it would have been about 10 years ago? And then talk a little bit about the role of sports in the obligations of a university president.
Kevin Guskiewicz 01:24
Well, first of all, Bob, thanks for having me. Amy and I got to Michigan, it was sunny in 65 those first two weeks, and everybody said, don't get used to it, because it's still going to snow. And we didn't believe them, but on April the 20th, we saw snowflakes. People are just incredibly warm and welcoming, and it's been great. I'm really looking forward to working alongside you and the teams to advance this incredible partnership with Henry Ford Health and Michigan State University. To me, to have a successful, leading global public research university like Michigan State University, it's about talent attraction, and so I've spent a lot of time over these past 12 months, it's about having a really good roadmap for the recruitment of top talent. If we're going to be a talent activator and putting our graduates out there to serve the state of Michigan and beyond and be the leaders of tomorrow, we have to prepare them to be leaders, and the way you do that is you model leadership and you hire great people that can prepare those future leaders. It's also about forecasting and being able to predict what's on the horizon. The famous Wayne Gretzky quote about why he was a great hockey player, wasn't that he was a great skater or shooter, but he knew where the puck was going to be, and he got to that spot on the ice. And the Henry Ford partnership with Michigan State is doing just that. It's identifying where the puck is going to be on the ice and being ready for it. But to your question about athletics, it's a big part of a college campus. I tell people, it's one of many avenues into the university. It's certainly an important one at Michigan State, and I'm proud of our world class faculty on campus, but also of our incredible coaches that provide opportunities for student athletes, but also for the fan experience on our campus. So it's a lot of fun, and we take it seriously.
Bob Riney 03:29
There's a unique situation in Michigan where we have Michigan State University and the University of Michigan both powerhouse national brands, both have been national champions over the time in various sports, and yet there's intense competition between the two universities. How do you lean into that in a way that creates the competitive juices, but also doesn't cross the line between wanting to have strong academic universities throughout the state.
Kevin Guskiewicz 04:01
We have got to find opportunities to partner with one another. We certainly will compete on the playing fields and the basketball courts and baseball fields, but those competitive juices have to align and coalesce together whenever we're out there trying to work within the university research corridor that was created years ago that we are now reimagining and finding better ways that we can leverage our unique strengths at each of those three great universities to sort of coalesce around a common theme, whether it's advanced manufacturing to try to help the state of Michigan, or if it's around healthcare, and those are two of our four main priorities, as is artificial intelligence and sustainability.
Bob Riney 04:38
I think the notion of collaboration and competition being mutually exclusive is nonsense. I think that they can coexist, and they need to coexist. You know, if you were doing a commercial pitch about Michigan State and its unique contributions to the state of Michigan in comparison to the great universities like University of Michigan and Wayne State, what would you pitch us?
Kevin Guskiewicz 05:05
Michigan State was the pioneer land grant university, 1855 founding, and it was built predominantly around agriculture, engineering, and education. Agriculture is a big part of what we do. We're helping to build out new opportunities to better grow products for our farmers and the dairy farmers, and we've got to stay true to that, but we have to become a more contemporary thinking university as well, and thinking about how we can define what the land grant of the future should look like,and that is where the health care comes into it. We've got two large medical colleges on our campus, nursing school that's nationally recognized and doing incredible work up in Flint in public health, but also the work we're doing through the Broad College of Business. We've got the number one program in supply chain management, number one program in packaging through our Ag and Natural Resources college. That's what I've been pitching. I'm excited about it.
Bob Riney 05:58
And you've got a great track record of keeping your graduates in the state of Michigan and being a part of the economic vitality in the future. And you know, I think that is another distinguishing characteristic.
Kevin Guskiewicz 06:12
We had the largest incoming class in the history of the university this past fall, over 11,00 first year students, and 73% of them are Michiganders, and we place 65% of our graduates in the state of Michigan for their first job and where they launch their careers. There's no other institution in the state that places that many graduates within the state. That's why I like to say we are Michigan's State University.
Bob Riney 06:37
I love that. We share something in common as leaders in that we worry a lot about the safety of our workforce and the safety in your case of students. Campuses have become epicenters of political tension, which is in many ways a healthy thing, but not when it spills over into any kind of violence, and so how have you processed this whole safety issue, while wanting to maintain the freedoms that I think shape the learning of people that are experiencing University.
Kevin Guskiewicz 07:13
We have to be a place where people can express themselves. You know, activism has been a part of college campuses for probably a century or more. We have to embrace that, yet we have to keep a safe environment. Some of the issues that the world's facing the Israeli-Palestinian war, the aftermath, and effects of that are showing up on college campuses across the nation. I'm a big believer in engaging with our students. We have to listen, ask people what's important to them, and that's how I've been working with our students, faculty, staff around this one particular issue, but safety is first and foremost. We spent a lot of time this summer reviewing our policies, making sure that we were more clear and what our expectations were, and then we had to communicate that out to the community, emphasizing that free speech is important and we have to model it. That's why a lot of the programming we're putting places around public discourse and civil discourse. We can bring two speakers in on a contentious issue that have very different viewpoints, but come to the middle at the end of the day to help move society forward.
Bob Riney 08:14
Another area that both Henry Ford Health and Michigan State University have shared in common is our belief in being purposeful about diversity, equity, and inclusion, that's gotten complicated lately with court rulings and other just divisiveness around those issues. Any thoughts on how you see navigating forward in that space?
Kevin Guskiewicz 08:38
I'm proud of the fact that at Michigan State we embrace diversity, equity, and inclusion. Diversity is a fact, equity is an aspiration, and inclusion, in my opinion, shouldn't be a choice around it. I think that if we're going to have a society where our students can learn through those different lived experiences, we need to have an inclusive and welcoming campus community. And so DEI is really important to us. You name the topic of the issue, we're better at solving it whenever those different lived experiences are around the table talking about it, and that's why one of the things I'm really excited about our partnership at Henry Ford + MSU is that through our joint research enterprise, we're going to try to address issues around health disparities that plague our most vulnerable communities. It's important to the metro Detroit area and then the state of Michigan.
Bob Riney 09:24
We're at the early stages of a 30 year partnership that I think both of us believe will go long beyond 30 years of the various components of this partnership, both big and small. What is on your excitement list? And then I may ask you, what's on your worry list?
Kevin Guskiewicz 09:44
Well first of all, let me just say that for Michigan State University to now have this partnership is going to just elevate our game, and I truly believe it's going to elevate Henry Ford's game. This is going to be important. It's going to allow us, just through the research center alone, I think, as a beacon. That was a really fun day when we celebrated the groundbreaking over in Detroit.
Bob Riney 10:04
You know, we are here to celebrate coming together for research, to create hope, to create innovation and to create discovery. And that is something we should be collectively, really, really excited about (cheers).
Kevin Guskiewicz 10:19
That center alone, nearly 350,000 square feet and seven stories of state of the art laboratory space is going to be a game changer for all of us. We're going to expand research in key areas, including cancer, and as a neuroscientist, I'm thrilled of the work we're going to be able to conduct in the area neuroscience, immunology, hypertension and more. And I just think it's going to provide advanced technology to help us recruit top researchers from across the country. I think the Nick Gilbert Neurofibromatosis Research Institute that's going to be part of that is the first of its kind and to partner with not just Henry Ford, but with the Gilbert Family Foundation is going to be really special. And that's just the beginning, I mean, it's not just about the research center, as you know, because it's also about the way we're going to have access for our medical students for placements out in the great clinical settings that Henry Ford provides, working alongside some of the world's leading clinician scientists and physicians.
Bob Riney 11:10
You guys made a really big step towards Michigan State leaning in and wanting to have a bigger presence in the city of Detroit, not only with our partnership, but becoming the principal owner of the Fisher Building, one of the most iconic, nationally award winning Art Deco buildings in the country, if not the world, in your dream list, what's that building look like in five years?
Kevin Guskiewicz 11:35
I would love nothing more than to create a campus, an MSU-Henry Ford campus. I need to be sure that Michigan State has more of a presence in the city. Five years from now. I hope that that building will occupy a lot of what we've just been talking about through the Henry Ford Health- Michigan State University partnership. I think a lot of good will come from that, but I do envision some retail, a couple restaurants. We have some other property on the back side, which is currently a parking lot. We've talked about everything from a high end grocery store to a boutique hotel that would be helpful for patients, families of patients that are coming into Henry Ford, and that'll draw in the research community as well. So a lot of opportunity, but I hope we're flying our joint flag there, over at the Fisher Building in four to five years.
Bob Riney 12:18
I know as much about retail to be dangerous, but I will tell you, we recently launched a Henry Ford logo tennis shoe, really for our employees that's really built for comfort. But we were blown away by how many outsiders, alumni of Henry Ford Health, patients of Henry Ford Health, that have been seeing this and saying, hey, where can I get those tennis shoes? Well, I think this blue and green set of retail products between our patients and our alumni and Michigan State's alumni, we might be onto something man.
Kevin Guskiewicz 12:55
I like it, Bob. I knew that you and Michael Jordan had a lot in common. I'd forgotten about this sneaker deal.
Bob Riney 13:00
I'll work the register on Saturdays. I don't care.
Kevin Guskiewicz 13:04
I love it. Well, count me in. I'm size 11 and a half.
Bob Riney 13:07
All right.
Kevin Guskiewicz 13:08
I look forward to sporting those.
Bob Riney 13:12
I'm going to have you answer a question. I want you to picture that you're not in a suit, you're not carrying the president title, but you're sitting on a beach somewhere. Tell the books, you read the music, you listen to, the hobbies you participate in. What's behind Kevin unveiled.
Kevin Guskiewicz 13:31
One of the things people may not know about me. I'm from Latrobe, Pennsylvania, 45 miles east of Pittsburgh, happens to be the home place of Arnold Palmer, Rolling Rock beer and Mr. Rogers. That's my hometown. I'm proud of that. It's a humble upbringing there, but I do like to golf. My handicap has gone higher and higher over the years in my leadership roles with less opportunity to play, but I still love getting out. It says few holes that keep bringing you back. I'm a lifelong Pittsburgh Steelers fan. When I was recently asked what's on my bucket list, I said, How about a Pittsburgh Steelers- Detroit Lions Super Bowl? That's my dream. Music wise, you know, spending a lot of time in North Carolina. I'm a big James Taylor fan. James Taylor was born and raised in Chapel Hill, which is where Amy and I raised our children.
James Taylor 14:18
In my mind, I'm gone to Carolina.
Bob Riney 14:23
I am a huge James Taylor fan, and probably have seen him more times in concert than any other artist. And my adult children now, who grew up in a very different generation of music and rejected most of the music that I love, they love James Taylor too. It's just there's something about sitting at a campfire and listening to James Taylor music.
Kevin Guskiewicz 14:47
More recently, my kids have gotten me into the sort of modern country, the Chris Stapleton type.
Christ Stapleton singing 14:52
Bob Riney 15:00
If we search hard enough on the web, are we going to find a country line dancing video of you?
Kevin Guskiewicz 15:07
Probably not. My 17 year old daughter has said, Please, I've seen your dance moves, and so let's not let anybody with a cell phone and a video take that, so.
Bob Riney 15:17
Well, it won't stop us from searching.
Kevin Guskiewicz 15:19
Yeah.
Bob Riney 15:22
Kevin, just in closing, tell me if you could have your dream headline about what you accomplished and what you've accomplished at Michigan State five years from now. What's that headline look like?
Kevin Guskiewicz 15:36
l think it's that Michigan State University tops a billion dollars in research this year, solving everything from cancer to helping to build out our autonomous vehicles to removing PFAS from water to really solving some of the world's biggest challenges. That's what a great global public research university needs to be doing, and a lot of that can happen in this partnership with Henry Ford Health. So that would be a great headline because it's not just about the dollars, it's about the impact that those dollars have. Maybe the second headline might be that the Spartans win six national championships that year. So those would be fun headlines. I love that question.
Bob Riney 16:16
Those would be awesome headlines. And you would have one headache with your phone ringing, looking for tickets if those national championships were happening, but that'd be a good problem to have. Looking forward to partnering with you, and thanks for being on The BOBcast.
Kevin Guskiewicz 17:06
Thanks so much, Bob. It's been a lot of fun, and we're going to make this partnership even stronger than we ever imagined a few years ago.
Bob Riney 17:17
Something that really surprised me about the interview is how calm and confident he was about finding this intersect between campuses still being an epicenter of free speech, an epicenter of where people grow, challenge, learn and even protest, and yet doing so in a way that makes sure that we're securing the physical and mental safety of all and it's being used as a learning experience, not a gotcha. And I thought his answer was particularly thoughtful about that, and that's right where we need to be heading. Once again, thanks for spending time with us and joining us on The BOBcast. I appreciate that you take the time to listen to these interviews. Hopefully get motivated by some of the tidbits of speakers that you're hearing from, the wisdom the way they prioritize, the way we learn together and the way we partner. And today's was a perfect example of that. I hope you heard what I heard from Dr Kevin Guskiewicz, and that's a commitment that goes far beyond just making sure we're preparing the next generation of students to enter the world, but actually doubling down on preparing them to be great citizens and partnering on ways that you can combine, in our case, research to crack the code on the next series of innovations, things that will make a difference in your lives and the lives of your loved ones. And he talked about the agriculture school. Michigan State is world renowned for their agricultural school, something that's going to be really important as we face climate change and we figure out how to adopt and adapt. But I wonder how many of us even know how much of the secret sauce of agriculture resides in that school and how we could actually move towards getting back to food being our source of wellness, as opposed to today, so much of our food causing the need for pharmaceuticals because of illness. Wouldn't that be unbelievably powerful. Dr. Guskiewicz is committed to doing it. If you enjoyed this episode, please follow, share, and leave us a review. Remember, every action we take today is a step towards the future we're building together. Let's keep striving, keep believing and keep moving forward until next time, take care and keep making a difference.