While Steven Kadish, College President Jim Yong Kim's strategic advisor and senior vice president, describes his role at the College as one that centers on breaking down barriers, building stonewalls at his Vermont home is among his favorite hobbies.
"The great thing about it is, it's like a puzzle," Kadish, who speaks softly and with a smile, said in an interview with The Dartmouth this week. "You're picking up something and fitting it into a space, and manipulating it, and then if it's not the right one, throwing it out and getting a new one. It's incredibly satisfying."
And, in many ways, it is that very process working to fit potentially divergent pieces together to produce a product that Kadish says has defined his work as an administrator and advisor.
"I've spent many, many years working in large, complex organizations to make the goals of the leadership happen and happen well," Kadish said. "I've been lucky enough to work for people with incredible vision. I feel like one of the things that I do is help folks with great vision see their visions become reality."
His position at Dartmouth, then, may represent just the latest iteration of that role this time with the goal of "serv[ing] Dartmouth and President Kim."
Kadish at Dartmouth
While he said Kim's work focuses on faculty, students and various College directors, Kadish said he is focused on the College's administrative processes.
"It's a lot of the back-of-the-house kinds of things," Kadish said. "Thinking about how a strategy translates into money, into people, into space. What are the [information technology] systems, what are the other processes, what are the communications? All of those things that need to happen in order to actually make something a reality."
Kadish said his role at the College has evolved since he first came to Hanover in June, and will likely continue to change in the coming months.
Currently, he said, his work is linked to many of the functions of the President's Office. Among other things, he is often tasked with leading internal meetings, communicating with the Board of Trustees and working on the College's finances.
Kadish, a self-described morning person, said he starts his day at 5:00 a.m. by checking his e-mail at home, and arrives at his office in Parkhurst Hall between 7:30 and 8:30 a.m.
He usually works until past 7:00 or 8:00 p.m., he said, and is often the last person to leave Parkhurst.
Kadish's wife, Linda Snyder, began serving as Chief Facilities Officer at the College in August. The two have three children.
April Thompson, director of Undergraduate Judicial Affairs, said Kadish's fresh perspective and thoughtful questions have made him "a tremendous asset" to her department. Kadish's ability to "think like a student," Thompson said, has helped her office make its web site more user-friendly.
When more than 30 students held a sit-in outside of Kim's office in October, seeking to bring attention to the need for campus sustainability, it was Kadish who spoke with them while Kim was in a meeting.
"He was really polite. He actually kind of admired what we were doing, or at least made a comment like that," Tim Bolger '10, a leader of the sit-in, said. "He was kind of quiet, he spoke kind of slowly, and I found him to be genuinely very nice and willing to try to listen."
After waiting for 45 minutes, the students presented Kim with a letter, and Kadish scheduled them a next-day meeting with the president.
"Being a person that implements peoples' dreams, their visions, I thought the most meaningful thing that could be done was not just let them deliver a letter, but actually get time with President Kim," Kadish said. He later added, "That's me trying to be pragmatic, respectful."
Kadish and Kim
Before coming to Dartmouth, Kadish served as the director of the global healthy equity division of Harvard University-affiliated Brigham and Women's Hospital. Kim was the division's chief.
After four years working as his colleague, Kadish said he is beginning to learn how the College's new president thinks.
"I can better anticipate the kinds of questions he might have," Kadish said. "I can suggest to someone, if they're making a presentation, the kinds of things he may ask so they can include it."
Kadish said his focus is on implementing Kim's goals.
"Am I advising him on strategy? If it's where is Dartmouth going, then no. If you think of it as strategy in terms of implementation, then yes," Kadish said, noting that he spends only five or 10 minutes per day with Kim outside of meetings, although the two are in contact via e-mail.
Kadish's personality compliments Kim's "strong presence" well, said Molly Bode '09, presidential fellow in global studies and higher education and former student body president. Bode noted that Kadish "exudes the passion with practically" that Kim often mentions in speeches.
"Kadish is somewhat soft-spoken, but his personality is actually much bigger than his soft-spoken nature," Bode said. "They can easily tell each other the complete and honest truth, and they're able to joke with each other too."
Kadish, for his part, said that his relationship with Kim is a mix of professionalism and friendship.
"Would he be someone who I always keep in touch with?" Kadish said. "Yes. If we weren't working with each other, we would be friends. But you really find your true friendship often after you're not working with one another."
Life Before Dartmouth
Kadish received his undergraduate degree in French and political science from Tufts University in 1978 and a masters degree in city planning from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1982.
From 2003 to 2006, he served as Massachusetts' undersecretary for health and human services, working with an approximately $10-billion budget, he said.
Howard Hiatt, associate chief of the division of global health equity at Brigham and Women's, said that Kadish is "without question, the best administrator [he has] ever worked with."
"Not only for Dr. Kim, but for me and for [Harvard Medical School professor Paul Farmer], he was always there to anticipate problems and, in effect, often resolved those problems before they became manifest," Hiatt said.
Hiatt said that Kadish was instrumental in bringing together the university's four major global health programs: Brigham and Women's, Harvard Medical School, Harvard School of Public Health and Partners in Health, the global health organization Kim co-founded with Farmer.
Kadish is a particularly skilled mitigator, Hiatt said.
"If there's a personal problem, he'll have sensed it very quietly and discretely without revealing it to others, and do what he can to address that problem," Hiatt said. "On at least two occasions, a person who really looked as though he or she was not measuring up was converted to a person whose competence was permitted to flower."
