Dan Cohen, Ph D, is the John C. Whitaker Executive Director and Professor of Practice at theCenter for Entrepreneurship at Wake Forest University. Over the course of his career, he hastaught entrepreneurship and strategy at the undergraduate, graduate, and executive levels. Sincecoming to Wake Forest University in 2015, he has cofounded Startup Lab with Greg Pool andcompletely revamped all aspects of the Center for Entrepreneurship. Before joining the faculty atWake Forest, Cohen was on faculty at Cornell from 2007 to 2015, where he founded and directede Lab, Cornell’s entrepreneurship accelerator program hailed by Forbes magazine as a major driverof Cornell’s ascent to a #4 national ranking in entrepreneurship. In 2012, Cohen was awarded Cornell’sRobert N. Stern Memorial Award for Mentoring Excellence. His academic career began in2005 when he accepted a faculty appointment at The University of Iowa’s Tippie College of Business.While at The University of Iowa, Cohen earned accolades for teaching, advising, and mentoringexcellence. Cohen earned his Ph D in management from Case Western Reserve University. Hestudies how nascent entrepreneurs develop a passion for entrepreneurship and how, and under whatconditions, they form an entrepreneurial identity. He also researches how entrepreneurs developkey capabilities, such as how to spot and develop valuable opportunities.Before his academic career, Cohen had a successful 15-year entrepreneurial career thatincluded founding, growing, and successfully exiting his startup in 2005.
Greg Pool, JD, MBA, is a lifelong entrepreneur. He started businesses during college at the Universityof South Carolina Honors College and while attending Wake Forest University for lawschool and business school. Greg has founded and cofounded several businesses that he has exited,as well as leading turn-around and relaunch efforts. Greg was the entrepreneur-in-residence atWake Forest University before becoming director of Wake Forest’s startup accelerator, StartupLab, which he cofounded with Dan Cohen. Greg is now a member of the entrepreneurship facultyat Wake Forest, where he specializes in helping entrepreneurs create early value in their companies.In 2017, he was awarded the Russell D. and Elfriede Hobbs Faculty Award for Exceptional Supportof Entrepreneurship.
Heidi M. Neck, Ph D, is a Babson College professor and the Jeffry A. Timmons Professor of
Entrepreneurial Studies. She has taught entrepreneurship at the undergraduate, MBA, and executive
levels. She is the academic director of the Babson Academy, a dedicated unit within Babson
that inspires change in the way universities, specifically their faculty and students, teach and learn
entrepreneurship. The Babson Academy builds on Neck’s work starting the Babson Collaborative, a
global institutional membership organization for colleges and universities seeking to increase their
capability and capacity in entrepreneurship education, and her leadership of Babson’s Symposia for
Entrepreneurship Educators (SEE), programs designed to inspire faculty from around the world to
teach more experientially and entrepreneurially. Neck has directly trained more than 3,500 faculty
around the world in the art and craft of teaching entrepreneurship. An award-winning teacher, Neck
has been recognized for teaching excellence at Babson for undergraduate, graduate, and executive education.
She has also been recognized by international organizations, the Academy of Management and
USASBE, for excellence in pedagogy and course design. In 2016, The Schulze Foundation awarded her
Entrepreneurship Educator of the Year for pushing the frontier of entrepreneurship education in higher
education. She was again recognized as Entrepreneurship Educator of the Year in 2022 by the United
States Association for Small Business and Entrepreneurship (USASBE) for her contributions that have
substantively advanced how scholars think and approach entrepreneurship teaching and learning.
Most recently, Neck was the recipient of the 2023 Karl Vesper Pioneer Award from the Experiential
Classroom at Notre Dame for her work to expand the reach and impact of entrepreneurship education.
Her research interests include entrepreneurship education with a specific interest in building entrepreneurial
mindsets. Neck is the lead author of Teaching Entrepreneurship: A Practice-Based Approach,
Volumes 1 and 2 (Elgar), books written to help educators teach entrepreneurship in more experiential
and engaging ways. Additionally, she has published 40+ book chapters, research monographs, and
refereed articles in such journals as Journal of Small Business Management, Entrepreneurship Theory &
Practice, and Entrepreneurship Education & Pedagogy.
Neck speaks and teaches internationally on cultivating the entrepreneurial mindset and espousing the
positive force of entrepreneurship as a societal change agent. She consults and trains organizations of all
sizes on building entrepreneurial capacity. She is the cofounder of Venture Blocks, an education-technology
company, and achieved a successful exit with Flow Dog, a canine aquatic fitness and rehabilitation center
located just outside of Boston. She also served on the board of a 100% family-owned, seventh-generation
land-management company in Louisiana, A. Wilbert’s & Sons. Heidi earned her Ph D in Strategic
Management and Entrepreneurship from the University of Colorado at Boulder. She holds a BS in
Marketing from Louisiana State University and an MBA from the University of Colorado, Boulder.
