Ron Daniel

D. Ronald "Ron" Daniel was a longtime top senior partner and director at management consultancy McKinsey & Company, serving as managing director (chief executive) from 1976 to 1988. He graduated from Wesleyan University with a B.A. in mathematics and received an M.B.A. from Harvard Business School.

Daniel was an officer of the U.S. Navy Supply corps in the 1950s, where he worked with early IBM mainframes. He joined McKinsey & Company, Inc. in 1957 and was a senior partner from 1968 to 1990. He served as managing director for twelve years (1976-1988) — preceding Fred Gluck — and is currently senior partner emeritus of the firm.

At McKinsey Daniel developed the concept of critical success factors. He hired and mentored future managing director Rajat Gupta. He was Jeffrey Skilling's former boss before Skilling became CEO of Enron.

In 2004, he described himself as "the bridge between McKinsey's founding generation and the present".

Outside McKinsey he was a director of Yum! Brands and chairman of New York-based private equity firm Ripplewood Holdings.

Daniel has a longtime affiliation with Harvard University. He served for many years as treasurer of the university. Daniel was also a member of the Harvard Corporation, the institution's ultimate governing body, and chairman of the board of the Harvard Medical School. He was also chairman of the Harvard Management Company, which oversees over $20 billion in assets and endowments.

Daniel also holds an Honorary Doctor of Humane Letters degree from Wesleyan and is chairman emeritus of the school's board of trustees. He is a member of the board of Thirteen/WNET (New York's public broadcasting station). He is also a member of the board of the Brookings Institution, and a trustee of Rockefeller University. He is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the Council on Foreign Relations.