Thomas J. Colligan

Vice Dean and Director
Aresty Institute of Executive Education
The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania

 

Speaker > Biography

Tom Colligan was appointed Vice Dean of The Wharton School’s Aresty Institute of Executive Education in September 2007. 

Tom began his career at Lybrand, Ross Brothers & Montgomery (now PricewaterhouseCoopers), after serving in the U.S. Air Force, and was an integral part of PwC’s organizational transition.  During his tenure at PwC, Tom served on the Governing Board and Management Committee, and, subsequent to the merger of Price Waterhouse and Coopers & Lybrand, developed the market strategy for PricewaterhouseCoopers.  In his role as Vice Chairman, Tom was responsible for developing a firm-wide strategy for cultivating and deepening relationships with PwC’s top 100 clients, representing $1.5 billion in revenue.  Tom has hands-on experience with issues of finance, growth and execution in Fortune 500 firms.

In addition to his corporate responsibilities, Tom has served as a lead partner and a trusted advisor to Fortune 500 firms in a number of industries including Technology, Telecommunications, Pharmaceuticals and Consumer Products.  Prior to spearheading the market strategy and the chairman’s program, Tom had global responsibility for Technology, InfoComm and Entertainment for the audit business.  During his tenure, he grew this practice from 18,000 to more than 22,000 professionals worldwide.  He lead his firm in handling large, complex, high-profile transactions, including the trivestiture of AT&T, the merger of Bell Atlantic and Nynex (now Verizon), the IPO of Lucent, the spinoff of AT&T Wireless, the acquisitions of MediaOne and Liberty Media by AT&T and numerous debt and convertible offerings at AT&T and Wyeth.

During his career, Tom has been directly responsible for the admission of over 50 partners to PwC.  Many of these partners are now in leadership positions, including industry leaders, office managing partners and global leaders on major accounts.  His passion for mentoring is manifested in training programs he implemented focused on relationship development and client management.  Tom is not only a financial expert, but also a professional supporting others who serve in financial leadership and financial expert positions.

Tom retired from PricewaterhouseCoopers as a Vice Chairman in June of 2004 and currently serves on the board of Schering Plough and consults to the board of Sharp Electronics.  He previously served on the board of Educational Management Corporation which was sold in a private-equity transaction in 2006.