Pete Gerend
Managing Director
Chief Operating Officer - Southeast & Central U.S.

As a team leader, Pete creates and directs educational programs that help clients stay rigorously focused on strategic outcomes. As COO, he manages key client-facing resources and performance improvement efforts.  

A teacher, facilitator, and consultant, Pete is particularly intrigued by the intersection of economics, politics, and psychology.  His teaching in leadership, strategy translation and team based learning has given him an opportunity to work with Fortune Global 200 companies in America, Europe, and Asia.  His current clients include Microsoft, Medtronic, PricewaterhouseCoopers, and Lehman Brothers.

Before coming to Duke CE, Pete consulted and developed novel healthcare programs for the uninsured at the Hudson Institute. He notes that the financial services industry, like American health care, operates in a very dynamic and highly regulated environment where “payer” and “customer” are not necessarily the same party.  In both cases, complex interpersonal and inter-organizational relationships drive outcomes and policies in sometimes surprising directions.  Is health care a right or a service?  What role should governments play in regulating global capital markets? Answers are never obvious, and in developing economies when stakes are raised, the problems can become even more intractable.

Pete is Adjunct Faculty at Duke University, where he teaches in the Psychology Department and the Management & Markets program.  He holds an MBA from the Fuqua School of Business and a B.S. in Chemistry and Political Science from Butler University.