Columbia Business School has awarded the 2014 Botwinick Prize in Business Ethics to David Stern, the commissioner emeritus of the National Basketball Association.
The Botwinick prize is given to a business leader who has displayed exceptional professional and ethical conduct. The prize is organized by the Sanford C. Bernstein & Co. Center for Leadership and Ethics, the umbrella for leadership and ethics research and activities at Columbia Business School.
Stern has shown a dedication to social causes, and was the driving force behind the creation of NBA Cares, the league’s global social responsibility arm. Other major achievements during his career included the launch of the Women’s National Basketball Association and the NBA Development League.
Another achievement of the NBA that Stern has been instrumental in is the NBA organized community events in South Africa. These events were started after Stern visited the new, post-apartheid Olympic committee in South Africa, as well as soon-to-be-president Nelson Mandela in 1993.
The Botwinick Prize in Business Ethics was established with a generous endowment from Columbia Business School alumnus Benjamin Botwinick, BS ’26, and his wife, Bessie.
Previous recipients of the prize include: Michael Hershman, president and CEO of the Fairfax Group, Barbara Krumsiek, chair, president, and CEO of Calvert Investments; Mikael Ohlsson, president and CEO for the IKEA Group; Peter Blom, CEO of Triodos Bank; Craig R. Barrett, retired CEO and chair of Intel Corporation; Jeffrey Immelt, CEO and chair of General Electric; Patrick Cescau, group chief executive of Unilever; James Sinegal, president and CEO of Costco; and Joan Bavaria, founding president and CEO of Trillium Asset Management.