This paper discusses the similarities of issues faced by academic and corporate leaders. Both types of institutions must adapt to the same societal, economic, and political pressures. These include rapidly changing markets, heightened competition, new technologies, and demands for accountability by multiple constituencies. Both industrial and academic leaders share a belief in empowerment (sharing and delegating responsibility), the need to balance short-term with long-term priorities, constraints on labor flexibility, and a weakening of resistance to all ideas "not invented here." There are also similar employee recruitment processes and recognition of leadership skills. Distinctions between the two organizational settings include academic freedom, educational outcome measurement, and resistance to change. Despite these differences, academic leaders can learn from the similarities with industrial organizations as they respond to challenges that include defining who the actual customers are of higher education and confronting the notion of higher education as a closed system that is resistant to change. (JLS)