DECD's recruitment arm taps Stanley CEO, Yale professor to board

Photo | HBJ File Stanley Black & Decker CEO and President Jim Loree.

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By Joe Cooper

Connecticut’s newly minted business recruitment arm has named Stanley Black & Decker’s chief executive and a Yale University professor to its board, according to state officials.

Gov. Ned Lamont and co-chairs of the Connecticut Economic Resource Center Inc. (CERC), operating alongside the state Department of Economic and Community Development (DECD), on Tuesday announced Stanley CEO and President Jim Loree and Jeffrey Sonnenfeld, an associate dean at the Yale School of Management (SOM), are joining the Rocky Hill-based nonprofit’s board of directors.

The public-private partnership between DECD and CERC -- billed as the Partnership to Advance the Connecticut of Tomorrow (PACT) -- was announced two months ago in conjunction with Lamont nominating David Lehman, an ex-Goldman Sachs executive, to oversee the state’s economic development efforts. Lehman’s nomination was recently approved by the state Senate.

It’s not been made public how exactly the DECD-CERC partnership will work.

CERC, which aims to foster business retention, formation and recruitment in the state, is co-chaired by former PepsiCo CEO Indra Nooyi and former Webster Bank CEO Jim Smith.

Loree joined Stanley, a New Britain-based hand- and power-tool maker, in 1999 as chief financial officer, before going on to be named chief operating officer and then CEO in 2016.

Sonnefeld is the senior associate dean of leadership programs for Yale’s management school and is the founder and president of the Chief Executive Leadership Institute, a nonprofit educational and research initiative focused on leadership and corporate governance.

He also previously served a decade teaching each at Emory’s Goizueta Business School, in Atlanta, Ga., and at the Harvard Business School.

In the coming weeks, CERC plans to add additional board members, including business leaders and others with expertise in workforce development, transportation, urban policy and business advocacy, Nooyi and Smith said in a statement.