Jack Welch, the retired chairman of General Electric and author of the best-selling Jack: Straight from the Gut, was scheduled to speak at the University of Chicago Graduate School of Business last October. This was well before his wife's divorce suit cast light on Welch's extraordinary retirement perquisites, and his reputation was riding high. Dean Edward A. "Ted" Snyder '75 dispatched an e-mail to his school community touting Welch as "the top CEO in recent memory."

"You didn't substantiate that," one faculty member promptly replied. After doing research, a student reported to Snyder that four out of six of the prior GE CEOs had been described with similar accolades.

"That's the kind of place this is," Snyder said. "People are disciplined in their thought, and they always push."