8/16/12
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Pat Williams |
On Thursday, September 20, 2012, Pat Williams will present “Moral Foundations for Sports, Business and Life” at 7:00 p.m. in Blackwell Auditorium, R-MC Center for the Performing Arts. Senior Vice President of the National Basketball Association’s Orlando Magic Pat Williams will present this lecture, which is free and open to the public. His visit is sponsored by the BB&T Moral Foundations of Capitalism Program.
Seating is on a first-come, first-served basis. Williams will sign copies of his books after the lecture. The books will be available for sale prior to the lecture in the R-MC bookstore and also in Blackwell Auditorium after the lecture.
This lecture will explore the broad issues of ethics and the moral foundations that guide us in life. Williams will explain how key virtues can lead to success in sports, business and life. He will also share anecdotes from his work with K-12 education, college and professional athletics and the world’s corporate boardrooms. Williams is the author of more than 75 books, including his version of the birth of the Orlando Magic,
Making Magic (Tribune Publishing, 1989). His two most recent books are
Bear Bryant on Leadership (Advantage Media Group, 2010) and
The Leadership Wisdom of Solomon (Standard Publishing, 2010). Williams is nationally recognized for his motivational, inspirational and humorous talks.
Pat Williams Pat Williams has more than 48 years of professional sports experience and is most known for his promotional and marketing wizardry. In his role as senior vice president of the NBA’s Orlando Magic, he has been responsible for drafting such popular athletes as Charles Barkley, Shaquille O'Neal, Maurice Cheeks, Andrew Toney and Darryl Dawkins. Williams was promoted to his current post from the general manager position in April 1996. His duties also include strategic planning activities relating to RDV Sports (named for Rich DeVos and the parent company of the Magic); spearheading research of future RDV Sports properties; and being the promotional leader and strategic marketer for memberships at the $50 million state-of-the-art RDV Sportsplex. Additionally, he is involved in training and mentoring RDV Sports employees, while making public appearances on behalf of RDV Sports and the Orlando Magic.
Prior to joining the Orlando Magic, Williams spent 12 seasons as general manager of the Philadelphia 76ers. During that time, he took a Sixers team that posted a 34-48 record in 1974-75 to a World Championship in 1983. Through several personnel moves during that time, Williams played a major factor in bringing the NBA title to Philadelphia. Before the Sixers, he served as general manager of the Chicago Bulls and then the Atlanta Hawks. For the Bulls, he raised average game attendance figures at Chicago Stadium from 3,700 to more than 10,000 per game.
Although Williams has spent well over four decades in the NBA, his first love is baseball, the sport that earned him a scholarship to Wake Forest University, where he earned a bachelor's degree in physical education. He was a three-year letterman as a catcher on the Demon Deacons baseball team and is a member of the Wake Forest Sports Hall of Fame. He later went on to earn a M.S. in physical education from Indiana University in 1964.
Williams’ baseball career began when he signed with the Philadelphia Phillies in 1962 and spent two seasons catching for the Miami Marlins, a Class A club in the Florida State League. He quickly moved from the playing field to the front office, when he was appointed business manager of Miami in 1964. He took the general-manager job with the Spartanburg (S.C.) Phillies in 1965 and was later elevated to the position of president of the organization in 1967.
In 1967, he was chosen the Minor League Executive of the Year by The Sporting News. Williams remains active in baseball as a catcher in Dream Week games in Florida during the winter. He was also the president of Orlando's Double-A Southern League team from 1990-1993. Williams’ son Bobby is the Washington Nationals’ Farm Director and his son Thomas is the senior accountant for the Boston Red Sox.
BB&T Moral Foundations of Capitalism Program Randolph-Macon College Professor David Brat received a
grant from the BB&T Charitable Foundation to expand the study of
ethics,
economics and capitalism through a broadened curriculum, faculty and
student research,
internships and one-on-one interaction with business leaders. The program has hosted a number of notable speakers including NFL Hall of Famer Raymond Berry and journalist David Aikman.
BB&T Corporation is the 10th largest financial services holding company headquartered in the United States with $152.4 billion in assets. Its bank subsidiaries operate approximately 1,500 financial centers in the Carolinas, Virginia, West Virginia, Kentucky, Georgia, Maryland, Tennessee, Florida, Alabama, Indiana and Washington, D.C. BB&T annual charitable contributions totaled nearly $20 million in 2008.
For more information on this event, please contact Pam Harris Cox at (804) 752-3712, pamelacox@rmc.edu or Anne Marie Lauranzon at (804) 752-7317, alauranz@rmc.edu.