Benjamin W. Heineman, Jr.

Benjamin Heineman is a graduate of Harvard College (1965), Oxford University (1967), and Yale Law School (1971). A former Rhodes scholar, editor in chief of the Yale Law Journal, and law clerk to Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart, he practiced law in Washington, D.C., before serving at the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare from 1977 to 1980, ending his tenure there as assistant secretary for planning and evaluation. Mr. Heineman was then managing partner of the Washington office of Sidley & Austin, focusing on Supreme Court and test case litigation. He has written books on British race relations and the American presidency, and he is the author of High Performance with High Integrity (Harvard Business Press, 2008). In 1987, Mr. Heineman became senior vice president, general counsel, and secretary of the General Electric Company (GE) located in Fairfield, Connecticut. In 2004, he was named GE’s senior vice president for law and public affairs and served in that position until his retirement at the end of 2005. Mr. Heineman is currently senior fellow at the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government and senior distinguished practitioner fellow at Harvard Law School’s Program on the Legal Profession. He is also senior counsel to the law firm of WilmerHale. Mr. Heineman is on the Board of Managers and Overseers of the Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, on the Board of Directors at Transparency International–USA, and on the Board of Trustees at the National Constitution Center. He has been the recipient of numerous awards, including the Lifetime Achievement Award by Corporate Board Member magazine, 2008, and the American Lawyer Lifetime Achievement Award, 2005.