Poets&Quants Founder Retires, New Leadership Team Takes Helm

Poets&Quants, the leading independent media platform covering graduate business education, has announced a major leadership transition as founder John A. Byrne retires, marking the end of an influential era that shaped global conversations around MBA and graduate business programs. Under Byrne's leadership since founding the platform in 2010, Poets&Quants grew from a scrappy startup into a trusted global authority, serving millions of readers with authoritative coverage, data-driven insights, and in-depth analysis for prospective students, business schools, and industry leaders. Byrne expressed pride in helping tens of thousands of young people achieve their dreams through the platform's independent voice, which became the world's leading resource on business education through reader trust and exceptional team delivery.

The company simultaneously unveiled a new leadership team to guide its next phase of growth and innovation, featuring three key appointments with distinct expertise. Marc Ethier, a journalist with decades of reporting experience who has served as managing editor for ten years, steps into the Editor-in-Chief role, overseeing all editorial operations while continuing his work on a book examining artificial intelligence's impact on elite business school classrooms. Sat Sharma, a higher-education veteran with over 15 years of involvement with Poets&Quants, becomes Managing Director, leading strategic growth, partnerships, revenue generation, and global market expansion. Newly hired Pola Lem joins as Executive Editor, bringing experience from The Grocer and Times Higher Education to lead market-facing editorial initiatives, multimedia storytelling, and audience engagement strategies, signaling an expanded commitment to video, interactive content, and new formats.

Together, this new leadership team will guide Poets&Quants into its next chapter with a clear vision focused on expanding multimedia and video storytelling, enhancing global coverage and audience reach, developing innovative data and AI-driven insights, and strengthening partnerships with business schools and industry organizations. As part of Times Higher Education, Poets&Quants will continue its mission to provide independent, authoritative coverage that helps prospective students make informed decisions while enabling business schools to showcase innovation and impact through consolidated rankings, news features, videos, podcasts, directories, and events. The transition represents both an honoring of Byrne's legacy and a strategic positioning for future growth in the evolving business education landscape.