In 1997, Victoria Dolan moved to Costa Rica with her husband, two kids, and two cats. A mid-level manager at The Coca-Cola Co. since 1991, she’d been assigned a new role as finance director for Coke’s Central America and Caribbean division.
“It was a completely different job, in a completely different country, speaking a completely different language,” Dolan recalls. “It was a really phenomenal experience, and probably the biggest, most pivotal thing that ever happened in my career.”
Dolan was part of an all-new management team charged with conducting a turnaround of the ailing division. During her two years in Latin America, she sniffed out kinks in the business like a bomb dog sniffing for explosives. The experience left a permanent impression on her—and by extension, everyone she’s worked with since.
“In Costa Rica is where I first learned one of the most important lessons in my career, and that is the importance of respect. Regardless of age, gender or culture, people want to know that someone cares about their point of view. They want to be heard,” continues Dolan, who recalls asking an older gentleman in his fifties or sixties what he thought the division needed to do differently to be successful. “He didn’t speak English, and my Spanish was rocky. But I had my translator there, and he started to cry. He said that in all the years he’d worked there, no one had ever asked his opinion before. To me, that was such a powerful moment. It taught me that leadership is about people—working through people, and helping people do things they never thought they could do before.”
Nearly 30 years later, that lesson is a North Star for Dolan in her work as a member of the Board of Trustees at The Chicago School, which she joined in 2016.
“I recently retired and I’m now doing primarily board work,” says Dolan, whose career in corporate finance spanned more than 35 years; included stints not only in Costa Rica and the U.S., but also Japan and Switzerland; and encompassed senior positions not only at Coca-Cola, but also at Marriott International, Colgate-Palmolive, and, most recently, Revlon, where she was CFO from 2018 until 2022. “At this point in my life, there’s nothing more valuable than the time I have. I want to use that time to leave a legacy, using all my years of experience to help people and organizations think through challenges and fulfill their strategic objectives … Because it’s not about me; it’s about making sure that people and organizations are better when I leave than when I arrived.”
Although Dolan is neither a mental health professional nor an academic, she seized the opportunity to work with The Chicago School because she believes so strongly in its mission.
“Its focus on community and whole health has such a positive impact on society and … feeds such an important need in our country right now,” Dolan says.
Fundamental to The Chicago School’s mission, of course, are its students, the majority of whom are minorities.
“When you consider the diversity of the student body and the different dynamics that creates within the school, and the fact that the board itself has become more diverse, I think my experience working in other countries and in global companies with diverse groups of people is really important,” continues Dolan, whose unique perspective has helped the university tackle challenges as varied as recruitment, financial planning, marketing, and technology—including the transition to e-learning, which made The Chicago School particularly resilient during the COVID-19 pandemic. “I have limited exposure to students directly. But from a governance standpoint, my ability to influence the strategic direction of the school allows me to influence student outcomes … When The Chicago School is fulfilling its mission, it’s enriching the lives of the people who are enrolled there. And that’s extremely important to me.”
Dolan is particularly passionate about the opportunity to help women, who constitute more than 80% of The Chicago School’s student body. “When I graduated from business school in 1985, one-third of my class was women. Today, about 10% of CEOs and CFOs in publicly traded companies are women. So, we’re losing women along the way,” says Dolan, whose advice to women leaders goes back to her formative experience in Costa Rica. “The best lessons I have learned as a woman in corporate America are to not pigeonhole oneself and to seize opportunities that you didn’t previously imagine. When I moved to Costa Rica with two children and two cats, that required a certain amount of risk. You need to have the self-confidence to try something new that you’ve never done before.”