About Me
Motivating students to learn using the real world as his palette and being an academic entrepreneur have been the hallmarks of Michael Claudon’s career at Middlebury College. Since joining the College faculty in 1970, he has mentored students, entrepreneurs and emerging leaders from Middlebury and Vermont to the Former Soviet Union. Having a particular passion for the art of starting and growing new business concepts into successful enterprises, he has focused on teaching applied economics and competitive strategies, and on extending learning beyond the classroom to the real world of live problem solving and entrepreneurial endeavors. In 1987, Claudon co-founded the Geonomics Institute. He grew it into an internationally respected, independent, nonpartisan, nonprofit organization that helped accelerate economic and political transition, focusing on enterprise restructuring and business development in the Former Soviet Union. After serving as Geonomics’ president for eight years, and dedicating most of that time to teaching and mentoring emerging business leaders in the region, Claudon returned to his first love, teaching Middlebury College students. In January 2000, Claudon organized a January term course that explored the emerging digital economy under the now defunct domain, www.DigitalMidd.org. Riding the excitement and momentum generated by students and alumni working and learning together, what was to be a one-time event has become a multi-faceted Middlebury College initiative. DigitalBridges2.0™ (www.digitalbridges20.net) currently creates and facilitates programs that help people transition and propel thought into action. In addition to the annual January course and conference, DigitalBridges2.0™ has expanded to include the Middlebury Solutions Group, an undergraduate venture consultancy dedicated to helping Vermont’s entrepreneurs grow ideas into viable enterprises; the Middlebury Entrepreneurs Mentoring Service, the go-to place for students interested in developing viable operating entities from their ideas; and BRIDGES, an exclusive online community of entrepreneurs in the extended Middlebury College community . The author or editor of two-dozen books and over a dozen research articles, Claudon earned his BA in economics and zoology from the University of California, Berkeley, and his PhD in economics from The Johns Hopkins University.

Industry

• Consulting Services
• Internet

Experience

• Business Idea Refinement
• Business Expansion
• Business Plan Expansion
• Philanthropy
• Presentation Skills
• Strategic Planning