O. Frederick "Fred" Kiel, Ph.D.

Orville Frederick "Fred" Kiel, a pioneer in the fields of executive coaching and character science, died on September 24, 2022, in Rochester, Minnesota. He was 82. He is survived by six children, Kelly (Gregory) Garramone, Amy (Doug) McNamara, Bryn (Daniel) Hennessy, Anna (Graham) Martin, Jordan (Sahar) Kiel, and Freda Kiel, his siblings Loren Kiel and Dolores Johnson, ten grandchildren, Medbh, Gwyneth, Noel, Neave, Violet, Havaa, Naomi, Nouri, Arezou, and Avishai, and his beloved dog Felicity.

Orville Frederick Kiel was born on May 15, 1940, in Rapid City, South Dakota, the youngest of five children of Orville Manford Kiel and Anna Mabel Shoemaker Kiel. His family were rancher farmers who instilled in him a commitment to being a true steward of the land, resulting in a lifelong love of the natural world and an interest in conservation and sustainable agriculture.

A true son of the Midwest, his educational journey began in a one-room schoolhouse (Alfalfa Valley 19) in Grindstone, South Dakota. Dr. Kiel attended Augustana Academy, then the University of Minnesota where he earned an undergraduate degree in psychology and a Ph.D. in Counseling Psychology.

Always animated by curiosity and optimism, Fred began his quest to "help leaders connect their heads to their hearts" in the 1970s as a pioneer in the field of executive coaching. As he would later recall, "counseling executives in those days was about hiring a psychologist to go in and talk one-to-one with managers to help them with work adjustment and work-life balance, be less abrasive, or other workplace performance issues." Recognizing the shift in executive counseling from business fix-it cases to the career development of high-potential leaders, Fred began challenging senior executives to improve their leadership skills. He developed a rigorous data-gathering and customized development process that provided executives with transformative feedback.

In 1991, with Kathryn Williams and Eric Rimmer, Fred co-founded KRW International, adapting his data-gathering and sharing model to guide executives in their journey to accelerate business success through principled leadership. Working with Fortune 500 executives, he and his team advised individuals who became CEOs of complex, high-value businesses, leaders of nonprofits, and family offices.

This would remain a theme throughout his work. Doug Lennick, a dear friend and colleague, asked Fred to help him develop a psychological explanation of how people score high on emotional intelligence while also scoring low on integrity. This insight led Fred and Doug to develop the concept of "moral intelligence," which they defined as "the mental capacity to determine how universal human principles should be applied to our values, goals, and actions," in their influential first book Moral Intelligence (Wharton Business School Press, 2005). Through interviews with business leaders, they identified connections between moral intelligence and higher levels of trust, engagement, retention, and innovation. Moral Intelligence 2.0 followed in 2011. These books have been translated into seven languages and are used as core texts in many university courses on business ethics.

Fred's most significant achievement, however, was his third book, Return on Character, published in 2015 by Harvard Business Review Press, a pioneering work in the field of character science. Based on the insights of his seven-year study of CEOs and executive teams, he established a correlation between "the keystone character habits (integrity, responsibility, forgiveness, and compassion)" of senior leaders and positive financial outcomes, employee engagement, and risk reduction. He codified this research into a concise ethos of "who you are matters more than what you do." Leaders set the culture, and the culture creates the value, both to shareholders and customers. Fred closed his book with a call for a change in global leadership norms such that leaders everywhere-business, government, science, politics, religion-are expected to be and become individuals with strong character habits. "Leadership character should be fundamental to business education programs and performance evaluation processes. Business schools are misguided. They emphasize training MBAs in the business skills but never even glance at the other side of the equation-who are you as a person? How do you treat other people? What does your heart tell you? Would your decision making improve if your head and heart were connected?"

He was also a co-author of Coaching at the Top, a 1995 article in the Consulting Psychology Journal, and a contributing author to The Wisdom of Coaching - Essential Papers in Consulting Psychology for a World of Change, published in 2007 by the American Psychological Association.

A prolific writer both professionally and privately, to the delight of his children and grandchildren, Fred self-published a children's book, Tales from the Grindstone Forest, illustrated by his young son Jordan. The Tales were inspired by stories from his youth set in a magical forest filled with lovely and loving animal friends. His prose is both lively and animated while also pausing to invite the reader to hear and feel the magnificence of the natural world.

Fred's love of people, conversation, and the land prompted him to build the Sacred Clay Country Inn in Lanesboro, Minnesota, his favorite place on Earth, in 2005. Constructed with the work and support of local and Amish carpenters and craftsmen, Sacred Clay (the name inspired by the clay beneath its hills and by Isaiah 64:8: We are the clay and you, Lord, our potter) sits on a verdant hillside overlooking Duschee Creek. Fred described Sacred Clay's mission as "helping people become more fully human-to experience both their head and heart, a place for personal renewal." In addition to serving as an anchor and oasis in the lives of his children, grandchildren, and friends, Sacred Clay was a place for weddings, family reunions, and a haven for guests to enjoy each other and nature at its best. Fred promoted and supported musicians, artists, Amish artisans, and craftspeople at Sacred Clay. His commitment to land stewardship and conservation led him to support sustainable farming and organic dairy practices.

Fred was strongly committed to community service. In 1976, he was appointed to the first licensing board of psychologists by the governor of Minnesota. Fred served on the boards of several philanthropic organizations, including Augsburg College Youth and Family Institute, Graywolf Press, Walk-In Counseling Center, Lyra Concert, the Eagle Bluff Environmental Learning Center, and the Lanesboro Chamber of Commerce. He also served on the adjunct staff of the Center for Creative Leadership for nearly ten years and served two terms on the Board of Psychology for the state of Minnesota.

Fred was a joyful, optimistic, hopeful, kind, generous, and funny father, grandfather, friend, and colleague. He is deeply loved and sorely missed.

Memorial donations may be made to Fred's favorite charities: The National Audubon Society, The Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, The Clean Air Task Force, Human Rights First, Natural Resources Defense Council, Soil Health Institute.