For John McGlade ’76 MBA’80, giving back to Lehigh University has never been a one-time gesture — it’s a lifelong commitment shaped by curiosity, leadership, and a desire to experience the world beyond Bethlehem.
“I was always fascinated by the world,” he says. “I liked understanding how things worked — technically, culturally, and economically.”
When he joined Air Products, he had no idea that the company would allow him to combine those interests so fully. He traveled the world as a leader, building business relationships and putting Air Products on the map as a multinational company, and also gave generously through its corporate matching gifts program.
Philanthropy was deeply ingrained in the Air Products culture by founder Leonard Poole, who emphasized community involvement alongside professional success.
“It was simply part of who we were,” McGlade says. “Giving back — financially and personally — wasn’t optional.”
For McGlade, matching gifts remain one of the most effective ways to multiply impact by doubling — and in some cases tripling — the reach of his personal giving. In doing so, he connected his lifelong curiosity about the wider world to tangible opportunities for Lehigh students, preparing them to thrive in a complex, global society.
Discovering a Love of Learning and Application
For the first two decades of McGlade’s life, he lived inside a two-mile radius of home, high school, and Lehigh University. When it came time to choose a college, Lehigh was the obvious choice: close to home, academically strong, and affordable.
Yet even while he was living and studying within walking distance, McGlade’s curiosity extended far beyond Bethlehem.
He entered Lehigh as a civil engineering major before switching to industrial engineering, with a strong focus in operations research, applying analytical modeling to solve real-world problems. The work was demanding, but he thrived on the challenge.
Equally important, Lehigh gave him room to explore beyond his major. As a junior and a senior, McGlade used electives to study business, marketing, and international relations. That intellectual curiosity, paired with a strong work ethic, became a defining feature of his career.
An Unexpected Beginning at Air Products
A professor’s recommendation led McGlade to interview with Air Products, a company he admits he barely knew growing up in the Lehigh Valley. He joined as a linear programmer, writing early optimization models on punch cards to help determine plant locations based on cost and logistics.
“The computers could only run the cards at night because they didn’t have enough CPU capability,” he recalls.
When McGlade started there, Air Products generated less than $1 billion in annual revenue. Over his 39 years there, it grew to more than $12 billion. Along the way, McGlade held roughly 20 different roles across engineering, operations, and business leadership, ultimately serving as president, CEO, and chairman.
What defined his path wasn’t a rigid plan, but a willingness to say yes — especially when opportunity meant learning something new.
Learning Leadership on a Global Stage
Much of McGlade’s career unfolded internationally. Beginning in the early 1980s, he traveled extensively throughout Asia, helping Air Products expand into Korea, Thailand, Taiwan, Japan, and Southeast Asia. He later relocated to Taiwan for three years to lead a major acquisition — long before email, smartphones, or real-time connectivity made global work routine.
“Being that far away forced independence,” he recalls. “You had to make decisions, solve problems, and understand people on their terms.”
Those experiences shaped his leadership philosophy. Later, as CEO, McGlade prioritized time with customers, employees, and investors over time in a corporate office, even placing senior executives around the world to stay closer to operations.
For him, leadership was rooted in presence, trust, and integrity — values he still emphasizes when speaking to students today.
Applied Learning at Lehigh
McGlade credits several Lehigh professors with influencing his trajectory, including Gary Whitehouse ’60 MS’62 and longtime faculty member Emory Zimmers ’66 ’67 MS’67 Ph.D.’73 P’07 P’09. That mentorship led to McGlade’s deep involvement with Lehigh’s Enterprise Systems Center (ESC), which Zimmers founded and continues to lead.
The ESC pairs students with real-world projects sponsored by companies, nonprofits, and public organizations. Multidisciplinary teams work alongside industry mentors to solve problems without prewritten solutions.
“It’s applied learning at its best,” McGlade says. “Students learn collaboration, leadership, and the reality that the answers aren’t in the back of the textbook.”
Fully supported by partner organizations, the center demonstrates tangible value while remaining financially sustainable — an example, McGlade says, of what makes Lehigh distinctive: rigor paired with relevance.
Advice for Students and Fellow Alumni
When McGlade speaks with students, his advice is direct: Don’t over-engineer your career. Show up prepared. Listen carefully. Act with integrity. And remember that leadership is something you practice every day.
To alumni, his message is just as clear.
“It takes a village to raise a person,” he says. “If you’re grateful for what you’ve been given, giving back is part of that gratitude.”
For McGlade, Lehigh was the beginning but never the end of that journey. Through sustained giving, mentorship, and matched support, he continues to ensure that future generations benefit from the same opportunities that shaped his own life.
