āMaking myself available as a mentor and perhaps a role model to aspiring students was an easy and a quite natural extension of my everyday endeavors.ā
āListening is an underappreciated and uniquely important skill,ā said James Demitrieus ā70. Honing his listening skills has brought Demitrieus tremendous business success since he graduated from Ā鶹ֱ²„. When he reflects on his career path from being a Wall Street intern to becoming a global CEO, what he remembers best is the value of truly ātuning in to what people are telling youā and actively paying attention, since, he believes, ālistening tells you everything you need to know.ā
Making myself available as a mentor and perhaps a role model to aspiring students was an easy and a quite natural extension of my everyday endeavors.
The Fellows Program: Giving Back, Paying Forward
Demitrieusā desire to share the lessons heās learned along the way inspired his next big idea: the Ā鶹ֱ²„ Leadership Fellows Program. He wanted to connect with current students and offer leadership and career advice to future executives. Partnering with Adelphiās Office of Advancement and External Relations, Demitrieus helped lay the foundation for the Fellows Program, which launched in Fall 2024. A select group of students, known as Student Leadership Fellows, enjoy opportunities to interact with prominent alumni, or Executive Fellows. This collaboration has already made a lasting impact on the students and alumni involved.
Student Leadership Fellows got the chance to listen to the lessons Demitrieus shared over a meal he cooked for them in his New York City apartment. āI love working with students,ā Demitrieus said, and his enthusiasm for listening to their stories is contagious. It is the conversations shared and relationships formed that have allowed the Fellows Program to take shape.
The first in his family to graduate high school, Demitrieus recalls the challenges he faced as he connects with other first-generation students who aspire to their own business success. Bridging what can be a āgap between book smarts and street smarts,ā he notices that the students heās met in the Fellows Program remind him of himself at that age. They are āhardworking and driven,ā and he encourages them to learn from any experience life might throw at them.
Meaningful Mentor Relationships
Demitrieus arrived at Adelphi as a transfer student from SUNY Cortland in the late 1960s on a lacrosse scholarship, and soon discovered that teamwork, an entrepreneurial spirit and a game-winning attitude could take him to the highest levels of corporate success. Heās eager to share the credit for his success with mentors he was lucky enough to connect with during his career. Those relationships helped him build effective strategic teamsāteams he is also quick to credit for contributing to his success. āMaking myself available as a mentor and perhaps a role model to aspiring students was an easy and a quite natural extension of my everyday endeavors,ā Demitrieus explained.
Roller Coaster Ride to Success
His career path didnāt exactly follow a straight line and, he said, was more like āsitting in the front seat of a roller coaster.ā Demitrieusā journey was never boring: from working at a Big Five accounting firm, to exploring the oil and gas industry, to heading up commodities trading at a major investment banking firm. He was tapped for management positions in Asia, which he recalls as a ātransformationalā time in his lifeāan opportunity he used not only to lead, but also to listen and learn. He worked to restructure the multinational SK Group and, soon after, his management career accelerated in the American high-tech and telecom sector at Ixnet, Frontier Communications and in industrial services engineering, where he served as CEO of Toronto-based Alumna Systems. After serving as president of Sherwood Valves and Harsco, Demitrieus diversified his corporate experience into biometrics and was eventually named CEO at EyeLock. Now, as managing director of Jameson Associates, an investment management and financial advisory firm, he leverages his extensive operating experienceāand his listening skillsāto provide clients with strategic and funding guidance.
At every turn of his journey, Demitrieus cultivated relationships and focused on āpeople-driven leadership,ā which are the lessons he imparts to business and finance students in Adelphi’s Robert B. Willumstad School of Business. His own experience in college centered on the connections he made as an and as a student, and the relationships that sustained himāmost importantly, his marriage to high school sweetheart and Adelphi alumna Lynn, MA ā72, and his long friendship with lacrosse teammate Tom āMoTownā Motamed ā71. The Adelphi community , and Demitrieusā latest involvement with Adelphi is a tribute to their unique fellowship.
Demitrieus is a true coach and a mentor to Adelphi students, as he encourages them to think deeply about engaging and collaborating in āpeople-to-people environments.āĀ āThereās a difference,ā he notes, ābetween someone whoās really smart and someone whoās really effective,ā and, often, itās a willingness to truly listen and learn. His openness to lifelong learning reflects an important goal not only for the newest Adelphi Leadership Fellows, but for everyone: āto go home smarter than you were when you started the day.ā