Get to know Yale leaders—Tim Pavlis

Tim Pavlis joined Yale in 2015 and is associate vice president for Strategy and Analytics. He oversees the Swensen Fellows program as well as the Office of Institutional Research and Academic Business Operations. Tim also has a leading role in Yale Carbon Charge, which is testing the effectiveness and feasibility of carbon pricing on Yale’s campus. Prior to joining Yale, he spent his career in strategy consulting, most recently as a Principal in Bain & Company’s San Francisco office. Tim grew up in Florida and began his career as an analyst at J.P. Morgan in New York after graduating from Princeton with a degree in Physics. He and wife, Lauren, along with their ten-year-old daughter Abby and eight-year-old son Ben, live in Hamden. The family loves hiking and travel, and his kids have convinced him to dust off his guitar as part of the family band “Treebark.”

What have you learned during the pandemic—both at work and at home?
On the professional front, I’ve learned how many people it takes to make this place work. And so many of them are behind the scenes. This summer I worked on the Operations Planning Group and now I know a lot more about who does what, especially during a pandemic. I know that there are staff members who’ve had to source the masks, pack them into bags, and deliver them to the students —there’s a cast of thousands who make Yale the great place it is. This had not been as visible to me prior to the pandemic, and fortunately, it has become visible to me in a new way. Personally, I’ve learned how much I value community. I consider myself a pretty introverted person normally, but I was craving the kind of human contact that I took for granted. But harder still is that I have young kids and seeing them disrupted in their ability to interact with their friends has been painful.

What are you reading now?
Reading and playing guitar are two places I can go to get some respite. I’m reading a bunch of books right now. I actually have a little reading group with my strategic analysis team and we’re reading The Privileged Poor by Anthony Jack. I like to have fiction and nonfiction going simultaneously. So, through the pandemic, I’ve been reading or rereading classics, where I can escape into a totally different world. I read Middlemarch for the first time, and it was so relaxing to escape into another world. I really appreciate the value of fiction, especially at a time like this.

What do you think is the best advice a manager can receive?
The advice I would give is to ‘walk the walk.’ What you do tells your team what you value and what you suggest they should do. If you make a mistake and you own up to it, you’re showing your team that it is important for them to own up to their mistakes. Right now, I think managers need to take a vacation because this is a stressful time, and when you take time for yourself, your team members will see that they can too.

What musical artist are you listening to right now?
I started playing guitar when I was a kid so I can’t escape the 90s. I listen to a lot of Radiohead. I also like the band Pavement. Those are my go-tos for listening and playing. I also I love jazz. I love listening to jazz, but I’m not skilled enough to play jazz; I can only listen to that.

What are you most grateful for?
My family, especially getting to watch my kids grow as human beings, and seeing their own personalities develop. There’s obviously some stamp of my wife and me in them, but there’s so much independence and it’s really amazing and sort of humbling to watch. Already, they have found certain passions. Our daughter, the older one, is super into reading and writing. She also loves math. Our son is totally into engineering. Everyone seemed to give him a different robot kit for his recent eighth birthday.

What would be your ultimate vacation destination?
I’m sure I haven’t found it, yet. I like cities for vacation. I also like beautiful topography so that’s why I loved living in San Francisco. There are places in Italy, which are my wife’s favorite destinations. But there’s lots of other places out there in the world that would fit the bill. I haven’t visited Asia. I’ve never been to South America. Currently, though, we can only look at online pictures and pretend to travel, right?

If you could solve one human problem in today’s world, what would it be?
Zero carbon energy. I get to work on this initiative here at Yale, which is great. I think finding and using technology that allows us to fulfill our energy needs without creating emissions is just really important.

What New Haven restaurant would you recommend to a new employee?
There’s a Thai cart on Church Street, which I always enjoy. The food’s good, and the owners are friendly and hard-working faces to cheer up my lunchtime.  That’s my favorite. Sadly, I haven’t been there for a long time; I hope those of you on campus stop by!

What has helped you develop as a manager over the course of your career—relationships, courses, making mistakes, hard work?
Good mentors. I came from the professional services world as a strategy consultant, and that’s very much a place where your supervisor had your job before you and is helping you to hone your craft by providing really intensive mentorship. So, I was very lucky to have those kinds of experiences. I also think developing is about taking advantage of opportunities that present themselves. One example is this COVID leadership role that I’ve assumed in the last six months. It has stretched me in an unexpected way because I’ve had to speak with people outside of my department, and I’ve realized that part of my role is to help people stay motivated during this challenging time. I think I will look back on this as an important part of my career development.

What are some of your favorite memories from childhood?
I grew up in Florida and we had a swimming pool in our backyard, and that was my main event all summer. I just lived in the swimming pool. I also remember throwing the football with my dad on weekends. I spent a lot of time with Lego blocks, often building them with my mom. Lately, she has dusted off those Lego kits and is giving them to my kids. It’s coming full circle.

What was the first time you… made a mistake on the job; reached an important goal; realized what you wanted to be when you grew up; were promoted?
My first job out of college I was in investment banking at J.P. Morgan in New York City. I thought I was so important and so cool because I had been hired by this company right out of college. Then one day I was sent to a law firm where we were working on a mergers and acquisition transaction— I still remember the chafing dishes of bad food. There were 40 people in the room and my job was to transcribe information into a spreadsheet. I was the lowest person on the totem pole. And, I thought, ‘Oh, I guess I’m not quite as important as I think I am.’ I’m glad that happened early on.

What would you say to your 12-year-old self if you had the chance to talk with him?
I would say you can’t control the world so don’t be such a perfectionist. This is something that I’ve continued to learn up to the present day. The interesting thing about this question, if you get a chance to be a parent, is that you have the opportunity to talk to your 12-year-old self through your children.