Monmouth University’s Leon Hess Business School (LHBS) hosted their annual H.R. Young Lecture Series on Thursday, Apr. 24, 2025. Vincent Forlenza, the retired Executive Chairman and CEO of the world’s largest medical supply company, Becton Dickinson and Company (BD), presented “Building a Global Medtech Leader” in the Great Hall Auditorium.
Students, faculty, and leaders in business gathered to combine classroom with boardroom as professors brought their classes, roughly 150 students and individuals from Forlenza’s alma mater, Lehigh University, were in attendance.
The H.R. Young Lecture Series named after Howard R. Young, a former director and partner at Goldman Sachs, has been an annual event sponsored by the LHBS, and has hosted a number of speakers from Mr. Carmine Coppola, Executive Vice President of Sony Music Entertainment, to Susan Fowler, American Writer and ex-software engineer.
Richard Ricciardi, corporate relations officer for the LHBS and who selected Forlenza as this year’s speaker, shared that they aim to select the highest quality people from all walks of life, and Forlenza wearing numerous hats fit that.
Forlenza started at BD in 1980, and worked his way up. First, running their biosciences area before becoming president in 2009, COO in 2010, CEO in 2011 and Chairman in 2012. After retiring in 2021, Forlenza has remained active in leadership roles as he chaired AdvaMed, the world’s largest medical technology association. He is currently chairman of the Board of Trustees of Lehigh University as well as MARAbio, a precision immunology company in early autism diagnosis while serving as a director for MNHI, Acuitive Technologies, and Moody’s corporation.
Under the leadership of Forlenza, BD transitioned from being a medical supply company to a major global player in diagnostics, devices and life sciences, while tripling its market cap. Medtech, otherwise known as Medical Technology, are the devices and systems used for health purposes, according to The World Health Organization. Medtech is an industry that is thriving in the U.S. economy, making up a total economic output of $381 billion annually in the U.S, as stated by AdvaMed. Further, “The industry is responsible for nearly 2 million jobs in the U.S., including both direct and indirect employment. Medical technology directly accounts for nearly 519,000 U.S. jobs.
Forlenza discussed corporate transformation and the different elements in corporate strategy that BD
had to go through to drive their company from medical supplies to a higher tech in faster growing markets.
Kylensky Miracle, a junior business major shared, “The biggest thing I took from this event on top of all the great knowledge Mr. Vincent told us was that it’s very important when you do decide to move up into corporate and you decided to eventually go out and seek these things, it’s very important to have a support system, it’s very important to have people you trust, it’s very important to look at ‘Okay, what am I doing wrong, what do I need to improve, and how are we going to do that?’ It’s very important to structure that in a way where everyone is on the same page and you’re communicating that.”
Forlenza concluded his presentation with a Q&A portion where he shared, “Do a good job at your job don’t think your career is linear…and move from business to business, so you get the understanding of how businesses work…and finally, most importantly, live the values.” Forlenza added, “Treat every job as a learning opportunity, learn not just your job but learn from those you interact with. You will position yourself for larger responsibilities”.
