Haider has served on the corporate boards of Asset Acceptance Capital Corp, Continental Waste Industries, Covenant Mutual Insurance, Evanston National Bank, Fender Musical Instruments, InterAccess, LaSalle National Bank Corp, National Can, Talman Home Savings, and Westchester Insurance.[1]
Haider has been considered a property finance expert.[5]
In March 2016, he was elected a Fellow of the Business Excellence Institute.[1]
In 1973, Haider left Columbia University and began working as a business professor at Northwestern University's Kellogg School of Management. For most of the next four decades, he would teach there as a professor of strategy.[4][6]
Haider served as head of the school's public management program.[7]
He has served as director of the Kellogg School Center for Nonprofit Management until 2016. He had played a part in establishing it.[1][8]
He retired from teaching full-time in late 2016.[1] He was made an Emeritus Professor in 2017.[1]
Haider had worked as an advisor to Richard J. Daley during his mayoralty.[10][11] Haider also worked as the Chicago city budget director (chief financial officer for the City of Chicago) under Jane Byrne from 1979 until 1980.[1][4][6][11]
Haider has also served as vice chairman of the Chicago School Finance Authority for fifteen years, during which time he helped refinance the schools.[1][4]
In 1987, Haider won the Republican mayoral primary, making him the party's nominee for mayor.[14][15][16] Haider had, previous to running for the Republican Party's mayoral nomination, been a Democrat.[6][14][15] The fifth overall mayoral candidate to be a resident of Edgewater, Haider would have been the third mayor from Edgewater if he were elected (and the first since Martin H. Kennelly).[17] Ahead of the primary, Haider was endorsed by the city's Republican Party organization on December 4, 1986.[15] He had narrowly defeated 1983 nominee Bernard Epton for the endorsement.[15] The search committee to find a candidate for the Republican Party to endorse had been chaired by Dan K. Webb.[10] After receiving the party's endorsement on December 2, 1985, he formally launched his campaign on December 3.[10] Despite the party organization having already endorsing Haider, both Epton and Democratic state senator Jeremiah E. Joyce indicated their intentions to challenge Haider in the Republican primary.[15] Neither ultimately ran. Instead, he was challenged by Kenneth Hurst, Chester Hornowski, and Ray Wardingley.[16] Haider won the party's nomination in the Republican primary.
His candidacy was seen as a long shot.[18] However, Republican leaders initially hoped that the 1986 election of Republican James O'Grady as Cook County sheriff was a sign that a Republican might be able to perform well in the 1987 mayoral election.[19] They hoped that a strong performance by Haider would assist the party in getting a Republican affiliated candidate elected Chicago alderman for the first time in twelve years.[19] Republican Party leaders considered him the party's most qualified mayoral candidate they had put forth in a long while.[19] However, a March 1987 poll showed that very few of those that had voted for 1983 Republican nominee Bernard Epton in the last election were intending to vote for Haider the 1987 election.[19] Part of this was attributed to there being two other white challengers against Harold Washington, Edward Vrdolyak and Thomas Hynes.[19] He also lagged in fundraising, with those opposed to Washington donating mostly to the other two challengers' campaigns, and with Republican Party members more focused on donating to presidential campaigns, as the race for the 1984 Republican Party presidential primaries had already begun.[19] His fundraising severely lagged behind the other campaigns.[19] Hynes withdrew from the race just before the general election, but this did not help Haider's performance.
During the campaign, in a desperate bid for press, Haider rode an elephant (an animal often used to symbolize the Republican Party) down State Street.[20]
In the general election he placed last out of the three candidates in the general election, only garnering 4.3% of the vote.
Nonprofit work
Haider has been on the boards of the Midtown Educational Foundation, Chicago Catholic Charities, and the U.S. Rugby Foundation.[1][4]
Rugby
Haider has long been involved in the sport of rugby. In 2018, he was inducted into the United States Rugby Hall of Fame.[2] He played rugby while at Stanford University, and continued playing and coaching rugby throughout his adulthood.[2]
Chicago Midtown Education Foundation’s "Reach for Excellence Award" (with Jean Haider)[1]
Business Excellence Hall of Fame inductee[22] in 2017
Works authored
Haider has authored around 50 scholarly articles and in excess of 100 newspaper columns.[4] He has also co-authored a multitude books.[4] Many of his books were co-authored with Philip Kotler and Irving J. Rein.
Haider, Donald (January 1, 1986). "Economic development: changing practices in a changing US economy". Environment and Planning C: Government and Policy. 4 (4): 451–469. doi:10.1068/c040451. S2CID153425347.
Haider, Donald; Rein, Irving; Kotler, Philip (1993). "There's no place like our place! The marketing of cities, regions, and nations". Futurist. 27: 14–21.
Haider, Donald; Rein, Irving; Kotler, Philip (February 1994). "There's No Place Like our Place! The Marketing of Cities". Public Management. 76.
Haider, Donald; Wohlgezogen, Franz (2012). "Change Comes at a Cost". Stanford Social Innovation Review. 10 (1).
Haider, Donald (2013). "Eight Implications of a Detroit Bankruptcy". Kellogg Insight Blog.
Haider, Donald (2013). "As Detroit Goes, So Goes Your Local School District". Kellogg Insight Blog.
Books
Haider, Donald H. (June 1, 1971). When Governments Come to Washington: Governors, Mayors, and Intergovernmental Lobbying. ISBN002913370X.
Marketing Places: Attracting Investment, Industry and Tourism to Cities, States, and Nations. The Free Press. 1993. (with Philip Kotler, Irving Reinn)
Marketing Places Europe: How to Attract Investments, Industries, Residents and Visitors to Cities, Communities, Regions and Nations in Europe. Financial Times Management/Prentice Hall. 1999. ISBN0273644424. (with Christer Asplund, Philip Kotler, Irving Reinn)
Marketing Asian Places: Attracting Investment, Industry, and Tourism to Cities, States and Nations. John Wiley & Sons. 2001. ISBN0471479136. (with Michael Allen Hamlin, Philip Kotler, Irving Rein)
Marketing Latin American and Caribbean Places. Pearson Brazil. 2004. (with David Gertner, Philip Kotler, Irving Rein)
