Students

Leadership and scholarship: Faculty news

For faculty as well as students, fall semester is a new start. This month we introduce you to the leaders of our various programs, and two of our faculty who have taken on school-wide positions. And it's always a pleasure to report on the news from our new faculty and doctoral students as they achieve career milestones. These are the people who assure that our students get the best possible preparation.

2012-09-04

Ajay Vinze heading up international programs

Ajay Vinze is the W. P. Carey School’s new associate dean for international programs. As a Fulbright Senior Specialist, Vinze has worked with scholars in Asia, Europe and Latin America. The new post will enable him to use that experience to broaden and deepen the school’s global research and educational initiatives. “My last Fulbright assignment was focused on transitional economies of the Balkans — evaluating and realigning their business-school doctoral programs, to help them better compete in Europe. For my second assignment conducted in the 2012-13 academic year, I hope to replicate the East European experience in Latin America” says Vinze. With a keen appreciation for the increasing importance of internationalization for Business Schools Vinze comments “We have to be forward thinking, engaging with institutions in Western and BRIC economies, and also being prepared to contribute in emerging economies. To stay competitive, we have to strengthen our existing wonderful network of partner schools and leverage it to make new friends.” Vinze’s research delves into the strategic applications and implications of information and communication technology, focusing especially on Latin America, Eastern Europe and Southeast Asia; sustainability and water policy; collaborative decision making; and IT and public health - disaster preparedness and response. Recognizing his research contributions, in 2012 he was awarded the ASU Faculty Excellence Award for Defining Edge Research and Creative Work for Professional and Practical Application of his research. Vinze was the faculty director of the W. P. Carey MBA executive program (2007-10) and was founding director of the Center for the Advancement of Business through Information Technology - CABIT (2002-2007).

Meet the team: Faculty leaders steer our initiatives

Our faculty share the leadership roles for our programs. We asked them to describe in a few words their programs and what they see themselves accomplishing this year. Here’s this year’s team: Altaf Ahmad, Faculty Director, Undergraduate Program “Technology changes fast, so we need to keep refreshing our courses and introducing newer technologies as well while still maintaining strong fundamentals. In addition to our new programming class (CIS 345), added last spring, and a refreshed networking class (CIS 430), watch out for exciting changes coming soon to CIS 360, the database class. Our information systems program offers students an added twist: not only do we want to introduce new technologies, but we also want to explore the business context -- which differentiates our students from other technology majors. Thus, updating and guiding the program through frequent change is a challenge, but given that we are technology enthusiasts and love making information technology work for business, it is a delightful challenge.” Robert St. Louis, Faculty Director, Masters Programs "The objective of our masters programs is to teach students how to add value to organizations by leveraging information technology. This is a major challenge. The next 25 years are likely to see more change than any 25 year period in our history. If you do not believe this, just take a look at the new cars. They sense when a car is in your blind spot, keep you from backing over things, and help you park. The Google Car even drives itself. In the IT world, almost nothing will be the same 10 years from now as it is today. How, then, can we teach students skills that still will be useful 10 years from now? "As odd it may seem, the answer lies in examining both the social and technical sides of information management. Although technology is changing extremely quickly, human nature is not. Moreover, most of the impediments to effectively leveraging information technology stem from human behavior rather than technology. The Socratic method was developed over 2400 years ago, but the decision biases that it was designed to overcome are just as prevalent today as they were 2400 years ago, and the method is just as valid today as it was 2400 years ago. By focusing on both the human and technical dimensions of information management, we are able to train students to be effective decision makers for a technology future that we all know will be completely different than today." Uday Kulkarni — Faculty Director, Dual MSIM/W. P. Carey MBA “What is common between Harrah’s Casinos, Continental Airlines, Progressive insurance, Oakland A’s Baseball Team, and Capital One Financial Co.? These organizations have transformed themselves to claim a sustainable competitive advantage by managing their Information Technology (IT) resources strategically. The MBA/MSIM dual degree program prepares students to become IT-savvy business leaders of tomorrow. The objective of the program is to teach students: the newly evolving technologies from a managerial perspective; how to develop a business case of introducing new IT competencies within an organization; how to identify the information needs of business processes and integrate IT into them; how organizations build a sustainable competitive advantage with IT.” Gregory Dawson — Faculty Advisor, Department of Information Systems Club (DISC) "For both the 2010 - 2011 and 2011 - 2012 academic years, ASU DISC was recognized as one of the top three information systems clubs in the world. With its outstanding group of officers, strong returning and new members and engaged and committed recruiters and alumni, I fully expect that DISC will remain as a phenomenal resource for students, recruiters and the university. I think a key reason for the success of this student run club is that it balances the professional needs of its members and alumni along with providing a strong social component."

Marilyn Prosch chairing W. P. Carey School’s faculty council

The faculty council is an important group that carefully considers curriculum changes, new programs and most other significant changes to W. P. Carey programs. This year, information systems Associate Professor Marilyn Prosch is heading up that group. The W. P. Carey School’s efforts to improve existing programs and launch innovative new programs means that the faculty council’s agenda is always full. The chair of Faculty Council also serves on the dean's administrative council in order to serve as liaison between the two groups. “This should be another exciting year full of efforts to continue to deliver world-class programs and courses,” Prosch said.

Presenting at conferences develops the idea

Doctoral candidate Matthew Sopha presented two papers at the Americas Conference on Information Systems in Seattle, Washington in August. The first was a paper about a class he taught with former W. P. Carey professor Sule Balkan, during which first-year honors students used AppMakr software to build apps for Microsoft smart phones. For the second presentation, he discussed the lead component his doctoral dissertation, a paper about how digital goods producers and consumers come together on social networks, specifically Facebook. “The nice thing about conferences is meeting people from all over the world in the management information systems discipline,” he said. “I got feedback from people I normally would not have the opportunity to interact with on a close basis.” Some of that input is already impacting the work. Sopha expects to finish and defend his dissertation in time to be hooded at commencement next May – then hopefully he’ll go to work at a university. “Beyond the research, the largest impression that I get to make on the world will be through the students that I interact with, and that is the incredibly fulfilling part of this job and this life. That’s something that makes me want to get up and come to work every day.”

Timothy Olsen: The dissertation defense

Timothy Olsen, one of our new clinical assistant professors, recently defended his Ph.D. dissertation at the Robinson College of Business at Georgia State University. The defense is something like a final exam at the end of a doctoral program. The candidate’s committee — the professors who worked with him during his studies and his research — hear him present his findings, grill him with questions and then retire to reach a verdict. Olsen said the atmosphere was festive. “At the defense I presented for 45 minutes. Three members of my committee were in the room, and one was on the phone from MIT,” Olsen said. “After I presented, I answered questions for 1.5 hours, and I enjoyed every minute of it. I got some great feedback during this process. The committee deliberated for 10 minutes, and then I was informed that I had passed.” The title of Olsen’s dissertation is “Realizing Shared Services: A Punctuated Process Analysis of a Public IT Department.” “For two years I attended meetings at a large IT department, studying how they pivoted from traditional/functional management to Shared Services, essentially trying to operate as a business within a business,” he said. Look for more on this topic in a future knowIT article. Later that night, Olsen went to dinner with friends, and with the help of a visiting scholar from Finland, Olsen celebrated his defense the Finnish way: by opening glass bottles of sparkling cider with a sword!

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