Kicking off a new year

Before launching into a new academic year, we took time out this week to gather the faculty — 32 strong — for a group portrait. They are as excited as the students to get back to class! But before we leave summer behind, read about our capstone projects

Before launching into a new academic year, we took time out to gather the faculty and staff — 36 strong — for a group portrait. They are as excited as the students to get back to class! But before we take off, read about the capstone projects completed this summer and get caught up on faculty research.

Lecturer Linda Prince: Teams cap their studies with real world project

Students in the undergraduate and graduate programs offered by the Department of Information Systems wrap up their studies by developing solutions to questions and problems facing some of the department’s partner companies. This summer, the capstone classes were taught by Lecturer Linda Prince, who provided KnowIT with a first-hand account of the projects:

BS in Business Data Analytics:

For the Summer 2016 semester, student groups worked on a project initiated by a business champion with a desire to give back and a passion for education. Yolande and Paul Grill, owners of Infosol Inc., a business intelligence company located in Phoenix, have had a long connection with ASU and W. P. Carey, speaking at information sessions, offering internships and hiring graduates.

This summer, they took that connection a step further, facilitating a connection between analytics students and a real-world client. Desert Song Healing Arts Center had collected several years of data, but did not know how to use it to predict trends, or even determine if the data they were gathering was complete or if there was other information they should collect from clients. They wanted to calculate whether moving from a pay-per-class to a pay-per-month methodology would help or hurt their business. The Summer 2016 Business Data Analytics students formed three groups, each doing a separate analysis, allowing Desert Song, with the assistance of Infosol, to choose which model would work best for their needs.

It was amazing to be able to give the students a real-world client, with the same challenges of data quality and deadline management that they will face after graduation. Students managed the client relationship and handled all client meetings and communications using the web-based project management and collaboration tool Basecamp, allowing the client complete access to what the students wanted to share before presenting without disrupting the daily workflow of the client. The student groups were given access to several analytics tools, including Tableau, Weka, SAS and more, giving them myriad options for showcasing their findings.

At the end of the class, Infosol and Desert Song attended presentations, where the student groups used visual analytics to show what they discovered. Students made business decision suggestions based on their findings, in addition to offering options for future data capture that could add to the predictive analysis in meaningful ways for Desert Song.

BS in Computer Information Systems:

The CIS 440 winning team, from left: Rashid Abu-Hadba, Ada Ho, Jeffrey Cardona, Daniel Phillips, Miguel Toralba and Brian Ohara.

This summer, a total of 27 students formed 5 teams, with each team developing a prototype business process solution for the Arizona Coyotes Foundation.

During the first week of class, the students met Elizabeth Kaplan, executive director of the foundation, who explained the outcomes needed from the project and answered questions from the student groups. Each team then used a variety of tools supplied to them, ranging from Go Daddy server sites to data visualization software, to build a solution that included the following:

• A database to store the foundation’s data
• A website, connected to the database, that could allow registration, contact and donation information to be submitted on a user level
• A Microsoft Access front end to allow the foundation easy access to enter data directly
• A web-based auction platform to allow the foundation to discontinue having to pay a third-party to host auctions

The competition was fierce and the student groups discovered ways to stand out. No two solutions were the same, making the decision extremely difficult for the Arizona Coyotes Foundation! If you are interested in partnering with our Computer Information Systems or Business Data Analytics Capstone courses, please contact us at wpcareyis@asu.edu.

It’s time for the fall career mixer

The W. P. Carey Information Systems & Business Analytics Career Fair is on the schedule for Monday, September 26 in the Ventana Ballroom at ASU’s Memorial Union. The fair provides corporations, nonprofits, and government agencies the opportunity to interact with students from W. P. Carey's undergraduate and graduate information systems programs that are consistently ranked in the top 20 in the nation by U.S. News & World Report. It is an effective venue for companies to showcase both their internship and full-time opportunities while also promoting their brand to more than 300 W. P. Carey students. Employers and students may register for this event here.

Alumnus in the news

Drew Schweinfurth (BS CIS ’12) turned up in our news feed recently in a TechCrunch story about two new APIs that Walgreens was launching. As a developer evangelist at the drug store chain, Schweinfurth manages developers on the company’s API team. According to the story, Walgreens “has long offered a number of tools for developers who want to plug into both its retail and pharmacy business.” The new APIs will “allow developers to access Walgreens store locations (and the features of those stores) and access its digital coupons from third-party apps.”

Drew was the president of the DISC club for almost three years while at W. P. Carey. He was a web developer at Archer Daniels Midland before joining Walgreens in July 2014.

We are proud of our alumni and we’d love to hear from you! Please send us your career updates and we will share them with the readers of KnowIT and the W. P. Carey magazine. Drop us a line at wpcareyis@asu.edu or use the form on the W. P. Carey alumni site.

Latest research from information systems faculty

Our faculty publish in the top tier journals in the information systems field. Here is a list of the latest work:

• Shi Michael et al. “Towards a Better Measure of Business Proximity: Topic Modeling for Industry Intelligence,” MIS Quarterly
• St Louis, R."The Benefits and Costs of Using Metadata to Improve Enterprise Document Search,” Decision Sciences, Vol 46, No. 6 (December 2015). With David Schuff, Karen Corral, and Greg Schymik.
• Steinbart, P.J., Keith, M., and Babb, J. “Examining the continuance of secure behavior: A longitudinal field study of mobile device authentication,” for publication in Information Systems Research.
• Huang, P. and Zhang, Z., “Participation in Open Knowledge Communities and Job Hopping: Evidence from Enterprise Software,” MIS Quarterly, forthcoming.
• Han, Sang Pil “Battle of the Channels: The Impact of Tablets on Digital Commerce”, with Kaiquan Xu, Jason Chan, Anindya Ghose. Forthcoming. Management Science.
• Han, Sang Pil “Mobile App Analytics: A Multiple Discrete-Continuous Choice Framework” with Sungho Park and Wonseok Oh. Forthcoming at Management Information Systems Quarterly (MISQ) Special Issue on Transformational Issues of Big Data and Analytics in Networked Business.
• Baird, A., Miller C., Raghu, T. S., Sinha, R. K., “Product Line Extension in Consumer Software Markets in the Presence of Free Alternatives.” Information Systems Research (forthcoming).
• Xueming Luo, Bin Gu, Jie Zhang, Chee-Wei Phang, 2016, “ Expert Blogs and General Consumer Perceptions of Competing Brands,” forthcoming in MIS Quarterly
• Huang, P. and Zhang, Z., “Participation in Open Knowledge Communities and Job Hopping: Evidence from Enterprise Software,” MIS Quarterly, 40(3), 785-806, September 2016.
• Victor Benjamin, Bin Zhang, Jay Nunamaker, & Hsinchun Chen. "Examining Hacker Participation Length within Cybercriminal IRC Communities" Journal of Management Information Systems. Forthcoming.
• Hong, Y., Wang, C., and Pavlou, P. A. 2016. Comparing Open and Sealed Bid Auctions: Evidence from Online Labor Markets. Information Systems Research. 27(1), pp. 49-69
• Yili Hong, Ni Huang, Gord Burtch, & Chunxiao Li, Culture, Conformity and Emotional Suppression in Online Reviews, Journal of the Association for Information Systems, forthcoming
• Han, Sang Pil, “Excessive Dependence on Mobile Social Apps: A Rational Addiction Perspective” with Wonseok Oh, Hyeokkoo Eric Kwon, Hyunji So. Forthcoming at Information Systems Research (ISR) Special Issue on Ubiquitous IT and Digital Vulnerabilities.
• Raghu, T. S., Machado, F., Sainam, P., Sinha, R. K., “Software Piracy in the Presence of Open Source Alternatives.” Journal of the Association for Information Systems (forthcoming).
• Ball, N. L., Wood, R. E., Allen, G, "Using Technology to Detect and Deter Electronic Cheating at a Large Public University”, Issues in Information Systems, Volume 17 (forthcoming).
• Kulkarni Uday R., “Business Analytics in the Context of Big Data: A Roadmap for Research”, Communications of the Association for Information Systems, (37), 2015, with Phillips-Wren, Iyer, Ariyachandra.
• Ni Huang, Gord Burtch, Yili Hong, & Evan Polman, Effects of Multiple PsychologicalDistances on Construal and Consumer Evaluation: A Field Study of Online Reviews, Journal of Consumer Psychology, forthcoming
• Mazzola, D., St. Louis, R., Tanner, M., "The Path to the Top - Insights from Career Histories of Top CIOs — An Exploratory Study”, Communications of the ACM, (forthcoming).