7 minute read
Making It Work at Work
By Kathy Kenne
Is working at the same place as your spouse a good idea? Couples who do it say it depends on multiple factors – personality, flexibility, whether you work directly together and the environment, to name a few.
Myles and Elissa Landers seem to be making it work for them in the College of Business. Myles is an Assistant Professor of Marketing and Elissa is an Admissions and Advising Specialist in the graduate program.
The young couple is energetic and invested in making students’ academic lives more meaningful.
At the undergraduate level Myles teaches Consumer Behavior and Retailing. He teaches Quantitative Method Research in Business to doctoral students. His primary research focuses on two particular areas. One is on services/retail strategy. He looks at strategic decisions that services and retail firms deploy, then draws on psychology and behavior economic theories to explore how these strategies are influencing customers including topics such as disidentification, intimidation, pricing decisions and embarrassment. His second area of interest is in how firms’ decisions can positively impact multiple stakeholders in the areas of life satisfaction, firm environmental orientation and sustainability at the firm and customer levels.
In her role in the COB’s graduate education program, Elissa’s interest is helping MBA online students develop education plans that best meet their needs while making them feel a part of the MSU family.
The couple met in middle school in Sylacauga, AL. By their high school years they were dating, and they’ve been together ever since. There were a few years they were at different schools – he at Jefferson State then Berry College playing baseball and she finishing up high school then attending the University of Alabama at Birmingham. But their relationship remained strong. Myles graduated with a degree in marketing, while Elissa majored in English.
After their marriage, Myles pursued his PhD at the University of Alabama while Elissa taught middle school and high school English. Upon completion of his degree, they moved to New York for him to take a position as Assistant Professor at Rochester Institute of Technology. They remained there for nearly seven years.
In 2020, with four-year-old son Axl now a part of their lives, they began looking southward seeking to be closer to their families. Good friend and MSU College of Business professor Frank Adams told them about a marketing faculty position opening at Mississippi State. That piqued their interest, and they found themselves eager to become a part of the Bulldog Nation.
Over lunch with Frank and his wife Angelia Knight, the Director of MBA Programs, Elissa learned of an available job in that office, advising online students. She was excited about the opportunity to aid those seeking advanced degrees, most of whom are in full time careers, in achieving their educational goals.
“I’ve enjoyed being able to work within my office to create a ‘culture’ for online students, even though they aren’t here on campus,” she shares. “I make an effort to talk to them on the phone more instead of just communicating with them by e-mail.”
Elissa likes the interaction with the typically older students in her program, helping them find creative ways to balance their academic work with full time jobs and families. There are also a number of student athletes enrolled in online courses. Elissa enjoys advising them on how to best meet the demands of their academics alongside their athletic commitments.
Asked how he finds fulfillment in his career, Miles shares, “I seek out interesting activities and research. I also enjoy mentoring PhD students.”
What has the couple come to appreciate about MSU?
“It’s the campus atmosphere,” states Elissa. “It has big school attitude, but it’s still small enough that you know someone pretty much anywhere you go on campus. People are passionate about this university.”
They have found the College of Business a particularly welcoming environment.
“I like that the administration seems to take any idea into consideration,” says Myles. “Our new dean seems to be very interested in how to have a transformative impact on students. My department is the best you could work for! We all get along and have similar goals. We’re given the resources we need to do our work.”
“The College of Business also seems like one big family,” adds Elissa.
So, back to the question of working together. What they enjoy is having more to talk to each other about because they know and understand what is going on in each other’s work environments. The downside can be that scheduling is sometimes an issue with sons Axl and toddler Avett. However, it’s grandparents to the rescue. Elissa’s parents stay with the children two days a week, showing the Landers’ wisdom in moving closer to family.
But the positives of side by side careers far outweigh the logistical challenges.
“It’s good to be able to see the person you care most about whenever you want to,” says Myles. “It especially helps when you may not be having the best day.”
Elissa adds some sage advice to that with a smile, “Division of snacks is important − so you don’t find your husband has emptied your snack drawer!”
“Yeah,” laughs Myles. “One day I was home, and I asked her to bring me a file from my office. She found all the ‘healthy’ snacks she had packed for me uneaten and stowed in the back of my desk drawer.”
Both the Landers enjoy an active outdoor lifestyle along with their children – trail running, climbing, mountain biking. Their bucket list includes taking their children to visit all the national parks as they grow up.
Myles is also the faculty advisor for the American Marketing Association’s (AMA) student chapter on campus that boasts between 60 and 80 members.
“These students are the best,” he says. “They really run the organization. I just offer advice when they need it. I learn as much from them as they do from me.”
AMA local chapter President Ainsley Sowers leads the organization. It focuses on hosting educational speakers and doing community service projects each month such has collecting canned goods for Bully’s Pantry or helping needy families with their children’s Christmas gifts. Landers attends the bimonthly chapter meetings as well as the executive committee meetings and makes time to meet with Sowers each week to discuss the organization’s plans and activities.
“Dr. Landers has been amazing,” she shares. “He’s helped us with minor things like finding a room for us to hold our meetings when schedules got crossed to bigger items like guiding our trip to New York for the National Retail Federation’s annual conference. As a college student, I have so many things going on. It’s nice that when I text him about something, he gets back to me really quickly.”
Both of the Landers have aspirations for their students. Elissa says that the online students with whom she works are already very successful, so they don’t need a push from her. Her focus, instead, is on counseling them on which courses to take, with all of their other life obligations taken into consideration.
Myles wants his students to enter the workplace with a sense of purpose, aware of the impacts they can make in their business environments and ready to make good decisions. He also wants them to nurture their senses of curiosity, so they never quit learning and exploring.
And both recommend working with your spouse if the opportunity presents itself – just be sure to develop a protocol for snackage.
