Dean’s Annual Report
AY20 Goals Progress Update and AY21 Goals
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College of Business — Annual Report
Team Accomplishments All accomplishments are made possible because of the phenomenal effort of our team of leaders, faculty and staff in the College of Business. Thank you for your passionate commitment to the vision and mission of the College of Business.
Vision Statement Inspire and empower to innovate, transform business, change lives and make a difference in the world.
Mission Statement Create knowledge, transform business and develop principled, adaptable global citizens through innovative active learning and personalized experiences.
Core Values Excellence. Integrity. Caring.
Recognitions Poets and Quants
Selected to be #79 among the top undergraduate business programs.
U.S. News & World Report
In the top 14% part-time MBA program and among nation’s best for five years.
Public Accounting Report
Ranks among the top 25 large programs in the country in a survey of accounting faculty conducted by the Public Accounting Report.
College of Business Leadership Team Balaji Rajagopalan, Dean
Jon Briscoe, Chair, Department of Management
Daewoo Park, Associate Dean
Gina Nicolosi, Chair, Department of Finance
Anthony Preston, Assistant Dean, Graduate Business Program
Vijaykumar Krishnan Palghat, Chair, Department of Marketing
Rebecca Shortridge, Chair, Department of Accountancy
Chang Liu, Chair, Department of OM&IS
Sarah Marsh, Chair, Department of Management (AY20)
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Reflections from the Dean
Innovation, Agility, Resiliency. The recent disruptions driven by the COVID-19 pandemic has challenged our ability to adapt and accelerated the ongoing revolution driven by technology. The need to adapt to be successful reminds us of the quote by Charles Darwin, “It is not the most intellectual of the species that survives; it is not the strongest that survives; but the species that survives is the one that is able to adapt to and to adjust best to the changing environment in which it finds itself.” Adaptation requires innovation, agility, and resilience, all of which have been a significant part of our DNA in the NIU College of Business. As you peruse our FY20 accomplishments report, you can be proud of how we exhibited our collective ability to innovate, respond to the changing environment, and learn from moves that didn’t work as we planned. Innovation About four years back, we embarked on efforts to focus on “Mission and market driven program transformation.” Initiatives under this umbrella particularly focused on using the power of digital technologies to enhance learning in courses and deliver new programs to reach new markets. By the time the pandemic hit, we had already increased the number of courses offered online from eight in 2016 to 142 classes offered in the recent past academic year. A significant part of this increase resulted from two new fully online graduate programs in cutting edge areas of “Digital Marketing” and “Data Analytics.” The combined enrollment in just these two programs is expected to reach almost 200 by fall 2020. To put this in perspective, the “Data Analytics” program crossed the 100 student enrollment mark in its second year, a goal we had set to be achieved in five years. Building on this momentum, two programs — MBA and Master of Accounting — will be offered in the online format in fall 2020. Another dimension to remain agile is creating a culture of innovation to experiment with ideas. We are excited that our vision for creating a physical space and associated programming that will serve as a platform for students, faculty and staff to build a mindset of innovation, is taking shape. We launched a program “Dean’s Instructional Innovation Fellow” that encourages faculty to re-imagine their courses for the new age of learning. Two of our faculty — Mark Groza and Federico Bassetti — redesigned their courses to enhance learning experiences for students. Agility As the pandemic put a pause to activities in the normal mode, our team quickly pivoted to using digital technologies to deliver all our courses. Within a span of two weeks, our faculty moved to delivering their classes using synchronous, asynchronous or a combination of both. Exemplifying the outstanding commitment of our faculty to our students, one them wrote this in praise of a professor, “I just wanted to send a big thank you for a great semester! I know that the second half of the term threw everyone off guard, and I really appreciate you adapting the course so we could still learn and succeed in our studies… I also wanted to say thank you for creating a lighthearted environment during this pandemic. It has been a stressful time, but your jokes and class interaction lifted the mood. Thank you for preparing us for this change and for adapting your
teaching to truly help us learn.” We also embraced technology for our co-curricular activities and events as well. Most of the events we planned for after mid-March were delivered virtually. Interestingly, the attendance at these events far exceeded the numbers we typically get when the event is held face to face. We also took the opportunity to launch new events like the “Wednesday Night Wisdom” series that has been a roaring success with average enrollment exceeding 75 participants. When university canceled the commencement ceremony, our college hosted a virtual graduation celebration for students, family and faculty on YouTube, located at youtu.be/uxKh904iVHg. Resiliency An exemplar of resiliency was exhibited by our students and faculty coach Dan Morgan, who accompanied them on the trip to Sweden. As the pandemic intensified, this group was stuck in Sweden with great uncertainty to their return. They made us proud by staying calm and didn’t let this dampen their enthusiasm for the trip or erase the learning from their trip. They even made news in the local newspaper! Students described their experience as one that tested their resiliency and was life-altering. This is best reflected in the words of a student who went on the trip: “My heart was warmed by the kindness of the people of Lidköping, when it looked like we might be stranded, multiple residents reached out and offered us a place to stay if needed. Between our business and campus visits, the students learned a great deal about the culture, educational system, and how marketing is done in Sweden. Also, there is a great deal to learn when we are under stress and I learned that this was a great team of students that handled whatever was thrown at them. In the end all went well and the students indeed did have the trip of a lifetime.” As you reflect on the phenomenal progress we have made in the past year, please take a moment to congratulate yourself and our outstanding talent in the college that makes us innovative, agile and resilient. Indeed, inside of every Huskie is the grit and resilience to overcome the toughest of challenges, limitless compassion to help others and soaring optimism for the future. It’s an honor to lead this outstanding team. Thank you. Go Huskies!
Balaji Rajagopalan, Dean
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College of Business — Annual Report
2020 Alumni Award Winners
Wes Saber
Mary Vrancic
(MBA 2014)
(BS, Marketing 2008, MBA 2014)
Distinguished Alumnus
Outstanding Young Alumnus
Jack Molloy (BS, Marketing 1994) Innovation and Entrepreneurship
Jackie Sander (BS, Public Health Admin 2008) Honorary Alumnus
Robert Rothkopf (BS and MS, Management 1967, 1973)
Sarjoo Patel
Student Engagement
Social Impact
(BS, OM&IS 2003)
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University Awards and Honor Distinctive Teaching, Mentoring, and Service
(L-R) President Freeman, Brad Cripe (recipient of the 2020 Presidential Teaching Award), Rebecca Shortridge (Accountancy Chair), Balaji Rajagopalan (Dean), Omar Ghrayeb (Associate Provost).
Sarah Marsh (Management) and Kathy McFadden (OM&IS), recipients of the 2020 NIU Outstanding Mentor Award.
Second from right, Dean DuCray (Class of 1964, Accountancy), recipient of the 2019 NIU Honorary Doctoral Degree.
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College of Business — Annual Report
Key Highlights of Progress Report on Goals for AY20 Theme One: Culture of Innovation Goal: Launch the Creativity Lab Progress: • Creativity Lab will be opened in Barsema Hall (BH) in fall 2020. BH renovations for the Creativity Lab are underway. Goal: Enhance Pedagogical Innovation Progress: • Two Inaugural Instructional Innovation Fellowships were funded in AY20 (Presentations on March 27, 2020): • Federico Bassetti — OMIS 475: Internet and Web Computing Technologies Summary: Enhance the learning experience of students by adopting Agile processes, as well as developing a learning community that can adapt to the pace and rapidly evolving nature of software development practice.
• Mark Groza — MKTG 350: Principles of Selling Summary: Transform MKTG 350 in-person class to a hybrid, flipped course design. • One Dean’s Instructional Innovation Fellowship will be funded for AY21. • Mya Groza — MKTG 443: Marketing Research Summary: Transform MKTG 443 using design thinking, active pedagogy and adaptive learning technologies. This will be an 8-week, hybrid, flipped course design.
Theme Two: Distinctive Student Experiences and Career Success Goal: Support steady state of five projects from the IGNITE! program Progress: • Five IGNITE! Positions were funded: Project details can be found here: go.niu.edu/experiencesignite. • Illinois Business Innovation Association (Student: Summer Ghoman). • Literacy Planet (Student: Zach Kalk). • Kishwaukee College (Student: Rachel Reynolds). • Egyptian Theatre (Student: Shawn O’Neill). • Production Cutting Services (Student: Josh Chuman). Goal: Complete Experiential Learning Center (ELC) Projects: Eight per semester, impacting 50 students. Progress: • Sixteen ELC projects were funded: Project details can be found here: go.niu.edu/elcprojects. • Fall 2019: Clover Technologies, McDonald’s, WeWarriors, Club Colors, Lakeshore Recycling Systems, YWCA of Metropolitan Chicago, HUMAGINARIUM. • Spring 2020: Grainger, Maxwell Telecare, Northern Illinois Research Foundation (NIRF), Vous Vitamin, The Shelby Group, Echo Global Logistics, WeWarriors (Part II), Transnational Payment. • 91 students participated — 43 graduate students and 48 undergraduate students. Goal: Increase number of students going on immersive global experiences by 10%. Progress: • 101 students traveled abroad. Total would be 125 without cancellations due to COVID19. Goal: Launch Digital Innovations and Data Analytics (DIDA) Lab Progress: • A fundraising plan is in place and execution has begun for the new DIDA Lab (currently working with NIU architects for the center space design).
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Theme Three: Mission and Market Driven Program Transformation Goal: Redesign, Enhance, and Differentiate MBA Programs. Progress: • MBA programs redesign and enhancement plans were approved by the Graduate Curriculum Committee. • Executive MBA program has new curricular structure and courses with innovative pedagogy for AY21. • One Year MBA program has newly refined core and elective courses for AY21. • Global MBA program has newly refined core and elective courses for AY21. • New Online MBA program (converted from evening MBA program) is launched for AY21. Goal: Launch the redesigned M.S. in Finance program. Progress: • M.S. in Finance program was redesigned to reflect the changes in the business world and better arm students with enhanced competence in their future career. Around 20 students will enroll in the program in Fall 2020. Goal: Strengthen the M.S. in Digital Marketing — curricular and enrollment. Progress: • M.S. in Digital Marketing (MSDM) was enhanced with curricular change. 56 students enrolled in the MSDM program in Spring 2020. Goal: Strengthen the M.S. in Data Analytics — curricular and enrollment. Progress: • M.S. in Data Analytics (MSDA) was enhanced with curricular changes including the revisions to the program goals and learning objectives. 110 students enrolled in the MSDA program in Spring 2020. Goal: Achieve revenue goal from Global MBA plus international initiatives: $750,000. Progress: • Global MBA program and other College of Business international initiatives generated approximately $900,000 in gross revenue for the university.
Theme Four: Faculty Research and Professional Development Goal: Establish faculty research excellence awards model in place by area. Progress: • All five departments established and executed department-specific reward structures. • 26 Professorships and 1 Research Fellowship in each discipline: • COB Research Spending — more than $1.02 MM in AY20. ➢ Research Fellowships and Research Grants — $370,000 ➢ Conference Presentations and Research Collaboration — $150,000 ➢ Graduate Assistantships for Faculty Research — $500,000 Goal: Expand professional development opportunities for staff. Progress: • All five departments provided professional development opportunities for staff- advising conference, training for advance data analytics, online conferencing, etc.
Theme Five: Inclusivity Goal: Hire retention coordinator and develop an inclusivity plan. Progress: • COB SEM Committee worked to develop equity gap-related initiatives (including an inclusivity plan). • COB SEM Committee will take next steps with the strategic diversity-equity-inclusivity (DEI) scorecard.
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College of Business — Annual Report
College of Business Faculty who Published in Financial Times Top 50 Journals
Yipeng Liu(OM&IS) — MIS Quarterly
Onkar Malgonde (OM&IS) — MIS Quarterly
Balaji Rajagopalan (OM&IS) — MIS Quarterly
Matthew Pickard (Accountancy) — The Accounting Review
Mark Mellon (Accountancy) — Journal of Business Ethics
Timothy Michaelis (MGMT) — Journal of Business Venturing
College of Business — Annual Report
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Activity Highlights Distinctive Student Experiences College of Business Week of Welcome (WOW) event with NIU Football Coach Thomas Hammock, College of Business Alum (August 2019) Thomas Hammock, a former Huskie player and assistant coach, has returned home as the 23rd head coach in the history of the Northern Illinois University football program. He has a B.S. degree in Marketing from NIU. His wife, Cheynnitha, is also a College of Business alum (Accountancy).
BELIEF Week Speaker Series
BELIEF is the name of the applied business ethics program in the college. BELIEF builds ethical business leaders through the integration of program development, faculty support, business community involvement and learner engagement. In October 2019, three events of the BELIEF Week Speaker Series were successfully held in Barsema Hall: 1) Ethics Across Industries (Joseph Sener, Frank Scarpiniti, Archer Dominick), 2) Relationships and Ethics: Keys to Success (Jeffrey Yordon, President/CEO of Athenex Pharma), 3) Ethical Organization: Lessons from the Front (Jed McClure).
ELC classes solve firm specific problems
Experiential Learning Center (ELC) projects bring together students’ open-mindedness and faculty thought-leadership to solve firmspecific problems. ELC attracts students from across the University who seek active and personalized learning. To date, more than 2,000 NIU students have participated as have a multitude of faculty and alumni as well as hundreds of Fortune 100 organizations, mid-sized enterprises, and entrepreneurial startups. In AY19, ELC developed new partnerships with MATTER, a Chicago-based Healthcare Startup Incubator and INNOVATION DuPage, an Entrepreneurial Venture. In AY20, ELC continued the partnerships.
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College of Business — Annual Report
Activity Highlights
Activities include many ongoing initiatives as well as those that were recently launched.
By the Numbers
230 students from 31 countries. 101 students traveled abroad. Five countries features as part of “Global Thursdays.” $23,000 in Study Abroad Scholarships. Faculty-led study abroad program in Marketing in March, 2020. New global academic partner — Chung-Ang University (CAU) Korea. • In continuing collaboration with PRIME Business School (Bogota, Colombia), the next cohort of MBA will be launched in fall 2020. • Nanjing China EMBA program was launched in January 2020.
• • • • • •
MBA student study abroad (Panama, March 2020).
Revenue Related Metric
• 2,192 undergraduate students. • 766 graduate students. • 54,996 credit hours delivered during the academic year. • $5,787,085 revenue generated through differential tuition, contract programs, executive education and global initiatives. • $3.62 million in total gift activity.
Reputation
Revenue Reputation
Relationships
Relationships
• 438 business professionals (including 285 alumni) visits to Barsema Hall. • 230 international students. • 160 organizations hired students. • 19 industries hired students.
ELC students met their client (WeWarriors, a Colorado-based startup) in person and made a marketing plan presentation. (fall 2019 and spring 2020.)
• Top Accounting program (2019 Public Accounting Report). • #21 B.S. Large Program. • #39 Masters Program. • #10 B.S. in Midwest. • #11 Masters in Midwest. • #79 nationally within a prestigious group of business school and Top 3 Business School with the most minorities (Poets & Quants). • Six COB faculty research publications in the Financial Times (FT) Top 50 Journals. • Best Business School in the U.S. for 33 consecutive years (U.S. News & World Report).
College of Business — Annual Report
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Lasting Impact
We thank the following individuals who retired recently.
Chuck Gowen
Terry Bishop
Geoff Gordon
“Chuck’s enthusiasm and passion for helping thousands of NIU Business students grow and achieve in life will be greatly missed,” said Sarah Marsh, former chair of the Management Department.
“A selfless outstanding professor who connected the business world for his students and always saw the positive in all his students! His tireless enthusiasm and support of students will be missed,” said Audrey Southard, HR consultant.
“Over his 29 years with us, Geoff not only taught marketing to students, but he taught us all about commitment, consistency, work ethic, and above all kindness and generosity” by Denise Schoenbachler, dean emeritus and professor of marketing.
Northern Illinois University is an equal opportunity/affirmative action institution. Produced by authority of the State of Illinois. niu.edu 53164 8/20
Professor of Management
“Congrats Chuck! So enjoyed working and writing with you over the years! Have a wonderful retirement which is so richly deserved! Cheers!” said William Tallon, retired professor of OMIS and dean.
Associate Professor of Management
“Terry has been a great friend and mentor. Will miss our chats outside your office door, my friend! Thank you for everything!! NIU will miss you,” said Dennis Barsema, chairman at Northern Illinois University.
Professor of Marketing
“You were one of the best professors and I will never forget how you helped me during my time at NIU.” said Michelle Radlowski, marketing director at Zscaler.
Noca Ervin
Patricia Myers
Kathlyn Buffington
“Congratulations, Noca. You have made a big impact on the COB in a short time. You have been great at juggling the dean’s schedule and helping the rest of the leadership team stay on tasks. I will miss your smile and positive presence in the COB” said Rebecca Shortridge, accountancy chair.
“Pat has been a pillar of strength not only in the college and NIU, but in the overall DeKalb-Sycamore community,” said Anthony Preston, assistant dean.
“Kathi has continually gone above and beyond to support staff with their multiple tasks and to ensure that service to our students continued to be our priority,” said Margee Myles, Undergraduate Advising director.
Assistant to the Dean
“It is Noca, the person who has made the most impact in our office. I love her perspective on life, her smile, and her compassion for others,” said Kelsey Johnson, senior director.
Office Manager, Dean’s Office
“Beyond a co-worker relationship, I consider Pat to be one of my closest friends. I will surely miss having her down the hall from me, where I can usually hear the faint sound of some country tune coming from her office and, of course her singing along with it. It will be extremely difficult to fill Pat’s shoes,” said Connie Weaver, staff.
Program Assistant, Undergraduate Advising
“I always admired Kathi’s energy and her contagious smile. Every student who walked past her desk would have received some of it. I will cherish the memory of Coach Hammock in Barsema Hall welcoming our students with Kathi’s energetic shout ‘Go Huskies!’ She epitomizes the Huskie spirit in every way,” said Dean Balaji Rajagopalan.
AY 21 Goals
Theme One: Culture of Innovation • Formal launch of the Creativity Lab. • Instructional Innovations Summer Fellows Program.
Theme Two: Distinctive Student Experiences and Career Success • Institutionalize the IGNITE program. • Engage — 50 students in eight Experiential Learning Center Projects per semester. • Continue efforts toward increasing internship/micro-internship/ ELC/IGNITE or similar experience participation rate to 75% over the next three years.
• Continue efforts to increase number of students going on immersive global experiences with a target of 30% of undergraduate students over the next five years. • Deliver architectural design for: • Digital Innovation and Data Analytics Lab. • Sales Lab 2.0. • Complete the work on concept design for FinTech Lab.
Theme Three: Mission and Market Driven Program Transformation • Execute on the new MBA program curriculum for all formats. Launch online MBA program redesign and enhancement. • Develop and execute marketing plan for promoting MBA programs to meet enrollment target of a minimum of 15 students in the EMBA format and 20 in the One Year MBA format. • Launch re-design exercise for the undergraduate business program. • Expand global initiatives: • Deliver Nanjing MBA program. • Explore new opportunities globally for graduate programs.
• Strengthen Specialized Masters: • Work to increase enrollment in the M.S. Finance program with a steady state of 20-25 students. • Launch Online Master of Accountancy; Execute on phasing out the Master of Science in Taxation program decision. • Explore synergies among online programs — M.S. in Digital Marketing, M.S. in Data Analytics, MBA. • Explore cross-disciplinary and new program opportunities.
Theme Four: Faculty Research and Professional Development • Institutionalize and modify department research excellence model as needed.
• Expand professional development opportunities for staff.
Theme Five: Inclusivity • Develop an inclusivity plan.
Leaders in Ethics and Academic Discipline (LEAD) members place second in their division at the annual Templeton National Case Competition in February 2020.
Experiential Learning Center (ELC) WeWarriors student consulting team in 2020.