Jindal School Now – January 2020

Jindal School of Management Stands with Good Company in MBA Alumni Survey

Jindal School building with sign in front

Alumni from the Naveen Jindal School of Management boosted the school’s reputation recently in their responses to survey questions from Bloomberg Businessweek. The Jindal School ranked highly on four of five questions Bloomberg asked MBA graduates. The questions were part of survey data Bloomberg collected in compiling its 2018 Bloomberg Businessweek Best B-Schools rankings.

The rankings, which Bloomberg Businessweek released Sept. 10, “show that the Jindal School has made an indelible impression on its alumni in offering educational excellence,” said Dr. Hasan Pirkul, Caruth Chair and Jindal School dean. “They say we encourage originality and vision. And they say graduates see the value in this and in helping one another.”

JSOM ranked No. 6 among 126 business schools surveyed for favorable responses to a question that asked alumni whether they would recommend their school to a friend because of the quality of its academic program.

“I would recommend my school to a friend because of the quality of its academic program.”
Rank School Score
1 Chicago (Booth) 100
2 IESE Business School 99.65
3 Northwestern (Kellogg) 99.19
4 Virginia (Darden) 98.34
5 Michigan (Ross) 98.32
6 UT Dallas (Jindal) 98.09
7 MIT (Sloan) 97.64
8 Carnegie Mellon (Tepper) 97.51
9 Stanford 97.07
10 Pennsylvania (Wharton) 97.04
Source: Bloomberg Businessweek, “The Best Business Schools as Scored by Alumni”

Alumni responses put the Jindal School ahead of such other business schools as Carnegie Mellon’s Tepper, MIT’s Sloan School of Management, Stanford’s Graduate School of Business and the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School. UT Austin’s McCombs School of Business and Texas A&M’s Mays Business School came in at No. 21 and No. 22, respectively.

JSOM alumni agreement with the statement “My education emphasized innovation and creativity” put the school at No. 10 for that question. The only other Texas school on that list was UT Austin, which ranked No. 30.

When Jindal School alumni were asked whether they would recommend their alma mater to friends who are interested in entrepreneurship, their affirmative responses resulted in the No. 13 ranking for JSOM. UT Austin’s McCombs ranked No. 8, and Rice University’s Jesse H. Jones Graduate School of Business ranked No. 16.

The Jindal School came in at No. 25 for the survey question in which alumni were asked whether their alumni network helped build their careers. The only other Texas school on that list was Texas A&M’s Mays Business School, which came in at No. 30.

Read more on Inside Jindal, the online news center of the Naveen Jindal School of Management.

Institute’s Innovate(her) Program Earns Tech Titan Award

Choi At Innovateher
Jindal School faculty member Emily Choi (left) with an Innovate(her) 2019 participant

Innovate(her), a program in the Jindal School’s Institute for Innovation and Entrepreneurship, received the 2019 Tech Titan of the Future-University Level award at the annual Tech Titans gala last August.

Tech Titans, the largest technology trade organization in Texas, recognized 14 outstanding technology companies, organizations and individuals in North Texas that have made significant contributions to their industries.

The Tech Titan of the Future-University Level award recognizes educational institutions that encourage and support students in choosing engineering and technology-related disciplines as a preferred path.

Innovate(her) participants engage with professional women mentors from the community through a series of activities designed to encourage innovative thinking. The students learn about technology, design thinking, financial management and brand development.

Denyse Carpio, assistant to the center director for the institute, credited the Tech Titans honor to the program’s strong corporate, alumni and mentor support.

“Over the past few years, Innovate(her) has blossomed into a meaningful, topical program for middle-school girls from across the Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex,” Carpio said. “Our staff is passionate about empowering girls to innovate and create, and that means that technology must be at the forefront of our program. The Tech Titans award not only affirms the spirit of the program, it also provides the opportunity to expand our scope even further.”

Read more on Inside Jindal.

Fall Finance Conference Gaining Momentum

Harold Zhang
Harold Zhang

The 2019 Fall Finance Conference, an annual gathering at the Naveen Jindal School of Management, attracted a record number of research paper submissions, a sign, one conference coordinator said, that the academic gathering is gaining recognition and respect.

Vikram Nanda
Vikram Nanda

“We received 200 papers, … the largest number we’ve ever received,” said Dr. Harold Zhang, Finance and Managerial Economics Area coordinator, who along with Dr. Vikram Nanda, O.P. Jindal Chair of Finance, coordinated the conference. “I believe that number shows that people are talking about the conference and awareness of it is increasing.”

About 70 educators representing many of the top universities in the United States and Canada, as well as a Federal Reserve Board member, attended the one-day conference.

Presented by JSOM’s Finance and Managerial Economics Area, the conference brings together researchers, scholars and students to promote their research, share their work and build relationships with others in their field.

Read more on Inside Jindal.

Faculty News and Achievements

Jindal School New Hires Bring Expertise in Business, Research and Teaching

Hasan Pirkul
Hasan Pirkul

Last fall, 16 new faculty members joined the Naveen Jindal School of Management, including an associate professor and five assistant professors, all either tenured or on the tenure track.

“The 50th anniversary of UT Dallas this year has made welcoming this group special,” said Dr. Hasan Pirkul, Caruth Chair and Jindal School dean. “We celebrate not only the University’s success — in healthy growth and in achieving top-tier status in only five decades — but also the Jindal School’s success in bringing in a faculty with top-tier teaching, research and business expertise.

The new faculty members include Dr. Scott Janke, director of the Master of Science (MS) in Management Science program and senior lecturer in operations management; and Dr. David Widdifield, the new director of the MS in Supply Chain Management program and a clinical associate professor of operations management. Also officially joining the faculty this fall is Paul Nichols, BA’95, MBA’98. Nichols, who was assistant director of the Institute for Innovation and Entrepreneurship, is now its executive director. He also continues as director of the MS in Innovation and Entrepreneurship program and as a senior lecturer in organizations, strategy and international management.

JSOM gained new faculty in its accounting, executive education, finance and managerial economics, information systems, operations management, and organizations, strategy and international management areas. At the start of the academic year, the faculty included 220 full-time and 111 part-time members.

New Tenure-Track Faculty

Rafael Copat
Rafael Copat

Dr. Rafael Copat, assistant professor of accounting

Previously: PhD candidate, Rice University

Research interests: corporate governance, proxy advisors, shareholder voting, conflicts of interest, executive compensation

Quote: “UTD has a big accounting department, providing me with a great opportunity for research collaboration. I am excited to be around people with such bright minds and prolific publication records. My main ambition is to make a meaningful contribution to corporate governance research and inform practitioners about issues that are vital to shaping economic efficiency. I hope to be recognized as a thoughtful and careful researcher, contributing to JSOM’s research productivity.”

Michael Hasler
Michael Hasler

Dr. Michael Hasler, associate professor of finance and managerial economics

Previously: assistant professor, University of Toronto

Research interests: how information acquisition, disagreement among investors and learning mechanisms impact investors’ trading strategies and asset prices

Quote: ““What I look forward to most is being in a very efficiently run and growing business school. I aim to publish many papers in top-tier finance and economics journals to further bolster the ranking of the Jindal School of Management.”

Kirti Sinha
Kirti Sinha

Dr. Kirti Sinha, assistant professor of accounting

Previously: PhD candidate, Northwestern University

Research interests: disclosure, public and private debt markets, mergers and acquisitions

Quote: “My research explores how information — financial or nonfinancial — affects real economic activities. With a specific focus on credit markets, I intend to use unique datasets to provide insights on how banks and other financial institutions utilize information in lending decisions and how these decisions impact real economic activities. This is important because of the widespread use of information disclosure regulation by policymakers. Through my research, I hope to inform policymakers about the costs and benefits of mandatory disclosure regulations.”

Ashwin Venkataraman
Ashwin Venkataraman

Dr. Ashwin Venkataraman, assistant professor of operations management

Previously: postdoctoral fellow, Institute for Quantitative Social Science, Harvard University

Research interests: machine learning applications in operations management and marketing, business analytics, choice modeling

Quote: “UTD has a very diverse student population, and I am looking forward to interacting with the students and getting to learn about their varied perspectives on different topics in my classes. I hope to create an enjoyable and intellectually stimulating atmosphere for the students and collaborate with my colleagues to produce high-quality and impactful research.”

Guihua wang
Guihua Wang

Dr. Guihua Wang, assistant professor of operations management

Previously: PhD candidate, University of Michigan

Research interests: the intersection of empirical econometrics and machine learning with application to healthcare

Quote: “I feel very excited about teaching at UT Dallas as I learned from my colleagues and friends that UTD students are smart, hardworking and keen to learn. My goal at the school is to become a productive researcher and an inspiring teacher. I will continue my line of research in healthcare to address important and challenging problems faced by patients, providers, payers and the government. Besides research, I enjoy interacting and sharing my knowledge with students. My teaching goal is to help students develop a solid understanding of course concepts and theories and to improve their critical thinking and analytical skills.”

Hongchang Wang
Hongchang Wang

Dr. Hongchang Wang, assistant professor of information systems

Previously: PhD candidate, Georgia Institute of Technology

Research interests: economics of information systems, financial technologies, online lending platforms, artificial intelligence

Quote: “Considering innovation is one of the top goals of UT Dallas, I wish to keep pursuing innovative research and converting it to inspired teaching. For my personal accomplishment, I hope to keep working on high-quality and important research projects, learning from senior colleagues, contributing to the academic community, and maintaining health physically and mentally. For the school and the University, I hope to provide high-quality teaching service, to become a supportive and collegial colleague, to provide suggestions and help to students, and to support relevant campus activities and projects.”

This story originally appeared on the UT Dallas News Center.

Jindal School Researcher Will Use NSF Award to Seek Energy Market Solutions

A Naveen Jindal School of Management faculty member recently received a nearly quarter-million dollar grant from the National Science Foundation that will allow him and his team to explore how best to apply theories from physics and math to solve challenges related to energy markets.

Alain Bensoussan
Alain Bensoussan

The NSF awarded Dr. Alain Bensoussan, Lars Magnus Ericsson Chair, Operations Management; and co-lead investigator Dr. P. Jameson Graber, assistant professor of mathematics at Baylor University, a grant in the amount of $229,999 for their investigation, “New Extensions of the Master Equation in Mean Field Control Theory and Applications.” It is the third grant awarded to UT Dallas and Bensoussan related to this research topic.

“The main objective of the new grant is to explore the possibilities of mean field theory in energy markets, and in decision-making with limited information,” said Bensoussan, who is also director of the International Center for Decision and Risk Analysis (ICDRiA) at the Jindal School. “It also values the cooperation between UTD and Baylor University.”

There is a longstanding cooperation between Bensoussan and Graber. It started when Graber joined ICDRiA as a postdoctoral research fellow supported by the first NSF grant on mean field theory under Bensoussan. After Graber joined Baylor, both submitted a successful proposal to NSF. The current award reiterates the team’s successful collaboration.

One unique aspect of the team’s study, Bensoussan said, is exploring the energy market with regard to energy consumers’ ability to become energy producers at the same time.

“This occurs typically with the installation of solar panels and the development of intelligent buildings, in which energy which is not used can be saved and resold,” he said. “Traditional modeling of energy markets cannot handle this aspect. Mean field theory is a new theory which can help better understand it.”

This story originally appeared in the Autumn 2019 issue of MANAGEMENT magazine.

Jindal School Professor Honored as DSI Fellow

Kathryn Stecke
Kathryn Stecke

The Decision Sciences Institute recognized Naveen Jindal School of Management professor Dr. Kathryn E. Stecke’s scholarly research and leadership by naming her a fellow of the organization at its 2019 conference in November.

A member of JSOM’s Operations Management Area faculty since 2002, Stecke is known worldwide for her scholarly expertise in flexible manufacturing and supply chain issues. She also is Naveen Jindal Advisory Council Chair. She speaks globally about supply chain management, operations and marketing interface concerns, flexible manufacturing systems and seru, a Japanese organizational and production system that focuses on electronics product assembly.

To be eligible for the fellow designation, DSI members must be distinguished scholars, as demonstrated by substantive research contributions. They must be members of the DSI in good standing for at least the last five years, and they must have been a leader in and contributor to the institute’s vision, mission and activities.

The institute’s board of directors noted that Stecke has published more than 80 refereed journal articles and has been involved in nearly 40 PhD dissertations. Her DSI activity includes serving as program chair for the 2017 conference and fulfilling many leadership roles.

This is the third fellow recognition Stecke has received. In 2009, the Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences named her a fellow, and in 2017, she was inducted a fellow of the Production and Operations Management Society.

Stecke is the only person to have been elected a fellow in all three organizations.

“This singular achievement highlights Dr. Stecke’s dedication and leadership in her field,” said Dr. Janet L. Hartley of Bowling Green University, DSI president. “These designations reflect on her career commitment to high-quality scholarship and underscore the regard in which she is held by her colleagues.”

JSOM Professor Earns Honors for Highly Cited Research

Mike Peng
Mike Peng

Clarivate Analytics Web of Science has identified JSOM faculty member Dr. Mike Peng among the world’s most influential and exceptional researchers for its 2019 list of Highly Cited Researchers. Peng, an O.P. Jindal Distinguished Chair, professor of organizations, strategy and international management, and executive director of the Center for Global Business in the Naveen Jindal School of Management, is listed among 113 scholars in economics and business. He has been on this list every year since 2014.

Read more on the UT Dallas News Center.

Student News

JSOM Students Bring Home Collegiate World Cup of Sales

Sales students from the Naveen Jindal School of Management recently earned the new top honor at the International Collegiate Sales Competition (ISCS), the Collegiate World Cup of Sales.

Competitors from about 80 universities in the United States, Canada and Europe attended the three-day event Nov. 6-9, in Orlando, Florida. Jindal School students accumulated the most overall points, which earned them the cup in the new team competition.

Student News
The ICSC winning team (from left): Howard Dover, Kameron Jong, Karianna Barreto, Semiramis Amirpour, Vathsalya Senapathi, Sophia Maloney, Ashton Murray and Taylor Barrington

Hosted annually by Florida State University, the ICSC puts students in real-life sales situations in front of judges from well-known U.S. companies.

Dr. Howard Dover, clinical professor of marketing and director of JSOM’s Center for Professional Sales, likened the ICSC to March Madness and the NCAA basketball tournament — but for sales.

“Just like it is rare for teams to win that competition, let alone make it to the Sweet 16 or Final Four, we had all of our team members make both the semifinals and the finals. The ICSC is the largest collegiate competition in the world, and we have competed since its inception. We have usually placed in the top 10, but the UTD sales program has never had a finalist in this competition prior to this event.”

JSOM’s role-play team members included Ashton Murray, a marketing senior who placed second in the finals, and Karianna Barreto, a marketing junior who placed fourth.

Vathsalya Senapathi, a global business senior, and Taylor Barrington, a business administration senior, took second place in the sales-management case finals.

JSOM was the only school to have teams in both role-play and case and to see all its teams in the finals.

Read more on Inside Jindal.

UT Dallas Wins Ethics Case Competition

Ethics Case Competition
The 2019 Collegiate Ethics Case Competition winners – Paulina Hruskoci and Ethan Mader

Combining unique skills and strengths to form a successful partnership, junior Ethan Mader and freshman Paulina Hruskoci recently captured first place at the 17th annual Collegiate Ethics Case Competition at the Eller College of Management at the University of Arizona.

It was the second time that UT Dallas has won the competition. Two Naveen School of Management students also placed first in 2014.

Mader and Hruskoci competed against teams from 24 universities on Oct. 17-19, in Tucson. They edged out The University of Texas at Austin for the victory. Rounding out the top five were the University of Florida in third, Indiana University in fourth and Pennsylvania State University in fifth place.

Mader, an accounting major in the Professional Program in Accounting, and Hruskoci, studying political science in the School of Economic, Political and Policy Sciences, were a great example of two people working together and succeeding, according to Jindal School Clinical Assistant Professor of Accounting Christina Betanzos, who has served as the faculty advisor for the UT Dallas team the past two years.

“Their win demonstrates the students’ dedication to not only conduct thorough research and come up with creative solutions and recommendations, but also their motivation to represent the University well and collaborate effectively,” Betanzos said.

Read more on Inside Jindal.

Jindal School Team Brings Home Fifth Healthcare Case Competition Victory

A team of Naveen Jindal School of Management graduate students recently won the case study competition of the North Texas chapter of the American College of Healthcare Executives. It was the fifth victory for JSOM in the annual event.

The winning team’s members earned a $3,000 cash award, along with individual trophies and one-year memberships in ACHE.

Healthcare Case Competition
Team members (from left) Dheera Dammanna, Avani Alla, Adam Jurecki, Allison Potter and Fares Stanbouly with their executive coach, Shane Jones.

All five members of the first-place team are MBA students, and four of the five are dual-degree seekers. Fares Stanbouly is an MBA student. Avani Alla and Dheera Dammanna are also pursuing MS degrees in Business Analytics; and Adam Jurecki and Allison Potter are also pursuing MS degrees in Healthcare Leadership and Management.

The Jindal School entered two teams in the competition for the first time this year. The winners placed ahead of their fellow UT Dallas competitors and teams from the University of North Texas Health Science Center, Texas State University and the UTHealth School of Public Health.

This year, participants offered solutions to an “anchor mission” project for UMass Memorial Health Care. The Democracy Collaborative, a community-development think tank in Washington, D.C., created the idea of an anchor mission, an effort to link the economic power and other resources of institutions such as colleges and hospitals to the communities in which they reside in order to help ensure the ongoing well-being of those communities.

“I think we came in first place because we had a wide variety of solutions rather than one big one,” team member Fares Stanbouly said. “There were many issues to address, and I thought that our solutions covered most of them.”

Read more on Inside Jindal.

JSOM Student Wins Marketer of the Year Award for Impactful Class Project

Naveen Jindal School of Management junior Shannon Cotts was named 2019 Collegiate Marketer of the Year by the Dallas-Fort Worth chapter of the American Marketing Association. The award was among 26 presented at the organization’s annual awards gala last May.

Marketer Of The Year
Shannon Cotts with her Collegiate Marketer of the Year Award
 at the AMA DFW awards gala

An accounting and marketing double major, Cotts won for work she had done in a Marketing Projects (MKT 4370) class with teammates Matthew Barker, Alyssa Martindale and Colby Thompson. The students developed a marketing plan to help increase consumer awareness of Fixd, a Dallas-based home warranty and service repair company. The project required extensive consumer research. The firm indicated the students’ work played a part in the company’s acquisition in January 2019 by ANGI Homeservices, the parent company of Angie’s List, a web-based home services company.

At the beginning of the project, the students met with Fixd leadership and discovered that the startup company had not conducted much market research in the past. Going in, the students hypothesized that Fixd would gain momentum by first interacting with consumers through its one-off repair services and then be able to upsell its home warranty products after gaining their trust.

“That was not the case,” Cotts said. “We determined that people were actually attracted to Fixd based on home warranty, not on home service. We found out that most people already have someone they already trust to do their quick repairs. To tear them away from those relationships would take a lot of energy.”

Read more on Inside Jindal.

Alumni News

Accounting Alum Earns Top CPA Exam Recognition

Matthew Brooks did not follow a traditional path to his current job as a tax consultant for Deloitte in Dallas. After changing his major a few times, Brooks completed his undergraduate degree in French studies at Brigham Young University, then worked for several years as a banker before coming to the Naveen Jindal School of Management to pursue an MS in Accounting degree.

Matthew Brooks
Matthew Brooks

Unconventional as it may be, Brooks credits this combination of career exploration and prior work experience — along with his JSOM professors — for his success in his graduate program and on the certified public accountant exam, where he passed all four sections on his first try with a high score that earned him a prestigious award from the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants.

“I was not as focused as an undergraduate, but after a few years working and going back to school, I had a greater understanding for what you learn in classes and how it helps in the real world,” said Brooks, who graduated in August 2018. “I began to not just study to pass a test, but to truly grasp concepts and ideas, which further helped me when it came time to take the CPA Exam.”

Brooks was awarded a 2018 Elijah Watt Sells Award in recognition of obtaining a cumulative average score of 95.50 across all four sections of the exam on his first attempt. Each section is scored on a scale of 0 to 99, and only 110 of the 86,000 who sat for the CPA Exam in 2018 met the criteria for the award. The recipients were announced in April.

Read more on Inside Jindal.

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