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New leadershipMichael J. Ginzberg, dean, and Charles Elson, director, Center for Corporate GovernancePage 6

3 Weaving technology intothe fabric of learning

6 Experts on board

8 New technology themother of his inventions

10 Under the microscope

12 Team players

14 Investing in education

16 Study abroad—a world-class experience

19 A penny saved…

20 Life after graduation

22 Awards and achievements

24 B&E briefcase

Photographs by Jack Buxbaum, Robert Cohen andKathy Flickinger, UD Public Relations; Duane Perry;Jim Graham and Anil Kapahi. Design and illustration by Barbara Broge, UD PublicRelations.Edited by Linda Dunn and Ann Manser.Contributing writers: Barbara Garrison, Ann Manser,Richard E. Miller and Mary Jane Pahls.

Dialog is published by the University of DelawareCollege of Business and Economics, MBNA AmericaHall, University of Delaware, Newark, DE 19716.Voice: (302) 831-2551Fax: (302) 831-6750E-mail: [dunnl@be.udel.edu]Web: [www.be.udel.edu]Direct inquiries regarding Dialog to Linda Dunn.

On the cover:New appointments this year include Michael J. Ginzberg(left), B&E dean and Chaplin Tyler Professor ofBusiness, and Charles Elson, Edgar S. Woolard Jr. Chairof Corporate Governance and director, Center forCorporate Governance. (Photo by Jack Buxbaum)

An Equal Opportunity/Affirmative Action EmployerThe University of Delaware is committed to assuring equalopportunity to all persons and does not discriminate on the basis ofrace, color, gender, religion, ancestry, national origin, sexualorientation, veteran status, age or disability in its educationalprograms, activities, admissions or employment practices as requiredby Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972, Title VI of theCivil Rights Act of 1964, the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, theAmericans with Disabilities Act, other applicable statutes andUniversity policy. Inquiries concerning these statutes andinformation regarding campus accessibility should be referred to theAffirmative Action officer, 305 Hullihen Hall, (302) 831-2835 (voice), (302) 831-4552 (TDD).

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Dear alumni and friends:Observing organizations over time has always fascinated me.

The people who make up the organization come and go, but theorganization reflects much more than the people who currently arein it. Everyone who has been a part of it leaves a lasting mark onthe organization. I am fortunate to have come to the College ofBusiness and Economics at the University of Delaware at this time.My predecessors, Dana Johnson and Ken Biederman, have made

their marks on this organization and have built a very strong foundation. The College hasexcellent students, faculty and staff, strong programs and first-class facilities. We also benefitfrom strong support within the University and from the business community. It is my honor tobe able to work from this base to help the College become recognized as one of the trulyoutstanding business schools in the country.

Since arriving in Delaware at the end of June, I have found many things about the Collegethat have truly impressed me. I cannot list all of them here but will hit a few of the highlights.Many more are described in this issue of Dialog. We have excellent undergraduate programsthat are getting better every year. The qualifications of the freshman class (2004) are the bestever, and well above the University average. You will read about the impressive achievements ofsome of our current students and alumni. And, for each of the award winners listed here, wehave many more students and alumni whose achievements are similarly impressive.

One of the unique programs at the College is the work of the Center for EconomicEducation and Entrepreneurship. The center’s work to support economics education forelementary and secondary school children across the United States (and even overseas) issomething of which we all can be very proud.

B&E faculty members are active researchers in a number of areas within the fields ofbusiness and economics. Articles in this issue of Dialog highlight work that some of the facultyare doing in corporate governance and work group productivity. There is a great deal ofinteresting and highly relevant research going on in the College, and I look forward to findingopportunities to share it with you.

The Information Technology Initiative is changing business education at the University inimportant ways. Over the past several years, we have doubled the number of students in theMIS minor, initiated a new certificate program for students from other majors and changed thecurriculum to integrate IT applications in each of our majors.

Our new Center for Corporate Governance is making a real impact. During the fallsemester, the center sponsored a seminar series that brought to campus the leading scholars,practitioners and journalists in the corporate governance field, including members of theDelaware Court of Chancery and the Delaware Supreme Court.

These are just a few of the successes the College has had over the past year. As you read thisissue of Dialog, you will learn about some of the others. As successful as we have been, there isroom for greater success. I have established objectives in several areas that we will be addressingover the next year or so.

The quality of our undergraduate programs is not as well known as it should be. We needto communicate the unique character and quality of our undergraduate programs to a wideraudience.

Our MBA programs offer strong fundamental business education, but they need to be morefocused on a few areas where we have special competence.

The IT Initiative and the Center for Corporate Governance are both very successful newefforts. We need to build on our success in these areas to make them the premier programs oftheir type.

We must exploit the opportunities we have to build executive education and internationalprograms, as well as to strengthen our research environment.

Of course, pursuing these objectives will require the help and support of the entire B&Ecommunity—alumni, students, faculty, staff and friends. I thank everyone who has supportedthe College with both time and resources. They have been critical in bringing us this far. I lookforward to working with you and to your continued support for the College of Business andEconomics.

Sincerely,

Michael J. GinzbergDean and Chaplin Tyler Professor of Business

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Nowhere on theUD campusis theinformation

technology revolutionmore embraced than inthe College of Businessand Economics.

Taking its cue fromthe University’senthusiastic plunge intothe e-age, the Collegebegan weaving techno-courses into the fabricof its curriculum evenbefore business fullyunderstood the powerof cyber-commerce.

As the ’80s gotunder way, B&E beganconstructing acomputing laboratorythat would teachfaculty and studentsspreadsheet technology.Later in the decade,before the largerbusiness communitydiscovered computernetworking, the Collegeset up a local areanetwork for faculty andstudents and beganteaching the tools, techniques andbenefits of networked computing. Inthe early ’90s, the College againcorrectly anticipated the future when itbegan teaching with group decisionsupport software (GDSS). TheUniversity, via B&E, was one of thefirst to join German software firmSAP’s University Alliance and makeavailable to business students thenewest state-of-the-art enterprisesoftware for running an entirecompany. And, B&E is constantly

upgrading its computer infrastructure. Clinton E. (Skip) White Jr., who

heads the College’s ManagementInformation Systems (MIS) program,joined the faculty 13 years ago fromPenn State because of what he sawhappening at UD.

“I was impressed with the level ofdedication to IT exhibited by theCollege and the University, and I sawthe opportunity to grow with it,” hesays. Once he arrived at Delaware, heset up B&E’s local area network andhelped create the curriculum for

teaching with networked computing.Later, he did the same for its GDSS.

White chairs the faculty committeethat oversees the College’s part in theDelaware Information TechnologyInitiative (DITI), a partnershipinvolving government, business andeducation, designed to make Delawarea leader in information technologyworkers, businesses and research. UD’spart is to encourage young people touse information technologies in theircourses of study and help them develop

Ryan German, BE ’99 (front, center), owner of the Caffé Gelato restaurant in Newark, meets withstudents who found ways for his business to make better use of technology. The students were part of aclass in management information systems (MIS) last spring that created problem-solving teams to serveas consultants to interested businesses. Members of the Caffé Gelato team include (from left) ColinSenney, Ron Aerow, Jennifer Pares and Tracy Paluscio, all BE 2000.

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IT skills and then use those skills inDelaware. While all colleges areinvolved in the initiative, most of thestate legislative funding for DITI wentto B&E. The state’s goal is to providestudents with the academic tools theymust have to enter the world ofbusiness trained in the integration ofbusiness needs with the appropriateinformation technology systems.

The College is doing that in severalways.

One is White’s latest project, acutting-edge graduate course he startedin fall 1999. “Current Issues inManagement Information Systems”focuses on teaching students how tocome up with innovative IT solutionsto business problems. White says thecourse requires students to reach ahigher level of business acumen byconsidering real-world upper-management challenges, such asoutsourcing, strategic uses ofinformation technology and how to useenterprise resource planning software.

The course incorporates problem-based learning techniques. Studentsread such books as Unleashing the KillerApp: Digital Strategies for Market

Dominance and Digital Capital:Harnessing the Power of Business Webs;listen to guest lecturers from companieslike Wingspan.com, an online bank;and are exposed to technologies of thefuture, such as web applicationlanguages ML, XBRL and EBXML—which White calls “the Rosetta stone”of global network business language.

As students cover these materials,they are assigned projects that requirethem to use what they’ve learned.White stresses innovative thinking. Insome cases, students have to developstrategies for fictitious companies, butthey also grapple with real-lifesituations. Projects are assigned toindividuals and to teams.

“My students find the coursedifficult but interesting andchallenging,” White says.

For undergraduates, the Collegeoffers two minors in business computertechnology systems. The MIS minorhelps train future managers to usebusiness information technologiesefficiently and effectively, while thecomputer and information system(CIS) minor gives students a “hybrid”skill that combines a business corecurriculum with programming

languages and system design.The CIS minor prepares astudent to work with acompany’s computernetwork as a programmer,a systems analyst or asystems administrator.

For students majoringin accounting,marketing,management, finance,economics, computerand information sciences orengineering, the MIS minor gives themin-depth knowledge of businesscomputing systems and software fortheir disciplines and shows them howto integrate information technologywith workplace practices to produce amore efficient, effective product. Someof the courses offered within the minorare “Introduction to BusinessInformation Systems,” “ModernBusiness Computing,” “SystemsAnalysis and Implementation” and“Information Planning and DataManagement.”

It was Delaware IT Initiativefunding that allowed the College tohire Gloria Diodato as project directorin the MIS-minor program last April.Diodato’s job is to stay connected tothe business community, developingprojects and internships for MISstudents, keeping curriculum updatedand identifying hands-on learningopportunities.

The place where all of that comestogether is in the senior project phaseof the MIS minor. Teams of studentsact as consultants to real-worldcompanies that come to them forexpert advice on how to solve a specificbusiness problem. The teams examinethe problem and then recommend thebest computer technology solutionwithin the company’s budget. Duringthe spring 2000 semester, 63 studentswere involved in 13 projects assignedthrough two courses: “TechnologicalProblem Solving” and “ProblemSolving Management Project.”

For example, last February, a five-person team worked with a departmentof Wilmington Trust Co. to find a wayto reduce the amount of time needed to

Students in the “Current Issues in Management Information Systems” course discuss aproject requiring them to devise innovative solutions to business management problems.The group meeting here to discuss a real-world situation consists of (from left) instructorSpring Davidson and B&E graduate students Michael Blake and Dawit Afeworki.

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process invoices. When theteam began meeting with bank officials,it was taking 60 days to get invoicesout. Ultimately, the team suggestedusing a simple database with a webinterface that allowed employees toenter invoices into the database as theyfilled them out, making the processinginstantaneous.

Diodato also arranges internships forMIS students. Companies contact herwith offers for summer and wintersession internships. Descriptions of thejobs appear on the ITI web site,[http://www.be.udel.edu/ITI/], withthe information students need tocontact potential employers. Recentinternships have been offered by J.P.Morgan, G5 Technologies, Walt DisneyWorld, American Express, AMC ofDelaware, Allstate and SEIInvestments.

Thomas Hofferd, professor of MIS,teaches courses with e-commercecomponents. So, when senior financemajor David Driesback, BE 2001, feltthe time was right to start a clubdevoted to e-commerce, he says, herecruited Hofferd as faculty adviser.

“There are so many benefits tobeing a member of the E-commerceSociety, like learning cutting-edgetechnology and then letting students trydifferent things on the club web site[http://www.ecomm.udel.edu/default2.asp],” Driesback says.

The first to join were businessstudents, Driesback says. But, asmembers worked with people in othercolleges to develop a web site and wordabout the E-commerce Society got

around, people fromoutside B&E began tojoin. “When we startedthe E-commerce Societyin 1999, we had sixstudents. Today, we havemore than 50 and we’restill growing,” Driesbacksays. The society web siteboasts, “Our diversemembership ofundergraduates and graduatesspans 15 majors.”

Senior Vineet Suri, BE2001, is a finance/marketingmajor with an MIS minor and aco-founder of the E-commerce

Society. He says he was concerned thatmany students didn’t understand the“magnitude andimportance ofe-commerce.”It was Suri’sidea for the clubto sponsorworkshops inwhich industryleaders impartsome of theirknowledge to UDstudents. InOctober, forexample, IBMrepresentatives held atwo-day workshop formembers.

The club hassponsored speakerssuch as James Harte,information technologyconsultant for Bowman& Co., who talked aboutthe Internet’s role as a globalmarketplace. Darrin Shoulders, vicepresident of web development for J.P.Morgan, talked about his company’splunge into e-commerce, and SagarMathur and Drew Snauffer ofAndersen Consulting gave clubmembers an overview of what thefuture holds for e-commerce.

The E-commerce Society website also has links to web projectsites that members have createdfor their e-commerce courses.

“Today, technology is not an add-on

in the classroom; it’s intricately woveninto the curriculum. You can’t take aclass without a connection toinformation technologies,” says ScottJones, who is associate dean of theCollege and helps oversee its role in theDelaware Information TechnologyInitiative. In assessing the changeinformation technology has made inthe way the College does its job, hesays, “Five years ago, the curriculumviewed information technology as atool to help solve business problems.Today, the curriculum viewsinformation technology as the businessopportunity.”

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If you want to study the subject ofcorporate governance, says Prof.Charles Elson, go where theexperts are. That’s exactly why he

came to Delaware—to the University,home of the new B&E Center forCorporate Governance, and to thestate, widely known as the nation’scorporate capital.

And, Elson says, that’s the samereason nationally known experts on thelegal framework that governs Americanbusiness have been gathering eachweek in a classroom in MBNAAmerica Hall to participate in hisseminar for undergraduate andgraduate B&E students. On anyThursday morning last semester, a

visitor to the seminar would havefound an impressive group of panelists.From judges in Delaware’s Court ofChancery, the nation’s premier businesscourt, to corporate attorneys whoargue landmark cases before that court,to widely respected academics andjournalists who follow the outcomesand implications of those cases—theseminar has attracted them all.

“The participation and theinteraction have just beenextraordinary. You couldn’t get bettergroups of people than we’ve had here,week after week,” says Elson, who inAugust became the College’s first EdgarS. Woolard Jr. Chair of CorporateGovernance. “We’ve had a great deal ofinterest from the legal and corporatecommunities, in Delaware and outsideDelaware, and from the financialacademy and the legal academy. I don’tthink there’s another place where youcould get together all the experts we’vehad here on a weekly basis.”

The Woolard Chair was created

with an endowment of $1 million ingifts from friends and colleagues of theformer chairman and chief executive ofthe DuPont Co., as well ascontributions from severalcorporations. Elson, a nationallyknown authority on corporategovernance and former law professor atStetson College of Law, joined theB&E faculty as both the WoolardChair and director of the Center forCorporate Governance.

The seminar, part of an advancedcorporate finance course, has become aforum for experts on such topics asexecutive compensation, boards ofdirectors and their “duty of care,”corporate ownership (stockholders vs.

stakeholders) and director andmanagerial accountability. Many of theparticipants initially agreed to attendbecause they knew Elson personally orby reputation and because theyrecognized Delaware’s unique positionas the legal home to so many ofAmerica’s largest corporations.

But, says Elson, the word has spreadabout the makeup of the panels, andcorporate attorneys, judges and otherspecialists now are contacting thecenter and requesting an invitation toparticipate in the seminar, which isbeing offered again this springsemester.

“I think these seminars are makingpeople aware of our existence at theUniversity of Delaware—what we’redoing and why they should supportwhat we’re doing,” Elson says. “And,the fact that we’re offering thesesessions and that people are not justwilling, but eager, to come means we’vereally hit on something here.”

Panelists have praised the students’

maturity and involvement in thesessions, as well as the sophistication oftheir comments and questions, he says.Students also attend the panelistluncheons that follow the classroomsessions.

“To me, this has been better thanbeing in a law school,” says Elson.“The discussions are so engaging eachweek that I feel like I’m in legalnirvana.”

The Center for CorporateGovernance also is planning asymposium May 18-19 on the 1985Delaware Supreme Court decision,Smith vs. VanGorkom, which addressedthe duties of corporate boards ofdirectors. The conference, a 15-year

retrospective, will examine whatchanges in board behavior were createdby the case and the implications ofthose changes.

The symposium, to be held at theUniversity’s Arsht Hall in Wilmington,will include a national group of legalscholars, judges, practitioners andcorporate directors and managers. TheNorthwestern Law Review plans topublish an issue on the symposium.

More information about thesymposium, seminars and otheractivities of the Center for CorporateGovernance is available on the center’sweb site at [www.buec.udel.edu/ccg].

Seminar panelists (top of facing page,from left) discussing corporategovernance guidelines are Warren G.Anderson, Peter C. Clapman, RichardH. Koppes, Anthony J. Horan, DanielBogler, Reed Abelson, Scott Fenn and E. Norman Veasey.

Corporate governance seminar attracts distinguished speakers

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Topics and panelists for the fallsemester’s corporate governanceseminar included:

Corporate Governance Overview—Adam Bryant, senior writer, Newsweek;William B. Chandler III, chancellor,Delaware Court of Chancery; JamesKristie, editor, Directors & Boards; JohnM. Nash, president emeritus andfounder, National Association ofCorporate Directors; Ned Regan,president, Baruch College, and formercomptroller, state of New York.

Stakeholders and Stockholders—Margaret M. Blair, senior fellow,Brookings Institute, and visitingprofessor, Georgetown University LawSchool; Jef Feeley, Wilmington bureauchief, Bloomberg News; James J. HanksJr., senior partner, Ballard SpahrAndrews & Ingersoll; James E. Heard,chairman and CEO, Proxy Monitor;Leo E. Strine, vice chancellor, DelawareCourt of Chancery.

Executive Overcompensation—Joseph E. Bachelder, member, The LawOffices of Joseph E. Bachelder;Chandler; John D. England, principal,Global Resources Group, TowersPerrin; Brian Hall, associate professor,Harvard Business School; Joann S.Lublin, deputy management editor,The Wall Street Journal; PatrickMcGurn, vice president and director ofcorporate programs, InstitutionalShareholder Services; RaymondTroubh, director or former director,numerous public corporations; EdgarS. Woolard Jr., former chairman andCEO, DuPont Co.

Director Equity Ownership and theDuty of Care—R. Franklin Balotti,senior partner, Richards Layton &Finger; Sanjai Bhagat, professor,College of Business, University ofColorado at Boulder; Dennis Carey,vice chairman, Spencer Stuart; MelvinA. Eisenberg, professor, University ofCalifornia at Berkeley and ColumbiaUniversity schools of law; Jack B.Jacobs, vice chancellor, Delaware Courtof Chancery; A. Gilchrist Sparks III,senior partner, Morris Nichols Arsht &Tunnell; Strine.

Shareholder Resolutions—GeoffreyColvin, editorial director, Fortune;Margaret M. Foran, vice president forcorporate governance, Pfizer Inc.;Lawrence A. Hamermesh, associateprofessor, Widener University School ofLaw; Brian J. Lane, partner, GibsonDunn & Crutcher, and former director,Division of Corporate Finance,Securities and Exchange Commission;Neil Minow, president, The CorporateLibrary; Strine; John C. Wilcox, vicechairman, Georgeson ShareholderCommunications.

The Caremark Case—William T.Allen, professor, New York UniversitySchool of Law and Stern School ofBusiness, and former chancellor,Delaware Court of Chancery; Jacobs;Edward Labaton, senior partner,Goodkind Labaton; Roger W. Raber,president and CEO, NationalAssociation of Corporate Directors;Alan A. Rudnick, vice president,general counsel and corporate secretary,CSX Corp.; Sparks.

Audit Committee Reform—GwennL. Carr, vice president and secretary tothe board, corporate secretary,Metropolitan Life Insurance Co., andpresident, American Society ofCorporate Secretaries; John C. CoffeeJr., professor, Columbia UniversitySchool of Law; Scott Reed, seniormanager, KPMG Audit CommitteeInstitute; Jacobs; Stephen P. Lamb, vicechancellor, Delaware Court ofChancery; John F. Olson, seniorpartner, Gibson Dunn & Crutcher.

Corporate GovernanceGuidelines—Reed Abelson, businesswriter, The New York Times; Warren G.Andersen, senior attorney, GeneralMotors Corp.; Daniel Bogler, NewYork correspondent, Financial Times;Peter C. Clapman, senior vicepresident and chief counsel,investments, TIAA-CREF; Scott Fenn,executive director, InvestorResponsibility Research Center;Anthony J. Horan, corporate secretary,Chase Manhattan Corp.; Richard H.Koppes, partner, Jones Day Reavis &Pogue; E. Norman Veasey, chief justice,Delaware Supreme Court.

Director and ManagerialAccountability—John A. Byrne, seniorwriter, Business Week; Blaine V. Fogg,senior partner, Skadden Arps SlateMeagher & Flom; Allen R. Myerson,Sunday business editor, The New YorkTimes; Howard G. Kristol, seniorpartner, Reboul MacMurray HewittMaynard & Kristol; Peter A.Langerman, CEO, Franklin MutualAdvisers Inc.; Lamb.

Who’s who of notable panelists

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Tom Lopez, BE ’67, is aninventor—not of gadgets andgizmos, he points out, but ofbusinesses and new

applications for technology. As a result,he’s also become a serial entrepreneur.

“I’m using the word ‘inventor’ in arather new way,” Lopez says. Hisinventions become the foundations ofcompanies that he starts, builds up andthen sells, either on the public marketor to other companies.

“I’m interested in the strategic endof business,” he says, “and once acompany is on a solid footing andrunning predictably, I look for the nextthing.”

The list of Lopez’ accomplishmentsis long. In the early 1980s, he helpedbuild and take public Activision, aleading independent developer of videoentertainment products. His next twoventures pioneered interactive andmultimedia CD-ROM technology andwere sold to Microsoft Corp. and TheWashington Post. Along the way, Lopezinvented the product we all know todayas Microsoft Bookshelf, and he alsospent three years at Microsoft as vicepresident in charge of the CD-ROMdivision.

In the early 1990s, Lopez foresawthe potential of the Internet and leaptahead to create MSHOW.com, a web-based communications company thathas become a leading provider of webconferencing and interactive broadcastservices for businesses.

Building the visionWhat kind of vision does it take to

be an inventor and entrepreneur inthese fast-moving, technology-driventimes? Says Lopez, “What I do is lookat the scientific research being donenow and extrapolate where it is headingin the next few years. I look forconvergence of critical factors by

answering questions: How advanced isthe research? Can it be applied costeffectively? What other ingredients canbe integrated with the results of theresearch to produce something that willbe of great benefit to society?”

Compact disc technology is a goodexample of this convergence. Whenmusic CDs began to proliferate, Lopezwas among the visionaries who saw thatthe tremendous demand for audio CDswould create a low-cost medium fordistributing large amounts of digitaldata. This technology could be appliedto computers with revolutionary effect.

“CD-ROMs allowed us to createvery large files,” Lopez explains. “And,once we could get to a certain file size,we could begin transmitting data that

was much more representational. Inother words, we could go beyondsending text to transmitting pictures,sound and even motion pictures indigital format.”

Lopez, along with partners BobOgdon and Frank Johnson, foundedhis first company, Cytation, with thegoal of using the power of CDs tocreate a reference tool kit for writersthat could be accessed directly from aword processor. “This sounds ordinarynow,” he says, “but this was the early1980s, and we were creating a

windowing environment using MS-DOS.” Not only is that product, whichbecame Bookshelf, still widely used,but many of the concepts it introducedto PC users, such as powerful databasesearching, are used on the Internettoday.

Of course, being a visionary meansseeing the potential of a business beforesomeone else does. But, it also requiresknowing when to move on. Lopezfounded his second company, also withpartners Ogdon and Johnson, after heleft Microsoft in 1988. That venturedeveloped a new market for interactivepublishing that merged text, graphics,animation, audio and video on CD-ROM. Early successes were aninteractive version of Newsweekmagazine, a movie adaptation forTurner Broadcasting and a CD-ROMversion of Ken Burns’ Civil War series.The company was sold in 1993 to TheWashington Post, providing liquidity toshareholders and gaining a valuablepartner and owner in the WashingtonPost Co.

Although Lopez continued to workwith CD-ROM technology, when hefirst saw Mosaic, the ancestor of today’ssophisticated web browsers, herecognized that the Internet would bethe next major delivery vehicle forinteractive multimedia. By 1996, he,Ogdon and Johnson had launchedBroadband Associates, an interactivebroadcasting company with a web-based business called MSHOW.com.

The “M” in MSHOW.com standsfor “multimedia,” and, similar toLopez’s earlier venture, the companyuses emerging technology to combinetext, voice, animation, video andinteractivity. For MSHOW.com, theend product is a robust, Internet-basedcommunications service that businessescan use to conduct a variety of onlineactivities. Clients include Charles

“What I do is look at thescientific research being donenow and extrapolate where itis heading in the next fewyears. I look for convergence ofcritical factors by answeringquestions: How advanced isthe research? Can it be appliedcost effectively?”

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Schwab, which uses the service toconduct investor education; CiscoSystems, which launched an onlinecustomer-support tool kit through anMSHOW.com presentation; andColumbia HCA, which usesMSHOW.com’s service to trainemployees at more than 200locations across the country.

One client application vividlyillustrates how the Internet ischanging ways of doing business forall kinds of companies. DoveBid, anasset valuation and auction businessthat resells heavy equipment used inconstruction and manufacturing,holds auctions over the Internet forcustomers around the world. “What’sinteresting in this example,” Lopezexplains, “is that the auctions wereoriginally held live, and customerswere given the option to fly in or toplace bids over the Internet. DoveBiddiscovered that not only were people

buying over the Internet, but theInternet bidders were driving theprices up, which of course is good forDoveBid and for the sellers theyrepresent. The online component hasbeen so successful that the auction isnow going to be hosted entirely overthe web.”

As MSHOW.com becomes anestablished player, Lopez remains onthe board of directors but recentlyresigned as the company’s chairman,leaving those functions in Ogdon’shands. “It’s my serial entrepreneurismagain,” he says. “This company iswell-organized now and expanding,so I’m easing out and looking for thenext opportunity.”

Risk, work and rewardsEntrepreneurs require more than a

vision to be successful. According toLopez, they must be absolutelypassionate about what they are doing,

or they are likely to be overwhelmedby the challenges—and the risks.

“It’s a lot like sky-diving,” he says.“It can be pretty scary wheneverything is on the line, but anentrepreneur is willing to put up thehouse and the life savings and just gofor it. He or she has a balance ofvision, passion, willingness to takerisks and tremendous self-confidence.”There’s also hard work. Lopezregularly reads about 50 periodicalsand visits numerous trade shows andconferences to stay on top oftechnology and build his insight intowhat lies ahead. He spendsconsiderable time educating himselfby talking to engineers and executivesabout their research and plans.

Lopez points out that even the bestpersonal qualities cannot alwaysguarantee success. Timing and luckalso play a role. “Generally, newmarket segments end up with four orfive major players, and most start-upcompanies die or get bought up,” hesays. “Sometimes, a company is doingall the right things, but a majorcustomer goes under, can’t pay andtakes the other company down, too.”

One important asset Lopez stressesis his 18-year partnership with Ogdonand Johnson. “That level of stabilityand trust is uncommon in high-techstart-ups,” he says. “Our skills andknowledge provide a nice complementto one another, and that has been animportant factor in building successfulenterprises.”

When success does come, as it hasfor Tom Lopez, the rewards extendbeyond the financial. “I get atremendous feeling of satisfactionbecause I am more than just part of abig organization,” he says. “I’m doingsomething that I really like, in which Ifeel deeply involved, and over which Ihave some control. It’s very satisfyingto build an organization, to be able toprovide jobs and help people buildcareers. And, when someone tells methey use my product and it’s helpedthem in some way, I really get acharge. It’s what keeps me motivatedand makes the work fun.”

Tom Lopez has started several businesses, including MSHOW.com, and has createdsuch products as Microsoft Bookshelf, all based on emerging technology.

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Many Americans have someretirement money stashedaway in mutual or similarinvestment funds, but—

especially with the market doing so wellin recent years—they probably havegiven little thought to the boards thatoversee those funds.

However, says B&E Prof. Raj Varma,this is precisely the best time to examinethe makeup of those boards and the feescharged by fund sponsors to manage thefunds. If the stock market were to take aserious downturn, and fee levels causedmore conspicuous dips in investmentreturns, he asks, would there be anyonelooking after investors’ interests? Thatquestion is at the heart of a new studyby Varma, associate professor of finance,who examined the composition andoversight functions of fund boards ofdirectors.

“It’s important to fix any problemsin the governance structure now, whilethe economy is fairly good,” he says. “Ifwe wait until the market plunges, itmay be too late. Those of us who haveour retirement savings in investmentfunds should be aware of how ourinterests are being represented. Oneway to do this is to take a closer look atthe board of directors. It’s not alwayseasy to get this information, but it canbe done.”

Many people are not even aware thatan investment fund has a board ofdirectors, which has a fiduciary duty toact in the best interest of the fund’sinvestors, Varma notes. Legally, he says,at least 40 percent of those directorsmust be independent or unaffiliatedwith the fund sponsors.

“But, the investment fund also istypically managed by the sponsor or anaffiliate, and little research has beendone to determine the extent to whicha fund sponsor exerts influence over theboard to approve the fee levels that thesponsor considers necessary to run the

fund,” says Varma. “What I have triedto do in my study is examine theboards of directors of investment fundsto see whether they are influenced and,if so, how this influence might affecttheir monitoring function.”

When he began his work, Varmasays, he was surprised to learn that littleinformation was available about theboards of directors of investment funds,particularly in regard to importantdirector characteristics, such ascommittee membership and fund-shareownership. “Publicly tradedcorporations provide detailedinformation about their boards ofdirectors in proxy statements that theymust file with the Securities andExchange Commission every year, butmutual funds do not have the same

requirement,” Varma explains.“Fortunately, there is a small sector

of investment funds, called closed-endfunds, for which this is not so.Because these funds are traded on anexchange, they are required by law tofile proxy statements that give moreinformation about their boards ofdirectors. This rich set of data enabledme to construct a detailedexamination of the composition andoversight function of the boards ofdirectors of investment funds.”

Using data obtained from the proxystatements of a large sample of closed-end funds, Varma determined that fundsponsors do exert considerableinfluence over the boards of directorsthrough a variety of mechanisms,including the installation of a sponsor-

Research examines funds, fees, affiliations and influence

Raj Varma, shown here teaching a class, has done extensive research on thecomposition of boards that oversee mutual or other investment funds and how thoseboards affect a fund’s performance.

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affiliated board leader, directorcompensation for serving on multipleboards for the same sponsor andcontrol of the director selection process.

“Although an independent boardleader is regarded by many people ascrucial for effective governance, I foundthat for 95 percent of my sample funds,the board leader was a sponsor-affiliated individual who worked as asenior executive for the fund sponsor,”Varma reports. “For more than 80percent of the boards in the sample,independent directors sat on at leastone more board for that fund sponsor,and in most cases the number wasmuch higher.”

The latter statistic reveals aninteresting difference between thedirectorship of an investment fund andthat of a corporation, he says. Acorporate director might sit on theboards of four or five corporations, buta fund director might sit on 20–30boards of investment funds. The studyrevealed that some fund directors heldas many as 99 board seats. Althoughthe mean compensation paid to a funddirector was only about $5,000 forsitting on a single fund’s board, themean total rose to more than $95,000for all the boards a director sat on for aparticular fund sponsor.

This practice raises the question ofhow independent a director truly is, ifhe or she risks losing multiple boardmemberships by challenging a fund’smanagement. Proponents of theexisting structure argue that havingindependent board members serve onmultiple boards of a fund family is inthe best interest of shareholders,because it creates economies of scaleand allows development of specializedmonitoring skills. Critics counter thatsuch directors cannot be trulyindependent and have little choice butto approve decisions that favor thefund’s sponsor, to whom they arefinancially beholden.

Some studies have raised theadditional possibilities that a boardmember’s age or tenure is related to agreater unwillingness to challengemanagement decisions, but Varma’sanalysis did not find any evidence to

support these conjectures. He alsofound little relationship betweenmultiple board service and absenteeismfrom meetings.

“The key finding in my paper,”Varma says, “is that how boardmembers are selected is what reallymatters. My analysis found thatsponsor involvement in the directorselection process was the one factorsignificantly associated with the priceat which the stock of a closed-end fundtrades.”

Varma’s research on closed-endfunds complements an earlier study ofopen-end mutual funds, which

suggested that fund fees are lowerwhen boards of directors are smaller,when the percentage of independentdirectors is higher and when boardmembers sit on a greater proportion ofother boards for the same sponsor.Varma’s work proposes that anadditional important factor that mustbe examined to determine theeffectiveness of fund governance is theinvolvement of the fund sponsor in theselection of new directors.

“This investigation coincides withwork being done by the SEC, as well,”Varma says. “SEC Chairman ArthurLevitt, in his address at a recentroundtable on independent funddirectors, remarked that he would askthe SEC to make fund governance oneof its top priorities and that he expectsthe fund industry to generatesubstantive responses, not cosmeticfixes, to enhance the effectiveness ofindependent fund directors. The SECis in the process of considering various

changes to the structure of fund boardsto improve the monitoring process. Myresearch indicates that the marketperceives that an important attributethat can contribute to trueindependence of a director is theabsence of sponsor involvement in thedirector selection process.”

Although Varma uncovered arelationship between board structureand the price at which common stockof a closed-end investment fund trades,he believes that a good deal of workremains. “We need to further expandour understanding of the reasons thesefunds sometimes trade at a discount,and we also need to look at otherfactors that affect contractualarrangements within the investment-company industry,” he says. Varma,who is in the process of publishing hisstudy, says he hopes to do more workon these issues.

He notes that his research interestsreflect an important strength of thestate of Delaware. As the dominantlocation for incorporations andcorporate law, Delaware occupies adistinctive place in corporategovernance. The University’s newCenter for Corporate Governanceexpects to capitalize on that location.“It’s an exciting time to be doingresearch in corporate governance atDelaware,” Varma says. “So manyprecedent-setting decisions are maderight here, and these decisions affectcorporations all over the country.”

Alumni board seeksnew members

The B&E Alumni AssociationBoard, which is involved invarious exciting ventures withinthe College, is seeking alumniinterested in serving on itscommittees.

To volunteer or for moreinformation, contact Linda Dunnat (302) 831-1811 or by e-mail,[dunnl@be.udel.edu].

“Those of us whohave our retirement

savings in investmentfunds should be

aware of how ourinterests are being

represented.”

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Giving employee work groupshelp in setting priorities andimmediate feedback on theirprogress is the most effective

way to make them more productive,according to recent research conductedby two B&E professors.

John Sawyer, associate professor ofmanagement, and William Latham,associate professor of economics, havefound that priorities and feedback arekey to productivity and are moreeffective, for example, than offeringincentives. Today’s businessorganizations are increasingly focused onwork groups and teams, and, since workgroups must apply their skills, effort,time, equipment and financial resourcesto those activities that will result in thegreatest output, the question of how tomeasure productivity improvement hasbecome crucial, the researchers say.

Sawyer and Latham conducted theirwork in a real-world setting. “Muchresearch on groups and organizationalbehavior has been done in lab settings,because in real settings the datawouldn’t be ‘ideal.’ Under typical fieldconditions, the number of groupsavailable to study is often small,”Sawyer says. “Groups performdifferent kinds of tasks, and there islittle opportunity to form the randomcontrol groups that you need for atrue scientific study.”

Nevertheless, Sawyer says, he believedthat an effective tool for measuring workgroup productivity in the real worldcould be developed by adopting some ofthe statistical analysis methods used ineconomics. To help him design this tool,he enlisted the support of Latham,whose expertise is in the field ofeconometrics.

“Initially, I simply provided a littleadvice,” Latham says, “but as the projectproceeded, I got more involved and

eventually became co-author of a paper withJohn. As we receivedfeedback fromcolleagues and journaleditors, we focused thework to emphasize theeconometricmethodology, and weultimately wrote whatwe hope is a tutorial onhow to apply this kindof analysis to the studyof organizationalbehavior.”

The resulting paperused a time series paneldesign technique toanalyze productivity of a small set ofwork groups. Published last year byPersonnel Psychology, the paper used fieldresearch data obtained by co-authorsRobert Pritchard, at Texas A&M

University, and Winston Bennett Jr., ofthe U.S. Air Force Research Laboratoryin Mesa, Ariz.

“To better understand how tomanage work groups and teams, weneed to learn more about factors thataffect group productivity,” Sawyer says.“For our study, that meant findingcommon measures for different groupsdoing different tasks. The elements wechose to analyze involved giving teams

priorities and feedback, setting goals andproviding incentives. These are the kindsof things that can be used as motivatorsin any work group setting, particularlythose involving multiple tasks that arerepeated again and again over time.”

The fact that people are doing thesame tasks many times means theyhave the opportunity to change howthey are working, and Sawyer andLatham’s research is devoted tofinding the effective ways of gettingpeople to modify their behavior sothey will be more productive in theirwork.

The analytical method used bySawyer and Latham allowed them toexamine the behavior of people in

actual production situations, working ingroups to accomplish their objectives.

The original research was conductedby Pritchard, who gathered data fromfive maintenance and materials storageand distribution groups of the Air Forceover 23 months. A multi-step processwas used to identify the tasks orobjectives that each work group wasexpected to accomplish (the “product”),to establish for each product one or

Team playersStudy finds ways to improvework-group productivity

John Sawyer (left) and William Latham conducted studiesin the workplace to determine how group productivity canbe measured and improved.

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“Giving people feedbackabout how well they aredoing is very important,and helping them prioritizeis important, too.”

-William Latham

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more measurable indicators, withquantified maximum and minimumfeasible outcomes, and to prioritize theindicators in terms of their importanceto overall group effectiveness.

These specifics became the basis ofwhat constituted productivity for eachwork group. Work groups were givenincentives, feedback about how theywere doing and guidance aboutprioritizing their work and setting goals,with each intervention addedsequentially over time. To deliverfeedback to each group, the researchersproduced a monthly report thatincluded measurement of the indicatorsfor the month, an effectiveness score foreach indicator, overall effectiveness ofthe unit and priority data—that is, theamount of improvement on an indicatorthat the work group could be expectedto accomplish during the next month.

Later, in analyzing this field data,Sawyer and Latham determined whatamount of improvement took place forspecific indicators. The results enabledthe two professors to draw somegeneralizations about how differentmotivators influence work groupproductivity in various situations.

“The important results we discoveredwere that giving people feedback abouthow well they are doing is veryimportant, and helping them prioritizeis important, too,” Latham reports.“The work groups used this informationto produce significant improvements inproductivity. We also found convincingevidence that goal-setting provided astrong motivational force forproductivity improvement, muchstronger than previously observed in theresearch. In our paper, we suggest thatprioritizing provides the strategynecessary to allow goal-setting to have itseffect. Goal-setting would not be asstrong without prioritized feedback.

“Surprisingly, our research showedthat incentives had little impact onproductivity in the work groups. Wethink that a strong commitment to goalsmay explain why. However, it’s possiblethat incentives may increase a group’spersistence in trying to achieve goalsover a longer period of time. To test this,researchers would have to continue

incentives for some experimental groupswhile discontinuing incentives forcomparable control groups.”

The bottom line, Sawyer and Lathamagree, is that when organizations arebuilding work groups and teams, theymust provide members of their groupswith an understanding of priorities andgive immediate feedback on how thegroups are doing.

“We hope that other researchersstudying work group productivity willadopt this methodology,” Sawyer says.“We believe that the research can begeneralized to many kinds of workgroup settings, including teams, workunits, departments or strategic businessunits. In human resources, for example,there is an increasing focus on hiring,placement, performance measurementand rewards at the team level. Pastresearch deals primarily withperformance at the individual level. But,interventions such as team-basedrewards and their impact on teaminterdependence and performance arephenomena that need to be assessed andanalyzed at the team level.”

Other areas of research that couldbenefit from these techniques are teamcomposition, diversity, interdependence,process and performance. As Sawyerpoints out, “Many training activitiestoday are targeted at the team level.Studies of team training in such areas ascrew coordination, problem solving orcreativity often result in small sampleswith nonequivalent control groups.Measuring these activities at the teamlevel, testing interventions such as achange in the composition or diversityand measuring team traininginterventions over time would provide amuch richer assessment of the effects ofthese factors on group performance.”

Sawyer and Latham say they areenthusiastic about the results andbenefits of their collaboration. “Ourinterests and expertise fit together verywell,” concludes Latham. “We expectthat, as more researchers in the area oforganizational behavior become aware ofthe powerful techniques we’ve adaptedfrom econometrics, they will be moreinclined to apply these techniques tofield-testing of their hypotheses.” A++

UD business studentsapplaud programs

For the second consecutive year,results of a recent survey show

that UD business students highlyvalue the efforts of the College toenhance its classroom facilities andto offer state-of-the-art computingresources. These results dovetailwith the recent survey by Yahoo!Internet Life magazine, which ranksthe University No. 2 in the nationfor “most wired” colleges, secondonly to Carnegie Mellon.

Undergraduate B&E studentsalso gave the College high marksbased on overall satisfaction withtheir business programs, as well asplacement and career services.MBA students, in addition topraising UD’s classrooms andcomputing resources, highlyendorsed the quality of teaching ininformation systems.

These data were obtainedthrough standardized surveysdeveloped by EducationalBenchmarking Inc. to providecomparative student feedback in asystematic way across a broadspectrum of undergraduatebusiness programs nationwide.Findings not only reflect howstudents perceive their Delawareexperience but also help tocompare UD’s programs withsimilar institutions. Throughsurveys of various constituents,such as employers, alumni, facultyand current students, the Collegeplans to continue its efforts toensure high-quality teaching anddevelopment of management andleadership skills for the 21stcentury.

14

Last year, the College of Business and Economics received more than $1.8 millionin gifts from more than 2,000 individuals and corporations. Those gifts were usedto fund scholarships, professorships and programs in the College to continue toprovide more opportunities for students, setting 2,000 B&E undergraduates and

600 graduate students on the road to success and leadership in business.“These generous donations to the College will result in generations of value and

return, as our students successfully compete in their professions,” says MichaelGinzberg, B&E dean.

Annual gifts touch all aspects of campus life, from scholarship support tostudent internships to mentoring and other professional development. Theyhelp sustain academic programs, faculty development, the College’sinformation technology infrastructure and other current needs. The purposeof the annual fund is to help bridge the gap between appropriated funds andwhat is needed in order to provide the very best educational experience.Annual giving also helps support “extra-dimension” programs and specialprojects for students and faculty that otherwise could not be offered.

Ginzberg says the importance of consistent, annual giving cannot beoverstated. “The College is thankful to all those alumni who remember thatthe University of Delaware helped prepare them, not only for where they aretoday, but also for who they have become,” he says. “We also are thankful for allour friends who acknowledge the College and the University as awonderful asset to the national and international businesscommunity.”

Investment in educationprovides substantial returns

“The generosity of the Bertuchs has been a

significant help in paying for my college

education. The meaning of the Bertuchs’ generosity,

however, goes beyond that of financial support; their

donation represents the pride that they have in the

University of Delaware. It has shown me the true

value of a Delaware education. I also have had the

opportunity to meet Mr. and Mrs. Bertuch and

regularly update them about my activities, internship

experience and academic progress. As a current Blue

Hen, it is comforting to know that there are alumni

who are supporting you and wish to see you

succeed.” Matthew Schwartz, BE 2001

Bertuch Scholarship recipient

B&E annual fund summary, 1999–2000

Amount of gifts:$1.86 million

Number of gifts: 2,105

Alumni donors: 1,400

Corporate, foundation andother donors:

390

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Kathryn Davis, BE 2004, the first recipient of theIredale Family Scholarship, is congratulated byBill Iredale, BE ’65, who endowed the award withhis wife, Kay Reeser Iredale, CHEP ’65. TheIredales’ $100,000 gift benefits B&E students fromDelaware County, Pa., Bill’s childhood home.

How gifts to the College are usedA sampling of the B&E programs that are supported by generousinvestments include:• Scholarships for undergraduate students based on

excellence and need;• Faculty research, travel and scholarship;• Edgar S. Woolard Jr. Chair of Corporate Governance and the

Center for Corporate Governance, to link the study anddiscussion of the structure of a corporation with thatcorporation’s financial performance;

• Information Technology Initiative, to fully integrate the use ofinformation technology into the business curriculum;

• Corporate Mentoring Program, to unite B&E students withalumni and friends to promote the students’ professionaldevelopment;

• Family Business Center, to provide a resource for familybusinesses to communicate with others and to foster anunderstanding of the issues family businesses face;

• MBA Case TeamCompetition, toencourage MBA studentsto compete in the use oftheir business skills; and

• Fortune Program, toprovide financial andacademic assistance foracademically talentedminorities.

Special thanks to our top investorsIndividuals:Mr. and Mrs. R. Franklin

BalottiMr. and Mrs. Perry S.

Beberman Mr. William D. Benfer Mr. and Mrs. Henri L. BertuchMr. Robert K. Cohen Mr. Barto J. Crivella Jr. Mr. and Mrs. Vincent L.

Crivella Dr. and Mrs. Rudolph E.

D’SouzaMr. and Mrs. James L. EverettMr. Joseph H. FisherMr. Charles Scott Forbes Mr. David J. GarrettMr. and Mrs. William H.

IredaleMr. and Mrs. Robert N.

Jefferson Mr. John H. Kipp Mr. Robert Kirkland Jr. Mr. Bryce M. Lingo Mr. and Mrs. T. William LingoMr. and Mrs. Robert J. LipsteinMr. and Mrs. Robert A.

MatareseMs. Martha B. McKinleyMr. and Mrs. Robert P. McNutt

Mr. and Mrs. Stephen M.Mockbee

Mr. and Mrs. Calvert A.Morgan Jr.

Mr. and Mrs. Christopher J.O’Neill

Dr. James B. O’NeillMr. Anthony J. Passerini Mr. David R. Powell Dr. Donald J. Puglisi Mrs. Jewel H. ReburnDr. Janis R. Reeder and

Mr. Rollin M. ReederMr. Edmond J. Sannini and

Ms. Concetta FrezzoMr. David Santry Mr. and Mrs. James A. Sears Mr. Lawrence G. SilverMr. and Mrs. Howard H.

SimonMr. and Mrs. Scott R.

Somerville Mr. W. Alvon Sparks Jr. Mr. and Mrs. A. Gilchrist

Sparks IIIMr. Daniel B. Strickberger Mr. William W. Valentine Mr. and Mrs. Ralph Von dem

Hagen Mr. Thomas J. Wallace Jr.

Mr. Robert W. Wandel Jr.Dr. Charles Wang Mr. and Mrs. Michael W.

WickhamMr. and Mrs. Edgar S.

Woolard Jr.

Corporations andfoundations:

Advanta Foundation Alex C. Walker Educational &

Charitable Foundation Chase Manhattan Foundation Chase Manhattan Bank (USA)Cross Country Bank CSC-The United States

Corporation Co. Delaware Council on

Economic EducationFirst USA Bank Greenwood Trust Co. J.P. Morgan J.P. Morgan Charitable Trust Jack Lingo Inc., Realtor MBNA America Bank, N.A. MBNA FoundationPuglisi and AssociatesThe Sue Ann & John L.

Weinberg FoundationWilmington Trust Co.

College thanks MBNA for generous giftHoward E. Cosgrove, chairman of the University Board of Trustees, speaks at a press conference inFebruary 2000, announcing a $25 million pledge by MBNA America to UD’s fund-raising effort, theCampaign for Delaware. The gift—the largest to date of the campaign—included $5 million for theCollege of Business and Economics. On the dais with Cosgrove are (from left) Diane Sievering, AS ’81,and Brian Dalphon, BE ’84, both MBNA executives; UD President David P. Roselle; and MBNAPresident and CEO Charles M. Cawley.

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16

Each January, B&E students greetthe dawn of the new year fromsuch diverse locations as Sydney,Australia, and Budapest,

Hungary. For these students, theoccasion marks the start of the

overseas portion of anintensive, month-

long WinterSession devotedto studying thebusinesses andinstitutions—and

experiencingfirsthand the

unique cultures—ofa number of the

United States’longtime and

up-and-coming

tradingpartners.

For morethan 25 years,

faculty in theCollege have sponsored

winter study-abroadprograms. The number of these

programs is growing, and thenumber of students applying to themalso has increased.

Faculty leaders say there seem to beseveral reasons that overseas study hasbecome so popular, one of which is thefun aspect of the program. Studentshave the opportunity to visit severalcountries, tour the sights andexperience different cultures in thecompany of their peers. But, theprograms are first and foremost full-credit courses, and they involvesignificantamounts ofwork andstudy as well

as adventure. Students attend lectures,take tests and write papers. So, what dothey get from these programs that theycan’t get at home?

“For many undergraduates, ourprogram is their first real-worldexposure to business,” says CarterBroach, of the Department of BusinessAdministration, who took a group ofstudents to Hungary and the CzechRepublic for the 2000 Winter Session.“Business is becoming increasinglyglobal. It’s appropriate for students to

have this exposure, because in theirlifetimes, more so than earliergenerations, they will have a need tounderstand and operate in aninternational environment.”

Each of the winter study programstakes a slightly different approach toeducating its students, but all aresimilar in emphasizing a mix ofactivities. Participants visit companiesand international organizations andaugment these trips with presentationsby high-level executives, academics andgovernment officials. Broach’s program,for example, studied aspects of

marketing and management ofcompanies in Hungary, a formerSoviet-bloc country that movedonto the fast track to membershipin the European Union.“Budapest offered some unique

opportunities to observe the challengesof converting from a commandeconomy under communism to amarket economy of the type found inWestern Europe,” Broach says. “It gavestudents the opportunity to see how alesser developed country was gettingready to integrate itself into a largereconomic framework.”

A similar approach is followed byJohn Kmetz and Ernie Saniga, alsofaculty from the Department ofBusiness Administration, who take agroup of MBA students to Europeduring Winter Session. “We want togive students a sense of what being ‘inEurope’ means,” Kmetz says. “TheEuropean Union is the biggest andmost balanced of the United States’trading partners, and most people arenot aware of how much impact it hason us. So, in 2000, we visited France,

one of the original and richest of theEU partners. Then, we went to Spain,which in the past represented one ofthe less developed countries. But, witha new administration, Spain is rapidlycatching up to other Western nations,and the contrast is no longer as great.For 2001, we decided to visit Hungaryand France to study the changing Eastvs. West conditions in business andpolitics.”

Along with studying managementand governmental organizations, theMBA students also look at businessoperations. “Globalization has createdmany similarities among manufacturingcompanies in particular,” Sanigaexplains, “but there are still someinteresting differences. For example,every company must meet certainquality standards today if they want to

a world-class experience

“Business is becoming increasingly global. It’s appropriate for students to have this exposure,because in their lifetimes, more so than earliergenerations, they will have a need to understand andoperate in an international environment.”

-Carter Broach

17

do business internationally. So, ourstudents see highly mechanized factoriesin a country like France, while in othercountries they see facilities using farmore labor-intensive processes, withskilled craftsmen doing jobs that havebeen automated elsewhere. The qualityof the end-product is the same, but themethods used to achieve that quality aredifferent. We look at the specific reasonseach country has for its approach.”

In the economics department, Profs.Charles Link and David Black offer atravel-intensive experience for theirgroup of undergraduates each year.Originally called the London Program,this group now travels widelythroughout Western Europe, withdestinations in England, Scotland,Ireland, France and Spain. The programhas two components, emphasizing theeconomics of the new single currency inWestern Europe and the economics ofhealth care.

“My original interest in thisprogram,” Link says, “was to teach acourse that could not be taught inNewark. We traveled widely to gatherthe different views presented to us fromexperts in government, academia andprivate industry. The health-caresystems in Europe, for example, arevery different from those in the U.S.,and I wanted to see what we couldlearn by speaking to experts in thosecountries on health-care issues. Onfinancial issues, we had speakers fromHer Majesty’s Treasury, from theForeign Office in the U.K., fromprestigious schools such as the LondonSchool of Economics and theUniversity of Paris and from manyinternational companies. Students areseeing the top-level people in thesefields, which is a unique opportunity.”

A program that travels to the otherside of the globe has gained popularityrecently with undergraduates. Led byWilliam Latham from the economicsdepartment and Helen Bowers from thefinance department, Winter StudyAbroad in Australia introduces studentsto the economic systems of that countryand its role in world and Asian financialmarkets. To accomplish these goals,students last year heard a total of 27

speakers from such organizations asnational and regional banks, agovernment regulatory agency,universities and global, regional andlocal companies—including a breweryand a bakery. “Students really like tolearn directly from the people whomake decisions in a business orgovernment,” says Latham.

The study abroad experience notonly immerses students in the ways ofbusiness and politics but also openstheir eyes to new opportunities andways of thinking about their owncareers, organizers say. “Of all theteaching I’ve done over the years, thesestudy abroad programs are the mostrewarding in terms of unsolicitedcomments from students,” David Blacksays. “Often, six months or a year later,they will report how the experiencechanged their lives.”

Kmetz agrees, saying, “The programis very intense, but the students love it,and it’s not an exaggeration to say thatthe experience is life-altering for someof them. They mature; they becomeaware of opportunities that exist outthere. We’ve had students take new jobsor even change careers as a result of theprogram.”

Enthusiasm for study abroad is high,and this year’s programs filled early.But, faculty participants say, thestudent travelers aren’t the only ones tobenefit. Through the relationships thesefaculty members have forged withbusiness, government and academicleaders around the world, they note,they have created College- andUniversity-wide opportunities forinternational research and for wider-reaching student and faculty exchangeprograms in the future.

Snapshots from recent study-abroadprograms include students in Melbourne(from left), Sara Russell, Erin Mostwill,Marisa Battaglia and Katie Lewis, and,skiing in France (standing, from left),Alison Litecky, Wendi Focht, MeredithWilkes, Kim Leddy, Chris Cripps,Adam Levine and (front) AndyPuffenberger.

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London Bridge

Robin Hood’s Bay, U.K.

Melbourne, Australia

York Minster cathedral

Chamrousse, France

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Switzerland, centrally located inEurope and home to a host ofinternational corporations and

nonprofit organizations, seems anatural place to study the workings ofglobal business, economics and finance.

And, for the past 25 years, UDstudents have been doing just thatthrough a five-week Winter Sessionstudy-abroad program. Most are B&Estudents, though the participants, likethe program itself, take aninterdisciplinary approach in exploringgovernmental as well as corporateoperations.

At Homecoming 2000, some of the750 alumni of the Geneva programgathered for several special activities thatgave them a chance toreminisce, sharing anecdotesand snapshots from theirtravels. Whatever year theytook part, most agreed thatthe program managed tocombine the best of numerouselements—classroom study,guest lectures by internationalexperts, opportunities toobserve corporations andother institutions firsthand,personally enriching traveland lifelong friendships.

“We decided that 25 years was such a milestonethat we should have areunion,” says Burt Abrams,an economics professor whohas been involved in theprogram for the past eightyears. “Many of the studentswho participated have said itwas one of the high points of theirexperience at the University.”

One alumnus who says he feels thatway is Bruce Georgov, BE ’83, ’84M,who went to Geneva in 1982. At thetime, he says, he was considering acareer in international business and hadheard from friends that the WinterSession abroad was a worthwhileprogram. Though he later changedcareer plans, and today owns aresidential trash business inMiddletown, Del., he says the Genevatrip was “without a doubt” one of his

best experiences at UD.“There was a group of 30 of us, and

I didn’t know any of them when we leftfor Geneva,” Georgov says. “We got tobe such good friends that, even today, Ikeep in touch with a few of them. Itwas just a nice experience overall. Theclasses were great—very informal, butwe worked hard and learned a lot—andthen we visited banks and internationalorganizations and learned even more.”

The program is designed specificallyto offer those kinds of varied activities,says Abrams, who notes that it was

started in the 1970s by facultymembers in business, economics andpolitical science who wanted to createan interdisciplinary curriculum. Today,he says, the focus is on economics, butstudents come from majors rangingfrom engineering to internationalrelations to finance.

The participants live and hold classesin a hotel in Geneva for four weeks andspend the fifth week traveling to otherEuropean cities, says Abrams. Theclasses, for which students earn sixcredits, are intensive and include lectures

by leaders of international organizations,executives of multinational corporationsand faculty from the Universities ofGeneva and Bern. Students also visitbusinesses, banks and some of the manyorganizations, such as the World Tradeand the International Labororganizations, based in Switzerland.

“We’ve visited the United NationsIndustrial Development Organizationand heard a talk by their senior executiveofficer about that organization’s role andhow political situations affect it,” saysAbrams. “We hear lectures on marketing

and international business atthe DuPont Co., whoseinternational headquarters isin Geneva, and we hear talkson the problems ofmultinational corporations atNestlé. We visit the SwissNational Bank, the CentralBank of Germany and SwissReinsurance, which is thesecond-largest reinsurancecompany in the world. Wereally try to give the studentsa broad experience.”

Beyond the travel relatedto academics, the Genevaprogram is structured to

enable the participants to betourists as well as students.Classroom work generallyends Thursday afternoon,giving students a three-dayweekend to make use of the

unlimited train travel provided by theirEurail Passes. Abrams says participants,many of whom are visiting Europe forthe first time, are pleasantly surprised athow easily and quickly they can travelfrom Geneva to other countries.

“We went to Paris, Munich, Zurich,Monte Carlo—a lot of very nice trips,”Georgov says. “On the weekends, agroup of eight to 10 of us would justtake off and travel. It was so much fun,and I got to see more of Europe than Iwould have thought possible in just fiveweeks.”

For retired B&E Prof. Al Billon (second from right), a veteran of16 Winter Sessions in Geneva, Homecoming 2000 was a family,as well as a Geneva program, reunion. Attending the get-togetherwere (from left) daughter Catherine Billon; son John Billon, AS ’92; wife Irene Billon, AS ’73; and daughter Natalie Billon.All participated in the study-abroad program.

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Youngsters across Delawareare learning aboutmoney—how to spend it

wisely and how to save it—through programs sponsored bythe College’s Center forEconomic Education andEntrepreneurship.

The center has joined forceswith Delaware’s Office of theState Treasurer and theDelaware State Chamber ofCommerce Partnership to bringelementary schools and bankstogether as part of the Bank atSchool program. Local bankshave on-site branches in 10schools, from ClaymontElementary north ofWilmington to SouthernDelaware School of the Arts inSelbyville.

Bankers come to eachschool each week, helpingstudents open savings accountsand accepting deposits. At theclose of the 1999-2000 schoolyear, Claymont ElementarySchool’s bank hadapproximately $10,000 deposited from450 young customers. Pupils from all

the Bank at School programsdeposited a total of more

than $35,000,according to the statetreasurer’s office.Thirteen additionalschools are targeted for

bank openings this year.The goal of the program

is to develop in students the ethic ofsaving and prepare them to makeinformed spending and savingdecisions and to handle creditresponsibly, readying them for adultroles as consumers and savers, saysBonnie Meszaros, the center’s associatedirector. A recent national surveyindicates that neither parents norschools are teaching children the factsabout money.

In Delaware, the new student

achievement standards and statewidetesting program expect students toknow about making personal economicchoices and to understand the role ofbanks and money in the economy. Thecenter provides teachers with trainingand curriculum materials on saving,spending and credit that reinforce thestudents’ real-world bankingexperiences. At the same time, thecurriculum materials help teachersprepare their students for the stateassessment.

Kim Watson, a teacher at WarnerElementary School inWilmington, has worked withthe center on various projects,including the Mini-SocietyProgram in which youngsters setup their own small businesses andsell items within the school. Watsonsays her fifth-graders have learnedsomething about what it takes to be an

entrepreneur, as well as basiceconomic lessons, by going intobusiness at the “Warner’sCorners” school shoppingcenter.

“My main thrust is to havethe students understand scarcityand how to make economicchoices, in terms of running thebusiness but also in everydaylife,” Watson says. “We all haveto make choices about what tospend our money on, when tospend it and when to save it.Not everyone is going to growup to have their own business,but they’re all going to beconsumers.”

For Bank at School, Mini-Society and all other programsavailable through the center, thestaff is “always available toanswer teachers’ questionsor to do a demonstrationlesson, if they requestthat, to get them started,”Meszaros says. “This is adifferent way of teaching,and the kids get veryinvolved. One rewarding thing

is that our programs are for all kids.They’ve been successful at all levels,from special education to gifted-and-talented programs.”

The center also has worked with theDelaware Bankers Association andrepresentatives from the bankingcommunity in coordinating NationalTeach Children to Save Day. Last April,more than 150 bankers went intoDelaware classrooms armed withlessons on saving and spending. These

bankers taught lessons in 198classrooms in 49 schools across

the state. The goal was toreinforce money-management skills withyoung learners and make

them aware of the servicesprovided by banks.

For more information on theseand other programs offered by theCenter for Economic Education andEntrepreneurship, call (302) 831-2559.

Photo: Bonnie Meszaros (left) and Warner Elementary School teacher Kim Watsonhelp Warner student Tyler Ferrero set up an in-school retail business.

A penny saved isa lesson learned

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As Vineet Suri, BE 2001,approached his senior year atUD, he had a good academic

record and a strong interest in a careerrelated to his majors in finance andmarketing. He also had questionsabout life after graduation, includingwhat specific job opportunities mightbe available, what the typical workdaywas like in those jobs and what fieldwould suit him best.

He found some answers throughthe College’s new corporatementoring program and MichaelSicuranza, BE ’95, a self-employedfinancial planner. At a reception tokick off the program last February,Suri and Sicuranza were among 20pairs of B&E alumni and studentswho met for the first time to begin amentoring relationship. Like the otherparticipants, they had applied to theprogram and had been matched up inadvance by administrators. By the endof the reception, they already weremaking plans to meet regularly and,over the next several months, theyspoke often in person and by phone

and e-mail.“We talk a lot about his choices

and options and what types of jobsmight be appealing to him,” Sicuranzasays. “I try to help him with thebenefit of my experience, and I’vebeen encouraging him to think aboutbalance in his life between work andother considerations.”

Suri says he recently spent a day onthe job with Sicuranza and found thatexperience especially valuable. “I wasexposed to the various aspects of afinancial planning business, and I wasable to get a better understanding ofthe business,” he says. “Michael hasbeen very helpful with career advice.”

That kind of experience is exactlywhat organizers had in mind whenthey began developing the mentoringprogram, says Terry Whittaker,assistant B&E dean for undergraduateprograms.

“We’re very enthusiastic about thisprogram because we think thementors can serve as coaches andreally help students identify anddevelop the skills that companies are

looking for in employees,” Whittakersays. “We also expect that it will helpthe students assess the pros and consof different jobs, so they can decidewhat is best for them.”

Mentors and students meet at anintroductory reception, where they aregiven an overview of the program andan opportunity to chat about whatthey hope to gain from participating.Each pair is expected to have at leasttwo or three contacts during asemester, in person or by phone or e-mail. In addition, organizers hope thementors will arrange for some activity,such as visiting the workplace orattending a professional meeting, withtheir students. The key is individualflexibility, says Joyce Hart, director ofstudent services for B&E. Hart andAssistant Professor Cynthia Huffmanorganized the mentoring program.

“A lot of the relationship willdepend on the mentor’s available timeand what the student’s interests are,”Hart says. “We’re really relying on thestudents to drive this—to develop aplan for their meetings and for whatthey hope to gain from therelationship.”

The mentoring program began inthe spring 2000 semester as a pilotproject with just 20 student-mentorpairs, but plans call for it to expand sothat, eventually, all interested studentswill have the opportunity toparticipate, Hart says. She says theprogram came about because a surveyfound that many alumni wereinterested in helping students withcareer development, and she hopes totap into that interest. The number ofstudent participants will be limited tothe number of available mentors.

For Sicuranza, the decision tovolunteer was easy. “I had a lot of helpwhen I got out of college, and it mademy transition to the working worldmuch easier,” he says. “I feel veryfortunate, and I’d like to give thathelp to someone else.”

To volunteer to become a mentor,contact Hart at the Academic &Professional Development Center,(302) 831-1813, or by e-mail,[Hartj@be.udel.edu].

Michael Sicuranza, BE ’95 (left), chats with Vineet Suri, BE 2001, at a receptionfor mentors and students. The two meet often to discusss Suri’s career plans.

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Life after graduationLife after graduationMentors share their real-world experience

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Seminars with nationally knownspeakers and group discussions ofcommon concerns, special spin-off

sessions to address timely issues indepth and a new e-consulting service aresome of the programs offered by B&E’sexpanding Family Business Center.

“The center serves as a resource forfamily businesses and provides themwith an opportunity to network andshare ideas and thoughts,” says JillLock, managing director of marketingfor the Wilmington, Del., accountingfirm Cover & Rossiter, one of thesponsors of a recent program at thecenter. “It provides uniqueopportunities and solutions to theirproblems.”

Since its inception in January 1999,the center has grown to include about15 members, five sponsors and fourcorporate partners, says the director, JimO’Neill. It has held several seminars,which have attracted participation fromadditional business people, on subjectsincluding how to develop a strategicbusiness plan and how to use such toolsas mission statements, advisory boards,family meetings and retreats.

A seminar last spring featured a talkby Marshall Paisner, founder and

chairman of the board of ScrubaDub Auto Wash Centers Inc.and author of Sustaining the FamilyBusiness: An Insider’s Guide to ManagingAcross Generations. Paisner discussedseveral questions he said were key to anyfamily business, including how to teachchildren to have pride in the business,whether conflict can be healthy for abusiness and whether owners shouldteach their successors to manage thebusiness in the same way they had beenrunning it.

In addition to the seminars, centermembers have access to other services,such as special spin-off sessions inwhich they can discuss their specificconcerns with experts. One spin-offsession, “Wealth Transfer and TaxIssues,” was hosted by center sponsorsto provide members with valuableinformation during tax season, saysO’Neill.

Also available to members is thecenter’s new e-consulting service. “Thisis an online consulting service thataddresses a variety of subjects such asaccounting, finance, banking, law andinsurance,” O’Neill says. “The keything about e-consulting is that it offersquick and fast service from our experts.”

The center’s goal is to assist familybusinesses, whose survival isfundamental to the American economy,says O’Neill. “Family businesses I knoware very proud of the economic andcultural contributions their businessesprovide and are thrilled to berecognized for these contributions,”says Tony Passerini, certified familybusiness specialist with theMassMutual/Flanagan FinancialGroup.

The center plans to begin anewsletter in the near future and tocontinue holding seminars. Issues to beaddressed in upcoming sessionsinclude: Who will run the companywhen Mom or Dad is incapacitated?How do you compensate the family? Isyour company prepared for businesssurvival after you are gone?

For more information about thecenter and its programs, call (302) 831-0743 or email[barkerm@be.udel.edu].

Promoting the power of finance Martin G. Mand, BE ’64M, is co-author of a new book,

Partnering for Performance: Unleashing the Power ofFinance in the 21st-Century Organization, which urgesbusinesses of all sizes to redefine the roles of their financedepartments and management professionals.

Mand is chairman and CEO of Mand Associates, aconsulting, speaking and writing firm, and a managingpartner of PFP Seminars, both based in Wilmington, Del.Before starting his own firm, he was executive vice presidentand chief financial officer of Nortel Networks and previouslywas vice president and treasurer of the DuPont Co.

In the book, Mand and William Whipple III, also a former

DuPont executive, make the case forbusinesses to utilize their financedepartments as an integral part of theirgrowth strategy and as partners in theirbusiness plans. Too often, they argue,financial divisions of companiesoperate as separate entities that arenot involved in helping to achievelong-term business goals.

Mand holds a bachelor’s degree incommerce from the University of Virginiaand earned his master of business administrationdegree at UD in 1964. Partnering for Performance waspublished last year by AMACOM, a division of the AmericanManagement Association.

B&E’s expanding FamilyBusiness Center serves as aresource for familybusinesses and providesthem with an opportunityto network and share ideasand thoughts.

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The College formally recognizedthe accomplishments of fouralumni and two students at an

awards ceremony in October. Theawards are presented each year duringHomecoming activities.

The 2000 Alumni Awards ofExcellence were given to George W.Forbes III, BE ’68; David J. Hartzell,BE ’77, ’79M; Robert P. McNutt, BE’69M; and Charles P. Pinto, BE ’69.Recipients are selected based on theircareer achievements, commitment toexcellence and contributions tobusiness and the community.

Forbes is executive vice presidentand head of corporate banking forPNC Bank, Delaware, where he beganhis career in 1970. He is active inseveral community organizations,including Children and Families First,the U.S. Olympic Committee, theDelaware Development Office’sCouncil on Development and Financeand the Delaware Bankers Association.

Hartzell is professor of finance andthe North Carolina Real EstateEducational Foundation Chair at theUniversity of North Carolina’s Kenan-Flagler Business School. He hasreceived numerous teaching awards

and has published many articles.Hartzell is a director and pastpresident of the American Real Estateand Urban Economics Association andwas the 1999–2000 North CarolinaYouth Soccer Association’s Boys’Coach of the Year.

McNutt is senior vice president,human resources, for Allfirst Bank inBaltimore and previously spent 32 yearswith the DuPont Co. He is involved invarious civic and church organizationsand has been a Boy Scout leader and ayouth sports coach. McNutt has been anadjunct professor in the College formore than 20 years, was active in theformation of the B&E AlumniAssociation, of which he was presidentfrom 1994-1997, and has served on theboard of the UD Alumni Association.

Pinto is chief human resources officerfor PPL Corp. in Allentown, Pa. Heserves on the boards of the Lehigh ValleySenior Citizens Center, the Girls Clubof Allentown and other communityorganizations, as well as on advisorycommittees for UD, MuhlenbergCollege and the Lehigh School District.

Captain of the University’s firstchampionship golf team, Pinto stillholds the UD record for most matchplay wins. He and his mother, RebekahPatterson Pinto, recently endowed ascholarship in athletics for the College.

Students receiving awards at theHomecoming presentations wereShanna M. Hanger, BE 2001, who waspresented the Leon and MargaretSlocomb Outstanding StudentRecognition Award, and Alyssa M.Graver, BE 2001, who was awarded theJohn F. Puglisi Scholarship.

Hanger, who is majoring inaccounting with a minor in MIS, isactive in numerous student andcommunity organizations and hasreceived honors including the HispanicStudent of Distinction Award and theFirst USA/Monique Neal Award. The

Slocomb Award, established to recognizestudents who demonstrate industriousand innovative characteristics, is given toa junior or senior with a qualifying grade

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George Forbes III (center) was presenteda 2000 Alumni Award of Excellence byB&E Dean Michael J. Ginzberg (left)and David Freschman, BE ’84, presidentof the Delaware Innovation Fund.

Shanna Hanger, BE 2001, recipient ofthe Leon and Margaret SlocombOutstanding Student RecognitionAward, with her parents, Rosie andJames Hanger, at the awards ceremonyin October.

David J. Hartzell, BE ’77, ’79M, shownwith his wife, Randee (Abel) Hartzell, AS’78, received a 2000 Alumni Award ofExcellence honoring his career achievementsand community contributions.

Alumni, students earn honors at annual ceremony

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point average who is employed whileenrolled in school full time.

Graver, also majoring in accountingwith an MIS minor, participates inintramural sports, works with severalcharitable organizations and has beenrecognized by numerous honorsocieties. The Puglisi Scholarship isawarded to a senior in accounting,finance or business administration whobest exhibits a commitment toeducation, athletics and service.

In 1999, the Alumni Awards ofExcellence were presented to:

• Robert V.A. Harra Jr., BE ’71,president of Wilmington Trust Co., amember of the College’s VisitingCommittee and co-chairperson of theCollege’s Campaign for DelawareSteering Committee;

• Robert L. Johnson, BE ’53, ’55M,who retired in 1997 after more than 50years of federal government service;

• Rep. Wayne A. Smith, BE ’84, aDelaware state representative since 1990and a member of the B&E AlumniAssociation; and

• Michael W. Wickham, BE ’68,chairman of the board and chiefexecutive officer of Roadway Express.

The 1999 Slocomb Award waspresented to Melissa R. Hoover, BE2000, and the 1999 Puglisi Scholarshipwas awarded to Matthew T.Heidenreich, BE 2000.

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Alyssa Graver, BE 2001 (seated), withher parents, Colleen and Charles Graver,and sister, Ashley Graver, after receivingthe John F. Puglisi Scholarship.

Two B&E staffmembers, onefaculty

member andapproximately 100students receivedUniversity andCollege awards atHonors Dayceremonies May 5.

Stefanie Waters,BE 2000, receivedthe DistinguishedSenior Award,which recognizesthe topacademically rankedsenior in each of theUniversity’s colleges.Waters graduated with a major inaccounting and is employed byPricewaterhouseCoopers.

Three students received B&Ealumni awards: Matthew Schwartz,BE 2001, the Alumni AssociationAward for outstanding academicperformance and leadership; MichaelGarcia, BE 2002, the Alumni HonorsDay Book Award, given to a studentwho has shown a sincere desire forknowledge and has participated inextracurricular activities designed tohelp fellow students achieve academicsuccess; and Jeff Vervlied, BE2000M, the MBA Alumni LeadershipAward, recognizing exceptionalleadership qualities in a student’sprofessional endeavors. Vervliedcompleted the Executive MBAprogram.

The First USA/Monique NealAward was presented to SantinoCeccotti, BE 2003. This awardrecognizes a Fortune 2000 student’sacademic excellence and outstandingsummer internship performance. TheFortune 2000 program allowsprospective employers to assist B&Eminority students in developinginterpersonal and social skills requiredfor business success.

The University’s Excellence inTeaching Award was presented to

Charles Link, a professor in theeconomics department, and theExcellence in UndergraduateAcademic Advising Award waspresented to Terry Whittaker, assistantdean of the College’s Academic andProfessional Development Center.Bonnie Meszaros, associate director ofthe Center for Economic Educationand Entrepreneurship, received theLeon and Margaret SlocombProfessional Excellence Award, whichrecognizes an exemplary commitmentto public service, communityinvolvement and innovative activity.

Among the many B&E students recognized at Honors Daylast spring were the College’s Hutchinson Scholars (fromleft), Joseph Iudici, Melissa King, Katherine Lewis andDouglas Motley, all BE 2000.

Santino Ceccotti, BE 2003 (right), wasgiven the First USA/Monique NealAward, and Terry Whittaker washonored for excellence in advising.

An abundance of accolades

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Erwin Saniga namedDana J. JohnsonProfessor

Erwin Saniga,professor of

businessadministration,was named thefirst Dana J.JohnsonProfessor of

Information Technology, effectiveSeptember 2000. The endowedprofessorship honors Dr. Johnson’scontributions to the College ofBusiness and Economics, where she wasdean from 1997 until her death in1999. Saniga was selected based uponhis distinguished record in teaching,research and service.

Saniga was instrumental inconceiving and designing the College’sminor in management informationsystems and has, with Prof. MichaelPohlen, taught the capstone courses forthe minor over the past 16 years.

Saniga received the College’sOutstanding Teaching Award in 1997and the University’s Mortar BoardAward for outstanding professor in1998. As a researcher, he works in thearea of computer modeling of businessand engineering processes and haspublished 39 refereed academic journalarticles. Saniga also has served asassociate editor of Economic QualityControl for the past 10 years.

Executive MBA classpresents gift to center

The Executive MBA Class of 2000marked its completion of the

19-month accelerated MBA degreeprogram with a $20,000 gift to theCollege’s new Center for CorporateGovernance.

Class representative Jeffrey Stroble,vice president of Fisher Investments,

presented the gift to UD PresidentDavid Roselle at a reception held lastspring to honor the new graduates. Thecenter was established in August topropose sensible and progressivechanges in corporate structure andmanagement through research andeducation. (See article on page 6.)

The Class of 2000 is the fifth tograduate from the Executive MBAprogram. Launched in 1994, theprogram boasts 130 alumni who aresuccessful business professionals in adiverse array of industries andprofessions.

B&E names newexecutive in residence

ClaudioSpiguel has

become theCollege’s firstexecutive inresidence andprofessor,effective Feb. 1.

Spiguel, who has been named aprofessor in the Department ofAccounting and Information Systems,is teaching courses in informationsystems and will lead B&E’s efforts todevelop its next phase of the state’s ITInitiative. He most recently was vicepresident, commercial informationmanagement, for AstraZeneca andpreviously held management positionsin information systems for variouscorporations and with the PlanningMinistry of Brazil.

Exceptional studentsearn recognition

Three B&E students have receivednational recognition for

outstanding achievements. EricaDiFusco and Matthew Schwartz, bothBE 2001, are accounting majors whoare minoring in management

information systems and economics.Santino Ceccotti, BE 2003, is majoringin finance.

DiFusco was one of 12 studentsworldwide chosen to attend theInternational Leadership Summit, heldin Cyprus in September. The summit,presented annually byPricewaterhouseCoopers, selectsparticipants competitively from anapplicant pool of students who havesuccessfully interned with the firm.

Schwartz was one of 43 studentsselected from more than 1,000applicants to receive a National Societyof Accountants Scholarship.

Ceccotti is one of five studentsnationally to receive a 2000 NordstromScholarship, awarded by the President’sCommittee on Employment of Peoplewith Disabilities. Born with spinalmuscular atrophy, Ceccotti uses awheelchair and has limited use of hisarms. He plans to earn a law degree andpractice corporate securities law.

Federal Reserve officialdelivers lecture

Edward G.Boehne,

then presidentof the FederalReserve Bank ofPhiladelphia,delivered theannual

Hutchinson Lecture last April on thetopic, “Financial Modernization: VastlyDifferent or Fundamentally the Same?”The lecture series was established tohonor the career of Harry Hutchinson,retired professor in the Department ofEconomics.

The lecture series is part of theHutchinson Scholars Program, whichalso recognizes several outstandingB&E students each year. The FinancialInstitutions Research and EducationCenter at the College supports theHutchinson Scholars Program by

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providing the annual lecture. A dinner,attended by prominent members of thebusiness community as well as studentsand faculty, preceded Boehne’s lecture.

Boehne was chief executive of theThird District Federal Reserve Bankfrom 1981 until July 2000.

Meet the College’s Class of 2004

This year’s B&E freshman class is ahighly selective group—390

students chosen from more than 2,600applicants for admission. Studentquality, as measured by SAT scores,continues to increase, with a recordhigh score for the College of 1,170. Asin previous years, most of the studentshail from Delaware, New Jersey,Pennsylvania, New York andMaryland, although many other states,as well as other countries, also arerepresented.

From symposia tosports, students arestaying active

Several student organizations andhonor societies, organized and led by

the MIS honor society, got together lastyear to pilot the “2000 BusinessSymposium” on campus.

Corporate representatives were onhand for the event, meeting withstudents about career opportunities andparticipating in panel discussions aboutbusiness-related issues. The event wasso well-received by the students and thebusiness community that plans areunder way to repeat it in 2001.

The symposium is just one of manyactivities sponsored by the College’svarious student organizations to helpenrich the students’ college careers and tofurther camaraderie among faculty andstudents. Another such activity is theannual student/faculty picnic sponsored

by the Student Business AdvisoryCouncil. More than 400 students, facultyand staff participated last fall, enjoying acookout, music and conversation.

Other highlights from recentstudent-sponsored events included theAccounting Student Association’svolleyball tournament, at whichstudents, faculty and recruiters tookpart in some friendly competition, anda debate on Social Security, sponsoredby the Economics Student Association,in conjunction with a faculty panel.

MBA alumni planspring golf outing

The MBA Alumni PlanningCommittee is making plans to host

a spring golf outing. Anyone interestedin joining the committee, participatingin the outing or helping to sponsor theevent should contact Robert Barker,MBA office, at (302) 831-8912.

MBA students have anew forum in

which to demonstratethe skills they’velearned, showcase theirtalents beforedistinguished alumniand leaders in thecorporate communityand promote the qualityof the MBA programitself.

The first MBA CaseCompetition was heldlast year, and the alumniwho organized it plan tomake it an annual event.Teams of students wererequired to present thorough analysesof a selected Harvard Business Reviewcase. Four corporate leaders judged theinaugural competition: Carol A.Ammon, president and CEO of EndoPharmaceuticals; Howard CosgroveJr., chairman, president and CEO ofConectiv; Robert V.A. Harra Jr.,

president and chief operating officerof Wilmington Trust Co.; andRichard J. Johnson, CEO of J.P.Morgan Delaware.

The first-place team of MarkChanel, Solveig Andres and FredericNavarro received a cash prize of$1,200. Two other teams selected as

finalists received $200each. Their memberswere Ted Smolenski,Bokah Worjoloh,Galina Georgieva,Birkan Baykara, JeffStroble, CarlThompson, AndySullivan, Dan Hass andDave Collins.Underwriting the prizemoney were corporatesponsors EndoPharmaceuticals andWilmington Trust.

The MBA alumnicommittee thatorganized the

competition consisted of Mark Oller’94 and Elyce Tavani ’98, co-chairs,and David Agee ’85, David Mench’94, Jennifer Sirota ’97, Sandra Heinig’98 and Brian Feeny ’98. Facultyadviser Scott Wycoff selected the caseand assisted the alumni committee andthe judges.

Finalists in the case competition include MBA students (from left) GalinaGeorgieva, Birkan Baykara, Ted Smolenski and Bokah Worjoloh.

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Competition showcases skills

Businesses are in the bestposition—better thangovernment, nonprofits or

academia—to effect needed socialchange in America, says formerpharmaceutical executive Kurt M.Landgraf, who spoke Nov. 3 to 75B&E students, faculty members andarea business people.

Landgraf, chairman and chiefexecutive officer of EducationalTesting Service and former CEO ofDuPont Pharmaceuticals, quotedGandhi, Dickens, John F. Kennedyand the American Indian philosopherStarhawk, among others, in a lecturehe described as “more emotive” than

might be expected from a corporateleader. He urged those in the audienceto become involved in communityservice and to find balance in theirlives by staying true to their ideals andby not equating monetary successwith personal worth.

“Doing good is the rent you payfor living on the Earth, and service iswhat life is all about,” said Landgraf.

“Do not go to work for a place thatdoes not match your value system.Money comes and goes, but yourpersonal value system will remain.”

He recalled the culture of racism,sexism and intolerance for diversitythat, he said, was openly rampant inthe corporate world as recently as1980, and he outlined some of thechanges he implemented at DuPontMerck, the pharmaceutical companyhe headed for five years, to combatthose problems. In addition topublicly firing employees for racistremarks or sexual harassment, he said,he also equalized pay for male andfemale employees and institutedfamily-friendly policies. The result,Landgraf said, was not only outsiderecognition for the company as a goodplace for women and minorities towork but also financial success, asmeasured by a compound annualgrowth rate of 99 percent.

He advised students, especially, tobenefit from his experience by not

allowing career concerns toovershadow other aspects of their lives.“Life is a balancing act,” he said. “Ifyou go to either extreme, you’re goingto be making a big mistake.”

Landgraf was a recent speaker inthe 2000-2001 Chaplin TylerExecutive Leadership Lecture Series,which is supported by the ChaplinTyler Endowment Fund. The seriesrecognizes Tyler and his wife,Elizabeth, for their commitment toeducation and to helping youngpeople succeed in business. Previousspeakers in the current series wereAnthony R. Goland, BE ’83, directorof McKinsey & Co., whose topic was“Perspectives on Leadership,” andMichael W. Wickham BE ’68,chairman and CEO of RoadwayExpress, who spoke about“Technology and Human Resources inthe Trucking Industry.”

Other speakers in the series includeDavid Freschman, BE ’84, presidentof the Delaware Innovation Fund, andAlan Dowling, a professor, consultantand dot.com executive involved in themanagement of health-care systems.Lectures in the series generally beginat 1:30 p.m. in MBNA America Hall.

For more information about futureTyler speakers, check the MBAprogram’s web site at[www.mba.udel.edu/news] or call (302) 831-2221.

Kurt M. Landgraf urges B&E studentsto balance their careers with time forfamily and community service.

Alumni can stay in touch online

Never lose contact with your UD friends because you’ve changed your e-mail address. E-mailforwarding allows you to link any and all of your e-mail addresses with one, easy-to-

remember Blue Hen address. It is as simple as selecting your Blue Hen address and completingthe registration form online. The University offers this lifelong program free of charge.

Another way to notify your UD friends of your new e-mail address is to have it listed in theonline Alumni E-mail Directory. The Office of Alumni and University Relations’ web siteprovides details on how to list your address in the online directory, as well as information on themany other services offered for UD alumni.

For more information, or to register for e-mail forwarding, please call the Office of Alumni andUniversity Relations at (302) 831-2341, or visit the web site at [www.udel.edu/alumni].

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Many faculty and staff membershave joined B&E recently. They

include:

CENTER FOR CORPORATEGOVERNANCE

Charles Elson (J.D., University ofVirginia) is the Edgar S. Woolard Jr.Chair of Corporate Governance anddirector of the center. He came to UDfrom the faculty of Stetson College ofLaw.

Alba Bates is the center’sadministrative assistant. She previouslyworked in the University’s Office ofthe Vice President for Administration.

DEPARTMENT OF BUSINESSADMINISTRATION

Yasemin Kor (Ph.D. forthcoming,University of Illinois) is assistantprofessor of corporate strategy. Sheconducts research in the area of firmresource development and renewal.

Dan Freeman (Ph.D. forthcoming,University of Arizona) is assistantprofessor of marketing andinformation technology. His researchinterests are in the areas ofinformation processing, socialmarketing and interactive marketing.

Mark Bambach (MBA, LaSalleUniversity) is an instructor inmarketing. He previously taught at anumber of colleges and universities inthe Delaware Valley, and he owns andoperates several companies in the cableand telecommunications industry.

Victor Giardini (M.S., DrexelUniversity) is a visiting instructor inmanagement and marketing. Hepreviously spent 25 years in a varietyof management positions at Conrail.

MBA OFFICEKim Hurst (B.A., University of

Delaware) is coordinator of MBAprograms. Previously, she worked atMBNA America.

Mary Zielinski, formerly with

National Plan Coordinators ofDelaware, and Marilyn Walker, fromWinterthur Museum, have joined theoffice as senior secretaries.

DEPARTMENT OFACCOUNTING AND MIS

Michael J. Ginzberg (Ph.D., SloanSchool of Management at MIT) isdean of the College and Chaplin TylerProfessor of Business. He previouslywas a professor and associate dean atthe Weatherhead School ofManagement at Case Western ReserveUniversity in Cleveland.

Guido Geerts (Ph.D., FreeUniversity of Brussels) is an assistantprofessor of accounting informationsystems. He came to UD from the EliBroad College of Business at MichiganState University.

Carol Ryan (M.Ed., University ofGeorgia) is an instructor in accountinginformation systems. Previously, shewas a consultant, coordinatingprofessional education to businessprofessionals, and has taught at UDand Widener University.

DEPARTMENT OF ECONOMICSLawrence Donnelley, associate

professor of international economics,has returned to the faculty afterserving as the associate provost forUD’s Office of International Programsand Special Sessions since 1990.

SMALL BUSINESSDEVELOPMENT CENTER

Juanita Beauford (M.S.,Wilmington College) has joined thecenter’s Government MarketingAssistance Program. Formerly, she wasdirector of the Job Placement Centerat the Ministry of Caring.

R. Wynette Word (A.A., ShawCollege) has joined the center as atraining assistant. She has experienceas both a trainer and a small businessowner.

College welcomes new facultyand staff members

Visiting Committeeprovides B&E withguidance and feedback

The B&E Visiting Committee ismade up of distinguished

business leaders, who providevaluable perspective and feedback tothe College. The members are:

John W. Field Jr.Chairman, Visiting CommitteeGreenfield Associates LLC

Henri L. BertuchChairman, Viatech Publishing Solutions

Raymond J. BromarkPartner, PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP

Donald R. BrunnerSenior trust officer, Tiedemann Trust Co.

James K. BuckleyAssociate, W.L. Gore & Associates

Ernst DannemannRetired

Robert A. Fischer Jr.President, Milford Fertilizer Co.

Anthony R. GolandDirector, McKinsey & Co. Inc.

Genevieve W. Gore(Emeritus)

Bruce L. HammondsExecutive vice chairman and COO, MBNA America Bank, NA

Robert V.A. Harra Jr.President,Wilmington Trust Co.

John W. HimesSenior vice president, corporate strategy,DuPont Co.

Richard J. JohnsonPresident and CEO, J.P. Morgan Delaware

Stephen M. MockbeePresident and CEO, Bancroft Construction Co.

Calvert A. MorganChairman, president and CEO, PNC Bank Delaware

Joseph R. SchmucklerCEO, Nomura Holding America Inc.

Scott R. SomervilleTax partner, Arthur Andersen LLP

Chaplin Tyler(Emeritus)

Michael W. WickhamChairman and CEO, Roadway Express Inc.

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S P R I N G 2 0 0 1

College of Business and Economics alumni update form■■ Yes! I would like to help the College of Business and Economics. Please let me know how I might help.

I would be particularly interested in:■■ Helping to attract top students to the University and the College.■■ Providing guidance to current students.■■ Helping to place students in internships, summer or permanent jobs.

We would like to hear from you. Please keep us updated regarding changes in your life, and also please let usknow what you think of what the College is doing!

NameClass year/majorHome address

Is this a new address?Home phone Is this a new number?Occupation EmployerBusiness addressBusiness phone E-mail addressWhat’s happening in your life that we may share with your fellow alumni?

The College of B&E always welcomes your input. Do you have any comments or suggestions?

Send your information to:Office of the Dean, College of Business and Economics

MBNA America Hall, Suite 303University of Delaware, Newark, DE 19716-2701

Fax: (302) 831-6750 / E-mail: [Alumnet@udel.edu]

OurMissionStatement

The mission of the College of Business and Economics is to fosterscholarship and to offer distinctive, innovative educationalopportunities related to the successful management and leadership oforganizations operating in an environment of scarce resources, rapidchange, global competition and advances in technology.

College of Business and EconomicsMBNA America Hall, Suite 303University of DelawareNewark, DE 19716-2701