College of Business Newsletter

September 26, 2005

 

From the Dean’s Office:

 

The semester is now well underway and things are beginning to settle into a routine.  First round of exams are here or will be soon.  From conversations with several of the faculty, the student population this year seems to be a good group.

 

Mark your calendars for the Fall 2005 Homecoming weekend.  This year the “college” homecoming gatherings will be integrated into a WCU Alumni Breakfast from 8:30 – 10:30 a.m. in the University Center – Grandroom.  Areas will be identified for each college gathering and it will be a good place to kick off a great weekend of activities.  There will be a groundbreaking for the new Student Recreation Center, ribbon cutting for the Norton Road Residence Hall, tour of the Recording and Television Studios in the Center for Applied Technology and finally a football game against Elon University at 2:00 p.m.  One special treat at the football games is the halftime, and post-game, performances by the Pride of the Mountains Marching Band (this year marching 340 members).  I hope you can join us for the weekend.

 

Forsyth renovation plans continue along a trajectory that will have us vacate the building in May, 2005.  We plan to be housed in the Belk Annex for about 15 months and then move back into a newly renovated Forsyth Building.  Students and faculty seem to have gotten adjusted to the new traffic patterns although there are still concerns about adequate parking in desired places.  My experience tells me that Western is not unique in the parking challenges we experience.

 

Management & International Business News:

 

  1. A case, “The Orange Peel Social Aid and Pleasure Club” by Dennis Patenotte (WCU MBA 2005) and George Mechling has been accepted for publication in the Journal of the International Academy for Case Studies (JIACS) . A winter publication is anticipated. 

 

  1. A research paper by Mario Sepulveda (WCU MBA, 2002) Mike Smith and George Mechling, “Using Forecasting to Diagnose the Need for Managerial Intervention in Business Processes” has been accepted for publication in the journal Foresight.

 

  1. “Using Competency-Based Student Portfolios for Undergraduate Management Program Assessment,” co-authored by Hollye Moss and Terry Kinnear, appears in the current issue of the International Journal of Business Disciplines.  This article describes the portfolio approach to assessment that Management faculty members at WCU have adopted. 

 

  1. Beverly Little will be participating in Leadership Asheville 24 this year.

 

  1. A case, “Western North Carolina Playhouse” by Beverly Little and Philip Little has been accepted for publication in the Journal of the International Academy for Case Studies (JIACS) .

 

  1. Mike Smith presented “Industrial Decline as a Source of Supply Risk” at the 5th International Research Seminar on Risk and the Supply Chain at Cranfield University in England last week.

 

  1. Mike Smith has had two workshops, “The Strategic Use of Supplier Price and Cost Analysis” and “Getting the Most from Your Indirect Purchasing Dollar,” accepted for the Institute for Supply Management’s 91st Annual International Supply Management Conference.  In addition, his invited presentation “The Meaning, Scope and Future of Supply Chain Management” will be given at the OIPMAC annual conference in London, Ontario, Canada in October.

 

  1. “Beyond Motivation: Engagement, Mindfulness, and Learning,” an essay by Bill Kane and Terry Kinnear, appeared in WCU’s Faculty Forum on September 1.

 

  1. On July 24, Steve Jarrell and his coauthors, T. D. Stanley and Chris Doucouliagous, presented their paper "Meta-Regression Analysis: Identifying and Explaining the Socio-Economics of Economic Research" at the Business and Economics Society International in Flagstaff, Arizona.

 

Hospitality & Tourism News:

 

  1. Students in Carroll Brown’s Quality Service class and Cynthia Deale’s Introduction to Hospitality and Tourism class were involved in a service learning experience as volunteers at Mountain Heritage Day on September 24t h.  The quality service class did a customer satisfaction survey at the event and the students in the introductory class conducted a tourism assessment of the service environment.  In addition, Professor Jim Taylor’s Quantity Foods class made ham biscuits as a class project to sell at Mountain Heritage Day on the 24th.

 

  1. Eta Sigma Delta (ESD), the honor society of the Hospitality and Tourism program, operated a booth at Mountain Heritage Day on September 24th. Students sold such items as slices of ice cold watermelon, glasses of lemonade and limeade, and homemade ham biscuits.  This was a major fundraiser for ESD.

 

  1. Faculty members in the Hospitality and Tourism program have been working hard to develop the new curriculum for the BSBA program.  Courses have been selected to reflect a management focus in the diverse hospitality and tourism industry.

 

  1. Next month, Hospitality and Tourism faculty will head to Auburn University to present papers and attend the fall conference of the South East chapter of the Council of Hotel, Restaurant, and Institutional Educators (CHRIE), October 13-15. Sandra Grunwell (co-author Steve Ha) will be presenting a study titled: “Evaluating the Success of a Regional Film Festival” and Cynthia Deale will be presenting a teaching and learning project titled “Using Photos and Photography as Teaching and Learning Tools.”  Cynthia also serves as the Secretary/Treasurer for the SE CHRIE chapter and has been in charge of the review process and conference proceedings for the fall conference.

 

  1. Sandy Grunwell and Steve Ha completed the 2005 Bele Chere visitors survey for the City of Asheville.

 

Masters of Project Management News:

 

  1. The two newest members of the Masters of Project Management (MPM) Program (Vittal Anantatmula and Alban deBergevin) have been professionally active.  Vittal Anantatmula has three recent publications:

 

  • Rad, P. and Anantatmula V. (2005). Project Planning Techniques: For successful execution and effective management of change. Management Concepts, Vienna, VA.  

 

  • Anantatmula V. Kanungo S. (2005). Role of IS and KM in Project Performance. IEMC2005. IEEE Computer Society.

 

  • Han B. and Anantatmula V. (2006). Knowledge Management from Employees’ Perspective in IT organizations. To be presented at Hawaii International Conference on Systems Sciences, HICSS39, 2006.

 

  1. Vittal also recently passed the PMP (Project Management Professional) exam.  Congratulations to Vittal!

 

  1. Alban DeBergevin will be presenting a paper titled Gambling on Enterprise Portfolio Management: Win, Lose or Draw in October at the Project Summit New England.

 

  1. The July PM Network publication devoted to Quality Control featured an interview with Jeanne Dorle.  At the PMI Global Congress in Toronto this month, Jeanne was elected Chair-Elect for the Quality in Project Management Special Interest Group.  In that capacity, she will be working with the PMI Component Relations Advisory Group on the Community Transformation Project to develop effective ways for global professional communities to interact virtually.

 

Business Computer Information News:

 

Dr. Perry has signed a contract with Thomson Delmar Learning. The tentative title of his book is Developing Professional Information Security Competencies. The text orients the reader toward a career in information systems security and focuses upon developing the knowledge necessary to pass the Security+ certification exam. The book cross-references the international standard “Information technology – Security techniques – Code of practice for information security management” or ISO/IEC 17799.

 

 

Small Business & Technology Development Center Stat of the week

Have you met a minipreneuer lately? In case you weren't sure, minipreneurs are a vast army of consumers turning entrepreneurs; including small and micro businesses, freelancers, side-businesses, weekend entrepreneurs, web-driven entrepreneurs, part-timers, free agents, cottage businesses, seniorpreneurs, co-creators, mompreneurs, pro-ams, solopreneurs, eBay traders, advertising-sponsored bloggers and so on.

  • According to a July 2005 survey conducted by eBay, more than 724,000 Americans report that eBay is their primary or secondary source of income. In addition to these professional eBay sellers, another 1.5 million individuals say they supplement their income by selling on eBay.
  • Over 50,000 people in the UK draw a significant portion of their income from selling goods online. A study by the Centre for Economics and Business Research (CEBR) shows that the average household boosts its earnings by GBP 3,000 through online trading.
  • Mastercard and Warillow International published a research study on a new class of small business - the 'Web-Driven Entrepreneur" - estimating that there are 5 million of these businesses in the United States, representing 25 percent of all small businesses.

So what are the drivers behind the MINIPRENEURS trend, and what does the ecosystem sustaining it look like? Visit trendwatching.com to find out more.

The SBTDC is a business development service of the University of NC system providing management counseling and educational services to small and mid-sized businesses across North Carolina. WCU’s center is located in 204 Forsyth.

 

NEXT NEWSLETTER – October 7