Beedie School of Business News

The Beedie School of Business APEX Business-IT Global Case Challenge team. From left to right: Carlos Hernandez, Robin Orford, Kyle Krystalowich and team coach Dr. Kamal Masri.

The Beedie School of Business continued its recent winning form in university case competitions by grabbing the silver medal at the high-profile APEX Business-IT Global Case Challenge.

The competition, hosted by Singapore Management University (SMU) from May 12 to 16, is regarded as one of the top management information systems case competitions in the world, and this year featured 24 top universities from as far afield as Germany, Denmark, Hong Kong, Australia, and the US.

The team’s second place finish in this year’s competition sees the Beedie School of Business go one better than the bronze medal achieved in the 2012 Apex competition. It is also the fourth time in this global-class competition’s five year history where a team from the Beedie School of Business has finished in the top four.   Keep reading…

Tags: APEX, APEX Biz-IT Global Case Challenge, Beedie School of Business, Carlos Hernandez, Case competition, case competitions, Kamal Masri, Kyle Krystalowich, MIS, Robin Orford, sfu, Simon Fraser University, Singapore Management University

The Beedie School of Business BBICC team. From left to right: Lindsay van Leeuwen, Justin Ling, Isabel Gomez-Garcia, Matt Martell and Peyman Abedi-Rad.

Students from the Beedie School of Business have enjoyed success at two prestigious international business case competitions, each capturing a top three finish in their respective competitions.

The teams competed at the Belgrade Business International Case Competition (BBICC), hosted by the University of Belgrade, Serbia, and the Royal Roads University International Undergraduate Case Competition (RRUIUCC), hosted by the University of Victoria. Each Beedie School of Business team earned bronze in their competition.

The BBICC team, coached by Beedie alumnus Matt Martell, consisted of undergraduates Isabel Gomez-Garcia, Lindsay van Leeuwen, Justin Ling, and Peyman Rad. The students won their place on the podium after competing against 12 teams from around the world, including New Zealand, the UK, Singapore, Denmark and the US. Keep reading…

Tags: BBICC, Beedie School of Business, Belgrade Business International Case Competition, Case competition, case competitions, international case competition, Royal Roads University International Undergraduate Case Competition, RRUIUCC, Simon Fraser University

The Beedie School of Business HEC MBA Sustainability Challenge team. From left to right: Colin Knudsen, Geordan Hankinson, Erin Lane and Andrew Lee

A team of MBA students from Simon Fraser University’s Beedie School of Business have captured first place at the HEC Montréal MBA Sustainability Challenge case competition.

The team, consisting of MBA students Erin Lane, Geordan Hankinson, Colin Knudsen, and Andrew Lee, emerged victorious from a field of 12 competing universities from across Canada, the US and Denmark.

The competition, held at HEC Montréal in Québec on March 16, seeks to demonstrate the relevance of addressing corporate social responsibility issues in the management of successful enterprises, and featured a panel of guest judges from industry and academia Keep reading…

Tags: Andrew Lee, aviation, Beedie School of Business, biofuels, case competitions, Colin Knudsen, CSR, Erin Lane, experiential learning, Geordan Hankinson, HEC Montréal, HEC Montréal MBA Sustainability Challenge, MBA, Stephanie Bertels, sustainability

The 2013 Beedie School of Business JDC West team

SFU’s Beedie School of Business captured the Academic School of the Year award at the prestigious JDC West case competition, held from January 18 to 20 at the University of British Columbia, edging out stiff competition from 11 other leading Canadian business schools to claim the title. The Academic School of the Year award is presented to the team which achieves the highest overall finish in the JDC West competition’s ten academic categories.

In addition, the Beedie School of Business placed third in the School of the Year category and enjoyed further significant success in the individual competition categories, taking first place in the International Business and Finance competitions; second place in the Management Information Systems, Business Strategy, Human Resources and Taxation categories; and third place in both Accounting and Debate.

“The success our 2013 JDC West team enjoyed is a tremendous achievement and reflects the well-rounded attributes of our undergraduate students and the alumni coaches who supported them,” said Andrew Gemino, Associate Dean of Undergraduate Programs.

“Competing with so many other top business schools and being named Academic School of the Year is a testament to the quality of education our students receive at the Beedie School of Business. The students, coaches and staff that supported this effort can be rightly proud of their success.” Keep reading…

Tags: Academic School of the Year, accounting, Amit Bhagat, Andrew Gemino, BBA, Beedie School of Business, Business Strategy, Case competition, case competitions, competition, Dean’s Circle, Debate, finance, human resources, international business, JDC West, Jeux du Commerce West Business Competition, Joel Thom, KPMG, management information systems, Maney Grewal, Sean Peters, sfu, SFU Beedie, Simon Fraser University, Student Engagement Office, Taxation, UBC, undergraduate, University of British Columbia

Sam Thiara, Associate Director of Undergraduate Alumni Engagement at Simon Fraser University’s Beedie School of Business, has been awarded the Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee Medal, a special commemorative medal honouring the significant contributions and achievements by Canadians. The award is being given to Thiara in recognition of his outstanding engagement and leadership.

Thiara has worked with hundreds of students and alumni since joining SFU’s Beedie School in 2004, and has also volunteered countless hours for various community initiatives in Metro Vancouver and beyond.

An alumnus of SFU as well as the University of Exeter in England, Thiara joined the Beedie School in 2004 as a manager of student recruitment and engagement. To date he has worked as a mentor and coach to hundreds of students, both as individuals and as teams, and recently helped coach a team of students to a silver medal at the International Institute for Business Development Case Competition in Thailand.

Prior to joining SFU, Thiara worked as the Community Consultation Manager for the Vancouver 2010 Olympic Bid Corporation, where he was responsible for building relationships with communities and providing the public with information about the bid. Keep reading…

Tags: BBA, case competitions, coaching, engagement, International Institute for Business Development Case Competition, Leaders of Tomorrow, Leadership, mentoring, Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee Medal, Sam Thiara, storytelling, student engagement, student recruitment, TEDx, TEDxSFU, University of Exeter, Vancouver 2010 Olympic Bid Corporation, Vancouver Board of Trade, volunteering

The 2013 CaseIT Organizing Committee

In 2004, two Beedie School of Business undergrads founded the SFU-hosted CaseIT, an internal undergraduate case competition focused on management information systems (MIS). In the years since, the competition has grown to become the largest MIS case competition in North America, with teams participating from all over the world journeying to Vancouver and the Simon Fraser University campus to compete.

Yet, rather than being surprised by the success of the competition, founders Paul Cyr and Zephaniah Wong had foreseen this path for CaseIT all along.

“When CaseIT was founded in 2004, the vision was for an international MIS case competition,” says Zephaniah. “We originally booked the Asia Pacific Hall at SFU’s Wosk Centre for the inaugural event, but were forced to initially scale back the competition. The CaseIT logo is actually a diagram of the Asia Pacific Hall – just one of the reasons why we pushed so hard for CaseIT to take place there in future years.” Keep reading…

Tags: BBA, Beedie School of Business, case competitions, CaseIT, international case competition, management information systems, MIS, Paul Cyr, Peter Lew, sfu, Wosk Centre for Dialogue, Zephaniah Wong

Jevta Lukic may be graduating from the Beedie School of Business this semester, but he says his relationship with SFU “is a lifelong thing.”

The following story was published on SFU News on September 27, 2012. 

By Ross MacDonald-Allan

Tags: Beedie community, case competitions, convocation, Education Generation, graduation, internationalization, Jevta Lukic, Premier's One World Scholarship, student exchange, Student Impact Award

SFU JDC West godparent Erica Rizzo and co-captains Amit Bhagat and Joel Thom.

The 2013 JDC West business schools showdown is six months away, but the SFU Beedie team is already hard at work to prepare for the prestigious competition.

Over the past few weeks, candidates for SFU Beedie’s JDC West academic team partook in the new case competition cohort, taught by instructor Tara Immell. The students did practice cases and presentations to develop their understanding of how to analyse cases and work as a team. The team is currently four months ahead of schedule, but co-captains Amit Bhagat and Joel Thom are convinced this new rigorous 8-week tryout structure has shown them which candidates are willing and able to commit to the team.

Keep reading…

Tags: Amit Bhagat, Beedie School of Business, Case competition, case competitions, competition, JDC West, Jeux du Commerce West Business Competition, Joel Thom, sfu, SFU Beedie, Simon Fraser University, Tara Immell, UBC, University of British Columbia

A Beedie School of Business undergraduate student has placed in the top three in the recent Focus 2040 case competition by predicting what the business world will look like in the year 2040.

Focus 2040 is open to undergraduate and graduate business students and is the first competition of its kind in the HRM and organizational strategy sector. Entrants have one task: to predict the world of work in the year 2040.

Beedie undergrad student Tiffanie Lai teamed up with UBC student Amanda Feng to enter the competition, hosted by McMaster University’s DeGroote School of Business. Their presentation earned them the third-place prize, which included $2000 in prize money. It was one of four SFU entrants to reach the final 25 in the competition.

Their vision was based on the future of the business world being very much an internationalized one. “Our final presentation focused on an immense shift in global economic power,” explains Lai. “We predict that current emerging economies will overtake the established economic powers, giving rise to an entirely new generation of employees. It will be essential for candidates to be multilingual, cultured and equipped with a roster of international experiences.”

The pair researched current business trends and surveys in order to develop their vision. The judges were impressed by their ideas, which included an international nexus pass allowing people in business to cross borders quickly and easily to facilitate the internationalization of business. Keep reading…

Tags: case competitions, CMA, Focus 2040, HRM, JDC West, Tiffanie Lai

Two undergraduate students from the Beedie School of Business have won the opportunity to represent Canada at the prestigious KPMG International Case Competition (KICC).

Christian Jeffery and Juan Pablo Leal won the local and national stages of the Ace the Case competition and will now go on to compete at the KICC with the rest of their team in Hong Kong this April.

According to the official KPMG announcement: “KICC will provide Christian Jeffery and Juan Pablo Leal with exposure to KPMG leaders and professionals from around the globe, international networking opportunities, and necessary business skills to succeed as an accounting professional.”

The Ace the Case program consists of three stages of competition: local, national and global. The competition consists of a two-day workshop and competition hosted in each of KPMG’s four national offices: Vancouver, Calgary, Toronto and Montreal. The workshops are designed and delivered by KPMG and geared towards first, second and third year commerce students with a long-term interest in pursuing a CA designation.

The local workshop provides students with an opportunity to improve case-writing and analytical skills, as well as presentation skills, in order to reach their full potential as young professionals. During day one, students primarily cover case-writing skills, including the basic approach, outlining, ranking of issues and quantitative analysis, among others. By the second day, students focus on the presentation aspect of case writing and properly presenting results as a group. Groups then go on to tackle a case head on and present solutions to a set of KPMG judges.

At the KICC, Jeffery and Leal will compete against students from across 23 participating countries. Teams will be provided with case studies based on a realistic business scenario, and will identify the key business issues and analyze, consider and develop a compelling set of recommendations to present to a panel of experienced KPMG partners and leaders from around the world.

“Ace the Case was an amazing opportunity to connect with the people of the firm, work in teams, and develop our communication and leadership skills,” said Leal. “It will be an honour to represent Simon Fraser University and Canada at the global competition in April!”

For more information on the competition, visit the Ace the Case website or watch highlights of the 2011 competition.

Tags: Ace the Case, BBA, case competitions, Christian Jeffery, Juan Pablo Leal, KICC, KPMG