Beedie School of Business News

From left to right: Adam Mills, Anjali Bal, Kirk Plangger and Colin Campbell at the Academy of Marketing Science Cultural Perspectives in Marketing Conference.

Four PhD students from the Beedie School of Business played prominent roles at a prestigious Marketing Science conference held in Atlanta, Georgia recently.

Current Beedie PhD students Adam Mills and Kirk Plangger were joined by Beedie PhD alumni Anjali Bal and Colin Campbell at the Academy of Marketing Science (AMS) Cultural Perspectives in Marketing Conference. The conference ran from August 28 to September 1, with a theme of Thriving in a New World Economy.

The group played a number of important roles at the conference, with all four presenting papers, chairing track meetings and acting as reviewers. Prior to the conference opening, Mills and Plangger were awarded AMS Fellowships, with Plangger also going on to act as Proceedings Editor for the event. Keep reading…

Tags: Academy of Marketing Science, Academy of Marketing Science Cultural Perspectives in Marketing Conference, Adam Mills, Anjali Bal, Colin Campbell, Kirk Plangger, Marketing Science, PhD, Research

The following article was published by The Globe and Mail on July 5, 2012.

Unlike in North America where students typically look like they want to leave 10 minutes before the scheduled end of a class, in Beijing Majid Ghorbani’s lectures often run 10 minutes overtime, or longer.

“Students in China can’t seem to get enough. They make me feel like they really want to learn,” says the recently transplanted Vancouverite, now an assistant professor in the business studies faculty of Beijing’s elite Renmin University.

Mr. Ghorbani, who has a PhD in management from Simon Fraser University, moved to China for the job last autumn along with his wife and two young children.

In Canada, he specialized in studying cross-cultural management practices where he examined how immigrants reshape economies as entrepreneurs and how their values affect how they run their businesses.

Keep reading…

Tags: Alumni, Beedie School of Business, business education, China, education, Majid Ghorbani, management education, PhD, sfu, SFU Beedie, Simon Fraser University

For many people, the notion of investing in a business involves an eventual return of capital and ultimate profitability. However, financial gain was the last thing on the mind of Beedie School of Business lecturer and PhD student Adam Mills when he made his latest investment in BBA student projects – ultimately leading to funds raised for children with chronic illnesses and disabilities.

In his Business 478 strategy class, Mills tasked his students with starting up their own businesses. He gave five groups of undergraduate students $100 each from his own pocket as start-up capital in exchange for 15 percent of each business, and told the students they could keep any additional profit.

Mills decided early in the process that hands-on experience was a more engaging way for the students to learn about business strategy than the traditional approach of writing a business plan as a capstone project. Keep reading…

Tags: Adam Mills, Business Strategy, entrepreneurship, Fruit Dealers, PhD