Blaize Horner Reich receives prestigious consulting Academic Fellow Award

Blaize Horner Reich, RBC Professor of Technology and Innovation at the Beedie School of Business.

Blaize Horner Reich, RBC Professor of Technology and Innovation, and former Dean of the Beedie School of Business, has received the prestigious Academic Fellow Award by the International Council of Management Consulting Institutes (ICMCI) for 2016.

The ICMCI Academic Fellow Award recognises academics who have contributed to the study and teaching of management consultancy.

Reich’s award honours her continued leadership role furthering innovations in the link between academia and the management consulting profession.

“I am proud to support strong ties between consulting and academia; there is a great fit between theoretical and practical approaches when solving the problems of practitioners,” says Reich. “In my own work, the experience I gained as a strategic planning consultant led to the creation of a new theory about aligning business and IT strategies inside organizations.”

Reich is an internationally recognized expert in IT and project governance and technology-based organizational transformation. She joined the Beedie School of Business in 1991 after 15 years as a successful information technology (IT) professional and management consultant in both Canada and Asia.

She became Dean of the School in 2014, overseeing the continued growth of both the undergraduate and graduate programs. During her tenure the Beedie School launched the Graduate Certificate in Science and Technology Commercialization, the Executive MBA in Northwestern BC, and an interdisciplinary undergraduate Certificate in Innovation and Entrepreneurship.

In 2015 Reich signed a partnership agreement between the Beedie School and CMC-Canada. The agreement is intended to develop a strong academic program with a focus on management consulting within the Beedie School leading to the CMC certification.

She has served as academic leader for the national Business Technology Management (BTM) program and as board member of the CIO Association of Canada, the Information and Communications Technology Council, and the BCIC New Ventures Competition.

In 2015 Reich was named a Women’s Executive Network (WXN) Canada’s Most Powerful Women: Top 100 Award winner, and in 2012 received Business in Vancouver’s Influential Women in Business Award.

“We are proud of Dr. Reich’s leadership contributions and appreciate that her efforts are recognized by our International Governing Body representing the management consulting profession,” says Lyn Blanchard, President of ICMC-BC.

The Canadian Association of Management Consultants (CMC-Canada) fosters excellence and integrity in the management consulting profession as a whole. CMC-Canada administers, and its provincial Institutes confer, the Certified Management Consultant (CMC) designation in Canada. The Association and its 2,850+ members advocate for the CMC designation and are dedicated to advancing the profession and delivering the benefits of those efforts to the client community.