“Seeing my research published in the form of a book is a great feeling. The book-form and powerful distribution channels such as Amazon.com provide it [my research] multiple legs to travel far and wide around the world to multiple constituencies,” stated Dr. Srivastava about the book’s publication.

About Networks,Clusters and Technological Innovation from Amazon.com

Firms often struggle and falter in their innovation efforts. However, past research has paid little systematic attention on why firms struggle in their innovation efforts. In this book, using a longitudinal research design the author examines how the characteristics of a firm’s ego network and of its cluster independently and jointly impact its technological innovation. This research provides a framework showing how networks and clusters may work in tandem in helping a firm overcome innovation barriers. The empirical evidence indicates that the efficacy of cluster resources increases in the presence of network ties within the cluster. It also shows that firms can mobilize resources of distant clusters using their network ties. The study further demonstrates that resource-rich firms leverage networks resources more effectively than the resource-deficient firms do while resource-deficient firms leverage cluster resources more effectively than the resource-rich firms do. The book makes important theoretical and empirical contributions to alliance, network,cluster, and innovation literatures. The research findings also have important managerial implications.

Poppy King comes to Michigan Tech

Entrepreneur and Author Poppy King will be on campus speaking today. At the age of 18 Poppy started her own brand of lipstick that has grown it into a multi-million dollar company. She has authored a book called “Lessons of a Lipstick Queen” that takes you through her journey.

Check out Poppy on campus at the following Times:

• 10am, EERC B45, Presentation and questions

• 12:30pm, Library, Book reading and signing

• 3:30pm, DOW 641, Presentation and questions

Kimberly Clark, a manufacturing company; Crowe Horwath, a public accounting firm; the IRS, a governmental entity; and Barclays Capital, a financial bank; each showed the group a wide array of career opportunities that require an accounting or finance degree.

While in Chicago Kappa Sigma Iota also had the chance to network with recruiters, discuss job prospects, and show the companies the terrific business talent that exists at Michigan Tech.

“Kappa Sigma Iota’s trip to Chicago has opened my eyes to the variety of opportunities that come with an accounting degree! I had a blast and I’m glad I went,” said KSI member, Alyson Dreher.

Learn more about Kappa Sigma Iota, Michigan Tech’s accounting organization.

Guest post from William Thiele, president of the Kappa Sigma Iota chapter at Michigan Tech.

Eric Kinonen

Eric Kinonen, a 5th year Management major within the School of Business and Economics and a member of the Efficiency Through Engineering and Construction (ETEC) group, discussed a project that he worked on with Lake Superior and Ishpeming Railroad (LS&I), helping to make their iron ore train operations more efficient. The 120-car trains currently need to slow down to get weighed, and one of the team’s solutions was to move them off the main track to get weighed on a side track.

“There’s some abandoned track here from Canadian National,” the business management major said, pointing to his poster. “This is near the Dead River Bridge, and they could pull off to the side to let the empty trains pass.”

Read the article, “But Can You Use It? Usability Day Involves Students Across Campus.”

Michael Simmons

Michael Simmons

Michael Simmons is a young, serial, award-winning entrepreneur, bestselling author of The Student Success Manifesto, and national keynote speaker to over 30,000 individuals.

Michael’s company, Extreme Entrepreneurship Tour, brings the country’s top young entrepreneurs to college campuses to spread the entrepreneurial mindset. Started in fall 2006, the tour has visited over 100 schools nation-wide and has received the Innovation Award from the National Association of Development Organizations and the Program of the Year award from Northern Michigan University. More can be learned at http://www.extremetour.org.

Michael co-founded his first business, Princeton WebSolutions (PWS), when he was sixteen years old. PWS was later rated the #1 youth-run web development company in the nation by Youngbiz Magazine. In addition, Michael has been the winner of three entrepreneur of the year awards from the National Foundation for Teaching Entrepreneurship, Fleet, and the National Coalition for Empowering Youth Entrepreneurship. He and his company have been featured in five books and on the AOL Home Page, USA Today, Inc. Magazine, ABC, NBC, and CBS. Finally, in 2006, Michael was named by Business Week as one of the Top 25 Entrepreneurs Under 25.

Anthony Adams

Anthony Adams

Anthony David Adams, 28, is an award winning American inventor and entrepreneur. Most recently, Anthony made headlines for his salacious education blog, DetentionSlip.org, which at just one year old was named one of the Top 25 Blogs of 2009 by Time Magazine.

In addition to DetentionSlip, Anthony serves as CEO of CreditCovers: skins for credit cards — an angel funded company based on a product he invented, patented, and developed.

You may have seen him and his companies on FoxNews, Time Magazine, The New York Times, Entrepreneur, Fortune, BusinessWeek, Daily Candy, Glamour, Readers Digest, ABC, NBC, Cool Hunting, or 500+ other media outlets.

Anthony has consulted on innovation, creativity, branding and marketing for The United Nations, BMW, SC Johnson Wax, Inventibles, The Salvation Army, Bisnow Media Group, The Summit Series and others.

Previous to his work in the private sector, Anthony was executive director and lead lobbyist at United Council, a 120,000 member student organizing non-profit. He holds a Masters in Urban Planning from the University of Wisconsin-Madison (2005), and a Bachelors in Psychology from Edinboro University (2003).

Anthony lives in lower Manhattan and enjoys ultimate frisbee, chess, skydiving, vegan food, computer programming, rubiks cubes, running and working out with his Broadway star brother, Nick Adams.

Brendan Ciecko

Brendan Ciecko

Brendan Ciecko, 21, is the founder and CEO of Ten Minute Media, a company that specializes in digital media and creative services for the music entertainment industry. Ciecko started producing websites for emerging rock bands at the early age of 12 and quickly transformed his talents into a thriving business. Since its official establishment in 2003, Ten Minute Media has acquired an impressive and flourishing list of major clients including, Warner, Universal, Sony Music, Capitol Records and some of the biggest names in entertainment.

With such a striking repertoire, Ciecko has gained the attention of the national press. In October of 2008, Ciecko appeared on the cover of Inc. Magazine in the feature article, “Cool, Determined, Under 30.” He has also appeared in Entrepreneur Magazine, Boston Globe, PC Magazine, FastCompany, NPR and was a national finalist of the Global Student Entrepreneur Awards.

Behind Ciecko’s business persona there exists an artistic and musical essence, a part of Ciecko that takes most pride in having worked with music icons, Mick Jagger, Natalie Cole, Katy Perry, and Lenny Kravitz.

Ciecko is an advocate in the efforts to revitalize historic downtown Holyoke, a post-industrial city in MA. He also sits on the Massachusetts “It’s All Here” Advisory Board.

Outside the office, Ciecko is an avid traveler, architecture geek, and lover of music and art.

Monday, November 16^th 3:00pm – 7:00pm, MUB Ballroom A

Extreme Entrepreneurship Bus

Extreme Entrepreneurship Tour - Hear from 3 young entrepreneurs that have made it big before the age of 30 tell their story, participate in interactive workshops, help spark entrepreneurship in the Copper Country, have chances to win prizes! Don’t worry if you can’t be there for the entire event or for the start come and join in when you can. You can RSVP for the event at

http://www.journeypage.com/events/miteun/ , however RSVP is not required to attend. Help make this the largest Extreme Entrepreneurship Tour in the past 3 years at Michigan Tech.

Tuesday, November 17^th 5:30pm, DOW 641

Elevator Pitch Competition – Come hear the business idea pitches from the students of Michigan Tech and Finlandia at the 3^rd Annual Elevator Pitch Competition. Students will be pitching their ideas for a chance to win cash prizes. Students interested in competing visit http://www.centile.mtu.edu/elevator_pitch.html for instructions on how to enter, deadline is October 30^th.

Wednesday, November 18^th 10am in EERC B45, and again at 3:30pm in DOW 642

Entrepreneur and Author Poppy King will be on campus speaking. At the age of 18 Poppy started her own brand of lipstick that has grown it into a multi-million dollar company. She has authored a book called “Lessons of a Lipstick Queen” that takes you through her journey.

The events are sponsored by the Entrepreneurs Club, the School of Business and Economics, the Institute for Global Leadership and Entrepreneurship, with financial support from the Michigan Initiative for Innovation and Entrepreneurship. Funding is also provided by Michigan Economic Development Corporation, Michigan Initiative for Innovation and Entrepreneurship, Grant Funding, and the University Student Government.

The Entrepreneurship Club of Michigan Tech is a student organization in the School of Business and Economics. The club is comprised of a mixture of students in all majors with the same entrepreneurial spirit.

More information on the Entrepreneurs Club.

Rich Leimsider, Darrell Radson, Judith Samuelson

Dean Radson met with other award recipients of the Aspen Institute’s Top 100 MBA Programs at an event sponsored by Ernst & Young in New York City’s Time Square this past week.

Pictured to the left, Dean Radson is joined by Rich Leimsider, the Director of the Center for Business Education at the Aspen Institute, and Judith Samuelson, Executive Director of the Business and Society Program of the Aspen Institute.

Of the 100 schools recognized through the Beyond Grey Pinstripes event about 50 were in attendance at the ceremony.

“We are proud to receive this recognition and will continue to strive toward program excellence,” Darrell Radson, stated regarding the event.

Read more about our recognition.

LSGI serves as an advisor to the Michigan Tech Applied Portfolio Management Program, overseeing finance students responsible for managing $1 million of the University’s endowment. They also instruct oil & gas and environmental law programs at Southern Methodist University School of Law in Dallas, Texas.

Eric Tangko and Ed Drouillard

Announcement featured in Yahoo! Finance.

More about LSGI Technology Venture Fund L.P.

]]> http://blogs.mtu.edu/business/2009/11/06/two-finance-students-awarded-work-study-grants/feed/ finance-program ed-eric-apmp Eric Tangko and Ed Drouillard http://blogs.mtu.edu/business/2009/11/05/owners-of-local-brewery-speak-at-michigan-tech/ http://blogs.mtu.edu/business/2009/11/05/owners-of-local-brewery-speak-at-michigan-tech/#comments Thu, 05 Nov 2009 06:12:09 +0000 lmczarne http://blogs.mtu.edu/business/?p=439

Owners of KBC with Entrepreneurs Club

Owners of the Keweenaw Brewing Company, a microbrewery that resides in downtown Houghton,  Dick Gray and Paul Boissevain talked about their business plan, strategy, and goals with about 30 students and community members  during a question and answer session last week.

Gray and Boissevain discussed their motivation behind starting a brewery and the challenges they faced. “We wanted to drink good beer and we didn’t expect to grow as fast as we have. Now our challenges lie in distribution and we don’t have a written plan for how to get where we want to be, we’re taking it day by day.” said Boissevain.

This event was sponsored by the Entrepreneurs Club of Michigan Tech.

“Our faculty earned this recognition through their commitment to teaching and research in social, environmental, and ethical stewardship as it relates to business. Our Tech MBA program focuses on conducting sustainable business in a technologically rich, constantly changing world, and our faculty and students rise to that challenge, “ said Darrell Radson, Dean of the School of Business and Economics at Michigan Tech.

While many MBA rankings exist, only one looks beyond reputation and test scores to measure something much more important: how well schools are preparing their students for the environmental, social and ethical complexities of modern-day business.

This year, 149 business schools from 24 countries participated in an 18 month effort to map the landscape of teaching and research on issues pertaining to business and society. Relevant data collected in the survey, as well as the entire “Global 100” list of business schools, is available at: www.BeyondGreyPinstripes.org.

“The best business students move quickly into the front ranks of business–and the attitudes and values they bring to the table are deeply influenced by their time in business education,” said Judith Samuelson, Executive Director of the Aspen Institute’s Business and Society Program. “Will they accept the status quo or act on their passion about the positive role business can play at the intersection of corporate profit and social impact? The schools that are competitive in the Beyond Grey Pinstripes ranking are the real trailblazers–they assure that students have the right skill as well as the will to make things happen.”

“In these challenging economic times, the general public, not just scholars, are questioning whether the established models of business are broken,” said Rich Leimsider, Director of the Aspen Institute’s Center for Business Education. “Beyond Grey Pinstripes schools are thoughtfully pursuing new approaches. They are preparing students who take a more holistic view of business success, one that measures financial results as well as social and environmental impacts.”

Ruth Archer, Director of the Tech MBA program at Michigan Tech added, “Our students are very concerned about a sustainable future. They appreciate receiving a first-class MBA in managing technology and innovation at the same time that they learn how to integrate social value with corporate profitability. This recognition will enable us to attract more like-minded students.”

Sample Findings

• The percentage of schools surveyed that require students to take a course dedicated to business and society issues has increased dramatically over time, but at a slowing rate: 34% in 2001; 45% in 2003; 54% in 2005; 63% in 2007; 69% in 2009.
• Since 2007, the number of elective courses offered per school that contain some degree of social, environmental or ethical content has increased by 12%, from approximately 16.6 to 18.6 electives.
• The proportion of schools offering general social, environmental or ethical content in required core courses has increased in many business disciplines–Accounting, Economics, Finance, Management, Marketing, Operations Management–since the last survey in 2007.
• However, the percentage of schools requiring content in a core course on how mainstream business can act as an engine for social or environmental change remains low, at 30%.
• Approximately 7% of faculty at the surveyed business schools published scholarly articles in peer-reviewed, business journals that address social, environmental or ethical issues. The titles and abstracts of the 1,211 articles are available at www.BeyondGreyPinstripes.org.

“Supporting environmental sustainability is a major strategic goal at Michigan Tech. To support this goal and maintain our cutting edge graduate programs, we continue to integrate environmental sustainability management education, including application and tools. This ensures that our MBA grads have the latest management decision making tools upon entering their chosen careers,” stated Dana Johnson, Associate Professor of Operations Management in the School of Business and Economics at Michigan Tech.

School highlights from this Beyond Grey Pinstripes survey cycle are featured in a new guidebook for prospective MBA students, titled The Sustainable MBA, which is already available at Amazon.com and the Aspen Institute’s publication website.

The Aspen Institute Center for Business Education (Aspen CBE) equips business leaders for the 21st century with the vision and knowledge to integrate corporate profitability and social value. We help business educators incorporate issues of social and environmental stewardship into teaching and research by offering targeted resources, networks and a platform to share cutting edge practice among peers.

As part of the Aspen Institute Business and Society Program, Aspen CBE maintains close ties with over 150 MBA programs in 28 countries. Our websites draw over 100,000 visits monthly and our events and networks attract over 1,000 participants each year.

The Aspen Institute mission is twofold: to foster values-based leadership, encouraging individuals to reflect on the ideals and ideas that define a good society, and to provide a neutral and balanced venue for discussing and acting on critical issues.