McCombs Alumni Network News

From McCombs Today

“A felony is forever. That’s not a legacy to leave to anybody.”

Harvin C. Moore III (right) gave a speech on ethics Nov. 4 to Urton Anderson and Janet Dukerich’s undergraduate studies class, Organizational Corruption and Organizational Control.

At first glance, Moore looks like the picture of success. He earned a law degree from UT Austin and went to work for a law firm in Houston, where he had a “Midas touch” for putting together lucrative business deals. His real estate developments were valued at $250 million and he co-owned a savings and loan business with more than $400 million in assets.

It wasn’t until Moore took off his jacket and put on the prison badge he wore during his 2-year sentence in federal prison that students realized that this wasn’t going to be like any ethics speech they had heard before.

Moore was in business during the collapse of both the oil and gas industry and the real estate market in the four oil and gas states - Texas, Colorado, Oklahoma and Louisiana. That collapse caused all of his personal business to fail and left him with only the savings and loan institution, which he believed to be in excellent health. Read More…

From McCombs Today

Ben Bentzin, marketing lecturer at McCombs and a former Dell executive, spoke with McCombs Communications Director David Wenger about changes in marketing approaches, Dell’s new focus on innovation to draw in customers and why he thinks you shouldn’t outsource your social media efforts.

David posted the full interview, along with audio clips, on his ID University blog. Check out a few highlights from Bentzin’s answers below:

On frequent reinvention of your marketing strategy:
A strategy is something a company can do better than their competitors sustainably over a long period of time. And so if the strategy changes every 6 months, it isn’t really a strategy it’s a tactic. And in some businesses these tactics are a process of exploration, finding out what works and what doesn’t work, which can be a very effective way of strategy development. To a certain extent the best market research you could possibly do is to put an offer in front of consumers and identify what consumers respond to. Once you’ve defined your strategy, if it’s a successful strategy, it will carry you for a very long period of time. Read More…

From UT Austin @Texas Newsletter, Volume 8, Number 5

Supervisors in the McCombs School of Business have notified 16 people that their positions have been eliminated as a result of the current budgetary crisis, with a final employment date of Jan. 31 for the affected positions. Staff reductions at the school were announced Sept. 15 and finalized on Monday, Nov. 2.

The school’s human resources director, Del Watson, in coordination with the university’s Human Resource Services department, will provide assistance to affected staff members with career services programs. Counseling will be available through the Employee Assistance Program. Affected employees will be given “special consideration” status in the hiring process for future positions at the university.

Read More…

From McCombs Today

Some of the best business students from around the world convened in Austin October 27-31 for the 16th McCombs International Business Competition (MIBC), one of the top annual undergraduate business competitions in the world. In total, 20 schools from North America, Asia and Europe competed in this year’s MIBC, which was sponsored by Motorola, the Undergraduate Business Council and the Office of Student Life.

Motorola put together an open-ended case that challenged the four-member teams to present an innovative global business strategy for the company. The winner was the University of Hong Kong, which became the MIBC’s first repeat winner.

Read More…

When: Monday, Nov. 9 from 6:30 pm - 8:30 pm
Where: Atrium, 10th Floor of the LBJ Library and Museum: 2313 Red River Street
Contact: Sarah McCracken
Registration: Future Forums Registration

Join us on Nov. 9 as we present Evan Smith and Fred Zipp in conversation on the new age of journalism. They will be exploring trends among traditional and digital media.

Evan Smith is CEO and Editor in Chief of the Texas Tribune, a new non-partisan public media organization. Smith was until recently the President and Editor in Chief of Texas Monthly.

Fred Zipp has spent 25 years in daily newspaper journalism, the last 11 with the Austin American-Statesman. He currently serves as the Editor. He began his career in Beaumont and has also worked in West Palm Beach. Read More…

From ABC News

In response to families across the country searching for ways to reduce expenses, ABC News provides “10 Ways to Go Away Without Going Broke.” One of these ways highlights a venture by McCombs Enterprises, Smarty Pig.

Be Social: Want to make it easy for Grandma and Uncle John to contribute to your vacation fund? Consider opening an account at SmartyPig, an online piggy bank where you can set a savings goal and target date. While you save, your money earns interest in a FDIC-insured financial institution to the tune of 3.25 percent APR, one of the most competitive rates in the country. And if you decide to make your goal public — you can even post a widget to your Facebook or MySpace page — your friends and family can also make donations.

Almost one in five SmartyPig customers are saving for a travel goal, according to Mike Ferrari, the company’s co-founder and COO. “In fact,” says Ferrari, “I have two kids, and my wife and I are saving on SmartyPig for two trips right now.”

For the full article, please visit ABC News.

This guest article was written by Adrienne Carlson, who regularly writes on the topic of online executive mba programs. Adrienne welcomes your comments and questions.

It’s no exaggeration when I say that nine out of ten people are nostalgic about the time they spent in school and/or college. They tend to call them “the best days of their lives.” That’s not to say that their current situation is bad; it only goes to prove that those days when you had no real responsibilities other than to make good grades and stay out of trouble are evergreen in your mind because you were young, carefree and ready to embrace life with a passion. We gain so much more than just an education from our school and college, so it is imperative that we try to give as much back. The term alma mater is reason enough, but if you need further motivation to give back to your school or college, read on:

• Alumni play a large role in determining the future and continued development of an institution.
• Your donations go a long way to support scholarships for deserving students who are short of funds.
• You are giving back to more than just your alma mater in this case; you are also helping someone gain a valuable asset, a quality education. Read More…
  Share and Enjoy:

  • 
  • 
  • 
  • 
  • 
  • 

From Newsweek

It’s been eight years since Enron collapsed into bankruptcy, but memories linger in corporate boardrooms, where directors are charged with preventing a reprise of the self-dealing and accounting scandals that sunk the energy company. It’s a set of responsibilities William Powers understands well: before becoming president of the University of Texas in 2006, Powers—a lawyer and professor—was tapped by Enron’s board to lead a special investigation to determine what went wrong and why. In the latest of his series of interviews as part of Newsweek’s partnership with the Kaplan University M.B.A. program, Newsweek chairman Richard M. Smith spoke with Powers about Enron’s impact.

Read excerpts from the interview or watch the full video interview.

From McCombs Today

Assistant IROM Professor Rafael Mendoza-Arriaga received the 2009 Nemhauser Doctoral Dissertation Prize for his paper “Unified Credit-Equity Modeling.” The award is given to the best doctoral dissertation in Industrial Engineering and Management Sciences (IEMS) at Northwestern University.

“Being recognized with an award named after Professor Nemhauser is a great honor that carries with it the great responsibility to produce excellent research during the academic career that I have just started at McCombs,” says Mendoza-Arriaga, who joined the McCombs faculty this fall. ”I hope to contribute much more to the quantitative finance group in the near future. Read More…

From McCombs Today

The Wall Street Journal, October 20, 2009

A recent column in the Wall Street Journal, headlined “When Bad Luck is a Crime,” uses research coauthored by Andrew Henderson (right), associate professor of management.

Excerpt: When it comes to cheering CEOs, booing them or throwing them in jail, a consideration that ought to be nagging is whether we’re reacting to luck or design. Ken Lay, to cite a notorious example, was prosecuted not for the sins that brought down Enron, but for failing to tell investors the company was predestined to fail even as he tried to save it….

How much more fun, when dealing with circumstances like these, to play the after-the-fact-know-it-all, naming heroes and villains with the confidence afforded by the rear-view mirror. Bad enough is when journalists give unreflective vent to this urge, but unhealthy for society is when prosecutors do it. Read More…