Written by Megan Tran-Olmsted
Professor Ram Ranganathan has travelled throughout the globe on various career expeditions. While he began his career in his home country of India, Professor Ranganathan has settled in the U.S. in various states to pursue his passions, exploring the intersectionality of the science of strategy, business management, and finally, academia.
Professor Ranganathan teaches the Business Honors Capstone class – Management 374/H. This class is one of the final BHP classes that students take during their time at UT. Professor Ranganathan says that this class is particularly insightful because it is not just another class where students learn a single subject. Instead, he believes that this class serves as a bridge between all the classes that students have taken – exploring how finance, accounting, marketing, and supply chain all work together to create successful businesses. Students are assigned to explore a single business of their choice, analyzing how business decisions made in various aspects of the company have contributed to the company’s success or the company’s failure.
Dr. Ranganathan says that a career in academia is unlike so many other careers. He is able to contribute to knowledge creation and knowledge dissemination. He says that he is able to create knowledge through the extensive research that he conducts with colleagues at McCombs, and he is also able to disseminate this knowledge unto others through the classes he teaches. Teaching is something special, says Professor Ranganathan. Not only does he get to interact with a younger generation of bright, insightful students, but he also gets to learn from students as they often challenge his research ideas, strengthening his work.
Professor Ranganathan joined The McCombs School of Business after finishing his Ph.D. in Strategic Management at The Wharton School at The University of Pennsylvania. Prior to making the switch to academia, Professor Ranganathan worked for Deloitte as a strategy consultant in California. This job was particularly stimulating for Ranganathan since he had received his a dual-undergraduate degree in computer science and computer engineering, allowing him to contribute to problem-solving for some of the world’s largest technology companies.
In addition to teaching, Ranganathan conducts research with The University of Texas, focusing on how companies adapt to technological changes, looking at company responses and the factors that enable companies to control the evolution of technology. One of the main reasons that Professor Ranganathan chose to come to UT after finishing his Ph.D was because of the excellence of the research department, coupled with the strong culture, focus on professor retention, and the bright students.
If you want to get to know Dr. Ranganathan better, but need some conversation starters, consider asking him the about the following topics:
- His travel aspirations (He travelled to 5 countries this summer alone!)
- What he likes to do in his free time (Hint: he’s an outdoorsman as long as it’s not allergy season)
- How him and his neighborhood cricket team are doing
- Some of his favorite books (He most recently read Justice, a book by Harvard Professor Michael Sandel, that discusses philosophy and the criminal justice system)
Stop by Professor Ranganathan’s office in CBA 4.234 on Tuesdays and Thursdays from 1:30-2:30PM to get to know him even better.