Tag: Business Community

The Friends of Olin reception is one of the highlights of the year. It allows Olin to thank the many volunteers who help shape our students’ development. The event took place on May 12, a week before Commencement.

Dean Mark Taylor kicked off the event by thanking our guests for being judges, mentors, speakers, volunteers, advisory board members, and employers.

Over the course of the school year, nearly 2,000 individual volunteers provided insights and guidance to help students develop to their maximum potential.

More than 300 guest speakers shared their expertise in and out of the classroom, and over 125 companies networked with our students at our Meet the Firms events throughout the academic year.

Poets & Quants celebrated two of our BSBA students, Colton Calandrella and  Jessica Landzberg, and two of our MBA students, Markey Culver and Conn Davis, this year.

Todd Milbourn introduced our three featured speakers: Lillie Ross, BSBA’17, Professor Dan Elfenbein, and IBM’s Jerry Lis. Each speaker shared their perspective on the role and impact of Olin’s many friends.

Speakers: Dan Elfenbein and Lillie Ross.

Lillie spoke of mentorship and the meaningful relationship with a Friend of Olin that she developed her sophomore year and will last beyond her graduation.
Professor Elfenbein waxed poetic on the value of having classroom speakers who help illustrate the key learnings from his class.

Jerry Lis shares from the heart how IBM is a Friend of Olin.

Finally, Jerry Lis spoke of how important it has become for IBM to have a strong relationship with Olin and how both his company and the University have benefited from the partnership. It was a beautiful afternoon and a great way to celebrate our corporate partners and their help in creating the Olin experience.

Special thank you cookies for Friends of Olin.

©Photo by Jerry Naunheim Jr.

Leaders in the financial industry appreciated Professor Xiumin Martin’s presentation of her paper Internal Information Asymmetry, Internal Capital Markets, and Firm Value at the December 9, 2014 Praxis luncheon.  A lively Q&A session ensued.

Bloomberg Businessweek ranks Olin Business School at Washington University in St. Louis #4 in Intellectual Capital (the volume of faculty research published in top business journals), among the best business schools in the country.

“Praxis” is the application of theory or ideas, and it’s the name of our annual publication that features faculty research that is relevant to business managers today. Research put into practice is at the heart of the collaborative relationship between Olin Business School and our Corporate Partners. Let’s work together to make business better.

Read Olin Praxis here and watch this video of Prof. Martin talking about her research on information asymmetry.

Contact Dorothy Kittner for more information at kittner@wustl.edu or 314-935-6365.

Wow!  Olin’s faculty members are doing some amazing research.

At our first Praxis luncheon this year, Professor Andrew Knight presented his research on how to effectively lead teams with diverse values.

Most of us think of diversity in terms of demographics, or skill sets.  Professor Knight and his team found that we really need to be thinking about diversity of values – because teams with similar values need to be managed much differently than teams with differing values, in order to maximize team performance.

When team members’ values differ, there is a high risk of conflict.  Managers of these teams can either provide structured, task based leadership, or they can provide person-focused leadership.  Professor Knight found that when managers provided task-focused leadership, teams with a high values variance vastly outperformed (and with less conflict) similar teams receiving person-focused leadership.

When team members’ values were similar, both leadership styles resulted in good performance, although the person-focused managers had slightly better outcomes.

This research is truly relevant to business, across all industries and functions, and certainly has changed the way I look at diversity in teams!

Murray Weidenbaum, Richard Mahoney, and Andrew Knight

The Praxis luncheon series was designed to help put the relevant, cutting-edge research of Olin’s faculty in the hands of business leaders who can apply its findings to benefit their own organizations.

Sponsored by Olin’s Distinguished Executive in Residence, Richard J. Mahoney, the luncheon series is part of a broader effort to foster meaningful, mutually beneficial interaction between Olin’s faculty and the corporate community.

Read a summary of Prof. Knight’s research paper in the new issue of Praxis: Research that Impacts Business.