The spring 2024 semester brought a wide-ranging group of academic conferences to the Naveen Jindal School of Management. Researchers, scholars and practitioners came together to discuss research findings, share academic best practices and provide insights and expertise from various industry and professional fields. Among the events presented by the Jindal School were the 19th Annual Fraud Summit, the 18th Annual Frank M. Bass Frontiers of Research in Marketing Science (FORMS) Conference, the Fourth Annual Undergraduate Deans Conference and the Inaugural Academic Summit for Business Analytics.

The Jindal School also hosted the Personnel and Human Resources Research Group (PHRRG) Conference, which originated in 2007 and rotates among its member schools.

Stories Bring Fraud-Fighting Lessons to Life

Stories told at the 19th Annual Fraud Summit, presented by the Center for Internal Auditing Excellence (CIAE) at the Jindal School, drove home lessons about how to combat fraud, an evolving challenge further complicated by technological advances.

Dr. Joseph Mauriello, director of the CIAE and chair of the Fraud Summit, sees huge value for the event for attendees and the Jindal School.

“What brings people back every year is learning about something new,” said Mauriello, an associate professor of instruction in the Jindal School’s Accounting Area. “The topics hit on fraud but the auditors have new challenges every year. They can hone their investigation skills. Many frauds run together, so it’s thinking in a different vein. There is a lot of new advancement in cybersecurity threats, for example, and it’s hard to keep up with the times and changes in technology.”

A presentation by Leah Wietholter, CEO and founder of Tulsa, Oklahoma-based Workman Forensics, laid out two real-life fraud cases — “The Case of the Mancave” and “The Case of the Sneaky CFO” — in mystery-story style. She said the stories help accountants and internal auditors in understanding where the best evidence can come from.

“If there is a case of fraud at a company, I want to show them how to have vision and not just how to search for internal documents,” she said.

Wietholter believes there are multiple advantages to learning through these cases.

“We remember stories,” she said. “And if you don’t remember all of it, you’ll at least remember the person who told it. And then you have a resource to call up. Listen to stories, connect with stories; it will make you better.”

Early-Phase Marketing Insights

The Frank M. Bass FORMS Conference, named for the late Dr. Frank Bass, Eugene McDermott Professor of Management at the Jindal School who was often called The Father of Marketing Science, was held Feb. 23-24. Presenters offered analysis into an array of topics — from video games to AI to retail — providing a high-level arena for discussion. Attendees came from 59 universities in nine countries, including India and China. Dr. Sanjay Jain, O.P. Jindal Distinguished Chair and professor in the Jindal School’s Marketing Area and co-chair of the conference, was enthusiastic about the conference’s direction.

“The conference has grown much bigger over the years,” he said. “There were more than 130 submissions and people who come here form a high-quality group in terms of knowledge.”

Dr. Ram Rao, Founders Professor in the Jindal School’s Marketing Area, said that a major benefit of the conference lies in the presentation of work that is still in its early phases.

“Maybe some papers here are still not necessarily fully fleshed out,” he said. “But this is part of the point, to discuss and help someone’s research possibly. We are here to share. The world of marketing is proceeding with analytics but these researchers are bringing to bear something beyond number crunching. It’s taking on a new avatar in the digital space. You go to the supermarket and there might be an ad for a product, but how does it translate into the digital space? These are good questions to be asking.”

Undergraduate Deans Conference Focuses on Technology

At the Fourth Annual Undergraduate Deans Conference, held March 7-8, the theme was “Innovate to Elevate.” Attendees from 45 schools grappled with the problems and opportunities of a changing higher-education landscape, including technology.

Keynote speaker Ed O’Boyle, global practice leader at Gallup, well-known for its public opinion polls, noted that higher education has received lower marks in recent polls overall than in the past.

“We’re seeing an erosion in our confidence in the higher education that’s happening throughout the country,” he said.

Even so, it doesn’t mean the value of an education is highly doubted, he said.

“71 percent of people who are currently enrolled in bachelor degree programs say it is worth it to be in school,” he said.

In her presentation, “What Happens to Learning When Generative AI Can See, Hear, and Speak,” Dr. Haya Ajjan, associate dean of the Love School of Business at Elon University, stressed the importance of universities adopting artificial intelligence.

“There are a lot of ways in which we can adopt it and I think we have to adopt it,” she said. “Our students are going to join a workplace that is going to utilize this new technology.”

Dr. Dawn Owens, associate dean of undergraduate programs at the Jindal School and conference chair, said that since conference attendees often wear many different hats at their schools, one of the conference’s goals was to help shed some light on available opportunities that might otherwise be missed.

“We’re making sure we’re giving the students tools and resources by incorporating AI into the classroom,” she said. “However, AI can also be used outside the classroom for student services and advising. Some of us haven’t thought of these things as much, again, because we have so many different roles. Here we can share ideas to further elevate student success, on both the academic and academic-supporting sides.

A Changing Business-Analytics Field

Challenges that business analytics educators face and best practices for preparing students for success in the rapidly changing profession were the focus of the Inaugural Academic Summit for Business Analytics at the Naveen Jindal School of Management held Feb. 9-10. Conference chair Gaurav Shekhar, an assistant professor in the Information Systems Area at the Jindal School, said that regardless of which trends are being discussed concerning the field of business analytics, they all share related challenges.

“Having a group like this come together shows your willingness to discuss your challenges and share things you are doing that have worked,” he said.

The conference drew 95 attendees, representing 45 institutions of higher learning and nine companies. Dr. Hasan Pirkul, Caruth Chair and Jindal School dean, shared information about the school he leads and his background in IS.

“We have seen the transition that has taken place in business schools,” he said. “They have become more scientific. Now we are seeing AI and now the practice of business is changing drastically. Everything has to change and these students will be the leaders.”

In his presentation, “The New Age of Analytics Programs,” Dr. Ramesh Sharda of Oklahoma State University addressed future trends, curriculum and common components of success.

Sharda, the Chuck and Kim Watson Chair and vice dean for graduate programs and research, Regents professor of management science and information systems, and the ConocoPhillips Chair of technology management in the Spears School of Business at OSU, stressed the importance of a willingness of students to “learn how to learn”— to be willing to continually learn new skills as the analytics landscape evolves.

In addition to Shekhar, other organizers from the Jindal School were Dr. Prajakti Akarte, director of the Jindal School’s undergraduate Business Analytics program and an assistant professor in the Information Systems Area; and Dr. Vatsal Maru, an assistant professor in the Information Systems Area.

“We had a very good response,” Shekhar said. “For all of our analytics professors, we have the same programs and challenges. “There is a lot of value in coming together like this and working together and working to keep the light of analytics… alive.”

Akarte added that bringing business analytics leaders together offered a forum for discussing solutions to their challenges, finding answers to important questions, and “sharing ideas for the benefit ofnour students.”

Maru concluded by stating the inaugural conference is just a beginning.

“Forums like this can only grow from this point onwards,” he said.

Jindal School Hosts Personnel and Human Resources Research Group (PHRRG) Conference

Academics and practitioners gathered March 1-2 at the Jindal School to discuss groundbreaking research related to the field of organizational behavior and human resource management. Dr. Riki Takeuchi, the Dr. Joseph Picken Distinguished Professor in Innovation and Entrepreneurship at the Jindal School, organized the day-and-a-half long conference.

“The topics presented range from AI, assessment centers, dirty work, leadership, time and research methodologies,” said Takeuchi, a professor in the Organizations, Strategy and International Management Area, “but the highlight of the conference is the very active knowledge exchanges among the conference attendees, including the presenters.”

Takeuchi also spoke at the conference. His presentation — “Time After Time? Conceptualizations of Time in Organization Science” — explained his research investigating the possibility of synthesizing the different ways of looking at time.

“I am very early in the process of considering this idea and I am hoping you can provide some ideas to help me decide what my focus should be,” he told attendees. “In my limited search of the literature, there are different concepts of time, but no overarching concepts of what time is.”

Other topics discussed at the conference included various exercises used by assessment centers in job candidate evaluations and the ways they have evolved; whether being employed in so-called dirty jobs, including construction, garbage collecting, debt collection and exterminating impacts future employment or salaries; best practices in research methodology; AI; the CEO effect; mediating models; and shared leadership.

Takeuchi has been a member of the group since 2018 and has made presentations at the annual conference four times.

“I do this because I can present my research ideas in a very constructive and developmental atmosphere, even though the ideas may not be as refined as I would like them to be,” he said. “I always receive numerous well-intended comments and useful feedback from these well-established scholars in the field.”