Spring 2020 MIS Advisory Board Meeting Minutes
Spring 2020 MIS Advisory Board Meeting Minutes in Athens
Discussions of Emerging Trends
Introduction– Hugh Watson and Lauren Stone
- Stone: MIS Advisory Board Student Representatives Introductions
- Watson: Explanation of the process of selecting student representatives
- Company representatives & faculty members introduce themselves around the room
Terry College of Business Update – Dean Ben Ayers
- Terry’s New Ranking
- 6 of 7 majors nationally ranked by U.S. News & World Report
- #12 among public business schools
- Facilities
- BLC now completed
- Half supported by the state, half provided by donors (companies and alumni)
- Completed expansion and renovation of 2nd floor of Terry Executive Education Center
in Atlanta
- 1st floor renovation (Summer 2020), 3rd floor renovation (Summer 2021)
- New and Expanded Programs
- Business minor
- Ability to impact more students across campus
- Terry wants to grow throughout the University
- Fintech Certificate
- 2nd FTMBA Cohort/STEM MBA
- Hiring and Appointments
- New Senior Directors for Development/ Alumni Relations, Marketing/ Communications,
Finance/Administration
- New Associate Dean for Research /Graduate Programs
- Hired for 15 faculty positions
- Executive Programs
- Out of Atlanta with leading companies
- Strategic Plan Development
- Finalized - Summer/Fall 2020
- Mission Statement of UGA’s Terry College of Business
- Overview of mission statement (what is important to Terry College of Business)
- Detailed Explanation of First Segment: Promoting Excellence in Teaching & Learning
- Key Themes: Leadership, Data & Communication skills, Sustainability, Change Management,
etc.
- Development & Alumni Relations
- Continued growth for Ten for Terry and Planned Giving Initiative
- $12.8M raised to date
- Thankful for more than just financial support
MIS Department Update– Maric Boudreau
- New faculty:
- Assistant Professors: Dr. Terence Saldanah, Dr. Mariana Andrade
- Lecturer: Dr. Karim Jetha
- Hiring in progress for one more position
- Part-Time Instructor in FinTech: Mr. Balaram Tidhi
- The MBT in the News
- Ranked No. 4 among all U.S. business schools (No. 17 last year!)
- More about FinTech Certificate
- Open to all UGA undergrads with GPA above 3.0
- Classes: Principles of Fintech, Fintech and Financial Services Law, Financial Technologies,
Internship in Fintech
- 64 Applicants, 61 from Terry
- MALC 2020
- April 2nd-4th 2020 in Athens, GA
- MIS department chairs from over 50 universities will be attending
- Panels, sessions, keynote speakers, debate, tailgate event
- Mainly focused on the topic of AI
- MALC 2020 Sponsors: Terry College of Business, Gartner
- 50 for 50 Campaign - 50th Anniversary of the MIS Program
- New fundraising initiative email sent to 4,923 MIS Alumni:
- $50 suggested to alumni who recently graduated
- $5,000 suggested to alumni with “high capacity”
- 500 suggested from remaining alumni
- Every donor giving a minimum of $50 will be mailed a special collectable MIS coin
- Undergraduate MIS Admissions
- Total Applied: 236, Total Accepted: 181
- Acceptance percentage is 77%, which makes MIS the most difficulty major to be admitted
in Terry
Student Organizations– Lauren Stone
- MIS Student Organizations
- Society for Management Information Systems
- Holds company information sessions
- Women in Technology
- Society for Cyber Security
- Society of Business Intelligence
- Terry Student Consulting
- MIS Student Advisory Board
- Organization Spotlight: Society for Cyber Security– Jackson Reid and Malan Anderson
- 60+ MIS and CS+ members
- Connect members with Cyber jobs
- Educate on digital self-defense
- Attend hacking competitions
- Contact: ugascs.com / ugascs@gmail.com
- One pager in booklet about each student organizations
MBT Program Update– Craig Piercy
- Online Master of Business and Technology Program
- 100% Online delivery since 2015
- Part-Time program reaching working adults all over GA and the US
- In two years, enrollment has doubled
- Improved Rankings
- #4 in Best Online Master’s in Business Programs
- Overall Score 96/100
- MBT Current Projects
- Nephrology Decision Support System, Terry College Sponsored Project Portal, UGA CTL,
Benson, Inc, SRCUS
- Take projects all the way from planning to implementation
- New course - MIST7516e: Advanced Topics of Business and Technology
- Current topics: Overview of FinTech, Blockchain, Machine Learning
- Capstone Project Cycle - February (2nd semester) to December (4th semester)
- Incorporating Cloud within curriculum
- Keep us in mind for:
- Student project opportunities
- MBT Class of 2020 Graduating this May
- cpiercy@uga.edu for any possible recruits
Discussion about Extending Offer Deadlines– Hugh Watson
- Discuss the rushed recruiting process from both the student and employer’s perspective
- Student’s Perspective - Malan Andersen (Student Representative)
- Completing an internship usually results in a full-time job opportunity
- The timeline can be very stressful to students being limited the opportunity to meet
other companies
- Company’s Perspective - Jennifer Rice (KPMG)
- Difficult to recruit for full-time positions without knowing which interns will accept
for full-time
- Companies expect students to decide what they are looking for during their summer
internship
- Offer deadline for KPMG is around September 15
- What is a company’s take on one of their interns networking with other companies who
are completing their internship? - Brandon Kim (Student Representative)
- Jennifer Rice (KPMG) response: they try to convert students to their company, but
realistically won’t always be 100%
- James Murrell (Anthem): gives perspective from a non-Big 4 company
- Try not to give a deadline to their interns to accept full-time
- Reserve positions for students who show interest and keep in close contact with them
- Sandeep Davalbhakta (State Farm):
- Reiterating what Murrell said - try to stay involved with the students on campus
- Bob Trotter (Garner):
- Garner’s perspective: If a student turns down an internship position, they’re not
eliminated for a full-time position. They will just be in a broader, competitive pool,
rather than a narrow internship-converted pool
- Perspective supported/ reiterated by John Holm (CGI) and Jarod Culbertson (EY
- Mark Huber (MIS Faculty):
- Suggested deadlines towards October 15 (after Career Fair)
- Students don’t necessarily want to change, they just want the opportunity to see what’s
out there
- It would do companies a favor as well because they would be getting students who are
certain of their choice
- The students do really want to work for your company, but they would like to discuss
with people in their life (parents, friends, etc.) before making a decision
- Lauren Stone (Student Representative):
- Suggesting one date for all of companies to implement for students to reduce stress/anxiety
with overlapping timelines
- Specifically for internships, since the process does start junior year
- Rob Goldberg (Deloitte):
- From a practitioner’s point of view, a single deadline is not realistic for companies
because it shifts a lot for the company
- Greg Daniel (Johnson Lambert):
- Believe that students who accept an internship should see themselves there full-time
Overview of the MIS Curriculum– Maric Boudreau
- Six required courses
- Technical-heavy, business-heavy, and a mix of both
- Recommended to complete the major in 4 semesters
- Area of Emphasis in Data Analytics
- Required: MIST 4610 - Data Management
- Additional required (3 of the following):
- MIST 5730- Advanced Data Management
- MIST 5620 - Business Intelligence
- MIST 4800 - Internship in Data Analytics
- MIST 4550 - Energy Informatics
- Area of Emphasis in Information Security
- Required: MIST 5640- IT Infrastructure
- Additional 3 required courses
- Mohamad Hadi (NCR): “Is there any discussion about considering one of the electives
as a required class?”
- Maric Boudreau: There has been discussion about the IT Infrastructure (a popular elective).
However, that may add to the timeline too much. There’s also an idea of merging two
courses into one.
- David Merry (IBM)
- Need more focus on cyber knowledge in courses
- Juliana Rafla (Student Representative)
- Information Security Management (MIST 5770) implements concepts from Business Process
Management and Project Management
- The case studies of different companies help get exposure to emerging technologies
and real business issues
- Lisa Favors (EY)
- EY is recruiting for more product managers, rather than project management
- John Holm (CGI)
- Although technical skills are important, problem-solving skills need to be kept in
the program because it incorporates into many areas of a business
- Malan Anderson (Student Representative)
- Even though we have a course solely based on emerging technologies, they are discussed
in 2-3 of our courses
Importance of Certifications–Hugh Watson
- Eric Rivard (Cerulium Corporation) & David Merry (IBM)
- Certifications are great, but don’t speak louder than actual experience like an internship
- Believe that a certification should be pursued after a couple of years of working
experience
- Sandeep Davalbhakta (State Farm)
- Reiterated the previous point, but especially with Cyber and Product Management certificates
- Jaime Davenport (Salesforce)
- Showing initiative by achieving a certification proves commitment, especially from
someone with limited experience
- Mohamad Hadi (NCR)
- Recommend certificates, or at least give the option to in courses
- Annie Jiang (KPMG)
- Good idea to start studying for these certificate exams early on in courses before
getting work experience
Trends That Will Impact MIS Education– Nominal Group Exercise
- Topic: What are some of the top technologies that we should incorporate into our courses?
- Each table discusses amongst themselves and vote the three top ideas
- Student representative at each table shares the top voted issue of the table
- Trends brought up
- Collaboration control tech
- Data: fusion, mobile, geo → regulations and privacy
- Product Management
- Design thinking: problem solving & strategy
- Cloud computing/ offerings
- Connect business value to IT - avoid silos
- Document writing requirements
- Compliance, security, ethics
- Analytics and automation
- Cyber security frameworks
- Blockchain applications and use cases
- IT assurance and auditing
- Total Results:
- Cloud Computing/ offerings
- Compliance, security, and ethics- GDPR, CCPA
- Analytics and automation/ use practical tools - RPA
- Connect business value to IT - avoid silos
- Design Thinking: Problem Solving and Strategy
Scholarship Awarding– Dr. Piercy and Hugh Watson
- Each donor is announced with the student receiving their scholarship
- A picture is taken of the donor representative and scholarship recipient(s)
- Corporation/ Organization Donors:
- Aflac, Brambles, CGI, Deloitte, EY, ISACA, KPMG, Moore Colson, NCR, Protiviti, PwC,
State Farm, Verizon Foundation, Hugh Watson Endowment
- Individual Donors:
- Mark Bryson, Terry Chase, Dennis and Nancy Cobb, Jay Ferro, Craig Fleisher, Steve
Follin, Patrick Gresham, Mark Mahoney, Bill Rajczak, Eric Rivard, Hugh Watson, Philip
Miles
- Pictures will be posted online
Minutes prepared by Esther Kim and Hugh Watson