At a Glance

Gary Johns (Management) has been named Hooker Distinguished Visiting Professor at the Michael M. DeGroote School of Business, McMaster University. As part of his November visit, Johns delivered a public lecture, “Opposed Signs, Reversed Causality, Curvilinear Relationships, and Extreme Base Rates: How Context Affects Organizational Behaviour.”

Ira Robinson (Religion) presented a lecture at the National Library of Canada in Ottawa on “Early Dilemmas of Jewish Orthodoxy in Canada: Rabbi Judah (Yudl) Rosenberg.”

Michel Despland (Religion) was the subject of an eight-page article in the October issue of the Religious Studies Review, published by the American Academy of Religion.

Congratulations to MBA student Donna Morris, who was recently given the 2003 John Molson MBA Outstanding Student Initiative Award for her leadership and community involvement. Donna held executive positions with the MBA Society, competed in case competitions, volunteered for charity fundraisers, and belonged to several external associations. At the same time, she worked as a marketing consultant and medical editor throughout her MBA.

Michel Laroche (Marketing) was the guest speaker in a seminar series, Leaders in Business Research and Practice, at Carleton University on Nov. 21. His talk was called “Acculturation and the Rise of the Global Consumer Culture.”

Murray Sang (Continuing Education) spoke at the Alafec General Assembly (Asociation LatinoAmericana de Facultades Y Escuelas de Contaduria Publica), held in Merida, Mexico, Nov. 12 to 15, on “Professional Career Programs in Canada, a Viable Option for Latin-American students.” In a note, he explained: “Cont Ed has agreements with UNAM university in Mexico City and the Yucatan. Each year they send us a number of their BComm students who do our short-term professional career certificates and receive credit for them from their universities. Hopefully, these numbers will continue to grow.”

Tadeusz S. Obuchowicz, VLSI/CAD specialist and part-time faculty member in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, has published a custom course pack with Pearson Custom Publishing. Titled “It's Only VHDL (But I Like It),” it is being used as one of the required texts in the COEN 313 course (Digital Systems Design II).

Bianca Grohmann (Marketing) received the Omer DeSerres Outstanding Paper Award at the 6th Retail Strategy and Consumer Decision Research Seminar of the Society for Marketing Advances in New Orleans. The paper, “It’s Beginning to Smell (and Sound) a Lot Like Christmas: The Interactive Effects of Ambient Scent and Music in a Retail Setting,” was co-written with Eric R. Spangenberg and David E. Sprott.

Christopher Ross (Marketing) and Linda Dyer (Management) were awarded Best Theoretical Paper at the 20th annual conference of the Canadian Council of Small Business and Entrepreneurship in Victoria, Nov. 5 to 7. The paper, “Advising the Small Business Client,” was presented at the conference by Professor Dyer.

Congratulations to Andrew McAusland, executive director of Instructional and Information Technology Services (IITS), who was named IT Executive of the Year by Computing Canada. The winner was chosen for project complexity, vision, impact on the organization and the leader’s ability to inspire and motivate employees. Over 200 applications were received for IT leaders from a variety of private sector organizations, as well as all levels of government. The article can be found in the Dec. 12 issue of Computing Canada or at www.itbusiness.ca

Isabelle Dostaler (Management), Ron Ferguson (Director, MBA) and William Averyt, MBA director of the University of Vermont, have created a course on strategy analysis run as a team competition over three intensive weekends in Vermont and Montreal.

Steven Appelbaum (Management) has had a paper, “The Case for Case Studies in Management Research,” accepted for publication in a special issue of Management Decision.

Karin Doerr (CMLL, Simone de Beauvoir) gave a talk about the great German-Jewish writer Heinrich Heine at the Jewish Public Library last fall.

David Ketterer (English, retired), honorary research fellow, University of Liverpool, was one of a number of voices making up Beware the Stare, an account of John Wyndham and The Midwich Cuckoos/Village of the Damned, adapted for radio, on BBC Radio 4 on Dec. 11. Ketterer and a colleague organized an event in London on July 10, 2003, celebrating the centenary of Wyndham's birth; it included the video appearance of Sir Arthur C. Clarke.