FEATURES

By AMY BIEMILLER

2012 Small Business Breakfast Series

March 14 – Taking Advantage of Today’s Favorable Tax Environment – Strategies to Enhance Business Profitability and Financial Security; Paul Salerno, Director of Financial Planning at Tax & Financial Group

May 9 – Building Your First Sales Team

To learn more about the Small Business Breakfast Series, go to http://bschool.pepperdine.edu/alumni/councils/oc/

Small businesses have big appetites for learning how to better manage the business of business. Now, the Graziadio Alumni Network (GAN) in Orange County is meeting that need for local small business owners, managers and nascent entrepreneurs – and provide a breakfast to boot – in a regular Small Business Breakfast Series on the Irvine campus.

“We recognized that a good portion of our constituents are either employed with, or have started a small to medium-sized business,” says MBA student Kris Carter, the Orange County alumni network’s director of small business outreach. “This observation, combined with increased awareness of this segment by the University, led us to initiate the program.”

Less a networking meeting and more a think-tank session over coffee, the Breakfast Series is open to anyone willing to pay the $15 fee and make the bright-and-early 7:30 a.m. start time. Attendees help themselves to breakfast goodies, then settle in for a presentation by a business leader or subject matter expert who delivers focused insight into specific areas that are important to business owners.

“Our speakers are subject matter experts who provide current, relevant information on topics that face a small business or entrepreneur,” explains Carter. “The greatest value is that attendees get access to individuals who have ‘been there, done that’ and can share what they learned through the process.” continue

FEATURES

By AMY BIEMILLER


If accounting is the language of business, Charles J. McPeak is an expert linguist. With 30 years of applied experience in the accounting field, McPeak has bridged industry to academia, bringing relevancy to the classroom for his MBA students of finance.

McPeak received his first taste of teaching more than two decades ago, when he taught a few courses at El Camino Community College while he was still a controller at Mattel.

“I fell in love with teaching. I told the dean that I wanted to teach full time and he told me ‘Wait until you are financially secure then drop out of industry and look for a teaching job.’” explains McPeak.

He followed that advice and started with Pepperdine as an adjunct professor in 1991. Since then, he has become a mainstay in the Graziadio School of Business and Management. His research interests center on the fields of earnings management, expensing stock options and the relationship of sustainability and financial performance. continue

RESEARCH

Insights from Small and Mid-Sized Private Businesses

For the second year, the Pepperdine Private Capital Markets Project and Graziadio School of Business and Management asked private business owners for their projections on how well the U.S. economy will perform. With over 99% of companies being privately-held, the American economy is dependent upon the success of these businesses. Lead researcher and associate professor of finance Dr. John Paglia queried business owners on such topics as confidence in their business growth prospects, hiring, job creation, impediments to U.S. gross domestic product, and government economic policies and their impact on business health in 2012.

The PDF report is now available. continue

FEATURES

By AMY BIEMILLER

For someone who thought a short stint in academia would be a stepping stone to another career, Dr. Terry Young has surprised herself with her tenure at Pepperdine.

“I came from the business world and wasn’t planning to stay long in academia,” she says. “But here I am, 27 years later, feeling very fulfilled.”

As a renowned economist with extensive knowledge about the global marketplace, Young also serves as a consultant on global sourcing and business startups. Such expertise has proved invaluable to her teaching in the Executive MBA program.

“I am fortunate to be able to apply my business experience to teaching. The greatest joy is being able to see a student understand a concept or principle I have taught and to apply it to their personal and business life,” she says. continue

FACULTY

Dr. Michael Crooke has been selected as one of North America’s Top 100 Thought Leaders in Trustworthy Business Behavior – 2012 by Trust Across America™, a think tank dedicated to unraveling the complexities of trustworthy business behavior. The former President and CEO of Patagonia Inc., Crooke is currently an assistant professor of strategy at Pepperdine University’s Graziadio School of Business and Management.

Crooke’s selection is based on his extensive and positive contribution to building trust in business. He coordinates the school’s new Certificate in Socially, Environmentally and Ethically Responsible (SEER) Business Practice Program and he teaches the capstone course on responsible business practice.

Crooke’s fellow recipients include leaders from the public and private sectors as well as authors, consultants, researchers and academics. Among the honorees are leadership titan and founding chairman of USC’s Leadership Institute Warren Bennis, Microsoft senior director of corporate citizenship Dan Bross, Fortune’s leading expert in corporate governance Ram Charan, Harvard professor and author Bill George, Harvard professor and a former business school dean Rosabeth Kanter, and Starbucks founder Howard Schultz, to name a few.

The Top 100 Thought Leaders represents the culmination of three years of research, said Trust Across America. Hundreds of nominations were received, and an extensive vetting process was undertaken. The list was reviewed by a group of independent judges and the final honorees were selected.