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Kelley Business Economics & Public Policy

Faculty Spotlight: Aaron Kolb

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Aaron Kolb worked in the finance industry for a few years before going to Duke for his Ph.D. He was thrilled to join the IU BEPP faculty in the summer of 2016—his first academic job.

At IU, Kolb teaches a Ph.D. class on economic modeling and an undergraduate game theory class.

“My research focus is on applied economic theory, and I am especially interested in studying strategic behavior in long-run interactions and strategic communication,” says Kolb.

One of his most recently completed papers was a joint effort with several coauthors, including BEPP colleagues, Marilyn Pease and Dan Sacks.

“We studied students’ decisions to disclose or not disclose their course grades under uncertainty about those grades,” says Kolb, who is currently working on a project with other coauthors about stake-building and price manipulation by activist shareholders.

Kolb has enjoyed working in this field for a number of reasons. On the research side, he loves collaborating to solve difficult problems and eventually seeing work get published. On the teaching side, nothing is better than when a student approaches him about connections they’ve made between his game theory class and things they’ve observed in the real world.

Kolb and his wife, Jennifer, have been married for 11 years. They have three daughters: Sophie (8), Abigail (6), and Hailey (4). During the pandemic, Kolb bought a bike, which was not an easy endeavor as they were a hot commodity and tough to find!

“I have enjoyed that for exercise and for getting around town without paying exorbitant fuel prices,” he says. When he finds a little free time in a day, he usually spends it either exercising or improving his cooking skills. The family’s favorite getaway is to drive a couple of hours over to Ohio to enjoy the Kings Island amusement park, which this year is celebrating its 50th anniversary.

Aaron Kolb, a man with short cropped hair and wearing a blue dress jacket and white undershirt in a stripped tie.

Aaron Kolb, Assistant Professor

“My kids are just big enough now to start riding real rollercoasters,” says Kolb.

In the summer of 2019, Kolb went to a conference on the island of Ischia off the coast of Naples, Italy. Kolb was astounded by the natural beauty that surrounded him. It was a high, both personally and professionally, as he got to meet and discuss research with many other theorists from around the world. He had an equally rewarding experience in February 2020 when he was on vacation with his wife in Orlando and ran into two of his former Kelley students.

“We were about to board the Jurassic Park water ride when I saw them,” he says. “[We caught up, and] they seemed to be doing great in their careers, as BEPP majors are wont to do.”

Though traveling is fun, Kolb is always happy to come back home to Bloomington as he appreciates the cooperative academic atmosphere that is shared among both students and faculty. Plus, it’s nice to return to his piano. Not many people know this, but Kolb has played classical piano since he was ten years old.

“My favorite composers are Chopin and Rachmaninoff, but I enjoy most genres of music,” he says.

The other thing he has enjoyed is simply learning from life—both the good and the bad, the hard and the easy lessons.

“I think it’s best [not to seek] perfect advice and instead be willing to take more calculated risks,” says Kolb. “Ultimately, I think we learn best from our own experience.”

 

BEPP 2022 Letter from the Chair

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portrait photo of department chair, Jeff Prince, in a black coat and buttoned collared shirt.

Jeff Prince, Harold A. Poling Chair in Strategic Management

 

Dear BEPP Community,

I am thrilled to write to you again as a kick-off and welcome to our annual department newsletter and blog!

The BEPP department consists of high-caliber economists working within a top business school.  As such, our primary purpose is to bring the rigor and critical thinking inherent in economic modeling and econometric analysis to important business and policy questions and challenges.  Recognizing our role, the purpose of this newsletter is to highlight how BEPP faculty, students and alumni have served this purpose over the past year.

Throughout our blog, you’ll find: an in-depth look at select faculty, a detailed discussion of our upcoming course on Digital Economics for Business, summaries of key BEPP activities, discussion of BEPP faculty involvement in Vietnam and Turkey initiatives, BEPP program highlights, BEPP club activities and engagements, and a BEPP alum spotlight.

Of course, there is much more to BEPP than what we can summarize in our newsletter or webposts.  So, if you haven’t already, please join the hundreds of BEPP friends who now follow us on Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/KelleyBEPP/), and if you’re a BEPP alum, please join our LinkedIn group (https://www.linkedin.com/groups/4347267) to not only learn about the department but also stay connected with fellow BEPP grads.

I like to conclude these newsletters with a thought that highlights general BEPP skills within a current context.  As I mentioned in last year’s newsletter, a major topic du jour is the alleged market power of so-called Big Tech firms, such as Apple, Google, and Facebook.  This issue has only increased in prominence, and we are seeing scrutiny of mergers and alleged market power by the government across a wide swath of the economy.  Of course, in this age of political divisiveness, opinions vary widely on the wisdom of this increased scrutiny, ranging from it being inadequate to it being excessive.  An important element in this debate is the long-running use of what’s known as the consumer surplus standard in evaluating market harm.  Put (overly) simply, in evaluating a merger, we ask whether we expect consumers to be better or worse off after the firms combine operations.  BEPP faculty, in their research and teaching, ask questions like: What are the merits of a consumer surplus standard?  What alternatives might a government use in evaluating a merger or other firm conduct?  How does one estimate harm, or benefits, to consumers when firms merge?  Answers to these and related questions can have profound impacts on the set of firms and ultimately the goods and services in various marketplaces around the world.

Please enjoy this installment of our blog, and as friends of BEPP, please don’t hesitate to stay in touch and stop by any time you’re back in B-town – we’d love to see you!

 

Sincerely,

Jeff Prince

Harold A. Poling Chair in Strategic Management

Vietnam Initiative: A Global Knowledge Network

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The Vietnam Initiative (VNi) is a global network for research and training in development policy in Vietnam. Founded in 2010 by IU’s O’Neill School of Public and Environmental Affairs Professor Tran Ngoc Anh, the VNi is a large group of independent scholars, who organize regular seminars and conferences in Vietnam. Andreas Hauskrecht, Clinical Professor of Business Economics at Kelley’s BEPP Department, is the co-director of the initiative, along with SPEA Professor Kerry Krutilla.

On the research side, VNi regularly conducts policy analyses requested by the Vietnamese policymakers. These analyses are carried out by research associates from more than 40 major universities and international institutions across the U.S. and around the world. The VNi is a Think-Tank of 60 scholars worldwide who are passionate and knowledgeable about Vietnam, including professors from Indiana University, the University of New South Wales, Duke University, RMIT, Cambridge University, Harvard University, and IPAG Business School Paris.“We’re providing educational services for the Vietnamese public sector and also providing research and advice for the government,” says Hauskrecht.

The World Bank has given a loan of $460M to the three biggest universities in Vietnam—the National University of Hanoi, the National University of Ho Chi Minh City, and the University of Danang. While Hauskrecht and his associates are working directly with those three universities, they are not the only universities because the big three actually host other universities, making them like an umbrella organization. This means that, in total, IU is working with 24 universities in Vietnam. The idea is to grow those universities in modern autonomous universities so that what they teach is politically independent and increasingly financially independent.

“The Vietnamese government does not use loan money for technical assistance,” says Hauskrecht. “They use loans only for hardware, which includes buildings and labs.”

Vietnam Conference in 2021

Vietnam Conference in 2021

When the World Bank gives a big loan, it’s common that they find a national donor who gives a grant for technical assistance. In this case, funded by USAID, the Partnership for Higher Education Reform (PHER) is a five-year initiative to modernize Vietnam’s leading universities and strengthen Vietnam’s higher education system in alignment with USAID’s Higher Education Program Framework. USAID gave a grant for $14.2M for five years.

“This is one of the biggest grants that IU has received in that field,” says Hauskrecht. “Although it’s a program with a complicated structure, we have four pillars to make it simple.”

The first pillar is governance, which includes quality assurance, management systems, and IT systems for the university. This main pillar has 12 sub-objectives. The second pillar is teaching & programs.

“We want to help them develop world-class curricula for different schools and programs,” says Hauskrecht, noting that they potentially also want to work in the direction of having joint programs with the Kelly School of Business and the O’Neill School of Public and Environmental Affairs.

The third pillar is research as they want to help the Vietnamese researchers with contacts in the U.S—with mentors to publish in international refereed journals.

“We’ve built seven Vietnam International Academic Networks (VIANs) where US-based academics work with Vietnamese counterparts,” says Hauskrecht, who is the only one out of two non-Vietnamese academic coordinators of the VIANs. Nevertheless, he continues to meet with a teacher to improve his Vietnamese speaking skills.

“When it comes to language, you have to practice with the guy at the bar or the taxi driver, and COVID made that difficult, but I’m improving,” he says.

The fourth pillar is linkages, which is essentially the connection between the universities and the private sector.

According to a report called “Vibrant Vietnam: Forging the Foundation of a High-Income Economy”

launched by the World Bank in May 2020, Vietnam’s goal is to become a high-income economy by 2045.

Hauskrecht has been working in Vietnam since 1991 in various advisory roles.

“I’ve worked for five different Prime Ministers and six Central Bank governors,” says Hauskrecht. “In fact, I’m so old that the current Central Bank governor is my former student!”

In July 2022, Indiana University had a conference in Vietnam that put PHER on the map in terms of leaders meeting leaders. Roughly 30 experts from IU, plus 120 Vietnamese experts and a couple dozen ambassadors and VN politicians, participated. One of the keynote speakers was former IU provost Lauren Robel. Other key IU players in attendance included Munirpallam Venkataramanan, the former executive VP for finance and development, and Terry Mason, former Dean of the School of Education. In addition, Hannah Buxbaum, Vice President for International Affairs and Ash Soni, Interim Dean, Kelley School of Business, were attending the conference.

This fall and spring 2023, Hauskrecht and his team will host 5 groups of Vietnamese leaders and key administrators from the three Vietnamese universities at IU in Bloomington. Then in 2023, they start the implementation in Vietnam. In his 31 years of working with VNi, Hauskrecht has been to Vietnam about 150 times.

“It almost feels like home,” he says.

In Hauskrecht’s opinion, PHER comprises all the strengths of IU.

“This is an enormous international outreach opportunity for Indiana University,” says Hauskrecht. “PHER is a wonderful way for IU to have an impact on the educational system of another country.”

Turkish Initiative: Offering Projects & Programs

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About five years ago, the President of IU, the Dean of the Kelley School, and the Associate Dean of Kelley visited Turkey to see what opportunities might exist for a collaboration. In 2017, Kerem Cakirer, BEPP senior lecturer, began working with the Turkish Initiative, serving as director.

The goal of the Turkish Initiative is to form relationships between Turkish universities and IU Kelley.

“We’d like to initiate some programs such as online progress, dual degrees, exchange programs or maybe even recruiting Turkish citizens to the U.S. and have MBA or even undergraduate students here,” says Cakirer. “That’s the goal, but it’s still a progressive thing.”

Cakirer and his team worked simultaneously on three different projects at three Turkish different universities: KOC University, TOBB University, and Izmir Ekonomi University. The first is an exchange student program, the second is a dual MBA program, and the third is an online MS program.

“The MBA students will take some of their electives online from IU, and if they would like to continue the MS program, they can count those electives as credits and continue their MS online program in Kelley,” says Cakirer.

Kerem Cakirer in a black suit and blue tie posing for a profile image

BEPP Senior Lecturer Kerem Cakirer

That plan went on for three years. During that time, Cakirer recruited 20 students, the maximum number of students allowed to enroll each year. They continued their study in Turkey but could take MS programs as well.

“The main goal was to expand IU’s presence in Turkey,” says Cakirer, noting that IU has other programs in England, Korea, China, India, and Eastern Europe as well.

This year IU started the initiative again with Sena and Seda Durguner, two Turkish colleagues of Cakirer’s who work in Kelley’s Finance Department. Cakirer, Sena and Seda started working on new projects with the full support of the Dean’s office.

“As Kelley Business School, we are looking forward to improving our partnership with Koc University, one of the most reputable universities in Istanbul, Turkey,” says Sena and Seda. “With this initiative, our goal is to provide a global experience where students get the opportunity to learn more about different cultures and establish life-long professional networks outside their domestic country. We are hoping this initiative will help Turkish students to network in the U.S. and Kelley students to network in Turkey.”

Following the COVID pandemic, the market for online programs has grown.

“Kelley is number one in offering the MBA and MS programs online, making this a perfect pairing,” says Cakirer.

New Faculty Spotlight: Thomas Youle

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Thomas Youle grew up in Rockville, Maryland, and got his undergraduate degree at Albion College in Albion, Michigan. He spent his last year of college studying at the London School of Economics prior to attending graduate school at the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis. His dissertation was on the market manipulation of the LIBOR benchmark interest rate. While at the University of Minnesota, Youle found a mentor in Pat Bajari.

“His energy and use of cutting-edge research was very formative,” says Youle, who hopes to provide the same positive influence for his students. “I want to be an effective teacher and resource at Kelley.”

Thomas Youle, wearing blue framed glasses in a black white and wearing a blue tie.

This fall at IU, Youle will teach Predictive Analytics for Business Strategy and Money, Banking and Capital Markets.

“I hope to bring cutting-edge empirical and statistical research into the classroom, exposing students to the exciting developments and case studies in economics and business,” says Youle, who plans to invite distinguished alumni into the classroom to guest lecture so that they can connect with students and bring real-world insights to supplement the course material.

“In time,” he says, “I hope to be a part of the superb workshop system at Kelley.”

He was interested in joining the BEPP faculty for a number of reasons, which included the people, the atmosphere, and the school’s stellar reputation.

“Several of my graduate school classmates were faculty here,” says Youle. “Plus, Kelley is a fantastic business school, and Bloomington is a great place to live!”

Youle and his wife, Jenni, have a two-year-old daughter named Elizabeth and are expecting another girl this summer. In his free time, he enjoys gardening and playing strategy board games. He also is a huge bookworm.

“There’s never enough time to read all the books I would like to,” he says.

He used to volunteer to teach college courses in correctional facilities in New York, which was work he found very rewarding. At some point in the future, he hopes to resume volunteering at correctional facilities here in Indiana.

For now, he’s having fun getting acclimated.

“My wife and I are loving Bloomington,” he says. “What a wonderful town.”

IU Welcomes Severin Borenstein as Featured Speaker for the Bonser Lecture

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In February 2020, BEPP and the IU O’Neill School of Public and Environmental Affairs hosted its annual Bonser lecture series. Its namesake, Charles Bonser, is a well-known academic and influential across both departments at IU. Andrew Butters, who helped organize this year’s lecture, says that the series creates an opportunity to bring in well-established thought leaders in the public policy space. Past speakers have included former heads of state, academics, and congressmen.

“It’s an eclectic group, but all individuals, each in their own respect, were able to bring a nice commentary to an issue of public policy,” says Butters. This year’s selection was Severin Borenstein, a full professor at the Haas School of Business at California Berkeley. He spoke about climate change and how to think about the role of energy and public policy implications.

“He discussed how we might think about a path going forward. He’s the perfect person to talk about these issues given his accomplishments,” says Butters, noting that Borenstein has sat on the boards of several major public utility commissions.

“He’s just this really nice balance of someone who has demonstrated himself to be a leader on the academic research side of things, yet he’s also been very involved in the public policy discourse,” says Butters. “I don’t think there was a member of the audience who thought both the content or the person delivering it was disconnected with how the world works or what’s at stake for these issues.”

Butter’s G492 student Nisha Kochar says that watching Borenstein’s lecture made it clear that while pricing greenhouse gases is a part of the climate change solution, it’s not the only component.

“If there is a continued focus on climate change research and greenhouse gas reductions, I believe that we will be able to get one step closer to limiting climate change and its impact on the planet,” says Kochar.

Butter’s G492 student Kirsten LoPrete says that listening to Borenstein’s lecture got her thinking, too.

“While I think making the earth cleaner and fighting to reduce climate change and greenhouse gas emissions will help all people by helping the planet, there are also short-term issues that need to be addressed along the way in order to not cause more harm in this effort,” says LoPrete. “It’s not just about finding the most economical way to cut emissions or playing into incentivizing the wealthy businesses that cause so much pollution. We also have to think about the communities that disproportionally suffer the effects of climate change and pollution.”

While Borenstein was originally slated to speak in the spring of 2020 and meet with faculty and other members of the IU community, COVID-19 changed all of that. As the pandemic evolved and it became clear early in the fall that life wouldn’t return to normal for quite some time, they got creative in how to make it happen in some way, shape or form.

“We wanted to make sure we still had the Bonser lecture given its importance,” says Butters. “We didn’t want to skip a year so we opted to go the webinar route.”

A videoconference photo of Boyoung Seo, Andrew Butterse, and Severin Borenstein.

Severin Borenstein participated in the Bonser Lecture via webinar.

Though it was unfortunate to not be able to hold the lecture in person, one upside to the virtual component was that the web event was recorded, which enabled students, faculty, and others to view later if they couldn’t watch it live.

“It was a nice topic and certainly an important one,” says Butters. “Borenstein spoke to a lot of timely, key issues on the energy side of things.”

The lecture was coincidentally timed around all of the turmoil that was going on in Texas.

“Borenstein spoke about the role of public policy and energy and how that can feed into inequality issues across different potentially disproportionately impacted communities,” says Butters. “He discussed how innovation, businesses and public policy institutions, and regulatory frameworks can be part of the solution.”

 

 

 

Alumni Spotlight

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In 2020, Laura Swedo graduated from the Kelley School of Business with a BEPP degree, having majored in economic consulting and co-majored in business analytics.

“I was always interested in economics, and the business economics courses were my favorite, along with econometrics and managerial economics,” says Swedo.

In one of her business analytics classes, they worked heavily in Excel until the department started to realize that it was wise to introduce students to programming languages.

“We did programming in R, and I thought it was so interesting because what took eight times longer in Excel could be done in two lines in R,” says Swedo, who was eager to learn more about the deeper backside of computers and analytics so she pursued a master’s degree in information systems. She graduated from the program in May 2021.During her time at IU, she appreciated the bonds she created with each one of her BEPP professors. Unlike finance and accounting majors with classes that are held in giant lecture halls, BEPP is one of the smaller majors with smaller class sizes.

“Connecting with professors means you feel more comfortable asking questions or going to office hours,” says Swedo. “IU is massive. Even the business school is massive so to find those connections in a smaller department is really cool.”

While at IU, Swedo was involved in a club called TAMID, which trains college students in finance and consulting skills. During the summer of 2018, Swedo travelled to Tel Aviv, Israel, for two months, interning for startups in industry.

Laura Swedo

 

“It was great to get that work experience in an entirely new culture and country where I didn’t know the people or the language,” says Swedo. “It was a cool opportunity to learn to adapt, and it was the most fun I’ve ever had in my life.”

Now addicted to Mediterranean food, Swedo loves falafels and gyros.

A Carmel, Indiana, native, Swedo’s favorite season is spring because each year after a harsh Midwestern winter, she welcomes that gorgeous 65-degree day that feels so perfect. In June 2021, however, she moved to Austin, Texas, to begin working it the IT department of General Motors as a software developer. She quickly learned that Texas summers are brutal.

“My place has an adorable patio, and I was so excited when I moved in because I thought it would be the perfect place to sit outside or have dinner, but it’s too hot during the day and the bugs are too atrocious during the night,” says Swedo, who hopes the patio can be her go-to spot when temperatures fall.

Swedo and her Cockapoo named Zoey, whom she calls “20 pounds of fluff and cuteness,” love to take walks and go hiking.

 

Laura Swedo with TAMID Group.

 

“I’m hoping to find some water around my new place because she likes to swim, especially in 95-degree heat,” says Swedo.

Though the last year has been challenging in so many ways, Swedo appreciates the new perspective she has gained from it all.

“I really do believe that you should take all the chances you have to see your friends and family because I think back to college when I put schoolwork before anything else and I feel like I missed a lot of great social opportunities,” says Swedo, who admits she often gave in to fatigue while in college, opting to chill out at home by herself and read a book or watch TV after a long day of classes rather than hang out with friends.

“The pandemic happened and all I wanted was to see people, go places, and do things, yet all I could do was be alone!” says Swedo. “I’ve learned to set aside time to catch up with a friend or see my parents. You can always make time for work, but connections and friendships will last forever.”

Faculty Spotlight: Matthijs R. Wildenbeest

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Matthijs R. Wildenbeest joined IU in 2007, right after earning his Ph.D. in Economics from Erasmus University in the Netherlands. He’s currently teaching Business Econometrics in the undergraduate program and Predictive Analytics for Business Strategy in the online MBA program. In recent years, he’s also taught Predictive Analytics for Business Strategy in the residential MBA program and Business Econometrics in the online MBA program. Prior to that, he taught Managerial Economics in the undergraduate program and Economics for Managers in the online MBA program.

Wildenbeest, who was appointed a Weimer Faculty Fellow for his research contributions and invited to be a keynote speaker at an international conference in his field, has a number of papers in which he studies consumer search behavior.

“To what extent consumers are searching for product characteristics and prices is important for the competitiveness of markets,” says Wildenbeest. “If consumers compare prices at many different retailers when searching for a particular product, this will put downward pressure on prices.”

In several of his papers, Wildenbeest has developed empirical methods to measure search costs in markets such as those for books, electricity, and cars. In addition to search, he’s also currently working on pricing in digital markets. In one such project, he’s studying how the use of algorithmic pricing affects competition on platforms.

Matthijs Wildenbeest

“More and more sellers on platforms such as Amazon Marketplace have outsourced their pricing decisions to third-party firms that use artificial intelligence to determine what prices are optimal, and there is currently a debate about whether these algorithms can learn to work together to set higher prices,” says Wildenbeest. “In our paper, we look at what simple rules a platform can use to make it more difficult for algorithms to collude.”

One of the most rewarding aspects of his job is seeing the impact of his research—for instance, when it has had an impact on policy decisions or an impact through citations in other journal articles.

Wildenbeest and his spouse Phuong have two children: Esmee (9) and Liam (6), as well as two guinea pigs and three fish. In his free time, he enjoys running and usually participates in the Indianapolis Mini-Marathon annually. He’s also run the Indianapolis Marathon in 2014 and the Amsterdam Marathon in 2016.

“Bloomington is a great place to live,’ says Wildenbeest. “Despite being a small town, there’s a wide variety of restaurants, cultural activities, and lots of things to do for the kids. We like to be outdoors, and I found it pretty amazing how many trails there are, which is great for running and biking.”

The family also likes to travel, and since he and his wife both grew up in the Netherlands, they typically go back once a year to visit family and friends. Before they had kids, they once made a one-month, round-the-world trip that took them to Europe, Asia, Australia, and back to the U.S.

Though the pandemic caused everyone to press pause on travel, Wildenbeest made the best of the situation by exploring in and around the Hoosier state.

“We found that it’s not always necessary to travel far,” says Wildenbeest. “For instance, we have learned that Indiana has many great State parks. We’ve visited a number of them in the past year.”

He looks forward to attending IU basketball games again and still recalls the first time he stepped inside Assembly Hall for a game.

“In Europe college sports are not very common and certainly not practiced at the level of the NCAA, so I was quite impressed by the whole experience, including the size of the stadium and the dedication of the fans,” says Wildenbeest. “When we have someone over from Europe, we try to take them to see a game because it’s such a unique experience!”

Course Spotlight: G316 Sustainable Enterprise

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“Sustainability means change,” says Steven Kreft, who teaches the undergraduate G316 course called Sustainable Enterprise. It follows the book Getting Green Done by Auden Schendler, which was written in 2009 and focuses on the barriers that block the business case for sustainability.

“The status quo of business is not sustainable in its present form so change of objectives, change of operations, and changes in the business model are needed,” says Kreft. “To change, barriers have to be overcome.”

The unique aspect of the Sustainable Enterprise class is that the students drive one-half of the content. The class meets twice a week. Kreft teaches one day, developing the themes that are present in the book, which offers a 2009 perspective. During the second class meeting, the content is controlled by the students who motivate the book themes through current business news events, providing a present-day perspective. This back-and-forth between the 2009 and present-day perspectives enables the students to examine what has and has not changed. They then analyze what barriers have been overcome to create change or what barriers are still in place to prevent change.

To generate the current business news topics, students submit a weekly article analysis where they are directed to find points of similarity or points of contrast with the relevant book chapter that is spotlighted that week. The five students with the most thought-provoking analysis are then chosen to lead the student-controlled class meeting of the week. Each of the student debate leaders’ analysis is posted to the class ahead of time, and the student leader is given 15 minutes to run their part of the class debate. The debate topics and leaders change every 15 minutes throughout the class period.

Steven Kreft image of a man in a blue business suit on a white background.

Students love that aspect of the class and as a result, the engagement level is always amazingly high, even during a pandemic.

“Last year when we went online, I was worried that I would lose some of them, but I regularly had all 40 students engaged in Zoom,” says Kreft. “They were all wired in.”

This individual content creation is an advantage for the students as they can tailor their article analysis to their personal interests and to developing their professional perspective within their core major. G316 is a required course in the Sustainable Business co-major attracting students from all different core majors in and outside of Kelley. Through the article analysis, students can customize their examination of sustainable business and channel their desires for unique experiences and perspectives.

“This format allows students to explore their passions in the area of sustainable business,” says Kreft, noting that there is no cookie cutter way to do sustainable business. “It’s got to be tailored. It’s got to be customized. It’s got to be applied in the situation.”

The class project is always geared to making arguments for change towards sustainable business. The current class project is positioned around the students writing an Op Ed that is targeted at publication in The Conversation. The students are given a baseline of research results that were generated by the previous semester’s G316 students that worked with the IU Environmental Resilience Institute to study Indiana business sustainability practices.

“The current task is to supplement the existing student research with their own perspective and framing in order to generate a thought-provoking, timely, and influential Op Ed,” says Kreft. In order to improve the student’s written communication skills, journalism expert Elaine Monaghan, from the IU Media School, collaborates with the class. At the end of the semester, the team with the strongest Op Ed, as voted by the class, works with Kreft to submit for publication consideration in The Conversation.

“This effort to publish will attempt to take student-led content creation beyond the class and into the public discourse on sustainable business,” says Kreft.

Faculty Spotlight: Francesco Marchionne

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The first time Francesco Marchionne came to Bloomington, he was introduced to Indiana’s fickle Midwestern weather. It was Feb 28, 2014, and temperatures were pleasant and warm. The following day, however, it started snowing and didn’t stop for three days. Being Italian, the stark temperature changes were a definite shock—especially when the cold snap lasted through mid-April.

“The experience stressed how Bloomington changed my life completely,” says Marchionne. “It was a new beginning so I thought, ‘Let it snow, let it snow!’”

Marchionne received his Ph.D. in Economics in Ancona, Italy, in 2006. After working at the University of Ancona (now Marche P. University) until 2012 as a teaching/research assistant, he landed a permanent position as a senior lecturer at the Nottingham Trent University in the UK. Marchionne came to IU as a visiting BEPP researcher from February to August 2014. He then joined IU as a lecturer a year later. He was promoted to Senior Lecturer in April 2021.

Through the years, Marchionne has taught a number of different courses: Macroeconomics, Statistics, ICT economics, Economics of Tourism, Microfinance, Introduction to Finance, International Finance, Economic Development, Economic Analysis of Global Issues, Money Banking & Capital Markets, European Integration, the US in a global economy, International Monetary Systems & Hedging.

“Due to this background, I developed a holistic approach to economics,” says Marchionne, whose teaching focuses on understanding complex situations and developing critical thinking skills.

“In my view, micro and macro are only categories created for teaching purposes, but the divide is blurred in the real world. Hence, I easily switch the viewpoint and cross the red line between micro and macro in my courses,” says Marchionne, who is the advisor for BEPP Club, Scholars Without Borders Club, and Global Macro Trading Club. He also organizes two case competitions for students a year: the FED Challenge and the State of Indiana Challenge.

One of Marchionne’s online Kelley Direct MBA students—a manager of a large multinational company—once spent the day before a $2-billion contract presentation working on one of Marchionne’s assignments.

Headshot of Francesco Marchionne in a black suit.

BEPP Professor Francesco Marchionne.

“He told me, ‘Macroeconomics is much more interesting and useful than selling aircrafts,’” says Marchionne. Or perhaps Marchionne is just a great teacher. He has, after all, been nominated twice for the Innovative Teaching Award and twice for the Service Award.

Marchionne, who is married with three children, studied music for 20 years. In his free time, he enjoys playing piano, learning about history, enjoying fine arts, and scuba diving. He also likes good food and wine, in particular Italian ones.

“This doesn’t include macaroni & cheese, pasta alfredo, spaghetti with meatballs, or similar things that do not exist in Italy,” notes Marchionne, who prefers fish to meat and white wine to red.

After working at IU for several years, Marchionne has amassed many fond memories, but one of the best was the first time he brought his G272 students to Italy.

“I started the course with 24 students not knowing one another and barely having visited one foreign country in their life,” he says. “I finished with a group of close friends, of which many decided to enroll for the Study Abroad Program. Others rented a house together the following year. That experience changed their life.”

And speaking of life changes, the past year has been a doozy for us all. With the challenges and limitations, however, also came clarity and perspective. It taught Marchionne that he’s more social than he realized.

“I missed social interaction and freedom of movement, and although I’m perfectly comfortable with online teaching, I vastly prefer in-person conversations to online ones,” says Marchionne. “Parties with friends seem a memory from another life. I would like to relive a ‘normal’ day with friends.”

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