Meet Hybrid MBA Faculty
The Hybrid MBA curriculum builds a strong foundation in business essentials. Our distinguished UW Foster School of Business faculty is made up of the highest-caliber teachers and researchers. They excel at linking academic theory with real-world practice to make the lectures, readings and in-class discussions applicable and challenging.
We’d like to introduce you to two professors teaching in the Hybrid MBA Program.
Frank Hodge, Professor of Accounting
What course will you teach in the Hybrid MBA Program?
I will teach the “Financial Reporting & Analysis” course in the program.
Why is it important?
Accounting and financial reporting are the language of business. Understanding them is critical if managers want to make informed decisions, both personally and professionally.
Why are you excited to teach in the newly launched Hybrid MBA Program?
I have a plaque in my office with a quote on it from Michelangelo. It states, “I am still learning.” I love to learn new things, which is why I am teaching in this program. I am having a lot of fun, and am learning new ways to motivate others to not only learn new material, but to excel at using it to make more informed decisions.
Bruce Avolio, Professor of Management
What course will you teach in the Hybrid MBA Program?
Leading Teams & Organizations
Why is it important?
This course is very much in line with Foster’s mission, which is to develop “students who are capable of leading teams and, ultimately, organizations and can roll up their sleeves to solve complex, unstructured, real-world problems.” This course takes students through what we call our ‘Leadership and Team Development Blueprint’ where students learn how to effectively develop their leadership to effectively work with individuals, teams, organizations and their community. Much of the course focuses on the real challenges and demands at each level of leadership development, including developing oneself, developing how one engages others to achieve expected performance, developing those that follow you to be leaders and at the highest level of abstraction, to be an effective strategic thinker and leader who stewards their unit, team, organization and community to a better future. Students in this course engage in real issues, challenges and development that helps them to work on their leadership and team development skills while working their way through our Hybrid MBA program.
Why are you excited to teach in the newly launched Hybrid MBA Program?
I have always worked with integrating technology into my work on leadership, teams and organizational development. Some of my early work back in the 1990s, was focused on e-leadership (a term we coined and widely used in the literature) and virtual teams development, More recently, I have been developing in our Center for Leadership & Strategic Thinking, what we call ‘gamulations’. These ‘gamulations’ are a combination of a simulated online experience and gamification principles, which we have used to build our first product that is now in 50 Universities around the United States and globe. I have always been guided by the principle, that we first need to think about what needs to be assessed and developed as we are dealing with social beings that need to engage one another to thrive, and then focus on the how, in this case using the best aspects of gaming and simulations. I believe that we can develop a hybrid program like no other school, in that we started our discussion during the formulation of this program focusing on the importance of building the type of collaborative relationships that are the hall mark of Foster, and then figuring out how to engage via a variety of interactive tools. This program in my view will set the standard for what we do in all other programs, and will place Foster front and center in leading how engagement via technology can accelerate the development of our students and faculty in a collaborative effort to maximize each group’s impact and performance.
Learn more about the Hybrid MBA curriculum and faculty.
Published 05.15.2021
Updated 07.21.2021
