I’m pleased to announce the 2024 recipients of the Mendoza Mission Research Award, an annual recognition of Mendoza research papers published in high-quality academic journals that exemplify the College’s imperative to “Grow the Good in Business.” 

Five papers were chosen from nominations submitted across the College, with one award winner in each department:

ACCOUNTANCY
Brad A. Badertscher, Deloitte Professor of Accountancy
Assurance Level Choice, CPA fees, and Financial Reporting Benefits: Inferences from U.S. Private Firms (Journal of Accounting and Economics)
Many U.S. private firms choose either a financial statement compilation or review rather than the higher assurance provided by an audit, yet little is known about these choices. The researchers find that CPA fees more than double for each increment in assurance. Commonly used financial reporting quality proxies are higher for both reviews and audits relative to compilations but are statistically indistinguishable between reviews and audits. The study also finds that assurance-level choices are associated with bank debt, trade credit and control concerns.

FINANCE
Jun Yang, Assistant Professor of Finance
Bank Stress Testing: Public Interest or Regulatory Capture? (Review of Finance)
The researchers test whether the influence on regulators affects banks’ stress-test outcomes. They find that the Too-Big-to-Fail banks face the toughest tests. Despite their more conservative capital plans, the large banks still fail their tests more frequently than other banks. In contrast, while the study finds little evidence that political or regulatory connections affect the quantitative element of the stress tests, these connected banks face less scrutiny under the qualitative dimension.

IT, ANALYTICS, AND OPERATIONS
Yoonseock Son, Assistant Professor of IT, Analytics, and Operations
Kaitlin Wowak, Robert & Sara Lumpkins Associate Professor of Business Analytics
Corey Angst, Jack and Joan McGraw Family Collegiate Professor of IT, Analytics, and Operations
Gender Mismatch and Bias in People-Centric Operations: Evidence from a Randomized Field Experiment (Journal of Operations Management)
In an increasingly digital world, understanding how gender bias manifests is imperative. In partnership with an online platform offering weight management programs and consultation services, this study shows that revealing the consultant’s gender encourages customers to leave more reviews and higher ratings, with the impact more pronounced when the consultant is female. Gender mismatches, where the client and consultant are of opposite genders, result in higher ratings and increased engagement compared to gender matches. 

MANAGEMENT & ORGANIZATION
Dean Shepherd, Ray and Milann Siegfried Professor of Entrepreneurship
Intersectionality in Intractable Dirty Work: How Mumbai Ragpickers Make Meaning of Their Work and Lives (Academy of Management Journal)
The challenge of dirty work is intensified when it is intractable — when it is difficult, if not impossible, for a person to avoid doing this work. This study of meaning making in the face of intractable dirty work examines ragpickers in Mumbai, India, who handle and dispose of garbage, and are further tainted by belonging to the lowest caste in Indian society and by living in slums. These ragpickers constructed both an overarching sense of helplessness rooted in the intractability of their situation, and a set of positive meanings — survival, destiny, and hope — rooted in specific facets of their lives.

MARKETING
Frank Germann, Viola D. Hank Associate Professor
Frontiers: Breaking the Glass Ceiling: Empowering Female Entrepreneurs Through Female Mentors (Marketing Science)
Governmental and nongovernmental organizations invest billions of dollars every year providing training programs to emerging market entrepreneurs. Many of these programs involve providing entrepreneurs with mentors. Unfortunately, the effects of these programs are often muted, or even null, for woman-owned firms. Against this backdrop, the researchers tested whether gender matching, where female entrepreneurs are randomly paired with a female mentor, could help address the gender gap. Findings from a randomized controlled field experiment with 930 Ugandan entrepreneurs showed that firm sales and profits of female entrepreneurs guided by a female mentor increased by, on average, 32% and 31% compared with the control group. In contrast, female entrepreneurs guided by a male mentor did not significantly improve their performance.

Please join me in congratulating the award recipients. We will celebrate their work during a special event in spring 2025 recognizing the winners of 2024 and 2025. Last year's celebration was a big success, and all in attendance seemed to greatly enjoy hearing a high-level summary of the research projects. Recipients also will be featured on the Mendoza Faculty Awards website and digital signage.

In Notre Dame,

Martijn

DEI Case Competition 2024

On April 12, the College hosted the third annual Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Grow the Good in Business™ Case Competition. Building on the success of the competition in 2022 and 2023, we opened this formative DE&I experience to all undergraduate and graduate students across the University of Notre Dame this year, requiring one student per team to be affiliated with Mendoza. The case focused on the rise of private equity in health care and its role in addressing health equity.

Health equity not only aligns with principles of justice, fairness and human rights, but healthier populations are also more productive, leading to economic benefits for society and increased social and economic mobility. Over the past two decades, private equity firms have become interested in the health-care sector. While this interest has generated scrutiny regarding quality of care and increased spending, some experts are optimistic that the private equity industry could provide health-care organizations with the capital they need to improve patient care, expand access and drive innovation. 

Students in the 2024 case competition were challenged with devising a for-profit investment that brings better balance to our health-care system. Their tremendous and bold ideas ranged from telehealth platforms and community gardens to meal kits for SNAP users. The proposed solutions served populations such as expectant mothers and rural communities, and involved for-profit and nonprofit organizations, social impact investors and a wide range of community partners. 

Congratulations to finance major Ellen Lundblad (BBA ’24) and physics in medicine major Renee Maslak (ND ’24) for winning first place on the undergraduate track of the competition, and Hannah Darr (MNA ’24), Caitlin Cruickshank (MNA ’24) and Katie Bardine (MNA ’24) for their first place finish on the graduate track.

The competition was a great success again this year, measured by the participation of students, faculty and staff, representation across Mendoza programs and majors, and support from the companies providing various forms of sponsorship. Seventy-nine students entered from nine graduate programs and 20 undergraduate majors. The competition engaged 23 first round and 11 final round judges from different stakeholder groups and was supported by 13 sponsoring organizations.

Financial sponsors returning from previous years included KPMG, ADP, South Bend-Elkhart Regional Partnership, 1st Source Bank, Notre Dame Deloitte Center for Ethical Leadership and Fanning Center for Business Communication. We also welcomed new sponsorship from Beacon Health Foundation, Notre Dame Institute for Global Investing, Fitzgerald Institute for Real Estate, Impact Assets and Lucy Family Institute for Data and Society. The exceptional financial sponsorship from these organizations allowed the College to award $35,000 in prizes to the top six teams in the competition, with the two winning teams – one undergraduate and one graduate – receiving $20,000 overall. 

A major accomplishment of this year’s competition was the extent to which the College involved multiple stakeholders, including faculty and staff from both within and outside of Mendoza, as well as alumni. Participation by these groups ranged from serving as faculty coaches for teams and holding pitch practices and office hours, to serving as first and second round judges. 

A special thanks to the following members of our own Mendoza community for providing this support: Randy Harrison, John Michel, Pat Gibbons, Jim O’Rourke, Carolyn Langley, Jeff Bernel, Sophie Shive, Jessica McManus Warnell, Brett Beasley, Mindy Evans, Andy Wendelborn, Jessica Stookey, Joe Sweeney, Tahra Taylor, Joe Holt, Lindsey McIntyre, Sherry Nadai, Natalie Sargent, Jennifer Wade and Kelly Rubey. I am also grateful to Stephanie Drudge, Lara Brian, Minhee Myung, Hether Graham and Zara Osterman for their significant leadership in elevating the case competition experience for our students this year.

The Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Grow the Good in Business™ Case Competition is one of the College’s many endeavors which reinforces that the pursuit of equity is essential to good business and to our charge at Mendoza. On April 12, the stellar work of our students in incorporating DEI ideals into real-world business plans confirmed what most of us already know, which is that our students are leaving Notre Dame with the important and essential capacity to be ethical business leaders. Our futures are certainly in good hands. 

In Notre Dame,

Kristen

Kristen Collett-Schmitt
Associate Dean for Innovation and Inclusion 
Teaching Professor, Finance

I am very much looking forward to the University Chair Lecture Series featuring Ahmed Abbasi at 3 p.m. on May 1 in the Jordan Auditorium. Ahmed, the Joe and Jane Giovanini Professor of IT, Analytics, and Operations and the co-director of the Human-centered Analytics Lab (HAL),  will present his 20-year career studying machine learning and AI, briefly highlight several real-world cases and discuss ongoing HAL research that is pondering important policy questions such as, "Is responsible AI impossible AI?" The presentation will help us all better understand human-centered AI. A reception will follow. I hope you will attend!

I’m pleased to highlight our latest research  published in top academic journals:

Zhi Da, Howard J. and Geraldine F. Korth Professor of Finance
Uncovering the Hidden Effort Problem (Journal of Finance)
Zhi and his co-authors use minute-by-minute Bloomberg online status and study the effort provision of executives in public corporations. While executives spend most of their time doing other activities, patterns of Bloomberg usage allow the researchers to characterize their work habits as measures of effort provision. They document a positive effect of effort on firm performance and also revisit agency issues that have received attention in the prior academic literature.

Kristen Ferguson, Assistant Professor of Marketing
The Mobile Giving Gap: The Negative Impact of Smartphones on Donation Behavior (Journal of Consumer Psychology)
While charities typically use the same messaging when appealing to consumers on their smartphones and PCs, this approach may backfire. This research finds that consumers are less likely to donate on their smartphones (vs. PCs), a phenomenon the authors call the mobile giving gap. Their findings across three lab and field experiments suggest that charities are leaving money on the table by using a one-size-fits-all strategy for all forms of online giving.

Tim Hubbard, Assistant Professor of Strategic Management
Competition and Constituents’ Polarization Online (Journal of Management)
Society's polarization shapes online engagement with organizations, particularly regarding identity-relevant events like competitions. Analyzing engagement among college football followers, the research examines how individuals who identify with the organization engage differently than those who dis-identify with the organization.  The study demonstrates that polarized constituents react to organizational events through identity-based mechanisms rather than objective evaluations of performance. The multi-method manuscript includes one of the first online psychophysiological studies in the stakeholder management domain.  

Yoonseock Son, Assistant Professor of IT, Analytics, and Operations
Kaitlin Wowak, Robert & Sara Lumpkins Associate Professor of Business Analytics
Corey Angst, Jack and Joan McGraw Family Collegiate Professor of IT, Analytics, and Operations
Gender Mismatch and Bias in People-Centric Operations: Evidence from a Randomized Field Experiment (Journal of Operations Management)
In an increasingly digital world, understanding how gender bias manifests is imperative. In partnership with an online platform offering weight management programs and consultation services, this study shows that revealing the consultant’s gender encourages customers to leave more reviews and higher ratings, with the impact more pronounced when the consultant is female. Gender mismatches, where the client and consultant are of opposite genders, result in higher ratings and increased engagement compared to gender matches. 

Lauren Vollon, Visiting Assistant Professor of Accountancy
The Capital Market Effects of Centralizing Regulated Financial Information (Accepted at Journal of Accounting Research)
Vollon and his co-authors use the introduction of digital storage and access platforms for regulated financial information (Officially Appointed Mechanisms, or OAMs) in the EU to study the capital market effects of information centralization. They show that the implementation of OAMs resulted in significant market liquidity improvements by reducing investors’ processing costs. Importantly, they document that information spillovers between focal and peer firms are a mechanism through which the positive capital market effects arise.

Thank you to Zhi, Kristen, Tim, Yoonseock, Katie, Corey and Lauren for your research contributions.

In Notre Dame,

Martijn

I’m pleased to announce a new policy for high-performing researchers that is truly historic for the College. For the first time, Mendoza will be offering our tenured faculty the opportunity to take paid research leaves — commonly known as sabbaticals — to focus on research and faculty development.

While this news directly applies to our tenured faculty, it affects the College as a whole. By providing more time for highly productive scholars to conduct intense and uninterrupted research, we are investing heavily in elevating our research culture, which is one of our top strategic priorities. 

The sabbatical policy will help us to be even more productive in publishing research in top-tier outlets. As we compete with our aspirational peers to attract, develop, and retain top scholars — all of our aspirational peers already have sabbaticals as standard practice — we will improve our standing as thought leaders. In so doing, we will be even more competitive with other highly ranked business schools. We thus seek to attract more top scholars to be part of the research culture within Mendoza.

Sabbaticals are a privilege and not an entitlement, and will be subject to the discretion of the administration of Mendoza on a case-by-case basis. To be eligible, tenured faculty members must meet all of the following criteria: 

1. Have been a Notre Dame faculty member for at least seven years.
2. Have not been granted a sabbatical leave under this policy in the previous seven years.
3. Have accumulated sufficient article acceptances in top-tier outlets since the previous sabbatical leave granted under this policy. 
4. Have provided sustained high-quality teaching.
5. Have provided sustained laudable service to the University.

A faculty member will not be responsible for teaching or involvement in University, College or departmental service (typically 20% of a tenured faculty member's role) while on the research leave. Thus, the faculty will have 100% of their time during the academic year to devote to research, upskilling, retooling and such development activities. 

We expect that relatively few of the eligible tenured faculty will be on sabbatical at the same time since the College must maintain the optimal functioning of the academic departments. During the initial rollout, the highest priority will be given to tenured faculty with the most research success during the previous six calendar years. Additionally, priority will be given to those whose application for a sabbatical is accompanied by strong justification for research advancement.

Mendoza sabbaticals are only available to tenured faculty; the sabbatical policy does not apply to teaching or other types of faculty. (Other types of faculty leaves not related to research include FMLA, primary caregiver and parental leave. More information about the University’s faculty leave policies can be found here.) 

To apply for a sabbatical, eligible faculty members should provide a written request to Ken Kelley, the senior associate dean for faculty and research, summarizing their research plans for a sabbatical leave before July 1 of the year that precedes the academic year in which the sabbatical would be taken. Sabbatical leaves may be granted two or more academic years in advance.

Ken is responsible for approvals of all sabbaticals, subject to the additional approval of the leave from the Office of the Provost per the Academic Articles, and will work with the relevant department on timing. As stated above, sabbaticals are not guaranteed and are fully subject to the discretion of Mendoza’s administration on a case-by-case basis with consideration of funding availability and teaching needs. Please contact Ken for the additional details of the Mendoza Sabbatical Policy.

I’m grateful to those who helped with the creation of the sabbatical policy, especially Ken, as well as the department chairs and members of the College Council, the faculty governing body that formally sanctioned the policy. 

In Notre Dame,

Martijn