In the Spring 2025 Business Exchange, Business Education with a Purpose

Sulin Ba Notes from the Dean , , , ,

Dear alumni and friends of DePaul’s Driehaus College of Business: 

Welcome to the spring 2025 issue of the Business Exchange!  

Two professionals in blue suits deep in conversation at a packed networking event
Dean of the Driehaus College of Business Sulin Ba converses with CTA representatives at the March 7 poster presentation

This year has been full of exciting news at Driehaus.  

Our students and faculty are partnering with the CTA to imagine how entrepreneurs can revitalize communities.  

They’re working with the sixth largest privately held company in America to find the insights hidden in data.  

And they’re charting the hidden landscape of affordable housing in Chicago, g

iving communities valuable tools to advocate for their needs. 

There are a few principles that unify these projects.  

  1. A Driehaus education has a purpose: Guided by expert faculty, our students are jumping straight into the real world. They’re wading through complications and complexity. And they’re getting to see their ideas and insights make a real difference.  
  2. A Driehaus education has an impact: Our students and researchers bring a fresh perspective to the challenges, large and small, that businesses face today. Our partnerships are win/win opportunities for the organizations we partner with and our students alike.  
  3. A Driehaus education couldn’t happen anywhere else: Each of these projects originated with one of the many personal connections that knit Driehaus and Chicago together. At a time when so much about education is changing, these stories attest to the enduring value of the personal, place-based connections that make Driehaus Chicago’s business school.  

In this issue, you’ll also read the stories of two alumni who are leaders in their respective fields.  

  1. On April 10, I sat down with alumnus and CEO Julian Francis (MBA ’96) for our second Executive Speaker Series. Our conversation provided a unique window into what it’s like to lead a Fortune 500 company in a uniquely fast-paced industry – and how managing people is critical to success.  
  2. Last fall, I was proud to hear that Jenny Ciszewski (BUS ’02) — a partner at Deloitte and the first female president of our accounting donor society Ledger & Quill — was named among the Most Influential Bay Area Women in Business. In this issue, you’ll hear how her philosophies of leadership and giving back intersect.  

Both Julian and Jenny attest to the enduring impact of DePaul’s Vincentian mission. Our alumni lead not just with skill but with compassion. And they – you – are more effective leaders for it.  

 

Sincerely,  

Sulin Ba, PhD 

Dean, Driehaus College of Business  

DePaul University 

In Collaboration with the CTA, Entrepreneurial Imagination Meets Historic Infrastructure Investment

Meredith Carroll Features, Student Stories , , , ,

MBA students harnessed entrepreneurship to envision revitalization

A group of student presents a poster with prominent depaul blues and reds, plus the CTA logo

A hub where pet owners can gather to meet neighbors. Urban agriculture using recycled water. Incubators for entrepreneurs and makers.

These were just a few of the projects that MBA students, led by Assistant Professor of Management and Entrepreneurship James Bort, proposed for a South Side community this winter quarter as part of DePaul’s partnership with the Chicago Transit Authority.

Writ large, the partnership harnesses entrepreneurship to drive economic growth on the South Side in conjunction with the agency’s historic Red Line Extension.

Students’ project proposals are the first step towards that larger goal. They demonstrate how entrepreneurs can capitalize on this massive investment in infrastructure, setting off a cycle of revitalization. To a much-needed infrastructure project, these projects bring entrepreneurial imagination.

“Entrepreneurship is fundamentally an imagined reality,” said Bort. “It’s about storytelling. It’s about your ability to be optimistic and empathetic.”

 

In collaboration with the CTA, focusing on a community with promise

The class focused their efforts on a once-booming stretch of South Michigan Avenue in Roseland.

CTA Director of Diversity Programs JuanPablo Prieto explained the factors that led to that decision.

“For every dollar we invest in transit, we get $4 in economic return,” he said. “We want the communities where we’re making these investments to benefit from that return.”

The CTA commissioned a transit-supported development study on the area, engaging extensively with community members. Students delved into that research.

With Prieto’s help, they also heard directly from community stakeholders. The head of the Chamber of Commerce came to speak. So did the local alderman’s chief of staff.

Stakeholder interviews ensured that students’ projects were grounded in the needs of the community.

“We moved from studying the history of Roseland to understanding who’s there today and what they need,” Bort said. “Only then did we move into ideation.”

 

Informed by stakeholders, projects focus on empowering local entrepreneurs

A group of students smiling and networking
Stefanie Slager, center, at the class’ poster presentation

On March 7, students shared their visions at a packed poster presentation. Faculty, staff, and students attended. So did CTA officials and community stakeholders.

“We were blown away by the thought, the intentionality, and the care that went into the listening sessions with the stakeholders,” said Prieto. “Each project had some element of what the stakeholders brought to the table.”

MBA student Stefanie Slager’s team shared a plan for a “living lab” for new entrepreneurs. There, they hoped, local founders and makers could launch businesses that would attract visitors to the neighborhood – especially in culinary arts, entertainment, fashion, and business innovation.

A box of fresh donuts sat on a table next to Slager. She’d picked them up that morning from Old Fashioned Donuts, an iconic 50-year-old, family-owned shop in Roseland: an example of the community’s existing strength and potential.

“When I went in on the day of the presentation, you could tell that everyone kind of knows each other,” Slager said. “How blessed are we to work with this community and hopefully make a difference? It is our goal for Roseland to again become the jewel of the South Side.”

A few groups over, MBA student Keiph Oliver and his team presented their plan. Like Slager’s group, they envisioned an entrepreneurial ecosystem – one that would equip residents with tools and resources to realize their own visions for the community.

“We want to create programs that bring businesses into high schools,” creating mentorships and job opportunities, explained Oliver. Exposing youth to a wide range of career paths was a priority.

“Exposure affects what someone believes they could be,” he said. “They don’t know what skills they already have. They don’t know how those skills could transfer.”

 

Looking ahead to the next phase of the DePaul-CTA partnership

Two professionals in blue suits deep in conversation at a packed networking event
Dean of the Driehaus College of Business Sulin Ba converses with CTA representatives at the March 7 poster presentation

In future phases of the DePaul-CTA collaboration, some students will partner directly with local businesses. Others will pick up where Bort’s winter quarter class left off, bringing select projects one step closer to reality.

For Bort, the projects attest to the vital role entrepreneurship plays in community renewal.

“Entrepreneurship is one of the most important elements for a community to succeed,” Bort said. “You need entrepreneurs working outside of the box, or working with resource constraints, figuring out how to make it happen.”

And, he added, you need initial investments in infrastructure to give those entrepreneurs a place to start.

“Without infrastructure, you really don’t have anything,” Bort added. “People have been fighting for this Red Line Extension for 50 years. What an exciting time to have been here for it.”

Prieto echoed Bort’s sentiments.

“I want to reiterate CTA’s commitment to this project,” he said. “This was a promise that was made more than 50 years ago to this community. We are committed to delivering on that promise. And we are excited to go down this path with the community as we not only build the extension but support the development that will come with it.”

 

For students, a lesson in the power of place and purpose

Another lesson of the project? The power of place, in all its specificity: whether that place is Chicago, Roseland, or DePaul.

Oliver is a graduate of DePaul’s film program who plans, empowered by his DePaul MBA, to one day launch his own production company.

“A lot of what I think about as a filmmaker is Hollywood,” he said. “The entertainment industry found a city and set up shop. It created this entire infrastructure that, for a long time, had no competition.

“How do we create an infrastructure like that for Chicago? What does that look like? In my lifetime, can I not only create a company, but can I contribute to generating a higher standard and a better business infrastructure? One that will bring more jobs and allow people to stay here?”

From Bort’s perspective, the collaboration is uniquely suited to DePaul.

“We have this Vincentian mission. When we see an opportunity to help, we jump in. That’s our default,” Bort said. “How does a DePaul grad stand out? Things like this, maybe. There are pro-social elements; there are human-centered design elements, empathy elements. It’s really tangible. It’s hands-in-the-dirt. And you’re working together to figure it out.”

Business Analytics Capstone Class Sparks Industry Collaboration, Student Success

Meredith Carroll Features, Student Stories , , ,

Capstone class “challenges the status quo” of learning

A large group of students poses in front of a screen in a modern room

 

When the co-directors of DePaul’s M.S. in Business Analytics program, Khadija Ali Vakeel and Sina Ansari, embarked on rethinking the program’s capstone last year, they knew they wanted it to center on a collaboration with real-world companies.

This approach promised to set students up for success in industry. But it also posed challenges. Real-world datasets are often messy. Clear answers aren’t guaranteed. Distilling insights from data is as much art as it is science, demanding storytelling skills as well as analytical savvy.

In a word, the setup for the M.S. in Business Analytics capstone “challenges the status quo” of how most classes are taught, according to Vakeel.

“Students lead their own projects,” she said. “Students pose their own questions and find their own answers, supported by the instructor and industry partners. They are discovering things. It pushes them to think about their own creativity and storytelling as well as analysis — all in a very compact time of 10 weeks.”

Students offer companies a fresh perspective

Vakeel and Ansari launched the new, hands-on version of the capstone project in spring 2024. That year, with the help of a third-party mediator, Altheon AI, the program collaborated with Skyline Design and Valqari.

In fall 2024, the program began collaborating with Reyes Holdings, a food and beverage distributor that is the sixth largest privately held company by revenue in the U.S. according to a list compiled by Forbes. That collaboration has continued ever since.

Reyes has a vast logistics network with a trove of data to match. Powered by AI, cameras in truck cabs collect virtually every kind of data imaginable. Are drivers eating or texting while they drive? Are they leaving an adequate stopping distance?

Most of all, Reyes wanted to know, how effective were its coaching programs? What could it do to make its operations safer — and bring down costs in the process?

The company had in-house experts to answer those questions. But it also needed a fresh perspective.

That’s where DePaul students came in.

“The students have so much energy,” said Vakeel. “They think outside the box. When employees of the company are looking at the same data day in and day out, they might not be able to see what a fresh perspective from students can bring in.”

The power of data — from unearthing hidden stories to driving strategy

A small group of students poses in front of a screen in a modern room
The winning team poses with faculty and corporate partners from Reyes Holdings.

The brief for the project was intentionally open-ended. Student groups could choose which variables to look at, how to analyze them, and how to put them in context.

In capstone instructor Nidhal Bouazizi’s words, the project offered an invitation to “get a little messy with the data.”

“We were just given this dataset and the objective to enhance driver safety. There were no other real guidelines,” said Nithya Abraham, one of the students in Bouazizi’s latest winter quarter class. “That wasn’t because of our professor; that was the nature of the project. You have to play with the dataset and figure things out on your own.”

For Abraham’s class, that dataset was an intimidating file spanning over 100 columns and nearly 300,000 rows. Ongoing guidance from Bouazizi helped the student teams refine their approach. So did representatives from Reyes Holdings, who worked closely with the class throughout the term.

Some teams analyzed how factors like time and location affected risky behaviors. Others, including Abraham’s, looked at the firm’s coaching programs, comparing their effectiveness across different subsidiaries around the country.

Often, the hardest part wasn’t sifting through data fields or crafting complicated predictive models. It was figuring out how to chart a course through the data that could lead to an actionable recommendation.

In that choice lay a key lesson of the capstone project: Data is only as useful as the recommendations distilled from it.

“We could have gone and talked about a thousand things, but we stuck to focusing on preventing near-collision events to align with the cost-saving objective,” said student Alyssa Kozal. “We wanted to make a strong recommendation. And I think that made our presentation strong too.”

Or, as Bouazizi put it: “recommendations are how you monetize the data.” Recommendations — and the narratives that connect recommendations directly to the data.

Ultimately, the story of the M.S. in Business Analytics capstone project isn’t merely about students’ considerable technical expertise, or even their creativity and drive in applying it to real-world scenarios. It’s about the power of connecting statistics to strategy — and about what happens when students get the chance to think like a leader.

Kozal and her teammates, Malika Diwakar and Srushti Summanwar, were among a select few teams who got the chance to present their findings directly to executives from Reyes Holdings.

“It was important to us to have a storyline,” said Diwakar. “Who are we? What was our objective in this process? We really focused” — inspired by guidance from Bouazizi, she added — “on explaining our entire thought process, beginning to end.”

That’s part of what the capstone class gives students, said Vakeel: the ability to tell stories not just about the data, but about the process of sifting through it. The ability, in that way, to connect a company’s operations on the ground now to its strategy moving forward.

“I’m not someone who can sit at a screen for eight hours coding,” said Abraham. “What I do enjoy is looking at datasets, drawing insights from them, and making recommendations based on those insights. The capstone solidified that this is what I like doing. This is where I want to build my career.”

For students and companies alike, the capstone opens up new possibilities

Business analytics is a growing field. Bouazizi and Vakeel cite a number of students who leveraged their capstone experience to secure internships. One of Bouazizi’s students even landed a full-time role working for a manufacturer of AI-equipped cameras like the ones Reyes uses.

“This hands-on experience puts our students at a huge competitive advantage,” said Bouazizi. “We’re not providing you with a case study somebody wrote. This is the real deal.”

This spring, the program will partner with LabelMaster in addition to Reyes. That will give students the opportunity to pick a project that aligns with their career goals. It will also, Vakeel stressed, be just as beneficial for industry partners as it is for students.

“I’d say that this is a call to action to Chicago-based companies who want to partner with us,” said Vakeel. “We are open to such strategic partnerships, and we would welcome them in the future.”

“The responsibility involved in these projects is very high,” she added. “But the students have made us proud. It is a win-win situation—for DePaul, for our students, and for the companies.”

Deloitte Partner Jenny Ciszewski’s (BUS ’02) Tips for Purposeful Leadership

Meredith Carroll Alumni Profiles , , , ,

The Driehaus alumna and first female president of Ledger & Quill was recently recognized as one of the Most Influential Women in Bay Area Business  

A group of four women in business professional pose, smiling with arms around one another's shouldersFor Jenny Ciszewski (BUS ’02), being a leader means understanding how work fits into the full scope of people’s lives — including her own. 

“I try to make sure people know that I want them to be the best version of themselves when they come to work,” she said. “And that means they need to have time for whatever they prioritize in life [outside of work].”  

Ciszewski is a partner at Deloitte, where in addition to serving her clients, she also leads the audit & assurance marketplace strategy which focuses on growing the business nationally. Last year, she was named among the Most Influential Women in Bay Area Business by the San Francisco Business Times.  

“Having done a minor in women’s studies at DePaul, it’s something that’s always been near and dear to my heart to have more women leaders in business,” she said. “Getting nominated and being honored in such a way was a full-circle moment.” 

Putting priorities into practice – and integrating work and life 

As a partner at one of the “Big Four” accounting firms, Ciszewski is a trailblazer. While the industry has made strides in recent decades, women are still underrepresented in leadership roles. That’s changing, Ciszewski is quick to note. But it’s a change that takes time.  

It’s also a change that involves reimagining how work and life fit together.  

“In our profession, and especially in audit, you have to manage work-life integration,” she said. “When I became a mom for the first time as a senior manager, I took it upon myself to mentor other first-time moms. I want to make sure that people understand that they can be super successful in this profession and super successful in their life as a parent.” 

Parenthood is far from the only responsibility that people need to balance with work. Work-life integration, Ciszewski noted, isn’t even about responsibility, per se — it might just as easily be about a favorite sport, or a concert, or a marathon training schedule. 

But there is something about parenthood in general — and motherhood, with its attendant cultural pressures, in particular — that throws the question of work-life integration into stark relief. The formative moments of childhood cannot always be planned in advance, nor rescheduled to make way for other priorities. 

After she made partner, Ciszewski had the chance to work with an executive coach as part of Deloitte’s ongoing professional development.  

“Those sessions really helped to clarify for me that, as a leader, my top priority is my family,” she said. “It’s being there for my three daughters.” 

Prioritizing family can still be accomplished while meeting and exceeding your goals at work, she stressed. It’s an ever-changing balance: one that requires letting go of the pressure that many mothers, in particular, feel to prioritize parenting at all times.  

“I don’t get so caught up in if I miss something of theirs because I’m traveling for work,” Ciszewski said. “I don’t feel a lot of guilt because my career is enabling them to do what matters to them. If I’m there most of the time — if they feel supported by me and my husband — that’s what matters.”   

A DePaul upbringing – and a legacy of support for women 

A woman poses with her pre-teen daughter, holding a glass awardCiszewski’s dad was that supportive and influential figure in her life. His mother marched for women’s suffrage and worked as an English professor at a time when few women worked outside the home.  

“My dad came from a very pro-female background,” Ciszewski said. “He taught my sisters and I to change the oil in our cars and encouraged us to play sports of all kinds. He always wanted us to know that we could do whatever we wanted in life— even if it seemed like a male-dominated area.’” 

With his support, Ciszewski and her three siblings pursued higher education. For Ciszewski and her sister Stacy Janiak, now a member of DePaul’s Board of Trustees, that meant attending DePaul.  

“I received a full scholarship to DePaul through Ledger and Quill,” DePaul’s alumni donor society for the School of Accounting and MIS, Ciszewski said. “I wouldn’t be where I’m at today without that. My dad was a letter carrier and my mom was a stay-at-home mom caring for the four kids; I made more my first year as an auditor than he did after forty years working at the post office.”  

Her time at DePaul reinforced the importance of giving back. As a student, she participated in service trips over spring break. She also tutored children every week at Visitation Academy in Englewood. After graduation, she served on the Ledger & Quill Board, including serving as its female president from 2009 to 2011.  

As for today, Ciszewski and her husband recently established a scholarship that will support female students in accounting. The scholarship honors her father, who passed away from pancreatic cancer in 2016. 

“To honor him in that way was so special,” she said. “I really feel that I wouldn’t be where I am today without the education that I received at DePaul— and without people who I don’t even know, who gave those funds for my scholarships. They had a huge impact on my life and my ability to get a degree and do well in the world. And hopefully, we can do the same for others.” 

A full-circle moment  

Establishing the Peter Babiak Memorial Scholarship was a full-circle moment for Ciszewski. So, too, was being honored as one of the Bay Area’s Most Influential Women in Business.  

When she crossed the stage at the awards ceremony, she had the chance to answer one of several prompts. She chose the one that asked her to share what she is most proud of.   

“When I got up there, I said that I’m most proud of being an incredible mom,” she said. “It’s ultimately what matters at the end of the day: that I’m doing right by how I raise them.”  

For Ciszewski, it’s one and the same as doing right by the people she leads at work — and all the leaders, women especially, who are coming up behind her. 

Institute for Housing Studies Unearths Hidden Stories of Affordable Housing in Chicago

Meredith Carroll Scholarly Pursuits , , , ,

Consider the intersection between housing market forces and finding a place to live: decades-long cycles play out alongside human-scale stories, each with their own role to play in shaping a city.

That intersection is where the Institute for Housing Studies (IHS) does its work.

Housed in DePaul’s Driehaus College of Business, IHS digs into the data to unearth the hidden trends shaping Chicago’s housing market. The institute partners with community groups and policymakers, providing data-driven tools that help make affordable housing accessible to the populations that need it most.

All of this gives IHS a unique vantage point into the stories hidden within Chicago’s housing landscape. Read on for some takeaways about the past, present, and future of affordable housing in Chicago from IHS Executive Director Geoff Smith.

The mystery of the disappearing two– and four-flats

Iconic, brick Chicago two-flats on a tree-lined streetWhen many people hear affordable housing, said Smith, they picture federally and locally subsidized programs.

For most low-income renters and homeowners, that’s not the case.

Instead, most affordable housing is so-called “naturally occurring.” That is, it’s affordable because it’s older, or located in a neighborhood with fewer resources and amenities.

Naturally occurring affordable housing is a broad category, defined as much by what it’s not (subsidized or regulated) as what it is.

Within that category, it turns out, the specifics matter.

A community group in Albany Park reached out to IHS with a phenomenon they’d noticed: two– and four-flat buildings in the neighborhood were disappearing.

Subsequent work revealed that such buildings were disappearing citywide — and that their decline correlated directly with the loss of affordable housing writ large.

The loss of two– and four-flats looked different in different parts of the city. In neighborhoods where land values were going up, new buyers were opting to tear them down in favor of single-family housing.

In neighborhoods with a history of systemic disinvestment, meanwhile, population loss meant that many two– and four-flats were falling into disrepair. And, when these buildings were demolished, they weren’t being rebuilt.

Particularly in these parts of the city, the loss of two– and four-flats didn’t just signify a reduction in the amount of affordable housing on offer. It signified the loss of a specific type of affordable housing, one with specific advantages.

“[These buildings offer] an opportunity to defray the costs by renting out the other units,” Smith said. “They offer the opportunity for multigenerational housing.”

“As you lose that kind of housing, you erode the housing options,” Smith continued. “You lose the opportunity to create new homeowners.”

Reimagining housing ownership, one data point at a time

If the landscape of affordable housing is varied and particular, then affordable housing interventions are too.

“There’s not one silver bullet strategy,” explained Smith. Scaling back restrictions on new development can help, he said, but that’s only true in neighborhoods where land and property values have been high enough, and for long enough, to justify the risk of investing in new construction.

One approach could involve working with landlords who want to sell their properties – particularly long-time landlords who own aging housing stock, which makes up a significant proportion of housing in Chicago.

“What kind of programs or incentives might you need to convince owners to keep the property without selling?” said Smith. “Are there ownership models that might exist where the owner could sell their property to a mission-oriented entity that would keep it relatively affordable?”

One such option, Smith said, is a community land trust. Such trusts hold the land that housing is located on, bringing ownership of housing itself within closer reach. Across the city, the IHS partners with groups that are experimenting with this model. Just last year, Smith served on a statewide task force that studied community land trusts, laying the foundation for implementation on a wider scale.

In an uncertain future, a vital role for applied research

On a local level, community land trusts are one example of a promising tool to preserve and expand access to affordable housing.

Implementing such programs, however, is slow going. And, on a national level, the future of affordable housing writ large is profoundly uncertain.

Federal programs have historically played a major role in expanding access to housing. What might happen if they’re scaled back?

“The one thing I can say is that, in times of volatility and uncertainty, having in-depth information on the market is more important than ever,” said Smith. “It increases the need to be targeted and strategic in how you deploy limited resources.”

“That’s a big role we play with our data,” he added. “So I’m hopeful that our work will continue to be relevant and useful, whichever direction the next few years take us.”

“You’re Only a Leader if You Have Followers”: Reflections on leadership from Julian Francis (MBA ’96)

jmercha3 Alumni Profiles , , , ,

In armchairs, two professionals in suits. One gestures as he speaks; the other listensPhotos by Sean Campbell, Working Anchor

The house was packed for the Driehaus College of Business’s second annual Executive Speaker Series, held on April 10, 2025. This year’s guest was DePaul MBA (’96) Julian Francis, former CEO of Fortune 500 company Beacon Building Products. In a wide-ranging conversation hosted by Driehaus Dean Sulin Ba, the audience heard about Francis’s leadership journey from student to the C-suite and everything in between, and got an insider’s perspective on how he makes tough decisions in an industry where timing is everything.

In addition to his MBA, Francis also holds a doctorate in materials engineering, which gave him an edge in an industry all about the built environment. He has an extensive record of executive leadership at several different firms, and at Beacon he led the country’s largest, publicly traded distributor of roofing materials and complementary building products.

Two professionals in suits in armchairs on a stage, audience just visible in the foregroundFrancis looked back on his time at DePaul with gratitude. Originally from the U.K., Francis was an international student looking to make his way in an unfamiliar culture. After a period of some uncertainty, he found his home at DePaul. “DePaul took a chance on me,” he related, “and for that I’ll always be grateful.”

After touching on Francis’s fond memories of Chicago and going to school at DePaul in the mid-1990s, Dean Ba and Francis moved on to the topic of leadership in today’s world. In a marketplace crowded with different recipes for leadership success, Francis offered a simple, succinct guiding principle: at the end of the day it is the people you associate with who matter as much, if not more, than ideas.

“I used to think it was all about the ideas, that if you just had that right, the most compelling ideas, then that was all you needed. It would work out,” Francis recounted. “But somewhere along the way I realized it’s not that, it’s the people who matter, the people you support and surround yourself with. Cultivating relationships with the right people is the single most important thing for aspiring leaders.”

Pausing to reflect for a moment, he summed up the evening’s theme: “You’re only a leader if you have followers.”

Leadership is something earned and recognized by others; it is a fundamentally social capacity. It is, in the end, all about the question of values: what do you believe? What do you stand for? Do you demonstrate the values your company professes, and how do you show it?

“Your values are everything,” Francis said. “Do you really believe in the values you claim? What about the people you work with? Do they believe in them, or do they just see them as words on a wall?” In a business environment that grows more uncertain by the day, a firm commitment to one’s values and vision can be a much needed source of stability.

The same can be said for one’s attitude to risk, Francis suggested. “One key lesson I’ve learned over the years is not just to consider the impossible, but to expect it,” he related. “The last thing you want is to be caught flat-footed by something you should have thought of,” he continued. “We can’t take anything for granted. If you always have a contingency plan for the seemingly impossible, then you’re ready for any scenario.”

Innovation, the Driehaus Way: A Message from Dean Sulin Ba

Sulin Ba College News, Features, Notes from the Dean, Student Stories

A Message from Dean Sulin Ba

Dear Driehaus alumni, supporters, and community members:

Welcome to the fall 2024 issue of Business Exchange. Read on to learn about how our faculty are advancing knowledge, how our students are building careers, and perhaps most importantly, how our alumni are forging change in their fields.

A group of smiling students poses with donuts, accompanied by Dean Ba in a bright blue, business formal dress
Driehaus Dean Sulin Ba, at left, serves donuts to students to welcome in the fall quarter.

The latest from the college

First, though, a few pieces of good news.

For the second year in a row, Driehaus was ranked a top school for entrepreneurship by the Princeton Review! Driehaus was ranked #12 among undergraduate programs and #15 among graduate programs. The rankings testify to the vibrant entrepreneurial community we’ve built in Chicago and around the world and to the entrepreneurial spirit of Driehaus grads.

You can read more about the news here.

I am proud and grateful to share that, thanks to a generous $2.6 million gift from Dr. Curtis and Mrs. Gina Crawford, DePaul is launching a Business Technology Leadership Institute. Housed right here in the Driehaus College of Business, the institute will facilitate collaboration with technology experts in DePaul’s Jarvis College of Computing and Digital Media.

Side-by-side portraits of a smiling, elderly couple in formalwear and stylish glasses
Dr. Curtis J. and Mrs. Gina Crawford (Photos courtesy of the Crawford Family)

Like so many of our faculty, students, and alumni, the Crawfords recognize that cutting-edge technologies have the potential to transform how business gets done. Indeed, much of that potential is already being actualized.

Their gift will empower our students to drive this change. More importantly, it will empower our students to drive this change in a meaningful way, informed equally by the subject-matter expertise, entrepreneurial spirit, and commitment to social good that already make Driehaus distinctive.

You can read more about the initiatives this gift will fund here. My gratitude goes out to the Crawfords for their generosity — and to the faculty, students, staff, and alumni who are already doing exceptional work in this space.

Driehaus is already driving change at the intersection of business and technology. Our Halperin Emerging Companies Fund recently invested $100,000 in Orgaimi, an AI tech firm specializing in data science models and predictive analytics.

In this issue

In this issue of the Business Exchange, you’ll read about how we’re working to prepare students for meaningful careers at the forefront of change. Students at the Northern Trust competition got the chance to delve into timely, real-world issues with guidance from industry experts. Opportunities like this don’t just set up our students for jobs after graduation. They set up our students for meaningful career trajectories, which will surely include jobs we can’t yet envision.

Read more about the case competition here.

Our faculty are also driving change by advancing our understanding of real-world issues. Read on to hear insights into how brands should and shouldn’t intervene in hot-button political issues and learn about the widespread, damaging phenomenon of weight-based mistreatment in the workplace.

Learn about pioneering research into weight-based mistreatment in the workplace.

Hear the surprising results of a study that examined how to approach discussing controversial political issues.

Underpinning so much of this work — as I know it underpins so much of your work — is the entrepreneurial spirit. The two alumni profiled in this issue, Triple Demon Dana Alkhouri and the late, prolific entrepreneur John Goode, embody that spirit.

Read the story of John Goode’s remarkable life and legacy here. 

Hear from Dana Alkhouri about making a career pivot and centering women’s stories.

In closing

Many of us are preparing to spend the holiday season with friends and loved ones: with members of the communities that make us strong. Although there are many challenges ahead, for Driehaus College, for DePaul, and for the larger world we live in, I find comfort in returning to what makes Driehaus what it is: our alumni and our students. Your passion — not just for innovating or forging your own path, but for taking others with you along the journey — are making a difference.

Sincerely,

Sulin Ba, PhD

Dean, Driehaus College of Business

“If you think you can’t do it, maybe you just haven’t found a way to do it yet:” The Remarkable Life and Enduring Legacy of John Goode at DePaul and Beyond

jmercha3 Alumni Profiles

John Goode, born September 24, 1934 and deceased September 16, 2024, embodied the entrepreneurial spirit. A polyglot who served on over one hundred company boards the world over, he was a portrait of the globetrotting, forward-thinking executives who built out the international reach of American business in the second half of the 20th century. As a distinguished DePaul alumnus, his life left an indelible impact on the DePaul community. 

An entrepreneurial upbringing 

An old, scanned in portrait photo of a middle-aged man in a suit, smilingBorn in the depths of the Great Depression, Goode quickly found his footing as a resourceful and creative young man. He embarked upon an enterprising path early: his first job was at the cash register of his mother’s shop at age seven, where he also took care of customers and stocked shelves. He was a quick study, even taking two buses to distributors to pick up boxes of candy for the store.  

Goode’s development through adolescence and into adulthood was a DePaul story through and through. In his high school years he attended DePaul Academy, an all-boys Catholic high school founded in 1898 – the same year that Saint Vincent’s College, better known today as DePaul University, was also established.  

It was a tumultuous period for Goode, who dropped out of school for a time and got into his share of trouble. But he eventually felt compelled to return to school, and begged DePaul Academy’s Father Fitzgerald to let him return. Father Fitzgerald was a talented teacher who would become a key mentor figure for Goode. The whole experience changed his life. It would also turn out to be the beginning of a fruitful, lifelong relationship with DePaul.

Goode went on to enroll at the Catholic university in the shady groves of Chicago’s Lincoln Park neighborhood in the late 1950s. During his studies, he was married with three children and worked full time as a doorman. In 1960, he became the first in his family to graduate from college. It would be the beginning of a long, remarkable journey, for which he would eventually be recognized and honored as a distinguished alumnus of DePaul University. 

A legacy of success, service, and kindness 

Goode’s positive attitude, natural talents, and DePaul education all propelled him into a remarkable business career. He worked his way up the corporate ladder to hold senior executive positions at many Fortune 500 industrial companies, eventually owning and serving as board chairman for Prestolite Electric, K&W Products, AP Labs, and American Innotek. He also invested in many businesses, and mentored many business owners over the years.  

Through it all, Goode retained a deep fondness for his time at DePaul, which he always believed had made a significant impact on his life, going all the way back to his formative experiences at DePaul Academy with Father Fitzgerald. And so, following his successes in the business world, Goode returned to the DePaul community to teach for the Department of Accounting in what was then the DePaul College of Commerce, eventually serving as an Associate Dean in the 1980s.  

Four middle-aged adults pose, smiling, with their elderly father
A photo of Goode with three of his children: John Jr., Jim, and Sue.

Although Goode went on to obtain advanced degrees from the University of Chicago and Northern Illinois University, he always maintained that DePaul had the greatest impact on his life. In true DePaul fashion, Goode was also an avid basketball fan, traveling to see the Blue Demons play in the NCAA Final Four in 1979. Eventually, all four of his children – John Jr., Sue, Lee, and Jim – would all attend DePaul themselves. His son, John Jr., even received his diploma on stage during his graduation from his father, who was then serving as an Associate Dean of the College of Commerce.  

Goode was well-known around DePaul for his commanding presence and jovial personality. Between classes, he valued friendship and camaraderie with friends and colleagues. Following the powerful example set by Father Fitzgerald earlier in his life, Goode strove to serve as a mentor to his students. After an especially brutal exam, he was known to meet up with the “survivors” (as he called them) at a local pub, where he would treat the students to drinks and lively conversation. He was also an avid golfer and sailor, and enjoyed taking students on sailing expeditions from Monroe Harbor.  

No problem too great to solve 

Goode made his mark at a national level. In the 1980s, he would go on to serve in the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, as well as the White House Council on Competitiveness. It was a far cry from his humble upbringing in the midst of the Great Depression: a testament, in this way, to Goode’s tireless entrepreneurial spirit.   

A scanned-in, black-and-white photograph of a suited man smiling as he speaks from a podiumThrough it all, Goode always held a firm belief in the foundational impact that the DePaul community had on his life and career. He was a prolific donor, giving millions of dollars to the university that had played such a formative role in his life. Such was his esteem for DePaul that instead of having a room named in his honor, he requested that the room be dedicated to his revered mentor, Father Fitzgerald. 

His experiences at the Chicago university cultivated his can-do, entrepreneurial attitude — one of the characteristics that those who knew him best remember as a cornerstone of his legacy. No problem was too great to be solved. As recounted by his son, John Goode, Jr., his attitude was well exemplified in one of his favorite phrases, a question he liked to pose when faced by adversity: “Are you telling me you can’t do it, or you haven’t found a way to do it yet?”  

Marketing Professor’s Research Leads to Surprising Conclusion about Political Conversations

Meredith Carroll Faculty Focus, Scholarly Pursuits

Middle-of-the-road stances risked alienating allies and opponents alike, research found

How do you navigate political discussions?  

You might expect, as many people do, that expressing “two-sided” or ambivalent positions about controversial political issues could help you bridge divides. In particular, you might expect that expressing ambivalence would make you more likeable to allies and opponents alike.  

A new study coauthored by DePaul Assistant Professor of Marketing Geoff Durso found exactly the opposite. Expressing ambivalence was not only unhelpful when it came to winning over opponents on contentious issues. It also hurt study subjects’ standing among those on the same side of the issue at hand.  

As a marketing professor with a background in psychology, Durso often works at the intersection of consumer behavior and political sentiment.   

Read on for a discussion of why the study’s results surprised him, what might explain the findings, and how insights from marketing and politics can inform each other. 

Or: Watch a video version of the interview on our YouTube channel, part of an ongoing series highlighting Driehaus faculty and what their research can teach us about the world around us.  

On politics as identity 

Driehaus College of Business (DCOB): What were your expectations going into this study? Did it surprise you to find that expressing ambivalence didn’t help — or in some cases even hurt — people’s likeability?  

Geoff Durso (GD): People generally like others who share their position. Then, if you think of people who disagree with you, it seemed reasonable to predict that expressing conflict in your own position might communicate some degree of respect or credence to your opponents’ position at the same time. So when it comes to both groups, you might expect that expressing two-sided opinions would be beneficial to people’s popularity, a sort of middle ground that everyone respected. But we find precisely the opposite pattern.   

My so-called position allies — those who agree with me on an issue — don’t like that I’m conflicted at all. They don’t like that I’m rocking the boat. And to my opponents, expressing conflict doesn’t matter, because I’m against them on the overall position. It doesn’t even register that I feel conflicted, or that my position acknowledges both sides.   

DCOB: How did you go about making sense of those results? Why do you think that was the case?    

GD: The way people think of each other is increasingly polarized. And what’s really interesting about that is that, sometimes, an issue position can become a group identity.   

Say, during the pandemic, I’m pro-mask mandate. But, I express conflict about it. I’m weakening the pro-mask mandate connection among my allies. And when it comes to an anti-mask mandate person, they consider me part of an outgroup “opponent” due to our larger disagreement on mask mandate policies.   

In other words, the nuances in my position don’t even register to opponents. And the same nuance makes my allies feel less connected to me.   

On the connections between marketing and politics 

DCOB: Some folks might be surprised to hear that a marketing professor researches political discourse. What do these two fields have in common?   

GD: I tell my students to think of politics as the marketing of a vote. You might have a dollar and you can give that dollar to any company (or candidate!) based on what products or positions they sell. Likewise, you can also give your vote to a candidate that represents what you want versus the other candidate. Both actions represent consumer behavior. It’s just the currency that varies.   

In other words, a marketplace is not just money, and it’s not just buying things. You can think more generally in terms of choices and decisions between many options in the marketplace. That’s what every marketing campaign has in common, whether it’s toothpaste brands or presidential candidates. The stakes vary, but the underlying marketing processes are similar.     

On where to go from here 

DCOB: Any takeaways from your study results that you think marketers should be paying attention to?   

GD: There’s more and more demand from consumers for brands to make sociopolitical kinds of statements. Our findings suggest that being two-sided about these is going to repel a lot of people. Trying to please everyone with a two-sided sociopolitical statement may simply lead to pleasing no one.   

DCOB: What questions has this research left you with? What do you want to understand better about this issue?   

GD: A truism of psychology is that we judge other people by their actions, but we judge ourselves by our intentions. Expressing ambivalence in our own sociopolitical position may feel personally right (we intend to bridge political divides) but we fail to appreciate how this would be perceived in reality – we may seem inconsistent or waffling, for instance.   

How do you get people to change their expectations around expressing ambivalence? How do you get them to shift away from being focused on their own intentions? Are there ways to generate win-win consensus on divisive sociopolitical issues, and how best to do so? That’s what I’d like to learn a bit more about in my future work. 

Three-Quarters of American Workers are Vulnerable to This Widespread Form of Mistreatment. Why Isn’t it Talked about More?

Meredith Carroll Faculty Focus, Scholarly Pursuits

Driehaus researchers shed light on weight-based mistreatment in the workplace

Research can be pathbreaking in any number of ways. It can distill received wisdom — or upend it. It can organize existing knowledge or chart a new course forward.

Or, like a paper recently published by four Driehaus researchers, research can put a name to something at once widely experienced and seldom discussed. Mistreatment in the workplace based on weight is an unfortunately familiar fact for those who experience it. But it’s rarely talked about: not among leadership; not in the media; and not even, thanks to shame and stigma, among those who are harmed by it.

“We wanted to study something that is real,” said Jaclyn Jensen, a professor and the associate dean for student success at Driehaus, and one of the study’s authors. “We wanted to shed light on something important that we think people are overlooking.”

On why weight-based mistreatment has gone unchecked

Jensen and her coauthors — fellow management and entrepreneurship faculty Grace Lemmon and Goran Kuljanin, along with Doctorate in Business Administration student Renee Chu-Jacoby —  published the results of their work in October.

Across two studies, the team found that weight-based mistreatment is as widespread as it is damaging.

In the U.S., for starters, 75% of the workforce counts as “overweight” or “obese.” (That’s according to the Body Mass Index: a widely used measure that is also widely criticized.)

As part of their study, the Driehaus team surveyed 1,008 adults who fell into this category. Among that sample, 758 people — or 75% — had been mistreated at work because of their weight within the past six months.

Together, these numbers sketch the outlines of a pervasive phenomenon, reinforced by widespread cultural stigmas. These stigmas, the researchers speculate, are part of why the problem has gone unchecked for so long.

“In our culture, we believe that if you’re larger, you’re responsible for being larger,” said Lemmon. “Larger bodies are associated with less competency, less warmth, more selfishness.”

“This is a topic that crosses the personal and professional divide,” added Jensen. “We maybe don’t have scripts that tell us whether we should be talking about it at all. Or, if we are, why we’re talking about it. Those guardrails just aren’t there.”

On why weight-based mistreatment can be hard to spot

For those who experience it, weight-based mistreatment is many-faced, many-formed. Jensen, Lemmon, Kuljanin, and Chu-Jacoby worked with a smaller study population to account for the full spectrum of how weight stigma shows up in the workplace.

They surfaced plenty of examples of overt, aggressive mistreatment: name-calling, exclusion, physical harassment. They also found examples of larger-bodied workers being perceived as less competent and less professional: of these workers being denied access to information or roles because of their size.

Just as damaging — and perhaps more surprising to those who haven’t faced it— were seemingly benign comments known as “benevolent mistreatment.”

Benevolent mistreatment might masquerade as concern for a larger-bodied coworker’s well-being. It might manifest as the suggestion to opt for a salad over a sandwich, or the snide remark about too many trips to the candy bowl — all directed at larger-bodied colleagues without being levied at smaller-bodied individuals who make similar choices.

Benevolent mistreatment, the researchers found, was just as damaging as other forms. No matter how overt or covert the behavior targeted at them, study subjects were likely to withdraw from work; to experience rumination and shame; or to neglect selfcare.

“[Benevolent mistreatment is] very much somebody entering your personal space: your personal emotional space; your personal cognitive space,” said Lemmon. “It might not be physical in nature. But it is still somebody trying to get their way into your life and control you. There’s an element of control implicit in benevolent mistreatment that’s not present in the other forms of mistreatment. And I think that’s why people react so strongly.”

On the potential costs to organizations

Weight-based mistreatment at work, the study found, is undeniably detrimental to workers’ mental health.

Equally, allowing weight-based bullying to proceed unchecked can cost organizations.

“It turns out that how people are treated inside organizations affects their behavior,” said Kuljanin. “That’s why I like this line of work. When you mistreat people, you’re clearly not getting the best out of them.”

The team hasn’t yet had the chance to quantify the impact of weight-based mistreatment on organizations. But, given the scale of the problem and existing research in workplace climates, they conjecture that these costs include lost productivity, deteriorating collaboration, and difficulty attracting and retaining talent.

“We’re social creatures,” Kuljanin said. “We talk about each other and gossip all the time. Organizations develop reputations. And so if you’re an organization that has a reputation for this kind of mistreatment, then you’re going to be missing out on a whole bunch of talent.”

On where to go from here

An issue so widespread, the researchers stressed, will necessitate solutions at any number of levels: from organizational culture right through to public policy.

As for what organizations can do? According to the team, existing research suggests that culture changes happen on many fronts. It happens when organizations change their policies. It happens when leaders draw a clear line. And it happens when all workers — but particularly those in positions of power — give one another models of how to act with compassion and empathy.

When workplace culture does shift, though, that change tends to be pervasive. It’s less about a shift in any one kind of behavior, said Jensen, than it is about a shift in the values underlying people’s choices.

“Take trying to diminish sexual harassment,” she said. “The message isn’t just, ‘respect your female colleagues.’ The message is, ‘all your colleagues deserve to be valued.’ So there are ripple effects. Those types of environments see less sexual harassment. But they also see less of other kinds of harassment, too.”

Compassion and empathy, the authors agree, are two such values that might drive change around weight stigma in the workplace.

—

All told, Lemmon, Jensen, and Kuljanin hope that drawing attention to the scope of the problem will be a catalyst for change.

“When you study nastiness in the workplace, you quickly learn that people know it’s going on,” said Jensen. “It’s just that they don’t necessarily want to talk about it. So one of the things that would be good to normalize, for organizations, is this idea: Not talking about it doesn’t mean that it doesn’t exist.”

“If the thrust of our outreach is awareness,” said Lemmon, “we’re happy.