On this edition of DeKalb Business Today, host Matt Holmes welcomes a trio of business leaders with ties to Emory University. Emory alum Kristin Diver talks about the importance of getting small businesses organized and how that can pay dividends come tax time. Brian Goebel discusses his efforts to help small businesses grow their networks and find capital. Emory professor Sandy Jap rounds out the panel, looking at how business relationships involving friends can go sour.
Brian Goebel/Director of the Start:ME Accelerator Program at Emory University Goizueta School of Business
Brian is passionate about knowledge, networks, and capital- the key elements required to address the most critical social challenges that we collectively face today. Brian applies these elements in implementing the field work of Social Enterprise @ Goizueta (SE@G).
Brian works closely with students, faculty, staff and community stakeholders as Managing Director to support SE@G’s wide array of initiatives and partnerships which includes student-led programs and Nicaragua based initiatives (specialty coffee and community health).
As Program Director for Start:ME, he works closely with community partners and business professionals to provide promising micro-entrepreneurs the business tools, network access and early-stage financing needed to develop sustainable businesses that not only support entrepreneurs and their families, but also build neighborhood vitality.
Brian’s expertise lies in strategic planning, organizational development, change management, program design and business planning. He brings a mix of corporate and community experience to the table as Brian previously served as a Management Consultant with Deloitte and Community Builder with the United Way of Greater Atlanta.
Kristin W. Diver/President of System Happy, Inc.
Kristin Diver cycled through various careers as an economic forecaster, a Spanish interpreter, and a European tour guide before finally settling down and starting System Happy nearly ten years ago. Fluent in four languages, she grew up in Puerto Rico and loves to travel. One of her favorite experiences was spending six hours negotiating for three pounds of silver jewelry in Morocco (in French)! She is president-elect of the Georgia Chapter of the National Association of Professional Organizers and lives in Decatur with her husband and two young children.
Sandy Jap/Professor of Marketing at Emory University Goizueta Business School, Author of “Partnering with the Frenemy: A Framework for Managing Business Relationships, Minimizing Conflict, and Achieving Partnership Success”
Sandy Jap’s research focuses on the development and management of interorganizational relationships such as how to create and manage strategic alliances over time, how to balance their risks and rewards, and how to share the payoffs of close collaborations. These efforts have been conducted in a number of industries, including the aerospace, automotive, chemical, petroleum, and consumer product industries. The results of this work have been published in a variety of books and journals, including: the Journal of Marketing Research, the Journal of Marketing, Marketing Science, Management Science, Organization Science, Sloan Management Review, and a wide array of special issues. She is an Editorial Board Member of the Journal of Marketing Research, and Marketing Letters, and is an Area Editor for the International Journal of Research in Marketing. More recently, she was named a Dean’s Term Chair Professor in 2009 and given the Lou Stern Award 2007 for the article in marketing channels and distribution with the greatest impact on the field three to eight years after publication. In 2003, she was named one of the top twenty “potential leaders of the next generation of marketing academics” by the Marketing Science Institute and in 2004 she was given the title of Caldwell Research Fellow, an internal award for research excellence.
Her current work involving online, reverse auctions has received significant attention from the academic community and the marketplace, including The Wall Street Journal, CFO Magazine, and Harvard Business Review. It also earned her a Frank Batten Young Scholar Award, given to top junior faculty for exemplary research in E-Business and Supply Chain Management. She joined the Goizueta Business School in 2001; prior to that, Professor Jap was on the faculty at the Sloan School of Management at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Her teaching includes courses in channel management, internet marketing, CRM analytic fieldwork, and marketing management in MBA, BBA, and Executive Education programs.
She has a bachelor’s degree and a Ph.D in marketing from the University of Florida (Go Gators!). She is on the editorial review boards at the Journal of Marketing Research, International Journal of Research in Marketing, and Marketing Letters. She is currently the President Elect of the American Marketing Association’s Academic Council. She joined Goizueta in 2001 after being on the Management Science faculty at the Sloan School at MIT. She was a visiting faculty member at the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania from 2008-2009. Professor Jap speaks frequently on issues related to organizational collaboration and partnering.
Here is a clip of her remarks to the Marketing Science Institute’s Board of Trustees on the topic of organizational trust. In 2010, she co-launched the Marketing Analytics Center (EmoryMAC), an initiative to facilitate research collaborations between industry and faculty and equip students in state-of-the-art analytical techniques.
