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ISBM PhD Seminar Series (IPSS)

The ISBM PhD Seminar Series (IPSS) provides a range of short, PhD level seminars in Business-to-Business (B-to-B) Marketing.

ISBM Ph.D. Seminar Series (IPSS)

Application Deadline For Spring 2008 Courses - January 5, 2008

Objective

To provide a range of short, Ph.D. level seminars in Business-to-Business (B-to-B) Marketing. These seminars, delivered electronically by some of the world's leading scholars, provide access to leading developments and methods necessary for doctoral students worldwide who are considering research careers in B-to-B Marketing.

Offerings

IPSS offers electronic participation in substantive and methodological courses essential for Ph.D. students with research interests in business markets. Substantive topics include theory development in business markets, sales management, marketing channel management, and new product development and marketing, among others. Methodological topics include qualitative research methods, social network analysis, and structural equation modeling, among others. Courses are repeated in a 2 - 3 year cycle.

Download an IPSS Brochure (.pdf 312Kb) *Acrobat

Course Offerings, Academic Year 2007 - 2008

1. Channel Management - Professor Mark Bergen and Professor George John (University of Minnesota) Spring 2008

This course is designed to provide a foundation for doctoral students interested in examining channels issues (designing and/or managing channels). It will identify, review and critique a variety of theoretical topics in the channels field. The major objectives are:

  • to help you understand the scope, methods and perspectives employed in the area
  • to help you become more sophisticated consumers of channels research, and
  • to help you clarify your own research interests

We will look at channels comprised of inter-dependent institutions involved in the task of moving goods and services from the point of production to point of consumption. We will examine the structures and processes that characterize these channels and study their causes and consequences. It should be clear from the outset that channels is a very broad field of study, and that it is impossible to cover every relevant topic and perspective. We will draw on a number of different streams of work including work on vertical integration, inter-fi rm contracting, intra-firm and hybrid contracting, relational contracting and channel relationships. This course is not intended to be a comprehensive review of the literature. We have purposely restricted our reading list to a very limited number of papers in order to dig deeply into each paper.

A set of required readings will be scheduled, and it is vital that you come prepared to discuss these in class. Our style is to combine some lecture time with discussion time. Usually, we will ask one or more students to take the lead on specifi c papers. The fi nal assignment will be a written research proposal for a topic in channels of distribution that will be presented and discussed in the last class session.

This course will be offered on Mondays, 11:00am - 1:00pm ET. Session begins January 14, 2008.


2. Innovation Strategy - Professor Gerald J. Tellis (University of Southern California, Los Angeles) Spring 2008

Innovation—the use of new technology to create new business models, products, and services—is a powerful force in world economies. Innovation is responsible for the steady improvement in consumers’ standard of living throughout history. Radical innovation creates entirely new markets and improves the quality of products while also reducing prices. It can propel small outsiders into leadership positions and bring down mighty incumbents that fail to innovate. Firms at the leading edge of innovation tend to dominate world markets and promote the international competitiveness of their home economy. Innovation also enables the creation of rent generating patents that can enrich corporations and entire nations. Thus, innovation simultaneously drives fi rms’ success, economic growth, and consumer welfare. Researchers need to understand the causes, dynamics, and impact of innovation in order to advise managers and policy makers how to harness this powerful force in today’s highly competitive markets.

This seminar will give students an appreciation of the issues, competing viewpoints, research methods, major findings, and unresolved problems in the area of innovation strategy. A tentative list of topics is:

  1. Technological evolution & innovation
  2. Incumbent strategy
  3. Organizing for innovation
  4. Market entry strategy
  5. Diffusion of innovations
  6. Global innovation
  7. Payoff from innovation

This course will be offered on Wednesdays during March and April, 1:00pm-3:00pm ET.


Students must first apply to the IPSS program to determine eligibility.

Apply to IPSS (.pdf 52Kb)*Acrobat

Applicants must provide:

  1. Application for couse. Click here for application. (.pdf #Kb)*Acrobat
  2. Statement of purpose indicating interest in B-to-B Marketing,
  3. One recommendation letter
  4. Relevant transcripts
  5. Any relevant research papers if available (for more advanced students)
  6. Proof of completion of prerequisites for methods courses.
  • Former IPSS students need only submit application along with course name(s) and year(s) of course participation.

Course Delivery and Participation

Each course consists of six to ten sessions of 90-120 minutes each, meeting weekly or biweekly. Class time will be determined by the instructor in consultation with the Instructional Delivery Committee. The courses will be taught via Microsoft Live Meeting. To learn more about Microsoft Live Meeting, please visit www.livemeeting.com. Students must have a computer with a broadband Internet connection and a phone line. During each session, each student must log in to the Live Meeting Site and be connected to the conference line for the duration of the class.

Each year, students are encouraged to attend the ISBM Ph.D. Camp, normally held just before the summer American Marketing Association (AMA) meeting, for organizational and socialization meetings.

Fees

Full and partial scholarships are available to defray the per course fee of $500. No qualified student will be excluded from any IPSS course on the basis of need. The fees are due only after admission and scholarship decision have been made and not at the time of application.

Academic Requirements and Integrity

Students registered for seminars will receive grades of A, B, C, or F depending on their performance. A grade of C or better entitles the student to a course completion certificate. Students are required to sign an academic integrity agreement to obtain a grade or certificate.

Committees

Advisory Board
Name Title Company
Hans Baumgartner Professor of Marketing and Charles and Lillian Binder Faculty Fellow and Marketing Department Chair
The Pennsylvania State University
Mark E. Bergen Carolyn I. Anderson Professor of Business Education Excellence and Chair of the Department of Marketing and Logistics Management
University of Minnesota
Anne Coughlan Associate Professor of Marketing Northwestern University
Robert Dwyer Joseph S. Stern Professor of Marketing University of Cincinnati
Srinath Gopalakrishna
Associate Professor of Marketing
University of Missouri-Columbia
Rajdeep Grewal
Professor of Marketing and Dean's Faculty Fellow
The Pennsylvania State University
Abbie Griffin Royal L. Garff Endowed Chair in Marketing University of Utah
Thomas Gruca Associate Professor of Marketing and Lloyd J. and Thelma W. Palmer Research Fellow University of Iowa
Jan B. Heide Irwin Maier Chair in Marketing University of Wisconsin
Sandy Jap
Caldwell Research Fellow Associate Professor of Marketing
Emory University
George John Pillsbury–Gerot Chair in Marketing University of Minnesota
Wesley J. Johnston CBIM Roundtable Professor of Marketing Georgia State University
Ajay K. Kohli Isaac Stiles Hopkins Chair in Marketing Emory University
V. Kumar (VK)
ING Chair Professor
University of Connecticut
Donald Lehman George E. Warren Professor of Business Columbia University
Gary L. Lilien
Distinguished Research Professor of Management Science
The Pennsylvania State University
James A. Narus Professor of Business Marketing Wake Forest University
Ralph A. Oliva Professor of Marketing and ISBM Executive Director Penn State University
Robert W. Palmatier
Assistant Professor of Marketing, Evert McCabe Faculty Fellow
University of Washington
David J. Reibstein William S. Woodside Professor and Professor of Marketing University of Pennsylvania
Aric P. Rindfleisch
Associate Professor of Marketing
University of Wisconsin-Madison
Venkatesh Shankar
Professor of Marketing and Coleman Chair in Marketing
Texas A&M University
Rajashri Srinivasan
Assistant Professor
University of Texas, Austin
Rajendra Srivastava Robert C. Goizueta Chair in e-Commerce and Marketing and Executive Director, Zyman Institute of Brand Science Emory University
Richard Staelin Edward and Rose Donnell Professor of Business Administration Duke University
Jan-Benedict E.M. Steenkamp C. Knox Massey Professor of Marketing and Marketing Area Chair

University of North Carolina

Gerard J. Tellis Director of the Center for Global Innovation, Neely Chair of American Enterprise and Professor of Marketing University of Southern California
Gerrit H. van Bruggen
Professor of Marketing
RSM Erasmus University
Christophe Van den Bulte
Associate Professor of Marketing
University of Pennsylvania
Rajan Varadarajan
Jenna & Calvin R. Gruest Professor of Business Administration
Texax A&M University
Barton A. Weitz J.C. Penney Eminent Scholar Chair and Executive Director, Center for Retailing Education and Research University of Florida

Admissions Committee

  • Professor Rajdeep Grewal, The Pennsylvania State University
  • Professor Abbie Griffin, University of Utah
  • Professor Gary Lilien, The Pennsylvania State University
  • Professor Richard Staelin, Duke University

Instructional Delivery Committee

  • Professor Rajdeep Grewal, The Pennsylvania State University
  • Professor Abbie Griffin, University of Utah
  • Professor Ajay Kohli, Emory University
  • Professor Gary Lilien, The Pennsylvania State University
  • Professor Rajendra Srivastava, Emory University

For more information

Academic Director: Rajdeep Grewal
E-mail: rug2@psu.edu

Administrative Director: Lori Nicolini
E-mail: avn2@psu.edu