Broad alumni:

As this truly unprecedented semester comes to an end, I’d like to invite you to engage with our spring 2020 issue of Broad Matters, a publication from the Broad College of Business.

I’ve been humbled and inspired by how our students, alumni and faculty have risen to the occasion to take on new challenges throughout this extraordinary time. We’ve brought to your inbox a handful of selected highlights of Broad faculty research, scholarly contributions and insights, not only involving our response to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic but also impactful expertise on timely topics.

Regards,

Sanjay Gupta
Eli and Edythe L. Broad Dean

Five is the magic number of people for making your Zoom calls effective

Workplaces across the country have gone virtual, and people are feeling the strain of wading through endless video meetings and email chains. As Eli Broad Professor of Management John Hollenbeck explains in his article just published in Business Insider, big teams are bad teams. You can make your organization’s virtual communication less painful by understanding and working within our human cognitive limits.

What CEOs need to know as U.S. industry rallies to fight COVID-19

Business leaders can’t simply snap their fingers and transform their production lines and supply chains overnight. It could take months for some manufacturers to fully ramp up efforts — well after the (first) coronavirus peak has hit. Department of Supply Chain Management faculty members Tobias Schoenherr, Sri Talluri and Vedat Verter offer insight in Chief Executive Magazine on what business leaders can do to respond as rapidly and effectively as possible.

A company’s good deeds can make consumers think its products are safer

Companies like to highlight when they do good things for society — behaviors that fall under the umbrella of corporate social responsibility. Companies do them to increase customer loyalty and, ultimately, earn more revenue.

Past research has suggested that customers like to purchase more from companies that do good deeds because of the “warm glow” that comes with it. In a new study, however, Department of Marketing faculty member Valerie Good and colleagues discovered another effect motivating consumer behavior: These activities can make people think the firms’ products or services are safer and of higher quality.

Hospitals could save tens of millions of dollars annually in their operating rooms

The United States spends more on health care than any other nation: roughly $3.6 trillion in 2018. A large portion of that spending — nearly 30%, by some estimates — is wasted.

Research from Anand Nair, professor of operations and supply chain management, and colleagues at Rutgers University quantifies how much money is being wasted in hospital operating rooms. The findings reveal that hospitals could save on average $1,800 per surgery, or nearly $28 million annually, by avoiding and reducing unplanned costs.

The census goes digital: 3 things to know

The U.S. Census Bureau is hoping that most people who live in the U.S. will use the internet to answer census questions, rather than filling out a paper form or providing those answers to a census taker in person, at their home.

Anjana Susarla, associate professor in the Department of Accounting and Information Systems, offers caution in a recent article appearing in The Conversation. As some of her work on digital platforms and electronic commerce has shown, collecting data online carries some significant risks that are new to the census and may undermine the accuracy of the count and the public’s trust in the process.

Hiring your friends could mean better performance

“It’s not about what you know, it’s who you know” is a common saying in the business world, emphasizing the importance of networking.

But beyond the gains of leveraging your contacts and embracing untapped opportunities, are there other benefits to hiring through your network? New research from Charles Hadlock, Frederick S. Addy Distinguished Chair in Finance, and colleagues at the University of Alabama finds that hiring decisions based on connections could result in securing superior talent, specifically for fields where individual human capital is critical for organizational success.