Faculty News

'Genuinely honored': Accounting faculty member receives one-year appointment to key SEC role

A faculty member from the Florida State University College of Business accounting department has won a selective one-year U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission appointment that college officials boast as a boon to her and the university's national and international reputation. Aleksandra "Ally" Zimmerman, an assistant professor and Dean's Emerging Scholar who specializes in auditing and taxation, in August will begin her assignment in the SEC Academic Intergovernmental Personnel Act Mobility Program in Washington, D.C.


FSU researcher: Comparatively poor maternity benefits can prompt new mothers to leave their jobs

If companies want to ensure that pregnant women and new mothers stay on their payrolls, they'd do well to offer competitive maternity benefits. They'd also want to hire and retain supportive managers and leaders. So suggests new research by Samantha Paustian-Underdahl, the Mary Tilley Bessemer Associate Professor of Business Administration in the Florida State University College of Business.


Eminent marketing scholar continues to blaze new trails

Diligence and dedication continue to result in recognition for Maura Scott, recently named Florida State University College of Business' inaugural Dr. Persis E. and Dr. Charles E. Rockwood Eminent Scholar in Marketing.


Early achievements result in marketing award for FSU scholar

Her research shows up in more than a thousand citations by fellow scholars. Her new findings resulted in five papers that are under advanced review at premier marketing journals. She has served on at least four journal editorial boards and at least five dissertation committees. The breadth of achievements by Colleen Harmeling reads like a list of feats that most faculty aspire to accomplish over the course of their career. For her success as an emerging female research star and mentor, the American Marketing Association recently named Harmeling winner of its 2023 Erin Anderson Award.


Calling all working dads who do daily chores

Samantha Paustian-Underdahl seeks volunteers for a study she's embarking on with Shanna Daniels, a fellow faculty member in the Department of Management.


'You can tell how much he cares': Brooks stresses 'competitive advantage' for MBA students

Consider the lengths to which Darren Brooks has gone to assist and promote the Florida State University College of Business. For the college and its students in recent months, he has: busted a dance move to great reviews, simultaneously tackled multiple roles and gotten pies smeared in his face and liked it. "I'm having a ball," Brooks said. "I really do enjoy what I do." But don't misunderstand: He means business.


'Breaking barriers': Marketing professor Maura Scott named Rockwood Eminent Scholar

Florida State University marketing professor Maura Scott finds herself reflecting on the legacy of Persis Rockwood, the late FSU marketing professor who established so many firsts that she might as well have trademarked the word.


Marketing professor focuses on 'the greater good'

Ethics. Inclusivity. Societal well-being. Maura Scott makes those concepts the focus of her award-winning research into, among other topics, ways in which organizations can simultaneously increase profits and make life better for their customers, particularly those from vulnerable populations. Scott, the Persis E. Rockwood Professor of Marketing in the College of Business, says her approach reflects her vision of using "rigorous, inclusive scholarly research to help improve consumers' financial and health decision-making and well-being, and to underscore the role firms can play in advancing the greater good."


Finance expert: Fed had to respond to high inflation

Soaring inflation and its threat to the U.S. economy gave the Federal Reserve no choice but to raise interest rates this week and to signal further increases in the coming months, said William Christiansen, longtime chair of the finance department in Florida State University's College of Business. "There's pretty much unanimous agreement that they have to raise rates," said Christiansen, referring to the Fed's rate-setting Federal Open Market Committee, or FOMC. "Rates are at historic lows, and they've been that low for a long time. Now inflation is very high, and the Fed has to respond."


What makes our 'Dancing CPA' tick

The robber said he had a gun, and 17-year-old bank teller Miles Romney wasn't about to question him. Romney merely did what his employer had instructed him to do in such cases – follow orders. In this case, that meant: (1) start handing over $100 bills and (2) don't press the alarm -- or he'd get shot. "I got robbed at gunpoint," Romney reflects about 25 years later. "That's why I dance." Leave it to Romney to turn any moment, even a serious one, into a punchline.