Dean's Column

As the new dean of the Smith School, I’m excited to have the opportunity to introduce you to some of the Smith School’s fantastic research.

This issue of Research @ Smith focuses on the important contributions the Smith School has made to healthcare research, policy and practice. Much of this work has been conducted in partnership with a host of corporate partners, such as Johnson & Johnson, IBM, CareFirst BlueCross BlueShield, MITRE, and Children's National Medical Center.

Smith students reap the benefits of having top-notch researchers in the classroom – professors like Ritu Agarwal, who founded the school’s Center for Health Information Decision Systems (CHIDS). Dr. Agarwal is a behavioral scientist who studies the use and adoption of information systems and important IT-enabled phenomena like global software development and IT strategy, particularly in the health care industry. Corporations have found her work useful in developing practical organizational policies related to IT use and adoption, and also in IT marketing strategies. And scholars around the world have used her work to inform their own research, making her one of the most-cited authors in the field.

We also bring business leaders from the health care industry directly into the classroom to interact with students. Chet Burrell, the CEO of CareFirst, recently spoke to a packed house of about 300 undergraduates as part of our CEO @ Smith speaker series. The MBA Healthcare Business Association also provides opportunities for students and practitioners to meet.

You can learn more about the Smith School’s research and ongoing partnership opportunities on our website, www.rhsmith.umd.edu.

Alexander Triantis
Dean, Robert H. Smith School of Business
University of Maryland