New Business Faculty for 2017

Leanne Adams speaks with Christopher Miller after the first faculty meeting in September. Both Adams and Miller are new instructors-in-residence in the accounting department. (Nathan Oldham/UConn School of Business)
Leanne Adams speaks with Christopher Miller after the first faculty meeting in September. Both Adams and Miller are new instructors-in-residence in the accounting department. (Nathan Oldham/UConn School of Business)

Impressive Professors Bring Strong Credentials, Added Zeal to School of Business Ranks

An expert in terror analytics, a marketer who worked for NBC, Pepsi and Disney, and a champion of the volunteer income tax program at UConn are among the newest faculty at the School of Business.

“Our new faculty members have both outstanding credentials and tremendous enthusiasm. I’m pleased to welcome them to our team,” said Dean John A. Elliott. “Our ability to attract these impressive professors speaks to the reputation of the university as a whole and the status and respect earned by the School of Business.”

The 13 new faculty members are:

Leanne Adams (Nathan Oldham/UConn School of Business)
Leanne Adams

Leanne Adams, an instructor-in-residence in accounting, joins the faculty after serving in an adjunct capacity since 2003. She completed her Master of Science degree in accounting at UConn in May, with a GPA in excess of a 4.0. She is a licensed CPA in Connecticut and earned the 2015 Educator of Excellence award from the Connecticut Society of CPAs. Her experience includes both public and private accounting in the financial services, manufacturing and non-profit industries. Her professional interests include financial accounting, as well as promoting citizenship and social awareness through programs such as UConn’s Volunteer Income Tax Assistance (VITA) program, which she has led for the past three years.

 

Maryam Jafari Bidgoli (Nathan Oldham/UConn School of Business)
Maryam Jafari Bidgoli

Maryam Jafari Bidgoli, a visiting assistant professor of finance, joins UConn after earning a Ph.D. in economics from Wayne State University in Detroit, where she also earned her master’s degree in the same field. Last year she was the recipient of the Blue Cross/Blue Shield of Michigan Foundation Doctoral Student Award for her proposal, “Health Shocks and the Labor Market: Cancer in Michigan.” Her dissertation topic was “Essays on Health and Labor Market Outcomes.” Her honors and distinctions include the Department of Economics Mendelson Award for Outstanding dissertation (2017), and Department of Economics’ Samuel M. Levin Award for Outstanding Paper in Economics (2017). Her professional interests include health economics, labor economics and economics of health insurance.

 

Sandra Corredor
Sandra Corredor, an assistant professor of management, joins the UConn faculty after earning a Ph.D. in strategy and entrepreneurship from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. She has won several academic awards for her work. Her research interests explore connections between innovation and corporate and international strategies. In particular, she examines the role that divestitures play in technology management, as well as the impact of firms’ international engagement on their innovation approach.
Jennifer Eigo

Jennifer Eigo, an instructor-in-residence in the OPIM department (Hartford and Stamford), is a two-time graduate of the department in which she will be working. In 2016, she completed her master’s degree in business analytics and project management, after previously earning a bachelor’s degree in management information systems. Most recently she has worked as manager of business performance and analytics at Travelers. During the last year, she has taught courses in project risk and cost management at UConn. She brings a blend of her industry experience in data analytics and IT project work to give the students full context for the skills they are learning. Her professional interests include insurance analytics and business process improvement.

 

Ugochukwu Etudo (Nathan Oldham/UConn School of Business)
Ugochukwu Etudo

Ugochukwu Etudo, an assistant professor of OPIM (Stamford) joins UConn after earning a Ph.D. in information systems from Virginia Commonwealth University, where he also earned his Master of Science degree in the same discipline. Etudo’s terror analytics research earned the VCU Presidential Research Quest Fund Grant this summer. He was selected to participate in the International Conference on Information Systems’ Doctoral Consortium, a select group of 40 candidates from around the world. His research interests include text mining and analytics, ontology engineering, information systems security and social media analytics for terrorism studies.

 

Christopher Field (Nathan Oldham/UConn School of Business)
Christopher Field

Christopher Field, an instructor-in-residence in OPIM (Stamford) joins the permanent faculty after working as a UConn adjunct instructor teaching undergraduate and graduate students in Hartford, West Hartford and Waterbury, where he received exemplary student evaluations. Field is an U.S. Army veteran who earned his Master of Science degree in business analytics and project management from UConn in 2015. His professional experience includes working as a principal training and development specialist at Raytheon and in various leadership roles in the U.S. Army. His professional interests include project management and analytics.

 

Kelly Herd

Kelly Herd, an assistant professor of marketing, joins UConn from the faculty at Indiana University. She earned a Ph.D. from the University of Colorado in 2011. Herd has been the recipient of multiple fellowships and awards. Her research interests are in consumer behavior with a focus on creativity, product design, and emotion. Prior to completing her Ph.D., she worked on marketing campaigns for clients including Toshiba, Disney, NBC, and Pepsi.

 

Simon Huang (Cox School of Business)
Simon Huang

Simon Huang, visiting assistant professor of finance, joins UConn from Southern Methodist University, where his teaching of investments was highly rated by students. His research interests include behavioral finance and investment management. His work has appeared in the program of leading academic conferences such as the Western Finance Association. Huang completed his doctoral work in financial economics at Yale University in 2014. His bachelor’s and master’s degrees are from the University of California at Berkeley. His industry experience includes working as a portfolio manager at PanAgora Asset Management and as a research analyst at Fortress Investment Group.

 

Christopher Miller (Nathan Oldham/UConn School of Business)
Christopher Miller
Christopher Miller, an instructor-in-residence in accounting, joins the UConn faculty after completing his Ph.D. work in accounting at the University of Mississippi. In 2016, he was presented with a Doctoral Student Teaching Award. He is a U.S. Navy veteran, and has earned three additional graduate degrees, including a Ph.D. from University of Nevada, Las Vegas. Miller’s professional interests include managerial accounting, financial statement analysis, short-seller behavior and business valuation. 

Frank Murphy

Frank Murphy, an assistant professor of accounting, joins UConn after earning his Ph.D. in accounting at the University of Arizona. His professional experience includes six years at Deloitte, where he was a manager of international tax services. After earning his Bachelor of Science in accounting from UConn in 2007, Murphy completed a Master of Science degree in taxation from Bentley University. He is a CPA in Connecticut. His professional interests include corporate taxation, tax avoidance and international taxation.

 

Cristian Pinto-Gutierrez (Nathan Oldham/UConn School of Business)
Cristian Pinto-Gutierrez

Cristian Pinto-Gutierrez, a visiting assistant professor of finance, joins UConn from the Universidad del Desarrollo in Santiago, Chile. He earned his Ph.D. in finance from Tulane University, and his undergraduate and master’s degree in finance from Universidad de Chile. He has worked as a financial analyst for the Ministry of Transport in Chile. His professional interests include media coverage and its impact on finance, mergers and acquisitions, and family business structure.

 

Eleanor Tice Sirmans (Nathan Oldham/UConn School of Business)
Eleanor Tice Sirmans

Eleanor (Tice) Sirmans, a visiting assistant instructor in healthcare management and insurance in the finance department, joins UConn after earning a Ph.D. in business administration with a concentration in risk management and insurance from Florida State University. During her time there, she mentored both undergraduate and graduate risk- management and insurance students. She is a member of several professional organizations in her field, including the American Risk and Insurance Association. Two of her research papers were presented at the recent American Risk and Insurance Association annual meeting. Her research interests include: annuities, health insurance markets, insurance economics and insurance regulation. She also serves as the assistant editor of Risk Management and Insurance Review.

 

Niam Yaraghi (Nathan Oldham/UConn School of Business)
Niam Yaraghi

Niam Yaraghi, an assistant professor of OPIM (Stamford), joins UConn after completing a fellowship at the Center for Technology Innovation at the Brookings Institute. Yaraghi has a Ph.D. in management science and systems from the State University of New York at Buffalo, earned in 2014. His work has been published in many research journals and he has granted many prominent media interviews and written op-ed pieces. Yaraghi is also the recipient of more than $400,000 in research grants. His primary research interest is health information technology.