Mayberry Chair of Excellence

2001-2002

The Mayberry Chair’s purpose is to increase awareness and enhance development of performance excellence related practices in business and education on a local, state, and national level. This is achieved by conducting and disseminating research, implementing projects and activities, conducting workshops for practitioners, and instructing students in undergraduate and graduate classes. The Mayberry team, consisting of Chairholder Curt W. Reimann, President Robert Bell, Dean Bob Niebuhr, Mayberry Professor of Management R. Nat Natarajan, and Mayberry Graduate Assistants Chad Meador, Nick Brown, and Sandra Robbins, has contributed to this mission during the past year. Activities carried out in 2001-2002 include:

• The Mayberry Advisory Board met during October 29 and 30, 2001. On that occasion, members of the Board interacted with students at the College of Business Administration (COBA) reception and participated in visits to various classes within COBA. They also took part in a panel discussion organized by MBA students.
• The Board members attended a presentation by Dr. Bonita Barger on the Online course, Human Resources Management, offered by her for the Regent’s Degree Program.
• At the recommendation of several Mayberry Advisory Board members, the Mayberry Chair of Excellence implemented a private, online discussion board in Spring 2002. The Mayberry message board serves as a medium to facilitate topical discussions and to distribute internal announcements to all Board members.
• The Mayberry Chair is collaborating with the Tennessee Tech School for Interdisciplinary Studies and Extended Education, with a focus on strategic planning.
• The Spring Mayberry Lecture was delivered by Roy Bauer, VP of Systems Manufacturing at Pemstar, on April 4, 2002. His talk, titled “Malcolm Baldrige at the Olympic Games,” in Johnson Hall Auditorium, was well attended and received by faculty and students from the Business departments (see report in this newsletter).
• Dr. Reimann served on the Technical Committee for the Juran Center for Leadership in Quality, Carlson School of Management, University of Minnesota. He worked with Professor Roger Schroeder on the Body of Knowledge project.
• Dr. Reimann serves on the American Society for Quality (ASQ) Juran Medal Committee. Dr. Reimann served as a member of an ASQ group to assess the future of quality.
• Mayberry Graduate Assistant Nick Brown served on the Tennessee Quality Award (TQA) Board of Examiners for 2001; Chad Meador and Sandra Robbins are serving on the 2002 TQA Board of Examiners.
• Mayberry Graduate Assistant Chad Meador and Dr. Susan Elkins, Dean of the School of Interdisciplinary Studies and Extended Education,Tennessee Tech, attended the Quest for Excellence Conference (see article in this newsletter).
• President Bell served on the Panel of Judges and Board of Directors for the Tennessee Quality Award Program. Dr. Nat Natarajan served on the Board of Examiners for the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award in 2001.
• Dr. Reimann taught a special topics class on Performance Excellence for senior undergraduates.
• Dr. Bonita Barger has incorporated the Baldrige Organizational Profile as the diagnostic and organizational analysis tool in the MBA Business Research course taught by her. She and Dr. Nat Natarajan have written a paper on this instructional innovation and its benefits. It will be presented at the Decision Sciences Institute National Conference in San Diego in November, 2002 (see article in this newsletter).
• In Fall 2001, Dr. Nat Natarajan was appointed to the position of Mayberry Professor of Management.
• Dr. Nat Natarajan presented papers at the annual meeting of the Decision Sciences Institute in San Francisco, and the EUROMA 2002 conference in Copenhagen. He also visited Tennessee Tech’s partner university in Pori, Finland, and the Graduate School of Management at St. Petersburg State University in St. Petersburg, Russia.