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BNZ Business Seminar Series – In 2007 the BNZ and the School of Business joined forces in a five year partnership to provide a series of business seminars linking the School and leading academics from within the school and abroad with local business practitioners.   

The involvement with the BNZ is another positive move by the School to be connected with the business community.  The School also benefits by having the opportunity to bring leading experts from around the world to our campus, and to develop relationships with those individuals and their home institutions.

Next BNZ Business Seminar:
Thursday 6 November, 6pm - Hutton Theatre, Otago Museum

"How Women are Changing the World of Business – A World Bank Perspective"
Presented by Amanda Ellis - Lead Specialist, World Bank Group Gender Action Plan

Women's economic empowerment is changing the face of business and is one of the many key factors to both business growth and poverty reduction. Dunedinite Amanda Ellis will share experiences from some of the world's leading companies committed to promoting women's economic empowerment.

Amanda has a wealth of knowledge in this area through her managment of the World Bank's Global Private Sector Leaders Forum which includes the global CEOs of such companies as Goldman Sachs, Pricewaterhouse Coopers and Standard Chartered.

Drinks and nibbles will held from 6.00pm, with Amanda starting her presentation at 6.30pm. This is an open seminar meaning all interested parties are welcome to attend. For catering purposes we would appreciate it if you could please RSVP to business@business.otago.ac.nz, or phone Anne hughes, 479 5197 by Friday 31 October.

 

2008 Seminar Series

Seminar #1 - Cultures of Success
Seminar #2 - A New Zealand High-Tech Business Model: Aspiration or Anathema?
Seminar #3 - How Women are Changing the World of Business – A World Bank Perspective

Seminar #1 - Cultures of Success
Professor Brendan Gray
DCC Chair in Entrepreneurship
Download the podcast of this seminar using Windows Media Player or in your Internet Browser

Professor Brendan Gray University of Otago DCC Chair in Entrepreneurship

On Tuesday 11 March 2008, Professor Brendan Gray presented his seminar entitled “Cultures of Success”. This seminar was jointly hosted by the Bank of New Zealand and the Dunedin City Council.

The seminar focused on how corporate cultures support and guide effective marketing and management practices. Insights into successful corporate cultures have been gained from comprehensive case studies of 32 successful New Zealand firms.

Professor Gray is the Dunedin City Chair in Entrepreneurship, a position made possible by a large donation by the Dunedin City Council and matched by the Government under the University of Otago Leading Thinkers programme. With the aid of further support from the School of Business he is establishing a Centre for Entrepreneurship , which aims to encourage and facilitate entrepreneurship research, teaching and commercialization. As well as working with academics and students, the Centre will also work with business owners and economic development agencies to help establish innovative, creative and internationally-competitive enterprises based in Otago.

Before being appointed as the University's first professor of entrepreneurship in July 2007, Professor Gray directed the Marketing Performance Centre (MPC), a multidisciplinary research group based in the University's Department of Marketing. Since 1998 MPC researchers have been investigating how to improve the competitiveness and performance of service enterprises. [Top]

 

Seminar #2 - A New Zealand High-Tech Business Model: Aspiration or Anathema?
Associate Dean, Graduate Studies and Research, Professor Sally Davenport
Podcast: Coming soon.

Professor Sally Davenport Victoria University, Wellington

Is there such a thing as a high-tech business model in New Zealand? If so, what are the implications for aspiring firms and for those in the public sector wishing to grow more of them? In this lecture, Prof. Davenport will explore the attributes that might make up such a business model and their impact on a firm's propensity to cluster and to become a target for trade sale. She will also comment upon what firms in emerging high-tech sectors such as biotechnology and nanotechnology, and even ‘low-tech' commodity sectors, may learn from this model.

Prof. Davenport has a background in the physical sciences having started academic life as a research chemist. She moved into the business world while working as a consultant in Britain in the late 1980s. She returned to New Zealand to take up a position teaching the management of science & technology but, being in Wellington, has also developed interests in research policy. She has worked as a consultant for organisations such as the Foundation for Research, Science & Technology (FRST) and the Ministry of Research, Science & Technology. She also has a long-standing research relationship with Industrial Research, one of the Government's Crown Research Institutes.
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