ne of the University of New Hampshire’s four strategic priorities is “Embrace NH,” which includes building collaborations that support the state’s economy. As a business school at a public, land-grant university it is central to our mission to partner with businesses and non-profit and governmental organizations in New Hampshire and beyond to share research, knowledge, and skills to enrich society and enhance organizational success.
These partnerships are woven through Paul College and not only benefit our business partners, but they also provide experience-based learning and research opportunities for our students and faculty. Collaboration drives innovation to solve complex problems. It helps us better understand the challenges faced by businesses in the state and region and help them navigate through and adjust. It also informs adaptation of our curriculum and programs to better prepare our students, as well as our faculty and staff, to tackle real-world challenges.
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Inspiring Students to Put Academics to Work
f you have expertise in your industry and passion for sharing that with others, UNH’s Paul College of Business and Economics is recruiting adjunct instructors for its Business in Practice Program.
Known as BiP, the program was created in 2018 to keep students up to speed on the tools, techniques and skills desired by employers in today’s rapidly evolving world. Tapping into the knowledge of industry professionals, BiP stacks on top of the core curriculum two-credit courses that help students develop skills most in demand by employers – skills such as analytical intelligence, communication, collaboration, emotional intelligence, and leadership.
New Initiative in Business Analytics Created to Meet Growing Student and Employer Demand
hanks to the vast amounts of data available today, organizations now have greater access to information that can help influence critical business decisions. What they need are employees who can harness the power of big data, and support to help them employ analytics tools to create value for their business.
The UNH Paul College of Business and Economics has launched a new Business Analytics Initiative aimed at providing New Hampshire and regional businesses with the critical help needed to sustain a competitive advantage.
UNH alumnus Peter T. Paul ’67 made a $6 million gift to jump-start the initiative. A $25 million gift by Paul significantly funded the new state-of-the art college in 2008 and in 2013 the former Whittemore School of Business and Economics was renamed.
Capping Off Their Master’s in Business Analytics Program
The inaugural class of master’s in business analytics students capped off their program with a capstone experience course that included consulting projects with a variety of regional organizations. Under the direction of Adjunct Professor Phani Kidambi, vice president -analytics & data science -strategy, digital & innovation, Wells Fargo, the student teams put what they had learnedin the classroom to work on real-world problems and solutions ranging from dashboards and databases to machine learning models and websites.
Holloway Competition Seeds Entrepreneurs and Innovators
hroughout the past 33 years more than 100 Paul J. Holloway Prize Competition finalists have launched nearly 120 businesses. Thirty of those businesses started as competition pitches, and almost 60% have been based in New Hampshire. To this day, 30% of former participants are currently the owner or founder of a company.
Nobl Coffee – Connor Roelke
CocoChew – Chip Linton, Chris Lovell, Edward Hoogasian, Ryan Kelly
NextStep HealthTech – Sam Warach
JaJaBelle’s – Jessica DePontiad
Kikori – Kendra Bostick
YouScheduler – Brancesco Mikulis Borsoi, Krstian Comer
My Place Teen Center – Donna Dwyer
Fuller Health Group – Brian Fuller
Holloway Success Stories
Something delicious is cooking at this business
Jessica dePontbriand ’03 grew up in a family where something delicious was always cooking on the stove or baking in the oven–whether she was home, at her yiayia’s, or with one of her great aunts’ who ran a Greek bakery out of their home in Nashua, N.H., called Makreena’s.
Nowadays, there’s still always something delicious in the oven. And oftentimes it’s cooking at her business, jajabelles.
Experiential education in the K-12 classroom? There’s an app for that
During the five years Kendra Bostick ’23G worked alongside teachers as a school social worker, the educational and emotional struggles her kids had inside the classroom ran the gamut. Not every child is the strongest reader or an up-and-coming mathlete. Not every child has the tools they need to deal with disappointment and frustration with standardized testing and strict curriculum.
Guiding businesses through COVID
or more than 37 years, UNH has hosted the NH Small Business Development Center. For decades, NH SBDC was one of the Granite State’s best kept secrets. With the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, it quickly became a lifeline to businesses across the state.
The COVID pandemic created challenges that tested people in ways no one could have imagined. New Hampshire’s small businesses were particularly impacted as they struggled to keep their doors open. Retaining employees, keeping supplies coming in, and pivoting to new health protocols were a few of the challenges they encountered and continue to face.
According to the U.S. Small Business Administration, there are approximately 137,000 small businesses in New Hampshire – 99 percent of all businesses in the state. They employ about half of the private workforce. Keeping them strong is paramount to the vitality of the state.
mall businesses drive the economies of New Hampshire, Maine, and northern Massachusetts and many of those are family businesses. The personal relationships can present challenges that need distinct guidance.
This is where the CEO & Family Enterprise Center comes in. Headquartered in the UNH Paul College of Business and Economics, the Center, which was started in 1993, provides information, resources, programs, and connections to family-owned and operated businesses as they navigate the shared challenges that all family businesses ultimately face.
“The biggest challenge for a family business is to have a clean ownership structure in place, as well as a clear and communicated succession plan,” said Director Michelline Dufort. “Families don’t always communicate well. Throw a business in the mix and it can get murky and complicated quickly.”
David Greenlaw ’80, a UNH Foundation Board emeritus member, made a gift of $2.5 million to fully endow the Dwayne Wrightsman Professor of Finance, a position he first established in 2005 to further develop scholarship in the fields of macroeconomics and finance.
