Guest speakers Patricia Bleil (Vice President and Business Director of Western Business Unit, Wyeth Pharmaceuticals) and her husband Gordon Bleil, (retired management consultant, bank executive, business owner, and adjunct management professor) discussed “Servant Leadership:  Does it work in corporate America?”  The Bleils challenged the students to be more Christ-like in their management/leadership roles by claiming, “to be first, you have to be last.”  They said effective and memorable leadership can be obtained through empathy and passionate regard for subordinates.

Another segment of the program highlighted the FMBA New Venture Project business concepts. This “poster session” featured numerous NVP groups across six cohorts, where students prepared presentations to showcase their awareness of business and advertising skills.  The innovative project concepts included both profit and nonprofit organizations, which were judged by a team of NVP advisors on the basis of content, organization, visualization and personal presentation of the business concepts.  First-time seminar students were able to observe, ask questions, and interact with advanced FMBA students.

The winners of the NVP poster sessions were: First Place- Real Men Relax Spa- (Steven Brown, Yasmeen Toney, Carmella Morrison, Dottie Smith).  Second Place- Virtual Computing- (Steven McDonald, Kenya Allwine and Ed Carter).  Third Place- Generations Day Spa- (Nia Lott, Denver Hopson, Brian Jones and Michael McGee).  Honorable Mention - The Local Bean- (Jennifer Tedeschi, Danielle Dalton, Chris Watkins, Matt Scaramastra).
As an added feature, former FMBA students who used their NVP project, “Play A Round Golf” to launch an actual business were on hand to answer questions students had regarding the launch of the company.

The Executive Seminar also featured the introduction of the newly appointed Interim Director of the Fast-Track MBA Program, Mark Lomax.  Lomax, a senior faculty member, also serves as the lead faculty for Central Pennsylvania. He will provide oversight of the FMBA curriculum, work with the other program directors in the credentialing and assignment of faculty, and trouble-shoot instructor or student service issues in the program.

The Campolo College of Graduate and Professional Studies at Eastern University offers a broad range of adult, undergraduate and graduate programs from community education to Associate’s degrees to its newest Ph.D. in Organizational Leadership. Areas of instruction include business, counseling psychology, education, health administration, leadership, nonprofit management, nursing and urban/international economic development. For more information call 1.800.732.7669, e-mail gpsadm@eastern.edu or visit www.eastern.edu.