February 2006

GW School of Business Establishes
Three New Management Departments

The GW School of Business recently formed three new departments — the Decision Sciences Department, the Information Systems and Technology Management Department, and the Management Department — in a reorganization of the Management Science Department. The department was originally created to accommodate the academic programs that did not “fit” within traditional disciplines such as finance, marketing, and accounting, and over the years it grew to include a diversity of “newer” disciplines like information systems, project management, and decision sciences.

Management Science was at one time the largest department in the University with 51 full-time faculty, 42 part-time faculty, 15 staff, more than 30 graduate teaching assistants, and more than 70 doctoral students.

“For several years now, the Management Science Department was considered too large,” said Edward Cherian, former chair of the department. “With the advent of a new chair in 2004, the faculty expressed an interest in seeing smaller departments that could more readily advance each discipline’s agenda.”

In May 2005 the faculty of the department met and voted to reorganize, presenting several new configurations, and by Oct. 7, 2005, a plan to restructure into three new departments was approved unanimously.

“Faculty worked through the summer on different configurations and resisted ‘outside influences’ that attempted to ‘promote’ certain configurations,” added Cherian. “They determined that all decisions and reorganization results were to be in their hands exclusively.”

The restructuring of the department required a lot of shifting, including division of the staff, the operating budget, and equipment. New chairs, by-laws, and course numbers had to be created to reflect the new departments. Office space allocated for the move into the newly renovated Funger Hall and the new Duquès building had to be re-allocated and doubts were expressed that the reorganization would be ready in under a year. However, with the assistance of a faculty dedicated to the project, reorganization was completed in less than three months.

According to Cherian, the new structure may include some losses: “Interdisciplinary research and publication may not be as forthcoming as they were previously, as well as the loss of flexibility of budget transfers from one budget to another, and the loss of flexibility of faculty and staff assignments.”

However, he said the new departments are easier to manage, more homogenous, and more focused on different disciplines and research interests. They have appropriate representation in both GWSB and University committees, and can be more relevant in judging APT decisions. While still uncertain whether the reorganization of the department will be successful or not, the faculty of the former Management Science Department is fully committed to the effort required to make the new organizations work.

Send feedback to: bygeorge@gwu.edu