On June 8, 2011, Mahesh Singh, Co-founder and Sr. Vice President of Products at Digité, delivered a guest lecture “Enabling Globally Distributed Projects,” in the Managing Product Development Course for the MBA-One Cohort at the Lucas Graduate School of Business at San Jose State University. Mahesh shared his experiences and insights of over 20 years in Software and IT Services in product management, marketing, sales, and project management. He is collaborating with Prof. Gita Mathur of the College of Business to develop teaching material for courses on product and technology development. Digité is a Silicon Valley start-up and leading provider of collaborative enterprise software for Agile Application Lifecycle Management, targeted towards Corporate IT, IT services/Outsourcing and IT-Consulting companies.

Biography:

Mahesh Singh is Co-founder and Sr. Vice President – Product at Digité, a Silicon Valley start-up and leading provider of collaborative enterprise software for Agile Application Lifecycle Management, targeted towards Corporate IT, IT services/Outsourcing and IT-Consulting companies. He is responsible for Product Management, Marketing and Professional Services for North America and Europe.

Prior to Digité, Mahesh spent over 10 years in the IT Consulting industry working with global giants HCL and NIIT as well as running his own consulting company during the Dot Com boom.

Mahesh holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Electronics Engineering from MS University and an MBA in Systems and Marketing from XLRI, India.

The GLLab (Global Leadership Laboratory) held a week-long session from March 1-5^th, 2011 with SJSU’s MBA-One cohort and seven masters students and one doctoral student from Leuphana University of Lüneburg, Germany. The German students were accompanied by Professors Juergen Deller, Volker Stief and Thomas Schomerus. This exchange program was developed by Dr. Deller, a former Lucas Scholar in Residence at SJSU and currently a Global Leadership Advancement Center (GLAC) research fellow, and Dr. Joyce Osland, executive director of GLAC. In May, MBA-One students will travel with Dr. Osland to Leuphana University and spend a week studying and visiting German firms.

In the GLLab, students were assessed, trained and tested on various global leadership skills by Dr. Osland. Dr. Pini Kemppainnen, GLAC Visiting Scholar from Finland’s JTO School of Management, also helped facilitate the GLLab.  A highlight was an 8-hour assessment center exercise focused on Daimler’s team and leadership competencies.  This session was designed and taught by Dr. Deller, Dr. Stief, and Anne Marit Wöhrmann who have first-hand experience with assessment centers used by German companies.

Guest speaker Karl Kokrhoun, CFO Vaccines & Diagnostics at Novartis, told students about the expatriate experience. Jon Atkins, Managing Director, RBC Capital Markets, described his job as a telecommunications analyst and provided students with career advice. Applied Materials executive Werner Finsterbusch, Corporate Vice President of Applied Global Service Sales, spoke about his company’s global focus and his career as a global leader.  The field trip to Cisco’s Executive Briefing Center to see the telepresence unit was another high point in the week.

To provide the German students with an opportunity to see how Americans live, Naglee Park neighbors and GLAC staff generously opened their homes to lodge the students. The week began with a welcome dinner for the German visitors and their hosts at the Osland house.

This program was made possible by GLAC staff Jeff Gaines (assistant director), Stacy Wheeler (coordinator), and Jessica Navarro and Emalynn Robinson (graduate assistants).  Dr. Mahesh Rajan, MBA Director, contributed to making this week a success, along with the staff of the Lucas Graduate School, Prabha Chandrasekar, Barbara Somers and John Cesari.

Our MBA students are in the San Jose Mercury News regarding a special project they conducted with companies, including Adobe, regarding business ethics.

Please visit this page to read the complete article.

The integrative case activities (successfully piloted in the MBA One program last year) was extended to the CMBA program also.  Students from both programs worked in teams on a case on Entrepreneurship that was led by Prof. Anu Basu. The topic was on Alternate Energy Sources to fossil fuels and students analyzed a case on  Nanosolar, a Silicon Valley based solar energy company.  Student teams were divided into two pools for the preliminary round of competition (April 18) and were judged by faculty panels from the College of Business.  A finalist from each pool presented to a distinguished panel consisting of Mr. Brian Stone (VP of Sales & Marketing, Nanosolar and a key principal in the case), Mr. Mike Balma (a consultant to the solar industry), and Prof. Joel West (College of Business) on March 25.  The team comprised of Jason Chan, Dylan Crutchfield, Dion Jefferson (all MBA One students), Weiwei Chen and Kellen Yeung (CMBA students) was chosen as the winner of this case competition. A picture of the winning team with the judges is shown above.

Two of the three COB teams took first place in their respective divisions at the International Collegiate Business Strategy Competition, which concluded Saturday at Cal State Long Beach. Together the three teams brought home six trophies, the best showing by the SJSU teams since 2008.

Now in its 47th year, and hosted by SJSU during the 1990s, the ICBSC is believed to be the longest continuously running business student competition in the US.

Each student team runs a simulated company for 20 quarters against other teams in their division. The main award is for the financial performance of their companies, but teams are also eligible for an award for the accuracy and realism of their printed reports.

Winning all possible awards was Toys With Sol, a combined CMBA/MBA One team that won first in their division both for company performance and for best reports. Led by CEO Patrick Grogan (CMBA), the team also included Christopher Heavingham (CMBA), Nafisa Jhaveri (CMBA), Casey Holland (MBA One), Nghia Nguyen (MBA One) and Shaun Teacher (Masters in Biotechnology). Although trailing when they arrived in Long Beach, the team won over the judges both through skillful execution of their core strategy and also through their masterful (albeit sleep deprived) presentation to judges Saturday morning.

The other graduate team, G_Input, took 2nd place in their division for company performance as well as the top prize for best reports. Led by Dan Duong, this MBA One team also included Adam Harlow, Chris Heuser, John Shippy and David Van Der Steen.

Tower Toys, an undergraduate team of six Sbona Honors Students from A&F, won first for company performance and runner up for reports. Led by CEO Jason Lopez, the team also included Monikka O’Neil, Kevin Tran, Michael Tran, Raa Valencia, and Lakshmi Venkatesan.

The students were very grateful for the presence of Associate Dean Deborah Crown joined the three teams for the Saturday awards banquet. In the six years I’ve been a coach, this is the first time I’ve seen a faculty member at the competition who wasn’t a coach, judge or a member of the host university.

Also present at CSULB were two retired COB faculty, Abdel El-Shaieb and Steve Achtenhagen, who served as ICBSC judges (but not for our teams.)

For more information and pictures of the winning teams, visit the International Collegiate Business Strategy Competition Website

On June 16, 2010, Mahesh Singh, Co-founder and Sr. Vice President of Products at Digité, delivered a guest lecture “Enabling Globally Distributed Projects,” in the Managing Product Development Course for the MBA-One Cohort at the Lucas Graduate School of Business at San Jose State University.  Mahesh shared his experiences and insights of over 20 years in Software and IT Services in product management, marketing, sales, and project management.  He is collaborating with Prof. Gita Mathur of the College of Business to develop teaching material for courses on product and technology development. Digité is a Silicon Valley start-up and leading provider of collaborative enterprise software for Agile Application Lifecycle Management, targeted towards Corporate IT, IT services/Outsourcing and IT-Consulting companies.

Beginning June 21st, all off-campus business graduate operations are scheduled to be moved from the current Rose Orchard facility to the Network Meeting Center at Techmart on Great America Parkway in Santa Clara.  If you are unfamiliar with Techmart, is it located  in the heart of the “Golden Triangle” (on Great America Parkway next to the Convention Center and the Hilton Hotel), and is easily accessible from Hwy 101, Hwy 237, and public transportation. The facility is located about 5 minutes (2 miles) from the Rose Orchard facility.  This new location offers a comfortable, up-to-date learning environment. Other business graduate institutions that use the Techmart facility include The Haas School at Berkeley, Pepperdine University, and Saint Mary’s College. 

Network Meeting Center at Techmart
5201 Great America Parkway,
Santa Clara, CA 95054 

www.networkmeetingcenter.com 

Network Meeting Center in Silicon Valley’s TechMart