Business Administration
- Degree Type Bachelor of Science
- Department Business Administration
- Academic Division The Williams School
- Offerings Major Entrepreneurship minor
Business administration is one of the most popular majors at W&L. We offer small classes (usually 16 to 22 students) that are innovative and experiential. Our professors maintain open-door policies and are regularly available to students outside of class. Quality teaching is unquestionably our highest priority.
Business Administration
Business students engage in multiple aspects of business administration and how they relate to the broader social and cultural aspects of society and the world.
Typical areas of interest are in the financial industry (such as banking, investments, Wall Street and real estate development), marketing (advertising and branding), entrepreneurship, corporate social responsibility, environmental sustainability and business consulting. Business Administration students engage in case studies focusing on many aspects of business (finance, marketing, organizational behavior, leadership, strategic management, law and ethics). They have the opportunity to critically analyze real companies in current situations and make recommendations.
The Connolly Center for Entrepreneurship
The J. Lawrence Connolly Center for Entrepreneurship is an interdisciplinary center intended to help students from across campus learn how to turn their creative ideas into successful business ventures. Students are immersed in a course of study that emphasizes analytical thinking, qualitative and quantitative reasoning, creativity and innovation.
The Connolly Center provides students with the necessary tools to develop business plans that are both executable and fundable, and an extremely supportive faculty and alumni community help shepherd students’ ventures from concept to business plan to launch and beyond.
The Roger Mudd Center for Ethics
The Roger Mudd Center for Ethics advances dialogue, teaching and research about issues of public and professional ethics across all three of the university’s schools — the College, the Williams School, and the School of Law. It was established in 2010 through a gift to the university from award-winning journalist Roger Mudd ’50.
“I enjoy the process of analyzing problems, finding the best solutions and supporting my decisions with evidence.”
Joe Wen
Class of 2019
Related Programs
The Shepherd Program for the Interdisciplinary Study of Poverty and Human Capability integrates thought and action in direct service to disadvantaged communities. Through an array of courses and service opportunities, the program prepares students from a variety of majors and political perspectives to work with those communities to address the problems associated with poverty.
The Environmental Studies Program is designed to educate students in a broad class of issues related to the environment and humanity's place in the natural world.
Bright Frimpong Co-Authors Journal Article on Crowdfunding
The first-year business administration professor authored the paper with the members of his doctoral dissertation committee.
Two Williams School Faculty Members Co-Author Journal Article
Bright Frimpong and Keri Larson teamed with two others to produce a paper on crowdfunding that was featured in the Journal of Business Venturing Insights.
W&L’s Leslie Frederick to Present at the 2024 AACSB Assessment and AoL Conference in New York City
Frederick will serve as co-presenter for a session that demonstrates the beneficial uses of technology in the curriculum mapping process.
Unger embraces the full W&L experience, including incredible academic opportunities and being a DIII athlete.
W&L Students Claim First Place at University of Georgia Stock Pitch Competition
A four-person team comprised of John Schleider ‘24, Diwesh Kumar ‘24, Bradford Bush ’25 and Drew Thompson ‘25 claimed the $3,000 top prize for their pitch on CVS Health.
Smith’s W&L experience includes finding a family in his lacrosse teammates and helping other students discover their career paths as a career fellow.
Rubel’s lecture will be held in Northen Auditorium on Feb. 22 at 5:30 p.m.
Professor Justin Davis Published in the Journal of Financial Reporting and Accounting
The second-year faculty member co-authored a paper analyzing the effect of CEO age on financial reporting quality and clawback provisions.
W&L Student Receives Venture for America Fellowship
Josh Rassin ’24 will begin his two-year placement with a startup company following graduation.
W&L’s Justin Davis Published in the Journal of Economics, Finance and Administrative Science
The second-year faculty member co-authored a paper analyzing the relation between institutional ownership and earnings management.
For Ross Draber ’10, people come first
The United Bank senior executive engages with the W&L community through student recruitment and event participation.
W&L Outcomes: Andrew Tartakovsky ’23
Andrew Tartakovsky ’23 received a Fulbright grant to teach English in Azerbaijan.
After
W&L
Business administration majors can look forward to careers in investment banking, marketing, consulting, finance, retailing and manufacturing. A number of alumni enter MBA programs at the finest schools in the country.
Meet the Faculty
At W&L, students enjoy small classes and close relationships with professors who educate and nurture.
Amanda Bower
Charles C. Holbrook, Jr. ‘72 Professor of Business Administration and Head of the Business Administration Department
- P: 540-458-8615
- E: bowera@wlu.edu
Bower teaches courses in marketing management and creative strategic planning. She has studied the relationship between the liberal arts and a business environment, which gives her courses an interdisciplinary aspect.
Robert M. Ballenger
Professor of Business Administration
Ballenger is a 1976 W&L alumnus who teaches courses in accounting information systems, data analytics and multimedia design. He previously worked for Unisys Corporation and served as the executive vice president of ServNET Technologies.
Andi Coulter
Visiting Assistant Professor of Business Administration
- P: 540-458-8922
- E: acoulter@wlu.edu
Professor Coulter teaches business communication and social media strategy. Her research interests include the music industry, user-centered design, and social sustainability in art. Professor Coulter wrote a book for the 33 1/3 music series on the New York underground band Suicide, and her current research looks at short-form video and engagement analytics.
Gavin Fox
Associate Professor of Business Administration
- P: 540-458-8018
- E: foxg@wlu.edu
Fox teaches marketing and works extensively with the entrepreneurship faculty. His background is in supply chain management and he served a tour in Iraq as a quartermaster First Lieutenant in 2004. He researches viral marketing.
Dennis Garvis
Professor of Business Administration
- P: 540-458-8069
- E: garvisd@wlu.edu
Garvis teaches courses in applied statistics as well as business management. He has researched effective teaching and learning, corporate governance, and entrepreneurial collaborations.
Elisabeth Gilbert
Assistant Professor of Business Administration
- P: 540-458-5076
- E: egilbert@wlu.edu
Gilbert teaches courses in the area of organizational behavior. Her research focuses on how people can improve their experiences at work, including such topics as voice, employee well-being and constructive deviance in organizations.
Andrew Hess
Ehrick Kilner Haight Sr. Term Professor of Business Administration and Associate Department Head of Business Administration
- P: 540-458-8346
- E: hessa@wlu.edu
Hess is a 1997 alum who researches and teaches in areas of social innovation, strategy and international business. Before returning to W&L, he worked for Fleet National Bank and Silicon Valley Bank in Boston.
Lingshu Hu
Assistant Professor of Business Administration
- P: 540-458-8383
- E: lhu@wlu.edu
With a PhD in journalism focusing on computational methods and a graduate certificate in AI and Machine Learning, Professor Hu’s primary teaching interests include making data analytics accessible to students in the social sciences and helping students master storytelling skills with data analytics and visualization.
Keri M. Larson
Assistant Professor of Business Administration
- P: 540-458-8601
- E: larsonk@wlu.edu
Larson teaches courses that help students learn to understand and use data in areas of management. She has researched the analytics of unstructured textual data to support organizational decision making.
Jayson Margalus
Johnson Professor of Entrepreneurship and Leadership and Director of the Connolly Center for Entrepreneurship
Jeffrey Schatten
Associate Professor of Business Administration
Professor Schatten teaches courses on organizational behavior, leadership and decision making, as well as a unique class composed of students and inmates and taught at a minimum-security prison near Lexington.
Robert D. Straughan
Crawford Family Dean of the Williams School and Professor of Business Administration
Straughan teaches International Marketing Strategy and Sustainable Business. He has authored dozens of studies on sustainable business and cross-cultural business. He works closely with students with career interests in consulting.
Pooja Thakur-Wernz
Assistant Professor of Business Administration
Thakur-Wernz is a strategic management and international business educator and scholar. Her research focuses on the impact of strategic choices made by firms, such as offshoring, outsourcing and international expansion, on the innovation of firms, especially in the pharmaceutical industry.