Stratakis Chair in Corporate Governance and Accountability; Executive Director, LeBow College Center for Corporate Governance; and Fellow, Wharton Financial Institutions Center, University of Pennsylvania

Dr. Ralph A. Walkling is internationally known for his research involving corporate governance and corporate acquisitions and for his ability to communicate financial concepts in an effective and exciting manner. He is a recurrent industry consultant and a leading contributor to the top-refereed journals in the field, including The Journal of Financial Economics, The Journal of Finance, The Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, and The Rand Journal of Economics. He is a past associate editor of Financial Management and the immediate-past president of Financial Management Association.

Dr. Walkling has worked with law firms; government organizations; executives from Fortune 500 companies; and divisions, including American Electric Power, the Bank of America, Borden, Emery Ari Freight, and Marathon Oil. Expert witness testimony includes work on corporate governance, acquisitions, corporate finance, financial analysis, valuation and damage calculations. He has testified before the Judiciary Committee of the Ohio State Senate. Dr. Walkling has been actively involved in numerous executive development programs taught on location for particular companies, and at universities throughout the world.

Read: "Say on Pay" from Directors & Boards Magazine
Watch: Academics research vs. Market practitioners

Fellow, Wharton Financial Institutions Center, University of Pennsylvania

Dr. David A. Becher's areas of expertise include mergers and acquisitions, corporate governance and financial institutions. His publications on corporate governance include, "Board Classification and Managerial Entrenchment: Evidence from the Market for Corporate Control," and "Why Do Good Takeover Bids Fail: Managerial Bargaining or Bad Faith?"

Watch: Failure of Corporate takeover bids
Watch: Deregulation - Impact on mergers and pricing

Assistant Professor of Finance

Dr. Jie Cai's research interests involve the models of corporate governance, mergers and acquisitions, executive compensation and derivatives. His publications on corporate governance include, "Shareholders' Say on Pay: Does it Create Value?," "Electing Directors," and "Executive Stock Option Exercises: Good Timing or Backdating?"

Watch:Long-Term Impact of Russell 2000 Index Rebalancing
Watch: Voice on Executive Compensation
Watch: Business Minute - Say on Pay

Assistant Professor of Finance

Dr. Naveen Daniel's areas of expertise include corporate governance, mutual funds and hedge funds.

His published papers in corporate governance include "Do firms manage earnings to meet dividend thresholds?" and "Boards: Does One Size Fit All?"

Associate Professor Finance

Dr. Eliezer Fich's areas of expertise include empirical issues in corporate finance, particularly the effect of board composition and director compensation on the value of publicly traded firms.

His publications on corporate governance include, "Are Busy Boards Effective Monitors?," "The Impact of Stock-Option Compensation for Outside Directors on Firm Value, "Why do CEOs Reciprocally Sit on Each Other's Boards?," and "Are Some Outside Directors Better than Others? Evidence from Director Appointments by Fortune 1000 Firms."

Associate Professor of Finance

Dr. Jacqueline Garner's areas of expertise include investment banking, initial public offerings (IPOs), corporate finance, and corporate governance.

Her publications in corporate governance include "An Examination of Board Stability and the Long-term performance of Initial Public Offerings," "Electing Directors," "An Examination of Board Composition, Donation Sources, and Their Effects on Firm Performance for Non-Profit Firms," "Democracy or Disruption: Majority Versus Plurality Voting," and "Director and Executive Compensation and the Likelihood of Corporate Fraud."

Watch: Business Minutes - Electing Directors to Boards

Department Head and Professor of Finance

Dr. Michael Gombola's areas of expertise include topics involving empirical methods in corporate finance, particularly those that overlap accounting issues.

His publications in corporate governance include, "New Evidence on the Effectiveness of the Insider Trading Sanctions Act of 1984" and "Further Evidence of Insider Selling Before Seasoned Equity Offering Announcement: The Role of Growth Opportunities."

Dr. Gombola has served as a consultant to Johnson and Johnson Consumer Products and Advanta Corporation.

Watch: Distress Risk and Stock Returns Following Private Placements of Equity
Watch:Earnings Management in Reverse LBO's

Assistant Professor of Economics

Dr. Teresa Harrison's areas of research include applied microeconomics with emphasis in health economics, nonprofit organizations and mergers/acquisitions.

Her research in relation to corporate governance includes "Board Members, Executives, and Donors: How Does Their Influence Affect Nonprofit Firm Performance?"

Watch: Non-Profit Exit Rates
Watch: Business Minutes - Growth of Non-Profits

Professor of Finance

Dr. Ed Nelling's areas of expertise include investments, corporate finance, real estate, and finance.

Dr. Nelling's legal and industry presentations involve work with law firms and executives from Fortune 500 companies and divisions including Johnson and Johnson, Invesco, and Arthur Andersen Business Consultants. He has also served as an expert witness in financial management cases.

His published papers in corporate governance include "Executive Compensation in Socially Responsible Firms" and "An Analysis of the Determinants and Shareholder Wealth Effects of Mutual Fund Mergers."

Watch:Impact of Corporate Social Responsibility

Department Chair Finance W.P. Carey School of Business, Arizona State University

Cole’s research areas include corporate governance and control, asset pricing, organizational economics, boards, compensation, mutual funds, insider trading, earnings management, law, and economics.

Associate Professor of Finance, Yale School of Management

Cremers’ research focuses on empirical issues in asset pricing and corporate governance. His interests also cover the development of new methodologies in investments and mutual funds, using Bayesian as well as classical statistical analysis.

Professor and Burton D. Morgan Chair of Private Enterprise, Purdue University

Corporate finance is Denis’ primary teaching interest. His current research examines corporate governance, corporate financial policies, and corporate diversification. He is the author of more than 40 published articles in leading peer-reviewed journals on topics related to corporate governance, corporate financial policies, corporate organizational structure, corporate valuation, restructuring, and entrepreneurial finance.

Professor and Duke Realty Chair in Finance, Purdue University

Denis’ teaching interests include corporate finance, mergers and acquisitions, and international finance. She is a Fellow of Purdue University’s Teaching Academy and also teaches a University Honors Program course on the Modern Corporation in Society. Her research areas include corporate governance, corporate diversification strategy, and mergers and acquisitions.

Tuck Centennial Professor of Finance
Founding Director, Lindenauer Center for Corporate Governance, Dartmouth College

Eckbo conducts research in corporate finance and capital markets, with emphasis on investment banking, corporate governance, mergers and acquisitions, and portfolio management and performance evaluation. He publishes regularly in top finance journals, and is a founding co-editor of the European Finance Review and the Journal of the European Finance Association. He is currently a director the Norwegian Research Council, and a former director of the European Finance Association, and the American Financial Management Association.

Associate Professor of Finance, Penn State

Field’s primary research interests include corporate finance, IPOs, and international finance. She has co-authored numerous articles in the Journal of Accounting & Economics, the Journal of Corporate Finance, and the Journal of Financial Economics. Field has served as the associate editor of Financial Management since 2006.

Professor of Finance
Washington Mutual Endowed Professor in Fiannce
Faculty Director, CFO Forum, University of Washington

Karpoff serves as an associate editor for the Journal of Finance, the Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, the Journal of Financial Research, and Managerial and Decision Economics, and on the executive committee and board of trustees for the Financial Management Association International. Karpoff has held appointments as the John M. Olin Visiting Professor at the University of Chicago’s Graduate School of Business (1998) and as the Visiting Alumni Professor of Finance and Alumni Research Scholar at the Emory University’s Goizueta Business School (2000-02).

Associate Professor, Finance and Economics, Rutgers University

Kedia’s research interests include empirical corporate finance, corporate governance, and corporate fraud. Her current research focuses on the causes and consequences of recent accounting scandals. She also examines the role of geography and distance on the resolution of information problems, corporate decisions, and performance. Her prior research on the diversification discount and the hedging of foreign exchange risk has been published in leading academic journals.

Wasatch Advisors Professor of Finance, Devaid Excles School of Business, University of Utah

Lemmon’s research interests lie in corporate finance, managerial compensation, capital structure and mergers and acquisitions

Professor of Finance, R.H. Smith School of Business, University of Maryland

Phillips’ areas of research include corporate finance and how financial decisions play a role in firms’ strategic decisions, and contracting in futures and forward oil markets. His work in corporate finance includes studies of private equity issuance, capital structure, Chapter 11 bankruptcy, and how leverage buyouts and other forms of high debt influence a firms’ and rivals’ investment decisions. His recent research published in the Journal of Finance has included how firms organize across multiple markets and their gains from mergers and acquisitions.

Associate Professor of Business Administration, Harvard University

Rhodes-Kropf is an associate professor in the entrepreneurial management unit, where he teaches the Venture Capital and Private Equity course in the MBA elective curriculum. He specializes in mergers and acquisitions, venture capital, hedge funds, and corporate governance and has published in leading finance and economic journals, including the Journal of Finance, the Journal of Business, Journal of Financial Economics, and the RAND Journal of Economics. His 2004 paper “Market Valuation and Merger Waves,” published in the Journal of Finance, was nominated for the Brattle Prize for “Best Paper in Corporate Finance” in 2005.

Wachovia Distinguished Professor of Finance, University of North Carolina

The Wachovia Distinguished Professor, director of the Wachovia Center for Corporate Finance, and a Sarah Graham Kenan Distinguished Scholar, Shivdasanis areas of expertise include corporate valuation, capital structure, financing strategies, mergers and acquisitions, and corporate governance. He is an award-winning teacher of mergers and acquisitions and corporate financial strategy.

David Sharp/Home Federal Bank Professor of Banking and Finance, Department of Finance, The University of Tennessee

Woidtke is a research fellow for the Corporate Governance Center at the University of Tennessee. She received both an undergraduate degree in mathematics and computer science and an MBA from Millsaps College. She attended Queen’s University in Canada as a Rotary Scholar and received a Ph.D. in Finance from Tulane University. Prior to coming to the University of Tennessee, Woidtke served on the faculty at Texas A&M University.

Alber Fingerhut Professor of Finance and Business Transformation
Daniel P. Paduano Faculty Fellow, New York University

Yermack is the Albert Fingerhut Professor of Finance and Business Transformation at New York University Stern School of Business. He teaches courses in corporate finance, restructuring firms and industries, and law and finance. He has been with NYU Stern for more than 10 years. His primary research areas include boards of directors, executive compensation, executive stock options, and law and finance. He has been published in many journals including Journal of Financial Economics, Journal of Finance, and Journal of Law, Economics, and Organizations.