Entrepreneurship Faculty
Helen Gernon, Lundquist Professor of Entrepreneurial Accounting
Helen Gernon's teaching interests include effective leadership, international accounting, federal income taxation, and managing and understanding cash flow from the entrepreneur's perspective. Her research interests pertain to multinational corporation financial reporting practices and the impact of capital market pressure on disclosure.
Michele Henney, Instructor of Accounting
Michele Henney is a full-time instructor with the Department of Accounting at the Lundquist College of Business. In her position she teaches courses in auditing, taxation, financial accounting and entrepreneurial accounting. She is also the undergraduate accounting student advisor and is working on establishing an executive education seminar series to be offered in Eugene and Portland.
She joined the faculty in 2004 after 22 years as a practicing Certified Public Accountant. During her professional career, she worked for accounting firms of all sizes, including running her own CPA practice for the past nineteen years. During that time her clients ranged from the smallest of "mom and pop" enterprises to multi-million dollar corporations.
Henney obtained a Masters of Taxation in 1988 from Golden Gate University and her doctorate in Accounting in 1994 from the University of Oregon. Since the completion of her Ph.D. studies she has been a member of faculties at the University of Colorado, Denver and Western Washington University in Bellingham, WA. She currently holds an active CPA license in the state of Oregon and continues to be involved with the accounting profession, through committee and board membership.
Beth Hjelm, Strategic Planning Projects Director
Beth Hjelm has more than twenty years of experience in financial management, marketing strategy, organizational planning, and performance improvement. Prior to joining the faculty at the Lundquist College of Business, she headed a consulting firm focused on strategic management and new venture start-ups. Hjelm was a member of Coopers & Lybrand Consulting for fourteen years. Her functional practice focused on delivering services to the chief financial officer and the financial organization and her industry focus was the telecommunications industry. Hjelm is a co-author of Reinventing the CFO - Moving From Financial Management to Strategic Management (McGraw-Hill) which presents a vision and an implementation methodology to develop best practices in the financial function. Hjelm has previously taught accounting at Elizabeth Seton College in New York and strategic management at Oakland University in Rochester, Michigan.
Ron Hjelm, Adjunct Instructor
Ron Hjelm has twenty-five years of healthcare management experience leading ventures throughout the United States in publicly traded, privately held, and non-profit organizations. He started his career in Michigan as a ground-floor member of a team that developed one of the first preferred provider organizations (PPOs) in the country. This plan received a UAW endorsement and was offered to many major employers including of all of the “Big Three” automakers.
Hjelm has led numerous start-ups, expansions, and turn-arounds in the health insurance and healthcare delivery fields. His experience encompasses many ventures that were nationally recognized as leading-edge innovators in their industries. These ventures ranged from in vitro fertilization (IVF) centers to comprehensive end-of-life programs to care for the frail elderly.
Hjelm holds a B.A. degree in Health Care Planning and Delivery from the College of Arts and Sciences, University of Pennsylvania. He received an M.B.A. degree with concentrations in Health Care and Finance from the J. L. Kellogg Graduate School of Management at Northwestern University.
Sam Holloway, Graduate Teaching Fellow
Sam Holloway is a native Oregonian who moved to Eugene after several years working in both industry and education. After graduating from Columbia University, he worked as an estimator and project manager in the heavy construction industry, specializing in bridge construction. He is currently working toward his Ph.D. in management, with research interests in innovation, venture capital, technology entrepreneurship, and organizational learning. Holloway is co-editor of a forthcoming research volume from Edward Elgar Publishing titled Organizational Learning and Knowledge Management Volume I: Managing Learning and Knowledge. Additionally, he teaches courses in entrepreneurship, business planning and strategy and in 2007, he received the Lundquist College of Business Ph.D. Program Outstanding Teacher Award.
Alan Meyer, Thomas C. Stewart Distinguished Professor,
Charles H. Lundquist Professor of Entrepreneurial Management
As academic director for the Lundquist Center for Entrepreneurship, Alan Meyer has two responsibilities: (1) heading research programs that are turning the center into a nationally-recognized center for research in innovation and entrepreneurship, and (2) overseeing the graduate and undergraduate academic degree programs. With National Science Foundation (NSF) funds, Meyer's current research focuses on corporate venture investing and the emergence of the nanotechnology investing community. Meyer also serves as research director for the Oregon Technology Entrepreneurship Consortium (OTEC), an NSF-funded program that provides opportunities for M.B.A.s to team up with graduate students in law and the sciences to pursue the commercialization of leading-edge technologies invented by scientists at UO and the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory.
Andrew Nelson, Assistant Professor
Andrew Nelson is assistant professor of Management at the University of Oregons Lundquist College of Business. His research focuses on the evolution of knowledge diffusion networks, the commercialization of university research, and the measurement of innovation. With Tom Byers (Stanford University) and Dick Dorf (University of California, Davis), Nelson is the author of Technology Ventures (McGraw-Hill, 2009). His doctoral dissertation on technology transfer in the digital audio and biotechnology sectors won the 2008 Best Dissertation Award from the Technology Management Section of INFORMS (Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences). He has also been named one of five inaugural Kauffman Foundation junior faculty fellows for promising research in the field of entrepreneurship. Nelson holds a Ph.D. in management science and engineering from Stanford University, an M.S. from Oxford University, and a dual B.A. from Stanford.
Wayne Parker, New Venture Planning Mentor
Prior to relocating to Eugene in 2002, Wayne Parker was president and founder of Amplified Holdings, Inc., a software and digital distribution company that he launched in 1994. Under his leadership Amplified grew to 140 employees, acquired three companies and controlled over $200 million on online sales of digital and physical music and movies. Amplified was sold to CNP Technologies in 2001. Since then, Parker has served as a consultant, with current clients including the Eugene Education Fund. He is on the Advisory Board of three organizations including Blue Violin, an Atlanta based software startup, and two Eugene-area nonprofit organizations. Prior to Amplified, Parker was head of marketing for two pioneering technology firms. The first was E-Tech, Inc. in high technology energy conservation equipment, and then software developer Comsell, Inc. Mr. Parker also worked in the administration at Georgia Tech as Associate Vice President for Alumni Relations. Parker received his M.B.A. from Georgia State University and a B.S. in Industrial Management from Georgia Tech.
Terry Sebastian
Managing Director of Lundquist Center for Entrepreneurship
Terry Sebastian assumed his role of managing director of the Lundquist Center for Entrepreneurship (LCE) in August of 2009. A successful principal investor and senior executive in the food industry, he is a founder and managing director of Lake Pacific Partners, LLC, a private equity investment firm focusing on consumer products, consumer services, and related industries.
Currently, he stands as lead director at Cal Pacific Specialty Foods, a processor of fruit based food ingredients, as director of Maxi Holdings, a value added poultry processor and as director of Gladson, LLC, a marketing services company serving consumer products retailers and manufacturers. He previously served as President of Maxi Holdings from 2004-2008 and as a director of Teepak, LLC, a $200MM revenue casing manufacturer.
Prior to founding Lake Pacific, Mr. Sebastian was senior vice president of Natural Nutrition Group (NNG), a leading manufacturer of branded organic food products, where he led the successful operational turnaround of the Health Valley Company and the operational integration of two acquisitions. Prior to NNG, he served as a member of the executive team at McCain Foods, a $300MM in sales food processor and was responsible for major supply chain and operations improvements as part of a successful turnaround. As a management consultant with the firm of Booz, Allen & Hamilton, he worked on corporate strategy, reorganization, and profitability improvement engagements for Fortune 500 clients in the energy and chemicals industries.
Mr. Sebastian earned his bachelor’s degree in finance with high honors from the University of Texas at Austin. He earned his M.B.A. from the Harvard Business School. He is also a member of the Young Presidents’ Organization.
Richard (Dick) Sloan, Undergraduate Coordinator of Innovation/Entrepreneurship, New Venture Planning Mentor
Dick Sloan was a mentor and advisor to the Lundquist Center for Entrepreneurship beginning in 2004 and joined the staff as undergraduate coordinator for innovation and entrepreneurship in Janaury 2007. Since relocating to Eugene late in 2003, Sloan provided strategic services for technology-based start-up companies, including Wellscape LLC, a promotional software business targeted to the pharmaceutical industry, and most recently MitoSciences LLC, a mitochondrial antibody-based diagnostic research and development venture. From 1998 to 2003, he was vice president of operations and business development for Miracor Diagnostics, Inc., a publicly traded multisite diagnostic imaging company. Prior to this, he held various executive positions with start-up and turn-around medical device and service companies in which his responsibilities included product development, business development, mergers and acquisitions, licensing, marketing, and general management. Earlier he was a marketing manager with the IVAC division of Eli Lilly and an international product marketing manager with Baxter International. Sloan received his M.B.A. in Finance at the University of Chicago and B.S. from the University of Illinois.
Taryn Stanko, Assistant Professor
Taryn Stanko is assistant professor of management and teaches in the areas of organizational behavior, management, and leadership. Professor Stanko's research interests revolve around the use of technology in organizations and the role it plays in virtual work, the management of multiple identities, and leadership in organizations. She is also interested in the interface between work and non-work roles and has several projects that meld these interests. Recently, her research has been supported by the University of California, Irvine's Center for Organizational Research, the Center for Research on Information Technology in Organizations, and the American Association of University Women.
Randy Swangard, Special Assistant to the Dean of Lundquist College of Business
Randy Swangard has been a member of the Lundquist College of Business faculty since 1986. He has been involved in a number of ventures in ownership, investment and advisory capacities. Further, he serves as a consultant to a variety of private and public companies in the Northwest as well as serving on boards of entrepreneur and business development organizations at both the local, state and national level.
Since 1986 he has taught entrepreneurship, small business management and venture creation courses. Swangard has been adviser to Lundquist Center for Entrepreneurship business plan teams and has traveled extensively in support of these teams at external business plan competitions. During his Lundquist College career, he has been the director of the undergraduate entrepreneurship program as well as the Strategic Planning Projects director for the M.B.A. program. Swangard was awarded the Harry R. Jacobs Professional Service award for 2000-01 and 2002-03. In addition, he has received several other college teaching awards.
Michael Tomcal, Instructor of Accounting
Donald A. Upson, New Venture Planning Coordinator/Technology Entrepreneurship Program Coordinator
Don Upson has has cotaught New Venture Planning and Venture Launch and been the Technology Entrepreneurship Program coordinator since January 2004. A Ph.D. chemist, he retired from the chemical industry after twenty-seven years in 2002, holding technology management positions at Eastman Kodak and Sterling Winthrop Pharmaceuticals, and executive positions at Molecular Probes and The Willamette Valley Company. He is currently Operations Liaison for the UO Venture Development Fund, cofounded LandSavvy, Inc. in 2005, and serves as a consultant to several companies and one professional society.