EY Business Excellence Student Summit
Download the 2009 EY Business Excellence Student Summit brochure to learn more about this program for students scheduled for July 19-21, 2009 at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio.

In July 2008, The Center partnered with Ernst & Young LLP to host the first Ernst & Young Business Excellence Student Summit at Miami University.  The event brought more that 30 of the top undergraduate business students from North America together for two days during which they worked on cases to consider difficult situations that they may face throughout their careers—from intern to Board of Director member. The cases demonstrated how emphasizing integrity, leadership, and transparency with internal and external stakeholders could lead to favorable long-term solutions.

The event included students from a number of top business schools, including Washington, Cal-Berkeley, USC, Arizona State, Texas, SMU, Texas A&M, Brigham Young, Kansas, Illinois, Alabama, Georgia, Florida, UNC-Chapel Hill, Toronto, British Columbia, Penn State, and of course, Miami. The event opened with an outstanding speech by E&Y Global Vice Chair Beth Brooke—who spoke at May’s FSB commencement. Watch highlights of the speech on the Center’s website. In addition to the case studies, the participants enjoyed a “Winter in July” event at Goggin with ice skating and broomball.

Thought-provoking case studies, team problem-solving exercises, and access to top professionals added up to a transformational experience for participants in Miami University’s first Business Excellence Summit.

Miami University sophomore Abishek Pai attended the event, held July 20-22. "The Business Excellence Summit was a great introduction to several tasks and potential problems that I will face in my career,” he said. “Having the opportunity to examine these ideas in a round table discussion format with some of the brightest students from across the nation proved to be an extremely valuable learning experience.”

The conference, presented by Ernst & Young in partnership with the Farmer School of Business’s Center for Business Excellence (formerly the Center for Governance, Risk Management and Reporting), was the first event of its kind to be held on a college campus. Focusing on the issues of integrity, leadership, and transparency in the world economy, the summit drew 33 hand-picked sophomore accounting majors from top undergraduate business programs in the U.S. and Canada.

“Early on in their business education, students need to be made aware of how leadership can impact the success of an organization,” said accountancy department chair Marc Rubin. “The Ernst & Young Business Excellence Summit was an important opportunity to expose students from across North America to these critical issues, as well as demonstrate Miami leadership in this area.”

Beth Brooke, keynote speaker and vice chairman of global markets for Ernst & Young, stressed the unmitigated value of honesty, integrity, and reputation in today’s business world.

“Your integrity is your most precious possession,” said Brooke, “If you act without integrity once, you don’t get a second chance. It really is that important.”

The conference structure presented case studies of business decision-making from the multiple perspectives of interns, managers, and executives. Students were encouraged to deepen their own critical thinking in breakout groups mentored by Farmer School Masters of Accountancy students.

Brian Ballou and Dan Heitger, Farmer School faculty members and CBE co-directors, reported that feedback on the summit was overwhelmingly positive.

“The student participants told us that the event was an eye-opening experience, alerting them to the various challenges that they will face as future business leaders, and that they appreciated applying the concepts discussed at the event to current issues,” said Heitger.