NEWS •HILLTOP HIGHLIGHTS
The Power of Problem Solving
HIGH MARKS
#19
New Index Predicts Consumer Spending
FOR MORE INFORMATION ABOUT THE PROBLEM-DRIVEN CONSUMPTION INDEX, VISIT BIT.LY/CONSUMERPROBLEMS.
Georgetown University McDonough School of Business
#4
MBA Evening Program: No. 4 (Bloomberg Businessweek)
Paul Almeida, Brooks Holton, and Michael O’Leary with former President George H.W. Bush and First Lady Barbara Bush.
#17
Building Strategic Partnerships
Undergraduate Business Program: No. 17 (Bloomberg Businessweek)
Professors Focus on Former Presidents’ Leadership Skills Georgetown McDonough Professors Paul Almeida, Brooks Holtom, and Michael O’Leary are working with four U.S. Presidential Centers to lead scholarly lessons on leadership. The centers reached out to Almeida, who also is senior associate dean for executive education, and O’Leary about leading the academic design of the Presidential Leadership Scholars (PLS) program, which focuses on four leadership skill areas -- vision and communication, decision-making, persuasion and influence, and coalition-building – that correlate to the strengths of Presidents Lyndon Johnson, George H.W. Bush, Bill Clinton, and George W. Bush. Almeida and Holtom recently drew from their scholarly research on strategic partnerships to teach 60 Presidential Scholars at the George H.W. Bush Presidential Center. The former president and first lady attended the module that included sessions taught by members of the president’s administration and focused on the development of effective alliances.
*Since December 2015
$90,684
Average post-graduation salary for the Master of Science in Finance Class of 2015
3DFOTO/THINKSTOCK
ON THE WEB
Full-time MBA Program: No. 19 in the United States (Financial Times) CHANDLER ARDEN
U.S. consumers account for approximately 70 percent of the national economy, making their spending habits critical to understanding economic growth. Two researchers at Georgetown’s McDonough School of Business have developed a new, effective way to predict consumer spending based on the idea that consumers often know the problems they plan to solve before they know which product or service they will use to solve those problems. The Problem-Driven Consumption Index (PDCI) is derived from results of a monthly survey that asks consumers what problems they plan to spend money solving in the near future. This survey, called the Consumer Problem Survey, tracks the quantity of, severity of, and types of problems that consumers plan to solve in nine major categories, including health care, home and housing, and transportation. By measuring and tracking the problems and their predicted spending on these problems, the survey goes beyond measuring just confidence or sentiment and provides new insights into when and where consumers will spend money in the retail market. The index is research-based and proven. Kurt Carlson, professor of marketing, and Chris Hydock, assistant research professor, have collected more than two years of data that has accurately predicted consumer spending. “The key to the effectiveness of the PDCI as a leading indicator lies in its upstream focus on intention to solve problems,” Carlson said. “This allows us to identify likely movements of money into the market for a wide range of problem solutions and, in many cases, make this identification before the consumer knows exactly what product or service they will buy to solve their problem.”
Spring 2016 •
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