The semi-finalists in the national search for a permanent dean of the University of Oregon Lundquist College of Business have been selected.
The search was announced in September 2023 and launched in January 2024. There are currently 10 semi-finalists and the search committee is set to select four finalists to visit UO in the weeks of May 13 and May 20. In each set of interviews with semi-finalists and finalists, the search committee plans to identify “strengths and weaknesses” of all applicants.
The new candidate will replace current Lundquist Interim Dean Bruce Blonigen.
Laura Lee McIntyre, Dean of the College of Education and Castle-McIntosh-Knight professor, is the chair of the search committee for the new Lundquist dean.
“I was asked by the Provost to serve as the chair of the committee,” McIntyre said. “And then there’s always representation from faculty, tenure track faculty, career instructional faculty and because the business school also has programs that they offer in Portland, there’s a faculty member from Portland, at the Portland campus and then their staff from the business school.”
According to McIntyre, the committee also has members from academic affairs and diversity, equity and inclusion and a member of Lundquist’s advisory council.
“The goal of any search committee is to have representation, but also ensure that the committee is not so large that it becomes challenging for just the logistics of conducting a search,” McIntyre said. “The search committee is not responsible for selecting the next dean.”
The search for the new Lundquist dean is connected to the Parker Executive Search firm that has been retained to help with the recruitment process and work on the search logistics with UO. According to McIntyre, Parker Executive Search is responsible for the selection of the new dean.
Graduate student Trey Trunnell is also a member of the search committee to represent student perspectives.
“I’m a very social person, and so it was just like I was in the right place at the right time to be asked if I wanted to be a part of [the search committee],” Trunnell said. “I think they might have thought that I would bring a pretty cool perspective from a student’s side of things.”
According to McIntyre, three listening sessions were held with faculty, staff, students, alumni and external members prior to the start of the search to engage with the Parker Executive Search firm and provide feedback for criteria wanted in the new dean.
From a student perspective, Trunnell said that his biggest criteria for the new dean was personality.
“I think something our Lundquist College of Business needs is a leader with a very strong personality,” Trunnell said, “someone who’s visible to the students because I feel like not a lot of students get to interact with the dean. It gets harder the bigger the school gets, especially if there’s only one dean.”
Criteria like Trunnell’s and other members of the search committee helped prompt the development of a rubric for interviews and applications, McIntyre said.
According to McIntyre, during the finalists’ visits, public presentations will be held by the finalists that are open to everyone and live-streamed.
“There’s an opportunity for campus constituents to provide feedback and all of the feedback will be reviewed by the search committee,” McIntyre said. “We make our sort of our final set of strengths and weaknesses and then the Interim Provost, along with our incoming Provost, who’s not here yet, we’ll make the final decision.”
According to McIntyre and Trunnell, anonymity is important throughout this process for the candidates so their identity is not disclosed to their current employer.
The Provost website will provide the names of the finalists set to visit and other information on the search.
Trey Trunnell, a member of the selection comittie for the new dean of the Lundquist College of Business, stands for a photo outside of Lillis Hall. Trunnel is attending The University of Oregon as a Masters of Science in Finance. He will graduate in June 2024. (Miles Cull/Emerald)
