Personnel

"My business has already benefited from working with Appalachian students in the Entrepreneurship Practicum course. We're using the creative and insightful marketing ideas and plans created during the course to help launch IJustWantToSleep to the next level.'"

Janet Bennett
President
IJustWantToSleep.com

Support the Center

Bryan Toney - Director, Center for Entrepreneurship

Email
toneybc@appstate.edu
Room Number
Raley 1016
Phone Number
828-262-6196
Biography
Bryan Toney has more than 25 years experience as an entrepreneur and entrepreneurship educator. Since 1997, he has been a lecturer in the Walker College of Business at Appalachian State University. He founded the Center for Entrepreneurship in 2006 where he has helped develop the entrepreneurship curriculum and a number co-curricular activities including the Carole Moore McLeod Entrepreneur Summit, the Young Entrepreneurs Symposium, the Dale Tweedy Mentoring Program for Entrepreneur Scholars, the Pitch Your Idea in 90 Seconds student business idea contest, the Student Entrepreneur and the Year Award, the Association of Student Entrepreneurs and more. Mr. Toney has also been involved extensively in a number of international initiatives, leading twelve study abroad trips to Scandinavia, Spain, Belgium, Austria and Germany, teaching undergraduate and graduate level entrepreneurship courses in Austria, China and Belgium and developing faculty and student exchanges.

Bryan Toney has been widely recognized for his leadership in developing entrepreneurial initiatives in the region. In 2007, he was awarded the first annual Jerry W. Davis Award for Entrepreneurial Excellence by the Appalachian Regional Commission in Charleston, West Virginia. On September 4, 2008, Toney received Appalachian State University’s W.H. Plemmons Leadership Medallion, which recognizes outstanding campus leaders. He has twice received the annual Walker College of Business Award for Excellence for non-tenure faculty members (2003, 2007).

Prior to joining Appalachian State, Mr. Toney was the Entrepreneur-in-Residence for the School of Management at the Georgia Institute of Technology from 1994 to 1997. There he taught courses in entrepreneurship, management consulting, international business and business policy. He also developed two educational and networking programs for high growth businesses and led a venture capital roundtable group focused on emerging technologies.

Mr. Toney is also the former founder and CEO of Information Management Inc. based in Atlanta. He began the company in 1985 and grew it to 25 employees before selling it to private investors in 1994. The company specialized in custom software development and systems integration and worked with more than 300 clients throughout North America including Apple Computer, BellSouth, Disney, Federal Express, Georgia Pacific, CNN, Coca-Cola, Motorola, AT&T, Georgia-Pacific, Norfolk Southern and Microsoft.

Mr. Toney holds a M.S. in Management from the Georgia Institute of Technology and a B.A. in Mathematics from the University of Tennessee.

Julia Rowland - Assistant Director

Email
rowlandja@appstate.edu
Room Number
Raley 1016
Phone Number
828-262-8325
Biography
Julia Rowland has more than 14 years of non-profit and workforce development experience. She joined the Center for Entrepreneurship as Assistant Director in August, 2007 and brings extensive experience working with a wide variety of constituents in recruiting, program development and communications.

Prior to joining the Center, Julia was the JobLink System Liaison for the High Country Council of Governments Workforce Development Program. There she built collaborative relationships with regional businesses, educators, government agencies and non-profit organizations and was responsible for educating these diverse constituencies about workforce trends, legislation and the JobLink system. She successfully spearheaded efforts to receive $50,000 awards from the NC Commission on Workforce Development for two regional centers.

Julia has also held other positions in the private and public sectors. Prior to joining the High Country Council of Governments, she served as interim Executive Director and Director of Member Services for the American Camp Association Southeastern, working with more than 650 members on public policy, youth development trends and education opportunities. Prior to that, she worked with the Montana Conservation Corps, a non-profit Americorps program where she was managed student recruitment activities, produced communication materials and coordinated an at-risk youth program.

Julia received her bachelor of arts degree in Interdisciplinary Studies from Appalachian State with a concentration in Environmental Policy and Planning and a minor in Biology.

Dr. Ben Powell - Assistant Professor in Management

Email
powellbc@appstate.edu
Room Number
Raley 4091
Phone Number
828-262-8332
Biography
Ben Powell was hired in 2007 to teach entrepreneurship at Appalachian State University. From 2001 to 2007, he taught entrepreneurship at the University of Alabama, first as an instructor and then as an assistant professor.

Dr. Powell's academic training began at Princeton University, where he was awarded the William Frost Memorial Prize in Chemistry, graduated magna cum laude, and was inducted in to the Phi Beta Kappa honor society. After Princeton, Dr. Powell studied regional planning at the Universitaet Dortmund for one year. His studies in Germany were funded by a full fellowship from the DAAD (German Academic Exchange Service) for non-degree graduate study at a German university. After returning to the U.S., Dr. Powell joined Millken & Company, where he worked as a shift supervisor in a textile mill, a plant chemist, and as a program engineer who helped to launch the company's composite fabrics (air bag) division and coordinated the company's alliance with TRW. Dr. Powell left Milliken to enter the MBA program at the University of North Carolina – Chapel Hill. He graduated in 1994 and was inducted into the Beta Gamma Sigma business honor society. He then became the founding general manager of the Environmental Business Group (EBG) in Bangkok, Thailand and later worked for Heiniburg Corporation in Thailand as a joint venture consultant in the automotive sector. In 1997, Dr. Powell entered the Management Ph.D. program at the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School, earned a M.A. in business in 2000, and completed his Ph.D. in strategy in 2003.

Dr. Powell's current research includes a study of the use of spin-outs to commercialize new technologies, an evolutionary framework for entrepreneurship, and a collaborative study of R&D joint ventures funded by the Advanced Technology program (NIST, U.S. Department of Commerce). Dr. Powell has also participated in research projects that have examined the escalation of commitment in acquisitions, the impact of firm scope on performance (conducted for McKinsey & Company), knowledge sharing among Toyota suppliers, Hewlett-Packard's management of its alliances with Microsoft, and a hotel construction project in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. He is a member of the Academy of Management (BPS, ENT, OMT, and TIM divisions), EGOS, INFORMS (Organization Science division), the Southern Management Association, the Strategic Management Society, and USASBE.

Dr. Mark Pruett - Assistant Professor in Management

Email
pruettmw@appstate.edu
Room Number
Raley 4066
Phone Number
828-262-7341
Biography
Mark Pruett developed and teaches a course on fostering and managing creativity and, with Assistant Director Julia Rowland, a seminar for entering freshman integrated with a residential learning community for entrepreneurship. With Director Bryan Toney, he developed an on-going 3-part entrepreneurship workshop program that has served hundreds of regional entrepreneurs in recent years.

In addition to entrepreneurship courses, he teaches strategic management. He is especially interested in arts, international, and social entrepreneurship, and works with faculty and students around campus and overseas. He leads study-abroad trips to Austria and Scandinavia, and regularly teaches as a visiting professor in Austria.

Prior to joining ASU, he was at George Mason University, where he created courses on the management of technology and managing organizational change. He has taught undergraduate, MBA, and Executive MBA courses, as well as a course for Senior Executive Service candidates in the Department of Defense. He also guest-lectured annually at the FBI Academy to forensic laboratory managers from across the nation.

Dr. Pruett has published research in five streams: entrepreneur development/education, technology/innovation, organizations/organizational economics, competitive strategy, and quality. Some of the topics include culture and perceptions, the development of new products and businesses, commercialization strategies, learning curve issues, organizational form and growth, intellectual property, and business failure. His research spans a variety of industries and countries.

He has been a film studio partner, vice-president of a land development firm, and an international business consultant, authoring dozens of feasibility studies for diverse foreign firms regarding joint ventures, process technology, and market development, and managing business development grant programs in Central America and the Caribbean.

Dr. Pruett has BS and MBA degrees from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and a PhD in strategic management from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

Heather Dixon-Fowler - Instructor

Email
dixonfowlerh@appstate.edu
Room Number
Raley 4087
Phone Number
828-262-2688
Biography
Heather Dixon-Fowler teaches entrepreneurship courses at ASU. She is especially interested in social entrepreneurship, "green" business opportunities, and international entrepreneurship education. Prior to joining the management department at ASU in 2009, she was at the University of Arkansas where she is currently a Doctoral Candidate. She has also taught courses in the areas of corporate strategy and organizational development and change. She has a BA degree in Management with a concentration in Organizational Dynamics from Eckerd College and a MBA from Wichita State University. She has been actively involved in multiple family businesses, has managed her own business, and has experience leading organizational turnarounds. In addition, she has worked as a training and development specialist in the HR department of a large financial services firm developing and delivering management training programs across the U.S.

Her research interests include corporate social responsibility, social entrepreneurship, and corporate sustainability. She is particularly interested in how the characteristics of the firm's leaders (CEO, TMT, BOD, and Entrepreneur) influence the social responsibility strategies of their organizations. Her research has examined topics such as the influence of executive international assignment experience on corporate social performance and the role of board environmental subcommittees on firm performance. She has also worked closely with the Applied Sustainability Research Center at the University of Arkansas on research focusing on "green" business. She is a member of the Academy of Management and serves as a reviewer for the Journal of Business Ethics.

In addition to teaching and research, Ms. Dixon-Fowler has been actively involved in bridging relationships between representatives from corporations, NGOs and the academic community. She helped coordinate the first large-scale meeting of academicians, researchers, NGOs and members of the retail community to discuss the development of an open-source Life-Cycle Inventory (LCI). She also assisted with the planning and execution of the first sustainability business plan competition in Northwest Arkansas.

Dr. Tom Will - Entrepreneur-in-Residence

Email
willte@appstate.edu
Room Number
Raley 4061
Phone Number
828-262-7418
Biography
Tom Will brings 40 years of business and educational experiences to our team. His educational background started with a Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of Dayton and later a Masters Degree from the University of Maryland with a concentration in the technology, policy and finance of international telecommunications. He spent two years in the Office of Telecommunications which reported to an Executive Office of the White House; followed by a Ph.D. from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. His doctoral dissertation, on the history of telecommunications policy in the United States, was published by Westview Press in 1978. In the following years he was the European Publisher of several technical magazines and lived in London. He is a former combat veteran from the Vietnam Conflict.

From 1979 through 2000, Tom was the founder of two companies, Latcom Inc. and InterCom Corp. in partnership with Patrick J. McGovern the Chairman of the Board of IDG. These two companies worked across 23 countries in publishing, consulting, conferences and exhibitions in the fields of telephony, data communications, satellite, cellular, fiber optics and broadcasting. The client portfolio spanned to over 500 companies, including global firms such as Ericsson, Alcatel, Siemens, STET, Telefonica, Nokia, BT, AT&T, NEC, Sony, Samsung, Great China Wall Company, IBM, Nortel, Motorola, GTE, Commscope, Andrews, Corning, among many more. In the Rose Garden of the White House in 1989, President George H.W. Bush awarded Latcom Inc. with the “E-Award”, the highest recognition the USA government presents to private companies for the successful development of international trade.

Tom was on the Board of Directors of Angel Technologies Corporation (high altitude long endurance aircraft). He was re-appointed in 2009, by the US Secretary of Commerce, to a seat on the North Carolina District Export Council. He has taught as a Senior Instructor in both business and public affairs at the University of Miami and Florida International University. At ASU Tom teaches Understanding Entrepreneurship, International Management, Strategic Management and International Strategic Management. He works with the Center of Entrepreneurship in its mentoring programs and with the Assistant Dean of International Programs at the Walker School on new global opportunities for both students and faculty.

Tom is married to Grace Palacios-Will and has two sons Tomas and Anthony.

Contact Us

entrepreneur@appstate.edu
828-262-6196