Timothy L. (Tim) Smunt

Education

DBA, Operations Management, Indiana University
MBA, Finance and Quantitative Methods, University of Missouri-St. Louis
BS, Industrial Management, Purdue University

Areas of Expertise

Dr. Smunt’s research and teaching focuses on a wide range of business issues, including operations productivity, healthcare costs and process design, new technology investment and other corporate finance issues, leadership and strategic planning, negotiations, international operations strategy, and managerial accounting.

Professional Activities

With over 30 years of experience at leading universities in both the United States and Europe, he has a strong research record and has published widely in prestigious academic journals, including Management Science, Operations Research, Journal of Operations Management, Production and Operations Management, Computers and Industrial Engineering, and Decision Sciences, as well as interdisciplinary journals such as Harvard Business Review and Academy of Management Perspectives. Most recently, he is collaborating with Medical College of Wisconsin faculty physicians on research that addresses both the efficacy and cost effectiveness of high cost drug treatments, which has resulted in articles published in two prestigious medical journals, Blood and Cancer. He previously served on the editorial boards of the Journal of Operations Management and the Decision Sciences Journal, and is a past area editor for Production and Operations Management. He has served as a guest editor for both the Decision Sciences Journal and Computers and Industrial Engineering.

Dr. Smunt was elected a Fellow of the Decision Sciences Institute and served as an American Council on Education (ACE) Fellow in the President’s office at the University of Chicago. The ACE Fellows Program is a nationally competitive and the premier leadership development program for university administrators. He previously held faculty and administrative positions at Washington University in St. Louis, University of Illinois – Urbana-Champaign and Wake Forest University. He also held visiting faculty positions at Indiana University, Purdue University, University of Warsaw and the Institute of Business Studies, Moscow, Russia. Dr. Smunt is also a Certified Fellow in Productivity and Inventory Management, and a senior member of the Industrial Engineering Institute. He previously served on the UWM Foundation Board of Directors Investment Committee.

As Dean of the Lubar College from 2009-2015, Dr. Smunt led a period of growth in the College's programs and reputation, as well as the successful reaccreditation of the Lubar College by AACSB International. He also initiated the separate AACSB accreditation of the college's accounting programs, which was awarded in July 2016. He established professional strategic planning processes at the Lubar College and worked with faculty on a number initiatives that resulted in the Lubar College achieving high levels of international recognition, including the College’s important degree programs rising for the first time into Businessweek and U.S. News & World Report rankings. He provided strategic direction for many new curricula, including major revisions to the long-standing BBA and MBA programs, a new MS degree program for graduates of undergraduate programs other than business, new online certificate programs in business analytics, enterprise resource planning, and technology entrepreneurship, a new online business minor, and the introduction of numerous individual hybrid and online courses, as well as a strengthened doctoral program. Smunt’s focus on fundraising efforts, corporate partnerships, executive engagement, alumni relations, branding, and international university agreements led to new opportunities for faculty research projects, and for student internships and placement, as well as increased student enrollment. Since he was appointed Dean, the Lubar College doubled its student scholarship support and increased private support of faculty research and academic programs. He was instrumental in establishing the Supply Chain Management Institute, opening the Technology Innovation Datacenter sponsored by IBM, reinvigorating the College's Business Advisory Council, and supporting the creation of the Lubar College Alumni Chapter.

Dr. Smunt’s corporate experience began at the Astronautics Company of McDonnell Douglas Corporation (now Boeing) as the cost estimator responsible for the Harpoon Missile contract. His work led to the first-ever warranty agreement for a technologically advanced defense product. In addition to teaching in Executive MBA programs around the world, he has been an advisor, executive educator, and consultant for a number of major corporations, including American Express, Duke Energy, Ecolab, Liberty Mutual Insurance Company, Continental General Tire, Barbados Shipping & Trading, Henredon Furniture, R.J. Reynolds, Coin Acceptors, Affinitec (now AAC), MEMC (formerly Monsanto Electronics Materials Corporation) and Hillenbrand Industries.

Some of his work on productivity and strategic planning at major corporations is discussed in the following articles:

• Resnick, B. and Smunt, T., “From Good to Great to …” Academy of Management Perspectives, 2008, Vol. 22, No. 4, pp. 6-12.

• Smunt, T. and Sutcliffe, C., “There’s Gold In Them Bills,” Harvard Business Review, 2004, Vol. 82, No. 9, pp. 24-25.

Selected research publications include:

• Dhakal, B., Narra, R., Giri,S., Szabo, A., Smunt, T., Ghose, S., Pathak, L., Aryal, M., Hamadani, M., Chhabra, S., Janz, S., D’Souza A., and Hari, P., “Association of Adverse Events and Associated Cost with Efficacy for Approved Relapsed and/or Refractory Multiple Myeloma Regimens: A Bayesian Network Metaanalysis of Phase III Randomized Controlled Trials,” Cancer, 2020, Vol. 126, No. 12, 2791-2801.

• Glock, C., Grosse, E., Jaber, M., and Smunt, T., "Applications of Learning Curves in Production and Operations Management: A Systematic Literature Review," Computers and Industrial Engineering, 2019, Vol. 131, 422-441.
  

• Smunt, T. and Ghose, S., "An Entropy Measure of Flow Dominance for Predicting Operations Performance," Production and Operations Management, 2016, Vol. 25, No. 10, pp. 1638-1657.

• Shafer, S. and Smunt, T., “Simulation Studies in Operations Management: Context, Trends, and Research Opportunities,” Journal of Operations Management, 2004, Vol. 22, No. 4, pp. 345-354.

• Smunt, T. and Meredith, J., “A Comparison of Direct Cost Savings between Flexible Automation and Labor with Learning,” Production and Operations Management, 2000, Vol. 9, No. 2, pp. 158-170.

• Monahan, G. and Smunt, T., “Processes with Nearly Sequential Routings: A Comparative Analysis,” Journal of Operations Management, 1999, Vol. 17, No. 4, pp.449-466.

• Monahan, G. and Smunt T., “Optimal Acquisition of Automated Flexible Manufacturing Processes,” Operations Research, 1989, Vol. 37, No. 2, pp. 288-300.

• Smunt, T., “Incorporating Learning Curve Analysis Into Capacity Planning Procedures: A Simulation Experiment,” Management Science, 1986, Vol. 32, No. 9, pp. 1166-1178.

His most current research topics include:

• “The Lot Size Problem and the Learning Curve: A Review of Mathematical Modelling (1950’s -2019)” (with Mohamad Jaber and Jaakko Peltokorpi)
• “Capacity Expansion in Risky, Rapidly Growing Industries” (with Stephen Lawrence)
• "Rethinking Managership, Leadership, Followership, and Partnership " (with Roger Plachy)
• "Resilience in Operating Systems Due to Abnormal Capacity and Demand Shocks"
• "The Determinants of Citations in the Production and Operations Management Journal" (with Sanjoy Ghose)
• “Acquisitions and Interruptions: Impact on Productivity in Service Operations” (with Sanjoy Ghose)
• "University Budget and Resource Allocation Models: Their Impact on Efficient and Effective Higher Education"
• "Designing and Executing Online and Blended Business Courses"

Healthcare related:

• “Process Mapping and Work Sampling Studies for the Development of Productivity Measures of Healthcare Providers” (with David Goff)
• "The Experience Curve Effect for Alternative Treatments of Multiple Myeloma: An Analysis of Longitudinal Claims Data" (with Binod Dhakal and Sanjoy Ghose)
• "Evidence of Tramadol Efficacy for Pain Relief in Dogs vs. Humans: A Review of the Relevant Research" (with Brian Teunissen)
• "Data-Drive Choices and Costs for Integrative Treatment of Mandibular Osteosarcoma in Dogs: A Case Study of a Beagle's Long-Term Survival" (with H. Xie)