UW announces nation’s first MBA in product management

The School of Business announced Tuesday, Nov. 19, the establishment of the Center for Product Management, the nation’s first MBA program focused on that subject.

The center, established by a $6.4 million gift from husband and wife Scott Cook and Signe Ostby, will produce top MBA graduates trained for product management jobs that are among the most attractive and in-demand careers for MBAs. While some universities offer a class or two in product management, no other university has a dedicated center.

The first students will be enrolled in the program in fall 2003, and the gift will cover full tuition and a stipend for many of the incoming students.

Cook co-founded Intuit Inc., a provider of financial software and services for small businesses, consumers and accounting professionals. Ostby, former vice president of marketing for Software Publishing Corporation, earned her bachelor’s and master’s degrees in business from UW–Madison, both in marketing. The couple live in California.

“Both Scott and I began our careers in product management at Procter & Gamble and feel that product management jobs provide outstanding training for successful general managers,” Ostby says. “As the ‘general manager’ of their product, product managers must be multidisciplinary leaders. For example, working with market research, the product manager identifies the needs of the customer. Then, working closely with the research and development team, they develop a product that wins in the market by meeting the needs better than the competition. Scott founded Intuit upon product management principles, which remain central to making Quicken, QuickBooks and TurboTax successful.”

“The University of Wisconsin–Madison is superbly positioned to teach the multiple disciplines required for success in product management,” Cook says. “The unique curriculum of the Center for Product Management relies upon UW–Madison’s A.C. Nielsen Center for Marketing Research and UW–Madison’s renowned engineering and bioscience programs.”

Keeping the Center for Product Management on the cutting-edge of the profession is an Executive Advisory Board filled with senior executives from top firms involved in product management, including General Mills, Intuit, Kimberly-Clark, Kraft Foods, and Procter & Gamble. Board members will help guide the curriculum and recruit the center’s students for internships and permanent positions while sharing their real-world expertise through seminars and mentoring the center’s students. As a member of the board, Cook will be a regular lecturer.

“Product management is basically running a business. The training MBAs receive here will provide the best possible experience to prepare them for eventually leading corporations,” J. Paul Peter, professor of marketing and chair of the Department of Marketing, says. “This center will deliver outstanding job candidates in high demand to the best companies in the world.”

Product managers, sometimes known as brand managers, manage all aspects of a product line for both existing and new products. Traditionally, even new hires in product management have significant profit-and-loss responsibility.

They are responsible for building sales, profits and market share by researching customer needs, understanding customer behavior, assessing competition, positioning products in their categories, developing compelling why-to-buy statements, setting the optimum price, coming up with packaging that sells, determining the best distribution plan, developing appropriate promotional and advertising campaigns, and evaluating market share performance.

Michael M. Knetter, dean of the School of Business, says the gift will allow the school to recruit a nationally renowned individual to be the center’s executive director. The gift funds substantial research support for the executive director, an important factor in recruiting a top academic leader.

“Wisconsin is known for providing extraordinary depth to its students through its specialized programs,” Knetter says. “The launch of the Center for Product Management is at the heart of our strategy of expanding the reach of our center-based programs.”

Applications for the fall class of 2003 are due by April 10, 2003. More information is available by calling the Graduate Programs Office of the School of Business, (608) 262-4000, or visiting www.bus.wisc.edu/centerforproductmanagement.

The following executives are serving on the Center’s Executive Advisory Board. (Degrees are listed for School of Business alumni).

Dick Antoine
Global Human Resources Officer
Procter & Gamble

Scott Cook
Chairman of the Executive Committee
Intuit

David S. Johnson, BBA’78, MS’80
Group Vice President
President, Operations, Technology, Procurement and Information Systems
Kraft Foods

Signe Ostby, BBA’75, MBA’77
Former Vice President for Marketing
Software Publishing Corporation

Bruce Paynter, BBA’75, MBA’83
President, Adult Care Sector
Kimberly-Clark

Jeffrey J. Rotsch, MBA’74
Senior Vice President
President-Consumer Foods, Sales
General Mills

Mark Schar (Board Chair)
Retired from Procter & Gamble