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In March, Morgan State University announced the appointment of Dr. Royce Burnett as the dean of the Earl G. Graves School of Business and Management.
His career has included nearly 20 years of accounting and business experience such as working for national firms. Burnett also has two decades of experience in academia including as a professor, researcher and academic administration. Before his appointment, he was a professor and chair of the Strome College of Business School of Accountancy at Old Dominion University.
The Daily Record reached out to Burnett to discuss his goal for his new role, how his background informs his current work and more.
The Daily Record (TDR): What first drew you to the finance/business world? What made you want to pursue this area as your career?
Dr. Royce Burnett: (RB): When I was younger I was really interested in public policy. I didn’t know what that was. (When you are a teenager), you have no idea what that meant but, at the end of the day, what I really wanted to do very early on was to make a difference. When I went to school I didn’t know what I wanted to major in but I knew that I wanted to be able to truly make a difference. I stumbled into it quite honestly.
I joined a fraternity and one of my fraternity brothers was an accounting major so I said ‘OK. In order for me to understand him and understand what is going on, I will just take some of the classes he is taking.’ When I took the accounting class and I understood the role of accounting and how accounting really prepares information or data for people to make decisions then I said to myself ‘Wow if I can really do that and really use that to make a difference in society then that is what I want to do.’ It wasn’t about the money. It wasn’t about the power. It wasn’t about the prestige. It was really about making a difference and in my life I used accounting to do exactly that.
TDR: You will officially take on the role of Dean at the Earl G. Graves School of Business and Management at Morgan State University beginning July 1. What are your goals for your new role?
RB: Morgan has really been identified as a premier research urban institute. We have been defined as a natural gift. We have a strategic plan that really talks about transforming Morgan so, for me, the role that I want to adopt and the role that I really want to cultivate here in the Graves School of Business is one that is going to do two things.
It is going to first of all inform the community about who we are and the great things that we have to offer. Not to say it hasn’t been done but really exemplify that so to develop a relationship with the community and our corporate partners.
The second thing is to be able to educate our students on what they want — the corporate partners and the community — and then to give them the skills. So ultimately the goal that I really want is to prepare our students to be successful in the marketplace and to have our community partners and our corporate partners by the same (way) say ‘Hey. Morgan is really rising to the top. This is really what we want to do.’ We want them to be our go-to entity in terms of students and as well as problem-solving in the community. I think that is the key thing. I know that is kind of global but those are the two aspects that I think are really really important. Getting a name brand and making sure they are aware we are right on the cutting edge of problem-solving and making our students aware of the facts of the skills that they (will receive) and preparing them for those skills and placing them.
TDR: How does your nearly 20 years of experience in public accounting and business inform your teaching and academic work?
RB: I started out in public accounting which is an external arm of accounting. Then I transitioned into the industry where I worked for Fortune 500 firms making decisions on how you allocate financial resources and I think what the experience did for me was to understand the role that we play in both the internal environment, the external environment and how do we make decisions so that at the end of the day what you are creating out of your actions is a value proposition that is really based on allowing people to make the best decisions with the information that they have.
For me, going into public accounting first of all allowed me to understand what financial reporting is all about and how you go about preparing information for external users of that information. Then when I went into the Fortune 500 area and had my own accounting practice, it really allowed me to understand as an internal decision-maker — how do I allocate my resources so that I achieve the goals that at the end of the day the community wants?
Then when I have that combination — I understand the external aspect of accounting and business cause it is not just accounting. It is business. I understand the external and I understand the internal then I can come together and say ‘OK. This is what the community needs.’ The community can be either corporate partners or our community and this is what the students need to be prepared. So I think by having that knowledge of business and how from the perspective of both internal and external that allows me to be able to set a path for developing success for the students.
From a teaching perspective — the beautiful part about this was that I have been able to go into classrooms and listen to what students are asking me and be able to pull it in and say ‘OK. Here is the initial question for the topic at hand but let’s expand this out to what it really means when you go to work for business.’
TDR: Morgan State has recently experienced rapid growth in several areas including enrollment, academic degree programs and new facilities and research centers. How does this growth benefit the School of Business and Management?
RB: Well I think the wonderful thing that we are going to be able to do is to really capitalize on this and it really is going to be (great) in terms of what I would say of our stable programs. But I think the real opportunity is the potential for interdisciplinary studies because what is happening is the whole idea of silos in academia is really starting to fall down meaning that you don’t have these colleges or these particular schools that are stand alone. You really are going to be looking at an institution where by people are really floating between all these entities that were formally referred to as colleges or schools. So what that does for us is it allows people to think.
For example, if I am in health sciences and they are coming up with an idea of how they go about getting a patent or how they go about developing programs for research, the first thing they are probably going to do is think — if I develop this, how am I going to populate this in the mindsets of the external individuals and even more so how can I make the process more efficient and effective? Well that creates a natural tributary for business to come in and say let’s partner with you. Let’s make sure you understand the different aspects. Now we are not coming in and being kingmakers because we don’t know anything about the natural sciences but what we know is, at the end of the day, you have a partner that you have to respond to and they are going to add certain amounts of information beyond just the technicalities.
For us, developing the opportunities because the growth is happening because we are getting such an expansive view of ourselves and because we are really challenging ourselves to think outside the box this is just going to be a natural (way) for us to go in and really be able to allow Morgan to go into areas that previously they had never thought about or to show our potentials for areas that now will be able to give us some value.
