Faculty Impact - Dr. Drew Stapleton
Posted: September 14th, 2023
Dr. Andrew (Drew) Stapleton, UW-La Crosse professor of management.
UW MBA Consortium teaching courses: Stapleton has taught MBA 774: Sustainability and Organizational Management since 2019. He also teaches MBA 702: Marketing Informed Managerial Decisions.
Present research: Dr. Stapleton is currently working on a wide assortment of research projects, including "A Proposed New Model and Empirical Test of TCO in explaining location decisions," "The Disrupting Influence of AI on Supply Chain Partners: A Review of ChatGPT on the Maritime Sector," "Distributed Consensus: Blockchains as Transactional Analogs of Computational Contracts in the Supply Chain," and more.
Instructor's wide-ranging experience helps prepare MBA program students
Dr. Drew Stapleton's professional career has spanned decades, industries, and job responsibilities. From working the beat as a reporter to holding critical operational positions for major international corporations and now teaching and conducting research, he brings a wealth of experience to his classes.
Stapleton, currently a UW-La Crosse professor of management specializing in operations and supply chain management, worked at the Associated Press, Xerox, and General Motors before stepping into the classroom.
Starting at the Associated Press, he covered the National Football League, National Basketball Association, Major League Baseball, and college football and basketball. "I am a numbers guy - so I really enjoyed analyzing the statistics and finding patterns," Stapleton says.
At General Motors, in addition to his work responsibilities, Stapleton enjoyed a special perk saying, "I was able to take multiple visits to the movie graveyard where GM had several of every car they ever built and would lease them to Hollywood for period movies."
While at Xerox, Stapleton says, "I was going to the maquiladora industry in Mexico to help create new products and solutions for firms doing business in the USA and Mexico."
Bringing that background to the world of education, Stapleton now instructs the MBA 774: Sustainability and Organizational Management and MBA 702: Marketing Informed Managerial Decisions courses. He finds joy in many aspects of his new profession, teaching the leaders of tomorrow in the UW MBA Consortium program.
He strives to include positive aspects from his MBA program to engage and inspire his students. "Fostering rapport with the cohort is something I experienced in my program and increased the students' intellectual curiosity. I strive to create the same environment." Stapleton says.
Stapleton also offers students unique opportunities to stretch their thinking. "One way is to begin each module with a logic or math puzzle to get the creative and quantitative 'juices' flowing."
"I find the discussions within the cohort to be fascinating." Stapleton says, "There is a high degree of intellectual brain power and curiosity in the UW MBA Consortium. It is quite fulfilling to have deep conversations about connecting the topics from class to the student's experience and career goals." |
