The Center for Family Business at Cal State Fullerton’s College of Business and Economics has been renowned for decades as a networking and professional development hub for the Southern California family-owned business sector. But the center is also growing as an education provider for CSUF business students tying entrepreneurship and family dynamics together. In January, Kulraj Singh, who teaches Family Business Dynamics, led a team of three students to the Family Business Case Competition in Vermont. One of the students, Melissa Aguilar-Perez, was awarded best presenter in the division for her performance.
The competition, organized annually by the University of Vermont at its Burlington campus, featured teams from around the world participating at the undergraduate and graduate levels. The students were given three cases over three days, with four hours of preparation time in a closed room without internet access or notebooks. At the end of four hours, the student teams presented before a panel of academic and professional judges. Every day, the teams were given a ranking and points, which were ultimately used to decide the finalists who competed in a final case under the same conditions. In addition to Aguilar-Perez, the CSUF participants included Cara Nguyen and Isaac Merino.
“Our team was the smallest team to participate in the entire competition, so it’s really awesome that we performed as well as we did,” said Singh, assistant professor of management. “CSUF’s Center for Family Business is an amazing organization with exciting opportunities for students as well as family businesses in the area.”
Aguilar-Perez said that the competition helped her prepare for her future through analyzing problems from a new standpoint — the emotional aspect of solving business issues.
“My family owns a bakery in Los Angeles that I recently started working at, and I identified a lot of similarities between myself and the people in the cases being presented in this competition,” said Aguilar-Perez. “It has helped me view and offer solutions to my family’s business conflicts in a way I would not have been able to prior to participating.”
The Family Business Dynamics course provides students opportunities to study unique challenges and advantages that family businesses face. It is open to both undergraduate and graduate students. Contributing 64% of the U.S. gross domestic product, employing 62% of the workforce, and comprising 78% of new jobs, family business is an economic pillar of the U.S. and global economies, from Walmart to Ford to local firms. The Center for Family Business and Singh have designed the Family Business Dynamics course to reflect real businesses with their unique complexities and challenges, resulting from the interplay between business and family.
“Reflections, use of practical tools and projects are used as assessment techniques. And select students are invited to represent CSUF at the Vermont competition, which is fully funded so the students can focus on their presentation,” said Singh.
For more on the Center for Family Business as an educator of students and a networking forum for existing businesses, read more articles in CSUF Business News. For more on the Family Business Dynamics course, contact Singh at krsingh@fullerton.edu.