Rick Cosier on Prabuddha De
Krannert has long been known for its prominence and expertise in the more quantitative aspects of business functions. One such key area to Krannert’s strategic mission is Management Information Systems (MIS). Although having several excellent faculty in MIS, Krannert lacked that superstar MIS leader when I became Dean in 1999. Along with Senior Associate Dean Bob Plante, I sought to rectify this situation by designating an endowed chair position to be filled by a world-renowned MIS faculty member. During the late 1990s MIS had become a dominate area within business schools. The number of students seeking degrees in MIS had rapidly expanded. So the challenge was significant to land our first choice. Well, we were successful in that — we hired Prabuddha De. Having been very active in the AACSB, I was well aware of the best MIS faculty around the world. At the start of our search Prabuddha was at the top of our list. He immediately exceeded expectations by assuming a strong and effective leadership role at Krannert. He led successful efforts to recruit great faculty and revise our MIS curricula across our various degree programs. He especially bolstered our MIS doctoral program. But over and above all that, Prabuddha is a wonderful person and remains a great colleague to all in Krannert. Prabuddha can look back on his career and take great pride in the contributions he made to furthering our knowledge of MIS and educating our students.
Rick Cosier
Dean Emeritus and Leeds Professor
The Krannert School of Management
Purdue University
Bob Plante on Prabuddha De
I was the Senior Associate Dean when we were successful in our search for a visionary Named Professor who would lead and build the MIS area into a preeminent area for conducting leading-edge research and development of insightful teaching programs. Looking back now, in an extremely competitive recruiting environment, we were successful and lucky in recruiting one of the leading academics in MIS, Prabuddha De.
To this day, I consider our successful pursuit of Prabuddha as one of the best and most impactful decisions we made during my term in the Dean’s offices. Upon his arrival at Krannert, Prabuddha began to set the stage and gather resources for achieving success in recruiting top faculty candidates. For example, one of the most important resources for faculty who are expected to conduct leading-edge research is a solid doctoral program. To this end, he immediately saw the need for and was tireless in his efforts as he set out to improve the MIS doctoral program. Through similar efforts, he has created an intellectual and more collegial environment in the MIS area.
Further, through collaboration with faculty from other academic areas within and without Krannert, he was instrumental in designing leading-edge undergraduate and graduate degree programs, including the highly ranked Master of Science program, BAIM (Business Analytics and Information Management).
We have been fortunate to have Professor Prabuddha De on our Krannert faculty. He has been an inspiration to many and leaves a legacy of influential leadership among the Krannert faculty. I wish Prabuddha all the best in his retirement. He has earned it.
Bob Plante
Lewis B. Cullman University Professor Emeritus of Management