SMITH BRAIN TRUST — Recent backlash against United Airlines following an incident at Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport does not surprise Roland Rust, the Distinguished University Professor and David Bruce Smith Chair in Marketing at the University of Maryland’s Robert H. Smith School of Business.

SMITH BRAIN TRUST — Google’s mea culpa for ads appearing alongside extremist video content on YouTube has culminated in promises from the tech giant, including a measure to block ads from channels with fewer than 10,000 views and a new system in which third-party firms will verify ad quality standards.

SMITH BRAIN TRUST – What could be better than free? For companies with a freemium business model – Spotify, Dropbox, Hulu and The New York Times are examples – it’s a key question. Can a company increase its number of paying customers when a free version is available? And if so, how?

Big data, business intelligence, predictive analytics, key performance indicators, risk analysis, marketing research – these buzz terms are prolific in the C-suite. At the Inaugural Smith Analytics Conference on April 21, 2017, in Washington, D.C., attendees will learn how to leverage the latest analytics best practices to help improve your company’s bottom line.

SMITH BRAIN TRUST – Getting admitted to the hospital means a 1-in-20 chance of contracting an infection, maybe even a potentially deadly antibiotic-resistant bacteria, also referred to as multidrug-resistant organisms (MDROs).

Leaders from the worlds of business, nonprofit and government packed a room in the Reagan Building and International Trade Center on April 5, 2017, for a timely conversation about driving and adapting tochange. The event, hosted by the Office of Executive Programs at the University of Maryland’s Robert H. Smith School of Business, began with an “Inside the Actor Studio” style one-on-one interview. Neta Moye, a clinical professor of management, quizzed Alonso Robinson, founder and CEO of Symphonic Strategies, on dealing with transition and complexity.

SMITH BRAIN TRUST – What does it mean when a pioneer of the telecommuting workforce begins to curb its work-from-home practices? For IBM, it means a massive culture shift, say experts from the University of Maryland's Robert H. Smith School of Business. And while the tech giant might be hoping it results in a surge in innovation, it also might spark a surge of resignations.

SMITH BRAIN TRUST – Are you ready to entrust your retirement savings to a robot? Investment advice is increasingly coming to clients from nonhuman sources, whether they realize it or not, as more money-management firms look to automated services to augment their team of human advisers and deepen the science behind stock-picking.

SMITH BRAIN TRUST — Gillette is shaving its prices by as much as 20 percent and focusing on its less-expensive products to compete with cheaper rivals, such as Dollar Shave Club. And the move is rattling investors, according to The Wall Street Journal. 

SMITH BRAIN TRUST — People who share copyrighted content on digital piracy sites don’t get paid or protected from lawsuits. So why do they do it? “The major motivation is building reputation in these online communities,” says Kalinda Ukanwa, one of 34 women PhD candidates at the University of Maryland’s Robert H. Smith School of Business. “They want bragging rights.”