Pitt Business: Joseph M. Katz Graduate School of Business & College of Business Administration

Press Release

November 12, 2007

Anne Nemer Named to Assistant Dean for Executive Degree Programs

PITTSBURGH—The Executive MBA (EMBA) Worldwide programs of the University of Pittsburgh’s Joseph M. Katz Graduate School of Business have achieved considerable success in recent years owing, in large part, to the leadership of Anne Nemer, executive director of EMBA Worldwide, and her efforts to strengthen the Katz EMBA brand. In an October 30 memo to faculty and staff, Katz/College of Business Administration Dean John T. Delaney wrote, “We have received positive publicity and recorded strong enrollments. We have also initiated custom programs in Prague that have allowed us to enhance our financial results. Anne Nemer deserves considerable credit for the performance of these programs. For her outstanding leadership, [University of Pittsburgh] Provost [James V. Maher] has approved my recommendation that Anne be promoted to Assistant Dean for Executive Degree Programs.”  The creation of Nemer’s new position recognizes the priority the Katz School has given to its executive and global programs.

The priority of the school’s executive and global programs is also demonstrated by the recognition of Pitt as one of the leaders in global business education by the Financial Times of London. An October 22 article in the Financial Times (“Teamwork makes a world of difference”) detailed several schools’ approaches to running global EMBA programs, including the Katz approach of bringing together students from three global sites for three Global Executive Forums during the 20-month program. According to the Financial Times article, “The forums, and the integrated approach across three campuses, distinguish the Katz course as one of a handful of global EMBA programs that have developed in response to the needs of executives and their sponsoring organizations, as business becomes increasingly global.”

As Nemer, who was interviewed extensively for the article, explained, EMBA students work in global teams during the three forums and forge relationships that “they will carry with them long after the program ends,” she said. The forums represent more than 30 percent of EMBA’s curriculum and help reinforce in students’ minds the idea that the cohort as a whole, and relationship building across the cohort, is as important—or in some cases even more important—than any sense of attachment to one’s home campus, the article stated.

A second approach—employed by schools such as the Trium Global EMB that brings together New York University’s Stern School of Business, the London School of Economics, and HEC School of Management, Paris, as well as OneMBA—has been to partner with other institutions, the Financial Times reported. But according to Nemer, “Schools that partner can’t guarantee that course content or faculty is the same.”

And though cross-fertilization across campuses works differently for all four programs mentioned, “The global EMBA programs stand or fall on their ability to prepare students for modern business life,” explained the article. “So much of the success of strategic alliances today depends on the ability of teams to work well with each other, and much of that is across cultures and cont[in]ents,” Nemer was quoted as saying.

Nemer earned the Bachelor of Arts degree at the University of Michigan, the Master of Education degree at George Washington University, and the Master of Business Administration degree at the University of Pittsburgh. She has more than 15 years of experience in education and teaching, with Fairfax County (Virginia) Public Schools and as the owner of her own educational consulting firm in Washington D.C., with Associação Alumni in Brazil—where she worked with the private and public sector to create and implement educational programs at all levels—and with the Katz School. Prior to taking the role as executive director of EMBA Worldwide, Nemer served as the director of  EMBA – Brazil and taught negotiation skills. Among her many accomplishments are establishing the Pittsburgh Alumni Association and the Pittsburgh Executive Series. Nemer’s external service includes serving on the Board of Directors of the Mattress Factory, an installation art museum in Pittsburgh, and volunteering for the Neighborhood Academy, a college-preparatory high school for at-risk children in the Pittsburgh area.