Jeannette Mena received the 2009 Academy of International Business best dissertation proposal award at the AIB annual meeting in San Diego on June 30. AIB is an academic association with more than 3300 members in 79 countries. This year, three dissertation proposals tied for the award, with the other winners being Pritwiraj Choudhury from Harvard Business School and Luis Dau from University of South Carolina.

Forty-eight doctoral students entered proposals in the competition from a myriad of prestigious schools such as University of California-Berkeley, Harvard, London Business School, Pennsylvania’s Wharton Business School and several Big Ten schools. All proposals were evaluated by a committee of 12 renowned international business scholars. Sponsored by the AIB Foundation, the criteria used in the evaluation were “(1) originality and theoretical foundations of the work; (2) rigor and soundness of the proposed methodology; and (3) potential contribution and impact of the proposed work to advancing the field.”

Mena’s winning dissertation proposal was titled “A strategic marketing examination of multiple stakeholders, satisfaction, and marketing performance of MNCs embedded in multi-entity supply chains in the global marketplace.” Ms. Mena said that “the study has been designed to tackle multi units of analyses and multiple supply chain entities to advance the international business literature.” Her committee consists of Tomas Hult (chair), David Closs, Robert Nason, Ahmet Kirca, Claes Fornell (University of Michigan) and O.C. Ferrell (University of New Mexico). The dissertation project is supported by the Center for International Business Education and Research at the Broad School.

Jeannette Mena has a Bachelor of Business Administration and a Master of Business Administration from the University of Puerto Rico, where she is from, as well as a Master of International Business from Florida International University. She has published eight articles in Journal of Managerial Issues and the Academy of International Business and American Marketing Association proceedings.