Peter Frost, a professor of Industrial Relations Management in UBC's Faculty of Commerce and Business Administration, has won the first Leaders in Management Education award for the Western Canada region.
The award, sponsored by The Financial Post and Bell Canada, was given in recognition of Frost's contribution to management education. An award recipient was named in each of four geographic regions -- Atlantic Canada, Quebec, Ontario, and Western Canada.
"The award reflects well on the Faculty of Commerce and Business Administration as a leader in business education,"said Frost, who is the Edgar F. Kaiser Professor of Organizational Behaviour. "My success is directly related to a faculty that recognizes innovation and change as essential in keeping pace with, or staying ahead of, changes in the Canadian and international business communities."
Frost has been praised by his colleagues, students and members of the business community for his innovative teaching and his role as one of seven faculty members teaching the core component of the new MBA program.
Dean Michael Goldberg said Frost was among the first to use video technology as an instructional tool in the classroom in the early 1970s. He used video to record and play back student presentations, and presented video vignettes in which actors depicted ineffectual and then more appropriate behaviours.
In 1991 he published Management Live: The Video Book, a series of videos that build on traditional textbook and lecture treatments of management and bring to life the concepts of organizational life. He is known for his series of "Reality" books, created with two colleagues and widely used in North America, bridging theory and practice in organizations.
Frost has played a major role in faculty development, hosting workshops on teaching and developing courses to teach PhD students how to teach in business schools. He is currently editing a set of original research papers on teaching effectiveness to be published in the Academy of Management Journal, one of the leading research journals in his field. He has twice received the faculty's Talking Stick Award for Pedagogical Innovation as well as Commerce graduate and undergraduate societies' awards for teaching excellence, a 3M Canada Teaching Excellence Fellowship, a Council for Advancement and Support of Education (CASE) Canada Professor of the Year Award and numerous other awards.
Frost was judged based on five criteria: teaching excellence, pedagogical leadership, academic and professional leadership, contributions to management practice and applied research. Of the winners the Financial Post wrote: "You may not know them by name, yet their ability to inspire future generations of business people -- and thus, influence business -- is profound as they shape the minds of students at Canada's management schools."