Karen W. Brown

Medill fondly remembers faculty member Karen W. Brown (1956-2016)

Karen was a lecturer in the Integrated Marketing Communications program and taught the IMC 450 Financial Accounting class from 2001-2014. In addition to teaching, she had independent consulting projects related primarily to the issues of business valuation. Much of her independent work was with Hewitt Associates in Lincolnshire, Illinois.

The major portion of her corporate financial advisory career was with Duff & Phelps Corporation in Chicago, Illinois from 1982-1996. There she directed the Financial Advisory practice within Duff & Phelps Capital Markets and was involved in all aspects of financial consulting with primary responsibility for project oversight and marketing.

Karen advised more than 100 corporate clients on matters including valuation of common stock, preferred stock, options and convertible securities, implication of buy-sell agreements, establishment of Employee Stock Ownership Plans (ESOPs), and fairness to shareholders of corporate transactions. She worked closely with the client's senior management on the development of financial projections, review of business plans and evaluation of the industry and market conditions.

Teaching Philosophy

Karen taught the core marketing finance course for IMC at Medill. The course provides an overview of the principles of corporate finance, including: financial statement analysis, business performance measurement, budgeting and long-term forecasting, and investment analysis.

Karen placed emphasis on understanding the economic rationale for managerial decision-making as it related to corporate strategy in general and marketing programs in particular. Her classes included a discussion of current business news while incorporating the finance and marketing topics taught throughout the course.

Upon successful completion of the course, her students possessed a basic understanding of the financial objectives of a firm and could analyze marketing expenditures using traditional investment decision-making criteria.