Rutgers Business School names new dean, effective Jan. 1

Rutgers Business School-Newark and New Brunswick will have a new dean with the new year, it announced Tuesday.Lei Lei will take over from Glenn Shafer, effective Jan. 1, 2015, Rutgers Business School said in a news release.

Three key Rutgers officials — Rutgers-Newark Chancellor Nancy Cantor, Rutgers-New Brunswick Chancellor Richard Edwards and Rutgers-Newark Provost Todd Clear — said in a joint statement that, “A combination of Dr. Lei’s accomplishments as an academic leader, her acuity as a scholar and teacher, deeply engaged with business challenges facing communities locally and globally, were among the key qualities that led to her selection.”

Click here to subscribe to the NJBIZ e-newsletters

Lei was founding director of the Rutgers Center for Supply Chain Management in 2001 and founding chair of the Department of Supply Chain Management and Marketing Sciences in 2008, Rutgers said. She has been a member of the Rutgers faculty since 1989, when she earned her doctorate in industrial engineering from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

“Lei highly values our faculty of top-notch researchers and practitioners, dedicated staff and many strong programs initiated and cultivated by previous leaders of RBS,” the joint statement from Cantor, Edwards and Clear added. “She is very proud of our breathtakingly diverse, high-quality and vibrant students, supportive alumni and strong partnerships with the business community.”

RELATED: Suitable For Work blog — Rutgers makes Bloomberg’s top business schools; which ones made the Top 10?

Rutgers praised Lei as an international expert in operations scheduling, project resource allocation models, logistics performance optimization and distribution network design, as well as being a respected and lauded professor.

Shafer had been dean of RBS since 2011.

“The tremendous potential of this moment would not have materialized without Dean Glenn Shafer’s vision, astuteness and courage at a time of multifaceted transition for Rutgers,” Cantor, Edwards and Clear said, in thanking him for his dedication.

ALSO ON NJBIZ

NJBIZ Power 50 Real Estate leaders revealed (slideshow)

Bringing military discipline to business practices

‘Tis the season: Consumers can start browsing Obamacare plans in advance of purchase