It was a fantastic reunion: More than 120 alumni and active members of WHU's Institute of Management Accounting and Control met in the historic vaulted cellar in Vallendar on March 15 to celebrate Professor Dr. Dr. h.c. Jürgen Weber's 65th birthday. Many of the guests came from far, using the opportunity to see friends from long ago and networking with each other. Young professionals, who have just recently completed their doctorate at the IMC, and experienced experts who graduated from WHU decades ago, enjoyed a dinner together and stayed until late at night to celebrate.
Jürgen Weber took the opportunity to look back on some of the IMC’s major achievements as well as the WHU’s overall development from a small institution to one of the leading business schools in Europe. “I am proud to be part of this family”, Prof. Weber said. Even though he has now formally retired from the WHU faculty and started his life as professor emeritus at the institute, he is almost as involved in the IMC projects as he had been before. Prof. Dr. Utz Schäffer on behalf of the IMC as well as Dr. Ludwig H. Bertsch and Dr. Stefan Grunwald-Delitz on behalf of the alumni thanked Jürgen Weber for his continuous engagement now and then.
As Utz Schäffer pointed out, Jürgen Weber has made a major contribution to research and teaching, having supervised 150 dissertations and 11 successful habilitations. He has published 1265 publications, among them 94 editions of „Advanced Controlling“ and 4 textbooks with 40 new editions and translations. “This means that, in the past 32 years, he has published almost one publication a week”, Schäffer added.
After the speeches, the guests enjoyed a long night at the vaulted cellar with lots of good talks, music, and fun. It was great to see so many former doctoral students and colleagues back home in Vallendar.