MCI professorship for Christian Ploder

In recognition of his contributions to research and teaching, the exemplary translation of research achievements into practice and his contributions to the further development of the MCI and the higher education sector in general, the MCI recently awarded the title of professor to FH Professor Dr. Christian Ploder. The appointment as professor was made by Claudia Mössenlechner, Vice-Chairwoman of the MCI Academic Council, along with Peter J. Mirski, Head of the Management, Communication & IT department. The subsequent inaugural lecture by FH Professor Dr. Christian Ploder was devoted to the topic "Will digitalization kill process management?

Christian Ploder, a lecturer at the MCI since 2017, has distinguished himself as a particularly committed lecturer and researcher at the MCiT Department. Recently awarded the Entrepreneurial School® Teaching Award, he combines teaching, research and practice in an exemplary manner. He teaches and researches in the areas of ERP systems, process management, business informatics and data analytics. In addition, he heads the Next-Gen-Lab, a center of excellence that SAP established at the MCI, and teaches as a guest lecturer at the University of Guelph Humber in Canada.

After graduating from the HTL Jenbach in 2005, he completed his studies in business administration at the University of Innsbruck, with a focus on business informatics. Until 2009, he worked as a research assistant on his dissertation on "Diagnosis of knowledge-intensive business processes in SMEs". This was followed by a move into the business world. He has held several senior positions in international industrial and software companies and furthermore completed a number of training courses in the fields of quality management and university didactics. His outstanding knowledge in the IT sector, his research activities and his profound practical experience, combined with modern didactics, are culminated into what makes FH Professor Dr. Ploder an authentic and inspiring lecturer.

In his inaugural lecture, held in English, he took his numerous relatives and friends, colleagues and students on an exciting journey into the research topic "Operational Excellence & Agile Auditing". He showed how data and technology can be used sensibly to improve business processes. Any modifications are to be seen in the three dimensions of employees, process and technology. Ultimately, the aim is to design processes in such a way that they correspond to the real world, and can be supported by technology. Audit trails help to manage and control the compliance of the processes by the employees.