Meet Our New Faculty: Timothy Bohling

Timothy Bohling | Professor of Practice | Johnson School

Meet Tim Bohling, one of our newest faculty members to join the Cornell University SC Johnson College of Business. He holds a DBA from Georgia State University, and an MBA and B.A. from the University of Houston.

Bohling serves as Professor of Practice teaching undergraduate, MBA and EMBA students at the Samuel Curtis Johnson Graduate School of Management, and is advancing a research portfolio centered on digital marketing, brand and customer management, and innovation adoption.

Prior to joining Cornell, Bohling served as professor and chief marketing and graduate enrollment officer at the University of Notre Dame Mendoza College of Business, as well as founded Bohling Consulting, a brand strategy and digital marketing agency. Previously, Bohling held several chief marketing officer and vice president positions at IBM, HCL Technologies, Stratasys and Georgia State University.

Bohling serves on the American Marketing Association Board of Advisors and previously served as an Executive Board Member for the Marketing Science Institute.

What is a research paper of yours that is important to you, your work, or the world at large?

Co-authoring a research paper recently published in the Journal of Marketing Research titled Testing Work-Life Theory in Marketing: Evidence from Field Experiments on Social Media, Bohling says that this paper explores the important work-life balance tension that often exists in people’s lives, and the prevalence of advertising that promotes products or services according to their ability to meet people’s needs at work or in their personal lives, or to bridge the divide between work and personal lives.

“The research findings conclude that advertisements that convey that their product or services can improve work and life are less effective than single domain (work or life) ads if the advertising involves resource-demanding products, but they are more effective if it pertains to resource-undemanding products,” he says. “This research offers a pioneering application of themes from work-life literature to marketing settings. This contribution is relevant in that work-life issues are pressing topics for today’s consumers, and firms invest significantly in ads with work-life content yet no prior systematic research has predicted or tested which factors make work-life ads effective.”

What is a current issue in business or business education that you are interested in, and why is it important to you and your work?

Bohling says that he is interested in is advancing the personal, business and societal impact that marketing strategy and digital marketing can have, when done right, on improving how we live, work, interact and buy. He says that he actively works with firms on achieving sustainable competitive advantage through elevating their brand reputations and increasing customer satisfaction across the digital-first omnichannel shopping and buying experience.