Faculty Spotlight - Professor Henry Balfanz

Henry Balfanz is a marketing professor in the College of Business at Northern Michigan University (NMU).  He has been teaching at NMU since the fall of 2011.  On-campus, Professor Balfanz is involved with several organizations.  He is a faculty advisor to the American Marketing Association and to Circle K, which is an affiliate of the Kiwanis Club on the college level.  He is also a member of Committee W, which is an organization that focuses on women rights.  In the community, Professor Balfanz is a member of the Marquette Kiwanis.

Professor Balfanz teaches several different marketing courses at NMU.  Most recently he has taught Advertising and Sales Promotion, Personal Selling, Political Marketing, and Introduction to Marketing.  He will be teaching Entrepreneurial Marketing next fall, a course in which he is really looking forward to.  Although this is Professor Balfanz’s first full-time teaching position, he has taught in the past at Bradley University (Peoria, IL) and Illinois Central College.  He has also taught business courses in the Czech Republic, an opportunity that came about while obtaining his MBA at Bradley University.  He has taught in the Czech Republic several times sense 2008, and says he will continue to do so as it is a very satisfying and rewarding experience for him.

Professor Balfanz grew up in Lincoln, IL and most recently lived in Peoria, IL.  In his past careers Professor Balfanz has managed radio stations in Great Falls, MT, Davenport, IA, Peoria, IL and Champaign, IL.  He also managed a group of weekly newspapers in Peoria for six years, and worked at an ad agency there as well.  Professor Balfanz graduated from Southern Illinois University at Carbondale with a Bachelor of Science in Broadcast Management in 1977, and earned a Masters of Business Administration in 2007 from Bradley University.  He jokingly remarked that every 30 years he obtains a new degree.

Professor Balfanz came to Marquette and NMU for the opportunity at his first full-time teaching position.  He had several other options, but chose NMU because he felt it had the right dynamic for him.  He says that he really enjoys the students here at NMU, stating that he feels the students are very “real” and very easy to work with.  He also said that he enjoys his colleagues at the College of Business very much, as well.  Prior to coming to Marquette and NMU, the farthest north Professor Balfanz had been was Traverse City.  He told me he was not aware of all the wonderful things that the Marquette community and the Upper Peninsula had to offer.

In his spare time Professor Balfanz enjoys running and biking.  He has completed nine marathons and over a dozen half-marathons.  He said that Marquette is a terrific place to be able to live and run.  Professor Balfanz has two sons, both of which are now adults.  His youngest son will be finishing his doctorate in Psychology at Pepperdine University in Malibu, California this May, and he is very excited about that.

Over the years Professor Balfanz discovered that he really enjoyed training his employees at the radio and newspapers operations in which he managed, and knew that when it came to switching careers he felt that he could be a good teacher.  When I asked Professor Balfanz is he any advice for NMU students he said, “Treat college like a full-time job!”