Johannes Wissel: Bringing financial industry experience into the classroom

Professor of Practice, Operations Research and Information Engineering

Academic focus: As a Professor of Practice my primary focus is on teaching, though I also see some wonderful opportunities to dive more deeply into research questions I became interested in while in the financial industry.

Research summary:  I am interested in exploring how expertise in the field of financial engineering could be used to answer some questions of price and efficiency that are arising in the transition to a new model of energy production and distribution.

What inspired you to pursue a career in this field?  I have always loved mathematics. When I was younger the truth of numbers and math were very satisfying. As I got older and started to see some of the many applications of mathematics, I came to understand that it wasn’t as simple as I had thought. But that made it more interesting to me, not less. As a first-generation college graduate my parents were supportive of my academic decisions and that was helpful.

I always knew that I wanted to teach, so even though I worked in the financial industry in several positions, when the opportunity came to get back into academia I gladly said yes.

What are you most looking forward to as a Cornell Engineering faculty member? The students at Cornell are so bright and curious. I will be teaching undergraduates, masters students, and Ph.D. students and have the chance to share some of what I have learned in industry. I was a visiting assistant professor at Cornell from 2008 to 2012 before I got into financial consulting and research and I have always known that I love teaching. It is exciting to be back.

What do you like to do when you’re not working? I have a four-year old and a two-year old and they keep me very busy. We all like to go hiking when we can.

Johannes Wissel faculty page