Thank you for your Interest in the Fisher Institute for Professional Selling!

Established through a gift from Ronald and Diane Fisher in 1992, the Ronald R. and Diane C. Fisher Institute for Professional Selling has enabled The University of Akron to establish one of only 13 certified, professional sales programs in the world. Through seminars, outreach programs, applied research, and a variety of other activities, the Fisher Institute is shaping the next generation of sales professionals as well as promoting professional sales as a lifetime career choice.

We work with many good companies who benefit from being Executive Advisory Board Members for the Institute. Namely, they provide mentorship to our current students, help reshape the sales curriculum so that it is current, and actively hire our outstanding graduates.

We also can fulfill sales training and consulting needs needed to develop sustainable improvements in sales performance that will directly impact your company’s top and bottom line. Our programs are based on the latest in sales performance research and learning methodology and offer hands-on real-world applications that deliver lasting results. Our one-of-a-kind Professional Sales Laboratory allows both our students and your sales team to learn by doing and to receive the immediate feedback from peers and trained sales assessors that is so critical to effective learning.

Fisher Accomplishments

The Fisher Institute for Professional Selling has had many accomplishments over the last few years including:

• We are one of only 13 accredited Sales programs in the nation: accredited by the University Sales Center Alliance and the Society for Sales and Marketing Training
• The college has been ranked by both BusinessWeek Magazine as one of the best undergraduate business schools in the nation, the only business program at a public university in Northeast Ohio to be included in the top 100, and U.S. News & World Report.
• For nine consecutive years, the Princeton Review has rated our graduate programs among the best.
• The part-time MBA program at The University of Akron and a joint master of social work program run by UA and Cleveland State University have been honored in U.S. News & World Report's 2013 edition of "America's Best Graduate Schools."
• All programs offered through the College of Business Administration are accredited by AACSB International - the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business. This prestigious body grants full accreditation only to the programs that meet their stringent requirements. Only 560 colleges in the world have achieved AACSB International accreditation (less than 5 percent of universities).
• One of our board members was awarded the best internship program in the nation by BusinessWeek based on his recruitment efforts through the Fisher Institute.
• A complete upgrade of the sales labs with the latest technology  (2008)
• A complete renovation of the classrooms and labs (2009)
• Instituted a new undergraduate health care selling degree

Fisher Institute for Professional Selling Faculty

In addition to part-time faculty, most of whom are full-time sales professionals in diverse industries, the Fisher Institute has three full-time faculty devoted to sales and sales management.