Business Foundations

Dr. Yass Alkafaji was an Associate Professor in the Business Department at the American University of Sharjah (AUS) for 13 years (ret. 2021), and has taught at Mississippi State University, Bowling Green State University, and Northeastern Illinois University-Chicago. Dr. Alkafaji is also a practicing certified public accountant, and is the founder of A&A Accountants and Business Consultants, based in Chicago, with operations in Dubai. He is the Director of the Iraq Public Leadership Program (IPLP). Dr. Alkafaji has written and spoken extensively on accounting, auditing, and tax issues for professional organizations and in professional and academic journals. He is a CPA, CFE, and CGMA.

Patrick Cline taught Business at AUIS for seven years and was founding Director of Takween Accelerator there. He has an MBA from the Kenan-Flagler Business School at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill and a BS in Financial Management from Clemson University.

Ahmed Tabaqchali is the Chief Investment Officer (CIO) of Asia Frontier Capital (AFC) Iraq Fund, and has over 25 years of experience in U.S. and Middle East capital markets. He is a lecturer in the Business Department at AUIS, and a Senior Fellow at the Institute of Regional and International Studies (IRIS) and at the Atlantic Council.

Mr. Alaa Hamade is Senior Instructor of Management at the American University of Sharjah (AUS). He has been in the education field for over 14 years. Mr.Hamade has taught Introduction to Business, Fundamentals of Management, Business Information Systems, Social Media, and Mobile Computing in Business. In 2010, he obtained a Master’s Degree in Business Administration from AUS, where he also had a Bachelor’s degree in Management Information Systems in 2007. He worked as a Web And Database Coordinator for six years, and he has been a member of the International Coach Federation (ICF) since April 2015.

Dr. Aida El-Khatib is a Lab Teaching Assistant for the Management Department of the School of Business Administration at the American University of Sharjah (AUS). She has been teaching at AUS for almost 12 years. She has a Bachelor's degree in Business Administration from AUS in 2006 as well as a Master's degree in 2013. In 2014, she was awarded the Lab Teaching Assistant of the year. She also worked for 3 years as an Assistant Relationships Manager at the Standard Charted Bank in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, where she was responsible for taking care of clients' banking and credit requirements.

Prof. Ashraf Khallaf has taught accounting and finance at the American University of Sharjah since 2012, where his teaching specialities include accounting information systems, financial accounting, intermediate accounting, advanced accounting, and accounting for Islamic financial institutions. His research interests include capital market research, R&D and IT investment return, data analytics and visualization, corporate governance, Islamic finance, and Islamic accounting standards. Dr. Ashraf also taught at Florida Atlantic University, the University of Southern Indiana, and the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign as a Visiting Professor. He earned his PhD in Business Administration from Florida Atlantic University and his MA in Accounting from Assuit University in Egypt.

Dr. Wilfried Vanhonacker established top business schools in Russia (Moscow School of Management SKOLKOVO) and China (China-Europe International Business School, CEIBS). He was the founding director of INSEAD’s renowned PhD program, and led the Olayan School of Business at the American University of Beirut, where he held the Coca Cola Chair in Marketing, and was a Research Scholar at the MIT Sloan School of Management.