Growing up, Ryan Sommerfeldt wanted to be a high school math teacher, but now, instead of teaching algebra or calculus, he is teaching accounting as an assistant professor at the BYU Marriott School of Business with the aim of helping students progress both spiritually and intellectually.
Although Sommerfeldt has always enjoyed math and teaching, he ultimately decided that high school teaching wasn’t the career he wanted to pursue. He tried out chemistry, then physics, and finally took an accounting class at his brothers’ suggestion.
“Everybody else talked about how hard accounting was, but I found it way easier,” Sommerfeldt says. “To me, it just clicked.” So, Sommerfeldt applied to BYU Marriott’s School of Accountancy (SOA) and, upon being accepted, changed his major one last time.
“God knew the path I was supposed to take the whole time,” Sommerfeldt says. “My wife and I discussed and prayed together, and although we never understood the full picture, by focusing in on what God wanted me to do, we always understood what the next step was, and that helped us get to where we were supposed to be.”
While he was a student in BYU Marriott’s MAcc program, Sommerfeldt felt prompted to pursue a PhD, and he realized that becoming a professor in accounting would fulfill his love of teaching, math, and accounting—his newest interest. Sommerfeldt joined the PhD prep track and worked as a research assistant for one of his professors.
During this time, Sommerfeldt had an experience that changed his perspective. He was walking across campus one day during exam week—he was a new father with a lot on his mind. “I stopped in the middle of the path and just looked around,” he recalls. “It stood out to me that BYU is a really special place, because there are thousands of people walking around campus, and they’re all being trained through the light of the gospel in their respective fields.”
His respect for BYU continued on after his graduation from the MAcc program, and Sommerfeldt earned his PhD from the University of Illinois in 2021—but because of the COVID-19 pandemic, job opportunities were scarce.
Fortunately, Sommerfeldt found a job at Washington State University (WSU), where he continued his work in behavioral research. His research focuses on how companies can encourage positive employee behaviors and discourage negative actions through strategies like monetary incentives, recognition systems, and whistleblowing programs. “I want to impact practice,” he says. “I want to publish research that will help organizations improve and help employees find more meaning in their work, so that employees and managers throughout the world will enjoy going to work.”
At WSU, Sommerfeldt and his department chair were the only two faculty working on behavioral research at the time—and the chair didn’t have much time to supervise PhD students who were also interested in behavioral research. “Within my first week, I was working with PhD students and helping them out with projects,” Sommerfeldt says.
This was highly unusual, Sommerfeldt explains, as faculty without tenure at WSU didn’t normally supervise doctoral students. “I really appreciate that experience because I really wanted to work with PhD students, and it allowed me a chance to get to work with great people,” he says.
Since May 2024, when he joined the ranks of the SOA, Sommerfeldt has kept in contact with PhD graduates from WSU, and he now works with students in the SOA’s MAcc PhD prep track.
Returning to BYU was a dream come true for Sommerfeldt. “There’s nowhere else in the world where people are not just trained to be experts in their field, but they’re trained with the gospel of Jesus Christ as the forefront of that knowledge,” he says.
He enjoys his interactions with his students and the opportunity to magnify the BYU Marriott vision of transforming the world through Christlike leadership. “We’ve got a lot of students who are very smart, they have testimonies, and I can help show them how to put those two together,” Sommerfeldt says. “They can use that influence in their lives and in the business world to shape society and make the business world a more Christlike place.”
Sommerfeldt adds, “In business, I think that we have a responsibility to help people become not only leaders but also Christlike leaders who treat their future employees and customers—and all the people they interact with—the way Jesus Christ would.”