Prof. Simga-Mugan received her Ph.D. in accountancy from University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign as a Fulbright Scholar, and B.S. and M.S. from İstanbul University business administration. She was a visiting researcher at Haas Business School – Berkeley.

She has published various articles in international journals such as the European Accounting Review, the European Journal of Finance, Accounting Education, Emerging Markets Finance and Trade, Russian and East European Finance and Trade, Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Journal of Business Ethics, Innovations in Education & Teaching International, Teaching Business Ethics, Business Research Quarterly and the International Journal of Accounting Research, and book chapters. She has also published in Hacettepe İdari Bilimler Fakültesi Dergisi, Muhasebe Enstitüsü Dergisi, Muhasebe Bilim Dünyası among others. The fifth edition of Principles of Financial Accounting that was co-authored with N.Hosal-Akman was published by McGraw Hill in 2012; and is adopted by several universities. She has also participated as an organizer, presenter and/or discussant at several international and national seminars. She taught financial and managerial accounting both at graduate and undergraduate levels, in addition to doctoral level accounting theory and research courses.

She has worked at Istanbul University, Bilkent University, SUNY-University at Buffalo, and Middle East Technical University where she also served as the chair of Department of Business Administration and was the associate dean of Faculty of Administrative and Economic Sciences. She was the Dean of Business School and later the Rector at Izmir University of Economics. She worked as expert financial consultant in the World Bank and KfW funded infrastructure projects in Turkey.