Teigan MacDonald was working on her application to the Rady School’s full-time MBA program while sitting in a hotel hallway in Fall 2018. She had traveled to Marietta, GA, to compete with her rugby club, the San Diego Surfers, in the Women’s Premier League National Championship. Teigan scored the first try of the match (like football’s touchdown) and the Surfers defeated the Glendale Merlins 34-28. That championship marked the second of three in Teigan’s rugby career, and the beginning of her new career.
Born and raised in Modesto, CA, Teigan earned a B.S. in biology and minor in economics from UC San Diego. When she began her undergraduate studies, she thought she might like to work in a bioengineering lab. “I took my first lab class and I absolutely hated it,” she says. “I hated not having windows and not being able to talk to people. It’s a very individualized experience.” Having spent most of her life playing–and thriving–in team sports, Teigan realized that the lab environment wasn’t for her.
Inspired by family members who’d studied economics, Teigan began taking coursework that blended her interests, such as economics of the environment and economics of healthcare. “I loved that you could take a class [on these subjects] and apply business concepts to them,” says Teigan. She’d found her niche. Before she graduated, Teigan’s dad, a stock broker, recommended that she take a personal finance class, one of the Rady School’s undergraduate offerings.
“I remember walking into Wells Fargo Hall and thinking, ‘Why have I not been here the whole time?’” Teigan says. “‘Whatever I need to do, I want to [study] here.” she says. “I was able to meet Joe Pecore, a great instructor. I went to his office hours and he really helped me figure out what I wanted to do and why I should go get an MBA.”
Teigan began the full-time MBA program in Fall 2019. “What I’ve enjoyed the most so far about is the holistic experience I’m getting at a graduate school,” she says. “My undergraduate experience at UC San Diego was great, but I didn’t really have career networking or resume workshops. I wasn’t really close with my classmates because I was in classes with 300 students. When I came to Rady, I thought, ‘Wow, this is more than just going to school. This is building a career.”
This summer, Teigan begins a new role in sales support at ACADIA pharmaceuticals, where she works part-time as a commercial operations analyst. She says that working closely with Rady career advisor Stephanie Sindt earlier this year helped prepare her for a new challenge. “We had internship meetups every week before COVID. It was a great way to crowdsource and work as a group and get Steaphine’s expertise. We would prepare for interviews and work on our cover letters and resumes.”
Ultimately, Teigan says that her dream job is managing sales teams for a biotech or pharmaceutical company. It’s a role that combines the competitiveness she’s fostered throughout her life in sports, the knowledge she’s gaining in her courses, and the collaboration and experience she receives among her peers.
“People forget that you try to interact with people just like you. This program encourages you to work with different people and learn how other people operate and work,” she says.
Teigan says that her favorite Rady experiences so far include her fall marketing class, the career treks organized by the Life Sciences Club to San Diego companies such as Thermo Fisher Scientific and ResMed, and conversations before and after class with her fellow students. Despite the current challenges and activities on hold–including rugby–due to the pandemic, Teigan remains optimistic about her future.
“When I land an interview or get a chance to talk to a company I’m interested in, I feel like I’ve scored a try, because it’s just one step closer to my goal.”
As the shelter-in-place orders find many of us exploring new hobbies—i.e. baking banana bread—and finding ways to fill time at home, MSBA student Diego Amenabar has been busy blogging. He has published two articles on the popular blog Towards Data Science. Not only that, but earlier this year he started his own website, Healthy-Analyst.com, where he tracks data from wearable devices to inform his health decisions, and hopes to inspire others to do the same.
What do you enjoy about writing?
I made myself a goal to practice my writing skills and what better way to do that than to write interesting blog posts? It all started trying to create a portfolio of my work for future job applications. To be able to publish some works, I need original ideas so I can also try to publish them in an important website. That’s how it started and I’ve had lot of fun and new knowledge in the journey. I will probably keep writing while I have ideas that are worth to share.
What made you decide to pursue an MSBA?
I think information is going to drive companies in the near future. Being able to understand it and get insights from it is going to be a basic skill. Many people ask why an MSBA and not a Master in Data Science, and from my end, the most important part about using information to drive a company is to being able to “read” the data in the context of the business for it to be useful. For this, MSBA is the perfect mix between technology and business.
What do you enjoy most about the Rady MSBA program?
It is an intensive program. Coming from years of industry experience, some in fast-paced companies and some in slow-paced, you start to appreciate when the intensity pushes you forward in achieving your goals, and learn [what you need to know] in the work environment. You do need to be responsible and be able to deliver on certain deadlines.
Read Diego’s Towards Data Science articles:
Not a Funnel! Use Sankey to represent your sales process
Follow Healthy Analyst on Twitter @healthy_analyst and Instagram @healthyanalyst.
The Class of 2020 has demonstrated extraordinary resilience and innovation. We are so proud to celebrate our graduates–albeit virtually–throughout the week. Please join us in congratulating these students and faculty who were selected by students as recipients of our 2020 awards.
The Robert S. Sullivan Award recognizes a student for a high level of leadership and contribution to the Rady School, UC San Diego, or larger community.
The Dean’s Award recognizes a student who epitomizes the philosophy of the Rady School (innovation, impact, collaboration, integrity and risk-taking).
Winners from all programs will be added here as they are announced. Don’t forget to join us for our Virtual Commencement broadcast 9-9:30 a.m. on June 13, 2020!
MASTER OF FINANCE
Student Awards
Dean’s Award
Jia (Jeff) Rui Wen served as the president of the Rady Finance Club and as MFin 2020 cohort rep, and participated and communicated important events and opportunities. Jia encouraged solutions and worked with the Rady faculty and administration to make the student journey better.
Robert S. Sullivan Award
Raven (Di) Deng represented the Rady School at several competitions, including the regional ACG Cup – placing second! He has been active not only in several Rady student organizations, they belonged to the UC San Diego competitive break-dancing club. With that busy schedule, Raven attended many events, representing the Rady School by being prepared and engaged.
Faculty Awards
Most Valuable Professor
Excellence in Teaching
FULL-TIME MBA
Student Awards
Dean’s Award
Lauren Rowley was recognized by Poets and Quants as one of their 2019 “MBAs to Watch.” She held leadership roles in the Consulting Club, the Women of Rady, and the Rady Student Board. She worked on wide-ranging initiatives from rebuilding the Rady Student Board election process to rewriting the Board constitution and created a legacy that will make the school more equitable and efficient for all programs. She also brought community leaders to campus for training opportunities and meaningful partnerships, using her platform to the benefit of all students.
Robert S. Sullivan Award
Joseph Baini (left) and Samuel Jordi (below) led the Venture Capital and Innovation Club, creating opportunities for students and build their professional network. Last February, under their leadership, a Rady School team was invited and competed in the regional level VCI Competition in Salt Lake City.
Because of their consistent work dedicated to their professional field, we recognize their impact and contributions to the Rady community. Their focused vision for a meaningful personal learning experience is inspirational and shows that you can create the experience you desire.
Faculty Awards
MASTER OF SCIENCE IN BUSINESS ANALYTICS
Dean’s Award
Coffey Zhang is being recognized for her consistent leadership and initiative throughout the program. As the President of the Data Analytics Club, she collaborated with colleagues, faculty and staff to create learning opportunities. She has made a lasting impact not only at Rady but in the San Diego community – connecting with companies for engagement opportunities for her peers, and becoming a founding board member of the Women in Big Data San Diego chapter.
Robert S. Sullivan Award
Diego Amenabar created a culture of trust and assurance among his colleagues. Serving as cohort rep, Diego demonstrated a willingness to support and serve their constituents, being a voice for concerns and a partner for the Rady administration.
Faculty Awards
MASTER OF PROFESSIONAL ACCOUNTANCY
Dean’s Award
Nizam Khan has been a champion for the MPAc program’s success and growth during its historic first year. He helped institute a Rady chapter of the Beta Alpha Psi organization, which will connect UC San Diego accounting undergraduate and graduate students. Nizam has positively represented Rady through professional engagement, supporting partnerships between the San Diego Accounting community and the Rady School that will benefit many future cohorts. This person has been recognized as a positive role model and enthusiastic leader.
Faculty Awards
Most Valuable Professor
Excellence in Teaching
Wade Lindenberger
FlexWeekend and FlexEvening MBA
Robert S. Sullivan Award
Elizabeth Zhang-Chen is being recognized for her broad engagement and positive impact within the Rady community. Elizabeth was an active member of the Rady Life Sciences Club and used their connections within the local biotech community to arrange company visits for Rady students. She also used her industry expertise to share professional opportunities with Rady students, often making introductions and referrals. She is a member of the Vistage on Campus mentorship program and initiated the first ever VOC alumni reunion. She also participated in not one, but two StartR teams!
Faculty Awards
Most Valuable Professor
Michael Finney
(selected by FlexWeekend MBA)
Update 6/15/20: Brilliant Biome and Ethos Mask both received funding!
Brilliant Biome finished second out of all 30 teams and was awarded a total of $10,500 in funding, including $3,000 as the winner of the Qualcomm Wireless Impact Reach Award.
Ethos Mask was awarded $1,000 as the COVID-19 Innovation Award winner.
Throughout the past academic year, student teams from diverse academic disciplines put forth their ideas for sustainable social innovation and participated in the Fowler Global Social Innovation Challenge. This challenge promotes hands-on experience and provides student entrepreneurs the opportunity to develop an idea that aligns with the mission of the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals.
As part of UC San Diego’s commitment as a Changemaker Campus, Rady’s Center for Social Innovation and Impact (CSII) facilitated a virtual information session for interested students throughout the university, and hosted an art of the pitch workshop by StartR accelerators co-director Kim Davis King. The CSII then selected a group of social impact experts to judge the pitch competition of five UC San Diego finalists.
Now, two teams with Rady students will represent UC San Diego in the virtual global finals on June 13, 2020. Finalists from seventeen countries representing thirty universities will pitch for up to $50,000 in seed funding.
Ethos Mask created a supply chain to manufacture 3D printed facemasks and distribute them to local healthcare facilities in need. Two full-time MBA 2021 students, (left to right) Amir Hassan and Nick DiGirolamo, and FlexWeekend MBA 2021 student, orthopedic surgeon Mark Schultzel, M.D., came together shortly after the COVID-19 pandemic struck the U.S. to quickly produce and supply these reusable masks.
Brilliant Biome offers a personalized microbiome approach to drug addiction and recovery. This team participated in the Spring 2020 cohort of StartR, and is comprised of scientists (from left to right) Sierra Simpson, Ph.D.; Gregory Peters, M.S., Ph.D.; and clinical project manager and FlexEvening MBA 2021 student Carrie Herbert.
RSVP here to attend the virtual Global Finals on Saturday, June 13 at 5 p.m.!
Since its founding in 2013, the StartR non-profit accelerator program has provided resources, mentoring and access to funding opportunities to more than 190 teams. The program is offered in five tracks—Rady, Inclusion, Impact, Veteran and Teen, each providing unique opportunities to learn from experts and receive guidance for building a sustainable business. In total, companies that have participated in StartR have gone on to raise 118 million dollars.
Traditionally, twice a year, StartR teams have the opportunity to pitch their startups in front of the San Diego business community at a live event called StartR Demo Day. While the event will not occur in-person due to social distancing guidelines, the show will go on May 13th in a virtual format, as ten teams present to potential investors and contacts, and two of the teams will be awarded a $500 prize by a panel of judges.
Get familiar with the StartR teams below, and RSVP to attend Demo Day here.
The Bioenergy Project enables universities, restaurants, and individuals to convert the nutrients in food waste into usable products such as biogas energy and food. A prototype has been running since June 2018 and has mitigated over 23,000 pounds of campus food waste. The Bioenergy Project was the recipient of the 2019 Lemelson MIT Student Prize. (StartR Impact)
Brilliant Biome offers a personalized microbiome approach to drug addiction and recovery. (StartR Rady)
Dietary Microbe Detection (DMD) of DMD Flower explores and provides innovative, rapid and accurate detection of microbes to ensure food safety and quality. (StartR Rady)
The Helper Monkie is an assistive auditory device designed to help children diagnosed with Auditory Processing Disorder (APD) to succeed in traditional classroom environments. (StartR Impact and StartR Inclusion)
H3 Heroes Helping Heroes is a social enterprise that supports veterans, first responders and their families with programming and resources to improve mental health and wellness. (StartR Impact)
Latina Grad Guide seeks to “close the academic achievement gap of Latinas in the U.S.” via workshops, conferences, digital campaigns and an app to assist with graduate school applications. (StartR Impact and StartR Inclusion)
Padfoot creates pet innovative products “that don’t exist, but should.” (StartR Rady)
Sav-E shows shoppers the environmental impact of products through an app, website and browser extension. “We believe that awareness is the key to change, and our goal is to give people that awareness. Doing so will prompt people to think critically about what, how, and why they buy what they buy, allowing them to make shopping decisions that help their wallet and help the planet.” (StartR Impact)
Tebra is working to produce a new type of key lockbox for surfers and outdoor enthusiats. (StartR Rady)
Viberent.co is developing a color-changing fabric to help reduce the excess inventory and waste by fashion retailers. (StartR Inclusion)
Over the past couple of months, the world has experienced changes, challenges and grief like we have never known. Each day brings with it new hurdles to overcome, but also new reasons to be hopeful.
The UC San Diego community is working tirelessly to find solutions to the obstacles we face as a result of the the pandemic. From critical research to combat COVID-19 to making masks for healthcare workers, we are proud to witness inspiring acts of resilience and care.
In recognition of the ways the community has shown care during crisis, and to support these efforts as the crisis continues, UC San Diego has organized u.Care, a “Day of Caring” from 6 a.m. on May 14-2 p.m. on May 15. During these 32 hours, our UC San Diego community is encouraged to share inspiring stories, and, if you are able, donate a gift of any amount to make a difference.
We are so proud of the many Rady School alumni, partners, staff, students, and faculty who have found ways to support others in this difficult time. We have shared several of these inspiring stories below:
You can also dedicate your gift to UC San Diego’s COVID-19 Emergency Response Fund and participate in a $350,000 match thanks to a generous challenge grant from The Conrad Prebys Foundation.
Richard Castle (FlexWeekend MBA ’13), the co-founder and president of Cloudbeds, a hospitality management software, launched the #HospitalityHelps initiative. The online platform facilitates connections between hotel properties that want to make their beds available to healthcare agencies, organizations or individuals who need them. Within a few days, the more than 1.2 million beds had been pledged at HospitalityHelps.org.
Alumni working at the Scripps Research Institute are conducting a study to improve the real-time surveillance of contagious respiratory illnesses such as COVID-19 using data from smartwatches and activity trackers. Through the app-based DETECT study, Katie Baca-Motes (MBA ’09 and Director of the All of Us research project), Royan Kamyar (MBA ’10, physician and CEO and founder of Owaves app) and project manager and incoming MBA FlexWeekend student Lauren Ariniello, along with their colleagues, are crowdsourcing anonymized data across the United States.
“By evaluating individual changes to heart rate, sleep and activity patterns, as well as logged respiratory symptoms and diagnostics test results, the Scripps’ team hopes to complement traditional public health surveillance methods, potentially leading to earlier detection and containment of current and future outbreaks in various geographical locations,” said Baca-Motes.
Three MBA 2021 students have organized a GoFundMe campaign to manufacture and distribute 3D-printed mask kits. Since organizing the campaign in early April, Amir Hassan and Nicholas DiGirolamo (MBA ’21) and Mark Schultzel (FlexWeeend MBA ’21) have delivered more than 500 face mask kits to local organizations in need.
Snehanshu Tiwari, Vishnu Sharon R. and Sakshi Sharma (MSBA ’18) contacted Professor Ken Wilbur to offer their help reviewing resumes, preparing for interviews or make introductions for current MSBA students graduating this summer. When Professor Wilbur shared this update on LinkedIn, even more alumni offered to help!
Sean Haggerty (FlexWeekend MBA ’17), founder of Protector Brewery, made curbside pickup and delivery available, in addition to offering the brewery’s supply of filtered water available to those in need. Protector Brewery has pledged to donate $1 from each order to Team Rubicon, a non-profit organization supporting veterans impacted by COVID-19.
Grace Evans Cherashore, a member of the Dean’s Advisory Council and Executive Chairwoman of Evans Hotels, is leading an effort to make hotel rooms open and available to healthcare workers. Medical workers who present ID at The Lodge at Torrey Pines, Catamaran and Bahia Resort Hotels are eligible to receive a discount of more than 50%. “The medical workers want to be in this fight as long as they can and a hotel allows them to be isolated,” Bill Evans, co-owner of Evans Hotel told 10 News. The Evans family has been a generous partner to the Rady School.
Jaden Risner and Clay Treska (FlexWeekend MBA ’19) founded Family Proud an app to help patients and their caregivers and loved ones manage their care, while they were students at the Rady School. In Spring 2020, the Family Proud platform was updated to include resources and support for those affected by COVID-19.
Steve Prestrelski (FlexWeekend MBA ’06) is the founder and chief scientific officer of Xeris Pharmaceuticals, which is offering its GVOKE Pre-Filled Syringe—an injectable treatment for diabetes patients who experience severe hypoglycemia—for $0 copay through May 31st.
The team at Indigo Marketing Agency, founded by Claire Akin (MBA ’10). prepared a list of tips for working from home. “Indigo Marketing Agency is a company run almost completely virtually by mothers of young children,” said Akin. “We saw so many of our clients struggling to adapt, so we wanted to offer our tips and tricks for working at home (even with small children) … I believe that we are helping our team members support their families and spend time with their children. It’s the best of both worlds and it provides a highly fulfilling lifestyle!”
Rady Alumni Board president Josh Kuss is the Senior Director of Commercial Strategy at Illumina and the commercial lead for the company’s San Diego Emergency Management Team. The team has been working since March “defining and implementing the strategies for how we keep Illumina’s employees safe, while ensuring supply to our customers, many of which are on the front line of SARS-COV-2/COVID19 research, tracing, and treatment. We tackled how to transition to work from home, and are now in the process of determining a sound return to work strategy,” said Kuss.
Academic Assessment Senior Analyst Christine McMahan volunteers with a national organization that has provided 100,000 masks for front-line workers. McMahan also offered to sew masks for Rady School staff and faculty in need. She made 65 in total, sewing every evening until she ran out of supplies.
Krithi Bindal (MBA ’17) is the founder and president of Aroga Biosciences, a regulatory writing biopharma firm which has been donating their scientific expertise to peer-review pre-print literature related to COVID-19 research.
“We are in a period of information overload,” said Bindal. “Misinformation about COVID-19, especially information lacking scientific rigor, can lead to significant risk to the public. I feel it is our duty as scientists to ensure effective communication and to help delineate scientific factual results from fiction. After all, our job as scientists is to find the truth.”
“The name of our company Aroga is based on the sanskrit term ‘arogya”, which means free of disease. We hope to continue to contribute to freeing the world of disease as we help to develop treatments for ailing patients. As we navigate these challenging times, our mission is unchanged and is stronger than ever.”
Sara Jones (Flex Weekend ’13) is the CEO of Plum Blossom Creations. She is offering free workshops on The Big Four of Mental Toughness.
“As an Unbeatable Mind student, I learned first-hand the power of the Big 4 of Mental Toughness in my fight against Triple Negative Breast Cancer. I used the Big 4 to feed my Courage Wolf, stare down my fears and thrive through the health crisis that threatened my life…
As lives were disrupted by homeschooling, layoffs, new routines and all the rest, I wanted to do what I could to help. As an Unbeatable Mind Coach, I had access to the four habits, tried and tested by warriors for 1000s of years, made simple and doable by Mark Divine, retired Navy SEAL through the Unbeatable Mind Academy. And I wanted to share those tools with others.”
To learn more about the Big Four of Mental Toughness, connect with Sara by email sara.jones@unbeatablemind.com or on LinkedIn. To sign up for coaching, visit https://bit.ly/UMCoachingwithSaraJones.
More ways in which the UC San Diego community is responding to COVID-19:
- Medical school researchers launched “MyWellnessCheck,” an online platform to help identify how certain attitudes and behaviors may help increase well-being during a crisis.
- UC San Diego Health is offering virtual appointments for people that have tested positive for COVID-19 but don’t require hospital care
- Groups of engineering students spent their spring break designing a low-cost, easy-to-use and easy-to-build ventilator that could serve COVID-19 patients
- The Theatre Costume Shop made and donated over 150 masks to UC San Diego nurses in one week.
- UC San Diego physician-scientist Dr. Eliah Aronoff-Spencer, along with a team of researchers, built a rapid response platform to connect clinicians with answers to COVID-19 questions, resources and potential solutions to the challenges they face.
Read more about UC San Diego’s response to COVID-19 here.
Are you a member of the Rady School community who would like to share a story of care? Please fill out this form or email cacannon@ucsd.edu.
In today’s business environment, being skilled in analytics is becoming more and more of an advantage across many industries and corporations. Playing it safe with a basic understanding of business practices might be satisfactory, but successful businesses use data analytics techniques and models to make better decisions and gain a competitive edge.
At Rady School of Management, we equip our students enrolled in the Master of Science in Business Analytics (MSBA) program with the skills needed to thrive in these types of data-rich business environments.
Our MSBA program offers rigorous, hands-on training that prepares students how to identify business opportunities, generate business insights and create business solutions, all through data and analytics. It’s unique in the sense that it delivers a curriculum at the convergence of data science and business.
As Raymond Pettit, Executive Director of Rady’s MSBA program, notes, “Rady is one of the few business schools that has a strong and collaborative relationship with our data science colleagues on campus. Many other schools that offer MSBA degrees are often stand-alone, however Rady offers cross-discipline opportunities through our close relationship with the Halıcıoğlu Data Science Institute and the Supercomputer Center at UC San Diego and our world-class faculty in all these areas.”
As part of the MSBA curriculum, students must participate in a capstone project, which consists of solving a well-defined business problem for a real life company. Each student pursues this experience as part of a team and must complete both written and oral exams to pass the course, as well as a complete report for the sponsor company.
With more companies seeking skilled professionals who can work effectively in teams to answer key operational and strategic business questions using data and analytics, the capstone project is crucial to position students for future career success.
“The capstone project isn’t just mandatory for students, it’s beneficial for them because it gives students the opportunity to practice what they’ve learned throughout the course and apply it to a real-world setting with an industry leading company,” says Pettit.
Every year, the capstone stakeholders include Rady School industry partners and big name companies such as Petco, Hewlett Packard, Becton Dickinson, Cisco, DIRECTavenue, Mirum, and Mazda among many others. These companies present students with an opportunity to obtain real industry experience that aids them in their job search and beyond.
It’s also not just beneficial for students, but it’s also valuable for the participating companies. Pettit added, “Many companies that our students work with see the capstone as a way to create a talent pipeline, so they can keep these students on as interns or they can hire students for permanent jobs afterwards.”
Some participating companies have been involved with the MSBA capstone project for several years, meaning they can build off projects from the previous years. Not only that, but the capstone is growing tremendously with more than 25 companies submitting proposals to take part just this year alone.
For this academic year, Pettit and the rest of the MSBA faculty were overall very pleased with the capstone results noting that; “The quality of students emerged in the amazing work and reports the teams presented to the sponsoring firms. This group of students will be making sizable contributions as their careers continue to grow and evolve.”
It’s an exciting time to enroll in an MSBA program at Rady as there are many advancements on the horizon.
“We’re going to expand the program and we can envision this expansion benefitting a larger number of companies based on the success we’ve seen so far,” says Pettit. “There is scope for the current capstone to develop into a joint-capstone in partnership with other disciplines on campus including data science undergraduates and our Master of Professional Accountancy program. To do this on the business side and work together would be huge and a new type of collaboration that nobody else is doing.”
If your organization is interested in participating in the MSBA capstone project, please contact Raymond Pettit at rcpettit@ucsd.edu or if you would like more information about Rady’s MSBA program, visit https://rady.ucsd.edu/programs/masters-programs/ms-in-business-analytics/
Eye opening, exuberant, unique, were all words Lauren Murphy and Andrew Engram used to describe their recent Rady School immersion trip to Cambodia. Engram and Murphy, along with a team of six students from the Rady School were chosen to support the Cambodian company, Hydro-logic. Hydro-logic is working to help provide water filters to those who have little to no access to clean water.
During this immersion trip, they got a chance to put everything they have learned at the Rady School into action. The students used their business acumen to find out what challenges Hydro-logic is facing, how the company can increase revenue and how to help the company discover the best plan of action possible.
Getting There
Andrew Engram
The trip was extensive, but enjoyable. Getting to travel together as a team, made us closer friends and we enjoyed our time together. We (six of us and Professor Michael Finney), took a shuttle up to LAX, then we took a plane from Los Angeles to Taiwan, which was 14 hours long. After another plane ride and a bus ride later, we finally arrived. When we arrived, our main source of transportation was a tuk-tuk, which is a small, three wheeled, motorized vehicle. Getting there took 19 hours total, and when we arrived, we were in immediate culture shock. We realized how much of a developing country this really was, and how much of the country was living in poverty. We were also very excited to begin working on our project as a team, and to do everything we could to help improve the water shortage problem with Hydro-logic.
Why were you interested in the Cambodia Immersion Trip?
Murphy
I thought it was a great opportunity to learn more about consulting. Also, knowing how beneficial Professor Finney’s courses have been gave me that extra motivation because he is a great teacher and I wanted to learn from him more on the trip.
Engram
It was an opportunity to travel internationally, and get in the weeds with different cultures by working in an international environment. This trip was different because it wasn’t so much having an outline of things to get done, but a learning experience to put into action. It was great to understand how rural Cambodians live and find out about their access to drinking water. The client in Cambodia was trying to improve the livelihood by improving the amount of people who have access to clean water. Professor Finney was also an amazing counselor and guide for the trip. This is by far the best experience I’ve had at Rady. Every second was a learning experience and research. I was grateful to be able to use all I’ve learned and put those thoughts into action, rather than reading a textbook.
What did the work consist of?
Murphy
Our tasks included reporting to the social enterprise, Hydro-logic. We learned about their needs and built a relationship with their team. We also got to go into the field and bring interpreters to chat with rural Cambodians who were getting the water piped directly to their homes. About 40 percent of the country gets piped water, and Hydro-logic sells water filters for those who don’t have easy access to clean water. One of Hydro-logic’s goals is to bring social impact, but also increase revenue. We were able to help them do that.
Engram
Once we understood what we needed to do, we met with the Chief Financial Officer, marketing team and private water operators. We also got to meet with rural customers, how they cleaned and obtained their water, and what they did to drink it.
Did the trip meet your expectations?
Murphy
The trip exceeded my expectations, though I didn’t know what to expect. The quality of engagement and work we were able to do, as well as our exposure to a beautiful international culture and building great relationships, made the trip a huge highlight of my time at the Rady School.
Engram
Yes. Getting positive feedback from the client was wonderful. Seeing the client believe in what we were helping them understand made me feel like all my hard work at the Rady School was paying off. It was good knowing the MBA program can make an impact and have a lot of value. We both gained confidence and were grateful for the courses we have taken.
Did the trip change your perspective of doing business in Cambodia?
Murphy
Yes. This trip inspired me to want to work more in an international, complex environment. I grew a lot professionally and personally.
Engram
It was such an immersive learning experience and everything I see is now through a filter of what was learned in Cambodia. I hadn’t worked in a country with an emerging market. It was eye-opening to see people need things we take for granted on a daily basis. It was also an opportunity to make a difference in the world.
What lasting impressions did the culture reveal to you?
Murphy
We explored Siem Reap, a city in northern Cambodia. It was full of aesthetic temples including Angkor Wat. The details, art and decorations were beautiful and breathtaking. Seeing the beauty of Cambodia and its historical city structures inhabited by people, opened our minds and gave us greater context to our work. It helped with our project to take a couple days to rest and process our thoughts and expanded our creativity in greater ways.
The Food
Murphy
The food was interesting as there was food from all over Asia in one country. Some of the peculiar foods included bugs, frogs and ants. There was a lot of Thai food, as well as a twist on a kind of noodles and stir fry. Their delicacies, which included tarantulas and scorpions, were very different from America’s.
Any Last Words?
Engram
Thank you to Rady Moxie who provided the funds for the trip and, had a stipend for expenses. Thank you to the Center for Social Innovation and Impact for the grant and Professor Finney for taking the time to do this. We want to be an example of what is possible and we think the Rady School should do more of these trips.
Conclusion
Murphy
While we were in Cambodia, the team, with the help of Professor Finney, was able to help solve revenue challenges, recommend a manual washing machine, improve a system to collect rainwater and analyze how the company could best increase their current product awareness and online presence. Hyro-logic even let Professor Finney know afterwards how impressed the company was with the team and the amount of knowledge they gained from the students. The students would recommend this trip to anyone who can go. They said it was more than another school project, it was a truly life-changing process they will never forget.
Career Fair Day – A day full of new opportunities, insightful conversations, and potential job offers on the horizon. Here at the Rady School of Management, there have been dozens of doors open for students at career fairs; from internships, to long-term jobs for the graduate students who have participated in Rady’s career fairs.
Each career fair typically consists of employers from corporate companies that have 250 employees or more. This one, however, consisted of not only large corporate companies but also smaller startups. This was an exciting, unique event for Rady because it is the first career day to ever have startups verses only corporations.
The Rady School of Management not only champions, but raises up entrepreneurs, so having startups present was an encouraging factor for the students who attended the career fair. Some of the startups that came to the career fair included founders from Rady School of Management such as LabFellows.
Some of the startup companies who attended were:
- Leadcrunch – B2B Sales and Marketing
- Sendlane – An intelligence-driven email automation service
- LabFellows – An integrated lab management platform
- Offer1
- GoSite – A web platform for businesses
- Launch Factory – A creative co working space
The list of new companies who attended were:
- Booz Allen Hamilton – Strategy, technology, and engineering
- AT&T – Communications, media, entertainment, and technology
- Tealium — A universal data hub
Some of the other companies that were present included, Trust&will, Artevist and Prudential.
Here at Rady, we are happy to host career fairs and have found them to be very successful for students looking for job leads and internships.
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