Tag: CEL Practicum

The first in a series about CEL practicums from Olin MBA students. Today, we hear from the Emerson team. Members of the team are Chi Yee, Annabelle Zhu, Anne Chen, Gaurav Malik, Leo Huang, Claire Liu and Lehai Li.

Emerson, a global manufacturing company that addresses some of the world’s most complex challenges with innovative solutions, is actively seeking to evolve the organization toward more data-driven decision-making in its marketing functions.

Olin’s Center for Experiential Learning team was thrilled to have the opportunity to work closely with key stakeholders from Emerson’s Commercial & Residential Solutions platform to develop a playbook for the company to deploy across its businesses to help better leverage data in its daily workflow.

Cross-company conversations

To better understand the company structure, workflow and respective business unit data utilization levels, the CEL team conducted 30 interviews with key marketing and IT team members. These conversations were extremely helpful in understanding how the various businesses are leveraging data and the challenges encountered as teams are adopting a more data-driven culture.

It was through these cross-company conversations that the CEL team was able to learn more about Emerson’s organizational culture and how it leverages data into business-level decisionmaking.

These conversations oriented the CEL team and equipped us to understand overarching challenges in using data to make marketing decisions. Recognizing these challenges, the CEL team is developing a playbook that defines and prioritizes key performance indices across the customer journey.

In addition to enabling business marketing teams to track and measure their overall marketing channel effectiveness, the playbook will also help identify data gaps. Understanding that the playbook must be user-friendly and applicable to business teams that are at varying stages of data use, the CEL team worked closely with Emerson to ensure alignment with current marketing workflows across the organization.

Additionally, Olin Business School professors Michael Wall and Seethu Seetharaman provided the team with a lot of guidance and professional expertise that helped ensure that the CEL team was developing an actionable and responsive tool.

Adjusting to a crisis

The sudden outbreak of COVID-19 created some uncertainty within the scope of this project, especially given the preferred high level of stakeholder engagement preferred. The CEL team worked closely with Emerson, however, to facilitate a smooth transition to online meetings that would minimize any disruption in project delivery.

The CEL practicum was an invaluable experience that allowed the team to gain exposure to challenges that many companies face as businesses continue to embrace more sources of data and incorporate insights into daily decision-making processes.

This project, in particular, allowed the CEL team to hear from executives at the highest levels in the organization and understand how they are thinking about the future of their business. This project gave the CEL team members the opportunity to apply what they are currently learning in their classes to a “real world” corporate challenge.

This project broadened our perspectives beyond the classroom and better-equipped us to become key contributors to organizations in our future careers.

Pictured above: Emerson Representatives: Mark Dunson, Dennis Traver, Jim Squires, Tracy Reiter; CEL Faculty Advisors: Michael Wall, Seethu Seetharaman; CEL fellow: Sarah Fuller; CEL Team: Chi Yee; Annabelle Zhu; Anne Chen; Gaurav Malik; Leo Huang; Claire Liu

This was posted on behalf of team lead Franklyn Nnakwue and his teammates Prateek Deval, Ryan Sun, Aria Ren, Amy Yu and Cathy Wang.

As a group of MBAs and specialized master students at Olin Business School, we worked on one of the most challenging analytics projects. Our client, Direct Supply, has a long relationship with Olin’s Center for Experiential Learning and Center for Analytics and Business Insights.

Direct Supply is a company that specializes in providing equipment, e-commerce, and service solutions to the senior living industry. With 35 years of history, it has many customers. For this project, we focused on the business’s products. Our goal was to leverage data to draw insights that Direct Supply could use to improve customer experience and operational performance.

Field trip to Direct Supply

To better understand Direct Supply’s business model, the team went on a one-day field trip to Milwaukee, where Direct Supply is located. After the interaction with the sales team, marketing team, data science team and supply chain team, we had a more robust understanding of the business and the ways our project could be transformative

We also understood that the project is not solely about writing code and answering the questions, but also about testing the viability of our recommendations.

Real-world challenge and timely adjustment

As we dug deeper into the project, we found that the initial hypothesis that we were working with wasn’t feasible. “Welcome to the real world,” said our professor, Seethu Seetharaman. As we sought to pivot our analysis, Professor Seethu and Professor Michael Wall offered us a lot of help in redefining the questions and finding other approaches to solving the problem. We finally figured out an alternative approach that could fulfill Direct Supply’s initial goal.

Projects won’t always go smoothly as planned, and challenges would always appear along the journey. The faculty advisors, CEL committee and CEL fellow were helpful in ensuring that the team was on the right track.

This was a precious experience for the team. The project offered us a great opportunity to get involved in solving real-world business problems. It was definitely the highlight of our academic experience at WashU.

Pictured at top: A client representative; Preston Tharp, MBA ’20; Nithin Ramachandran, client; Aria Ren, MSCA ’19; Franklyn Nnakwue, MBA ’20; Cathy Wang, MSCA ’19; Ryan Sun, MSCA ’19; Amy Yu, MSCA ’19; Michael Wall, CEL/CABI faculty adviser; Prateek Deval, MBA ’20; Seethu Seetharman, CEL/CABI faculty adviser.

Abigail MacDonald, MBA ’18, contributed this post on behalf of Olin’s Center for Experiential Learning. Lexi Bainnson, BSBA ’21, edited and formatted this CEL blog post.

Back row: Jeff Brown, MBA ’19; Ingrid Claussen, innovation manager, Rosario Board of Trade;
Nick Wosniak, MBA ’19; Gabe Berkland, MBA ’19. Front row: Abigail MacDonald, MSW/MBA ’18;
Ana Galiano, Austral University, Rosario – School of Business Sciences dean; Ankita Bhalla, BSBA ’20.

St. Louis is known as one of the best agricultural technology ecosystems in the world. With great agriculture universities, world-class research centers, interested investors, and thoughtful infrastructure, St. Louis is a perfect example of a successful ecosystem.

This fall, a team of graduate and undergraduate students at Olin Business School took a deeper dive into agtech ecosystems to learn about the importance of those essential institutions, groups, and entities necessary to have a successful ecosystem. We partnered with Austral University in Rosario, Argentina, and the Yield Lab, located both in St. Louis and Buenos Aires, to look at two different agtech ecosystems. As part of this process, we traveled to Buenos Aires and Rosario in early October.

Wheels up

Before leaving for Argentina, the team conducted research and interviews in St. Louis. We were excited to share their findings with the partners at Austral University in Rosario and the Yield Lab upon arriving in Argentina. We had a full schedule once we touched down in Argentina, and all of us were focused on the goal of the trip: to understand the key drivers of the agtech ecosystem in Rosario and to learn about how it has evolved over time.

Rosario is located in the province of Santa Fe, which is in the heart of soy country in Argentina, making it a perfect place for an agtech ecosystem to emerge. St. Louis is also located in a heavily agricultural region. The team spent some time driving between the cities of Rosario, Cordoba, and Santa Fe. Ultimately, this traveling gave us the opportunity to see the countryside of Santa Fe and how it closely resembles the agricultural region around St. Louis.

On our second to last day in Rosario, our team visited Molinos Agro, a large local soy crushing facility in San Lorenzo (just outside of Rosario). We had spent most of the week learning about the agtech ecosystem from the beginning of the value chain with startups creating new farm technology or genetically engineering seeds.

A fuller view

As a result, visiting Molinos Agro was especially helpful in that it gave us a glimpse into the middle-end of the value chain. The soy beans came into this facility as raw materials and left as either soy mill or soy oil. This was a great experience for our team, as it allowed us to see the effects that startup technology can have on an entire industry.

Our week in Argentina was filled with activities. Throughout the visit our team had the opportunity to interview with accelerators, startup founders, large local corporations, government agencies, investors, and the Rosario Board of Trade. These interviews provided great insights into the Rosario agtech ecosystem. Upon returning to St. Louis, the team has been hard at work to learn more about the Rosario ecosystem and to create a gap analysis between the two ecosystems. This gap analysis will provide insight into the necessary pieces of a successful agtech ecosystem.

Based on our experiences thus far, taking on a CEL practicum project is a lot of work, but it provides students with experience in industries in which they may have never considered working and helps students to develop useful skills in consulting, teamwork, and critical thinking.

Pictured above: Abigail MacDonald, MSW/MBA ’18; Gabe Berkland, MBA ’19; Nick Wosniak, MBA ’19; Jeff Brown, MBA ’19; Ankita Bhalla, BSBA ’20.

Jeff Brown, MBA ’19, wrote this on behalf of his practicum team from the Center for Experiential Learning. MBA ’19 team members included Jeff Brown, Abdul Rehman Azmat, Grace Lee, Ricardo Marrujo Mexia, and Samuel Roth. The project advisor was Rich Ryffel.

Our client was Doyon Limited. Doyon is an Alaskan Native Corporation (ANC) and the largest private land owner in the United States. At the beginning of the project, we knew little about ANCs or about the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act that led to their creation.

What we soon discovered, however, was that Doyon has a responsibility to protect Native Alaskan land and resources and to help its shareholders flourish. The part we were to play in helping Doyon fulfill this mission involved strategic planning as Doyon seeks to diversify beyond its core upstream oil and gas ventures.

Structuring the problem

Our first task was to bring structure to ambiguity—to bring ourselves down from 30,000 feet to ground level. This proved to be more difficult than expected. The complexity of the project put us in danger of venturing down numerous rabbit holes and getting lost in the minutia of the industries we were tasked with analyzing. However, our ability to clearly define the project via a statement of work hammered out together with the client helped us to create a project framework and stay on track.

Interacting with the client

In our first week on the project, we had the pleasure of meeting Doyon executives in person. Throughout the day, we interacted with the client professionally and—just as importantly—personally. too. This time spent together allowed us to better understand Doyon’s business and helped build a rapport that was useful during subsequent meetings. We became more confident that we could ask difficult questions, and at the same time, the client gave honest feedback on our work. In the end, because of the trust we built, we delivered a better final product and more value for Doyon.

Housekeeping and administration

Sometimes the little things can have major implications in a client relationship. After our first virtual meeting, our advisor, Rich Ryffel, gave us a piece of advice that we will use moving forward: “Make sure to keep meetings within the scheduled time or the value of your time will be diminished in the client’s eyes.”

Rich explained that not only should you respect the client’s time but that the client should respect yours, too. Mutual respect can keep both sides from making unreasonable asks and help maintain a productive working relationship.

Getting to know the local culture

Phase 2 of the project took us to Alaska, where we visited Doyon’s offices in Fairbanks and Anchorage. We also presented the results of our analysis and recommendations on which industry to make the focal point of phase 3.

The team spent the first two days as tourists, attending cultural events and visiting various attractions. We watched the beginning of the Iditarod, hiked a waterfall trail, and even caught a glimpse of Denali. When the meetings started, we were given a tour of Doyon’s in-house museum of native Alaskan artifacts and had lunch featuring dried salmon that is apparently such a delicacy that buying and selling it is regulated by the federal government. These experiences taught us a lot about native Alaskan culture and drove home the importance of Doyon’s core values.

Understanding the client’s businesses

Through meetings with various subsidiaries, we developed a better understanding of those businesses’ relationship with the holding company. We learned about utility joint ventures, oil exploration, pipeline building, oil and gas engineering services, and government IT outsourcing.

The meetings illustrated the real-world implications of findings from Frost and Sullivan, Ibis, Bloomberg, and others. Each night, after a long day of meetings and dinner, we rushed back to the hotel and worked well after midnight to incorporate what we had learned into the presentation we were preparing for senior leadership.

Adapting the message

Finally, the team met with the CEO, COO, and CFO to present our mid-project recommendations. Each executive brought a different perspective, and with that perspective, a different level of interest in or resistance to our recommendations. The discussion was not always easy, but the reactions we received taught us that, when presenting to executives, we need to consider all the vested interests in the room so that recommendations may be as acceptable, practical, and actionable as possible

Pushing till the end

Our final presentation went off with a hitch, and our team leader, Jeff Brown, was even invited to present our findings to the Doyon board of directors at their annual meeting. The feedback from Doyon was positive, and we wrapped things up with confidence that Doyon could integrate our recommendations into its long-term strategic planning process. While we learned a lot about business throughout this process, the best part of the experience was the time spent with the team and the client.

Having fun with the team

As MBA classmates, we already knew each other to varying degrees, but sharing this experience brought us closer and created moments that we’ll remember long after we’ve forgotten the actual project. One such memory was the birthday party that we threw for Grace while in the middle of putting the final touches on our executive summaries.

We surprised Grace with a card and cupcakes and sang happy birthday in the meeting room. It was just one moment during one meeting, but the experience was indicative of the good times the team shared together and of why we are much closer now than at the beginning despite the intensity of the experience.

Working with the client

Working with the client has taught us how to lead meetings with confidence, how to communicate more clearly, and how to read the client for clues about where they are taking the conversation. All these skills came to bear during our final presentation, which was done remotely via WebEx.

In a video conference, reading nonverbal cues can be very difficult, and the meeting flow can easily break down. By the time we delivered our final presentation, we had already completed five previous video conferences. As a result, we were familiar with how to manage the pauses, how to read the client’s questions, and how to reply in a way that moved the conversation forward.

These experiences will be invaluable in our future career and made us look back on our final presentation with so much pride about the work we’d done.

Pictured at top: Team members Jeff Brown, Abdul Rehman Azmat, Grace Lee, Ricardo Marrujo Mexia, and Samuel Roth, all MBA ’19.

Allison Halpern, BSBA ’18 and CEL marketing student associate, writes on behalf of the Center for Experiential Learning.

Through the CEL Practicum, students have the unique opportunity to consult for companies on a global scale, from startups to Fortune 50 firms.

Professional MBA student Elise Hastings and a team of student consultants recently traveled to Mumbai to meet with their CEL Practicum client, ArtO2, an independent art organization aiming to increase the awareness of contemporary art practices. Elise reflects on the consulting process her team undertook in Mumbai, and why site visits are essential to project success:

What was the biggest takeaway from consulting in-person, rather than remotely?

Elise: It was extremely important that our team understood the context of our project by meeting with our clients in person. We met with all the stakeholders involved and were able to build a relationship. They treated us with immense kindness and respect. They helped show us the rich culture of the city and prioritized hospitality. We understood that relationship building and trust was important in the business culture there, and being with the clients in person greatly facilitated these interactions. We also met with some of the people our clients served, which made it easier for us to understand the challenges and opportunities of the organization and areas we could provide support.

What unique value did your team contribute to ArtO2?

Elise: Our team has a variety of skill sets and backgrounds–including law, accounting, strategic planning, nonprofit fundraising, and social enterprise consulting. We were excited to work with a relatively younger and smaller organization like Art Oxygen, because we could play a larger role in structuring the organization for growth. With our group’s skills, we can support a lot of the strategic planning and organizational structuring that can best position ArtO2 to grow their impact and reach sustainability.

What were the most rewarding—and most challenging—aspects of working with your client?

Elise: It was a great opportunity to work with a group of passionate individuals that are attempting to bring contemporary art to Mumbai and build an arts infrastructure in a rapidly urbanizing city. We enjoyed building connections and understanding the process of creating an international consulting relationship. Although this relationship-building experience was rewarding, it was challenging to achieve. Being in a new place and cultural landscape over just a short timeframe, it was difficult to build that base of trust and understanding. Throughout this process, we enjoyed witnessing the impact of their work and learning how we as a group could help the organization grow that impact.

A special thanks to our partners at IIT Bombay, our IIT Bombay-WashU Research and Educational Academy family, and most especially, Executive MBA alumni Ravi Vishnu and Saurabh Shrivastava for their support in making this project happen.

Learn more about the CEL Practicum experience on the CEL’s website.