Tag: WashU at Brookings

Executive MBA Class 45 will be the first to march to Pomp & Circumstance this year at their Diploma and Awards Ceremony Saturday scheduled for April 30, 2016, 10:30 a.m. in Emerson Auditorium, Knight Hall.

John Herber

The keynote speaker will be John Herber. He is the Managing Partner of RubinBrown, St. Louis. Founded in 1952, RubinBrown LLP is one of the nation’s leading accounting and professional consulting firms. As a Partner in the Assurance Services Group, Herber serves clients in the Manufacturing and Distribution service industries.

Herber’s consulting experience includes strategic planning and individual, business and estate tax planning. John is an active community leader and was also named one of the Most Influential St. Louisans by the St. Louis Business Journal in 2011 and 2012.

Patrick Smith

Class 45 elected classmate Patrick E. Smith, Sr. as their class speaker. Smith is the Senior Director of Metro Division Operations and Community Relations for Ameren Missouri. He leads four Missouri operating divisions engaged in the safe design, installation, and maintenance of the electrical distribution system. This includes service to nearly 800,000 customers in Missouri from the Mississippi River to the western St. Charles border. He also leads business and community relations strategies for Ameren Missouri.

Smith’s career has spanned three decades at Ameren beginning as a journeyman lineman. He rose to his current position in senior leadership after serving in positions from supervisor of electrical operations to strategic analyst and superintendent of operations for the company. Smith has a bachelor’s degree in psychology from Washington University in St. Louis. He and his wife, Crystal, have two children in college. He is active in the community and passionate about youth leadership development.

David Nicklaus looks for answers in a recent column featuring an interview with Olin’s Lamar Pierce.

The great economist Milton Friedman famously argued that a business’s only social responsibility is to make more money, and his view dominated boardroom thinking for decades. What has caused big business to abandon Friedman’s principle? Lamar Pierce, associate professor of organization and strategy at Washington University’s Olin Business School, thinks it’s the advent of social media and the 24-hour news cycle. “Because of the changing nature of media, it’s easier to get messages out very quickly, and it’s more important to get them out,” Pierce says.

The St. Louis Post-Dispatch
“CEOs turn activists when social issues affect the bottom line”
4/17/16
Link to article

A startup that employs drones to gather soil and plant conditions by flying over acres of farmland is ready for takeoff, according to David Nicklaus in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.

Ali Ahmadi, who completed his Executive MBA at Olin last year, is an accomplished entrepreneur and Chief Operating Officer of the company, Aerial Agriculture. And, Ahmadi knows drones: He has served in the U.S. Navy and U.S. Department of Defense as a drone flight operator and logistics project manager.

From The St. Louis Post-Dispatch:

“In the 21st-century version of a land rush, more than 600 companies have received permission to fly drones over farm fields and collect agricultural data.

Only one of them is headed by a 27-year-old experimental physicist and headquartered in an old warehouse building in downtown St. Louis. Harrison Knoll, the founder and chief executive of Aerial Agriculture, thinks his company stands out in other ways, too.

For starters, there’s the artificial intelligence system his team has built. It will take the data gathered by the drones and turn it into actionable advice for farmers, telling them which part of a field needs more nitrogen and which plants are showing signs of a pest infestation.”

Read full story.

Photo courtesy of  Ali Ahmadi

Every day we meet people. Some meetings are fleeting and are for simple, daily activities and tasks. We meet people at the grocery store, at the local coffee shop, at the gym. Other meetings create real connections. You will also meet people during volunteer activities, at charitable events, or through professional organizations. If your parents were like mine, you may have been taught to treat everyone with respect and to be kind. In other words, practicing The Golden Rule .

When you are in the job market you need to take the Golden Rule one step further. You need to treat every meeting as an interview. One definition of an interview is a “formal meeting in which one or more persons question, consult, or evaluate another person.” The concept of questioning, consulting, and evaluating happens all the time, whether the title of the meeting on your calendar is “interview” or you are sharing a cup of coffee at a volunteer event. I am a huge believer of networking to help you in your career search and transitions. Networking is a great way to learn and develop a viable plan for the transition. Keep in mind, however, there is a gray line between a “networking meeting” and an “interview.”

Consider the following scenario: A friend is currently looking to shift his career direction and has started looking to join a company with a strong sustainability mission. Your friend has decided to volunteer with a local non-profit organization that is helping companies develop various sustainability programs and decided to attend a monthly meeting of the non-profit group. While in line for a cup of coffee, the woman behind your friend makes small talk. She asks your friend why he is attending the meeting. He says he has an interest in sustainability and then goes to find a seat.

Hopefully, as you read this you cringed. You know the error of your friend’s ways. What should he have done differently if he was thinking of this interaction as an interview? Follow these simple steps to turn small talk into a real connection.

Introduce yourself at the start of your answer and provide a simple but direct statement of your current situation, your focus areas, and what you believe.

“Hi, I’m Tom Golden. I’ve been passionate about the area of sustainability and believe this organization has the most comprehensive methodology to help companies design viable solutions. I’m also in the process of transitioning from my current VP of Finance role into something that will allow me to use my skills in the sustainability area. What is your name and what brings you to this event?”

Ask questions of the other person to show interest and to allow both of you to assess commonalities and connections.

“You are the COO for Sustainability Best Practice Consulting Inc.? I recently read about the type of work you did for Big Oil Co. and the impact your group had.”

Showcase your background to establish your credibility.

“In my role as the VP of Finance I have been able to help my company establish a viable sustainability program while establishing a strong ROI.”

Ask for time to meet and discuss further your common interests.

“Would you be open to meeting and discussing how you moved into your role and how you view the sustainability issues facing businesses today?”

In addition to being able to converse about your background, your passions, and your desires, don’t forget the non-verbal questioning and evaluating that happens in every meeting. Be very conscious of your body language, eye contact, and use of purposeful pauses. It goes without saying that you are dressed professionally. If, in the above scenario, your friend were wearing shorts and a ball cap, the COO would make a note. While it is easy to say “it shouldn’t be about how I am dressed,” why even make it something that has to be considered?

During a job search or career transition, most of the attention is focused on crafting the best resume, responding to job postings, and setting up formal interviews. Studies have been done that say most jobs are found via networking. Networking, whether formally initiated or spontaneous, looks a lot like an interview and should be treated as such. Just remember: If it feels like an interview, and even if it doesn’t, it probably is in some way, shape or form.

This post originally appeared on LMHAdvisors. In addition to LMHAdvisors, Lisa Hebert serves as a Career Consultant specializing in supply chain, consulting, and Olin’s veteran student population.

On day two in China, EMBA-45 was amazed by the high-tech efficiency and vastness of the Beijing Hyundai plant.

In China, Hyundai produced over a million cars for Chinese customers in 2015. Hyundai is an example of a foreign-owned company going into partnership with the Chinese Government in order to get a piece of the Chinese market. It is now the fourth most popular selling auto brand in China.

In the afternoon, the EMBAs were invited through a side gate to the United States Embassy. After an airport-type security check, the cohort was ushered into a conference room for a briefing.

Cathy Feig, U.S. Foreign Commercial Services, explained the challenges and possibilities of doing business in China. Following her presentation, the EMBAs were given a tour of the artworks on display throughout the Embassy office building and grounds.

Day three was a travel day. High speed rail from Beijing to Shanghai.

In the evening we took the hour long river cruise to see the city lights.

Andrew Gulovsen, EMBA-45 and Sekhar Nadella, EMBA-45 at the Hyundai briefing.

Guest blogger: Cory Barron, Student Services Manager, EMBA team