By Marisa Farella
As a full-time Kellstadt MBA student with graduation around the corner, I’ve been exploring, with my fellow students, the various career routes that follow our big day. One route my program has led me to explore is consulting – at Deloitte, Accenture and The Cambridge Group, to name a few. The world of consulting is daunting but with the support and direction of the Kellstadt Graduate School of Business, it doesn’t feel so impenetrable.
Recently, I had the good fortune of taking Associate Professor Jaclyn Jensen’s Consulting Skills course. This course provides students the opportunity to partner with real clients with real-world needs to deliver real-world solutions for the duration of the quarter. My group was honored to consult a small, female and Latina-owned sustainable architecture firm with their recruiting, hiring and onboarding processes that the company was looking to grow. This was just the type of exposure and familiarization with consulting that I was seeking within my program. The lessons my group and I took away from this hands-on experience spanned beyond our virtual classroom. Here are a few of those lessons.
Establish Clear Communication with Your Team and Client
The Kellstadt MBA program blends a generous amount of group project work into the curriculum, and communication plays a vital role in the success and outcome of any group project. Luckily, having developed strong relationships with my cohort colleagues, I was familiar with the different personalities and learning styles of my group members. This made for what we thought would be a seamless project experience.
But a few weeks into our project, our communication with our client hit a bump as we realized expectations around roles and responsibilities were a bit unclear.
It took facing this challenge for us to understand the importance of clearly communicating expectations, processes, agendas and more. To help us bounce back, we began having weekly touch bases and recaps with each other as we progressed through the project. Those regular points of communication were helpful tools that ultimately contributed to our success at the end.
Don’t Be Afraid to Ask for Help
Throughout the weeks working with our client, Professor Jensen was there to give us redirection and guidance. When we faced our challenging situation with our client, she communicated with us the reality of consulting projects: they don’t always go as planned.
Professor Jensen took on the role similar to that of a career advisor. This is a role you find in consulting firms and one that helps analysts and consultants continue to thrive.
When I felt like I wanted to quit, she reminded me that I have the tools, knowledge and resources to get back up, apply what I know and deliver success.
Be Ready to Pivot as Needed
Our team members worked tirelessly to produce a solution for our client. We tried our best to go above and beyond to reach her expectations. When the time finally came to present her our materials and solution, she was speechless. Our client was a powerful, greatly accomplished woman who had a poker face like no other. What was she thinking? She hates it. We failed. No MBA degree for me! (These were all the fearful thoughts that went through my mind.)
When our client began to speak, we all held our breath. She said she was incredibly taken back by our deliverables and that we hit it out of the park. She explained that what we presented not only met her expectations but exceeded them.
Those fearful thoughts in my mind shifted from fear to fulfillment. This is why consultants do what they do. This why I’m in graduate school. This is why I chose the Kellstadt Graduate School of Business.
Overall, I learned that succeeding in a class like this requires you to be adaptable. It’s crucial that a team of students listen to a client’s feedback and apply the necessary and appropriate changes that need to be made to ensure the client’s satisfaction.
This project ended up turning into an opportunity I had not yet faced within my program. Without it, I may not have learned as much I have about myself as a professional, a student, a team member or most importantly, a consultant. It was in this course, with the help of Professor Jensen, that I strengthened my professional resilience. Add that to the list of characteristics us Blue Demons have.
Thank you to our client for your patience and understanding during the learning moments we had as a group, and thank you to Professor Jensen for the constant support and limitless lessons during this course. After all is said and done, this experience has definitely strengthened my desire and interest to pursue a career in consultancy.
Marisa Farella is a current MBA candidate and graduate assistant at Kellstadt Graduate School of Business. She graduated from DePaul University in 2018 with her BA in public relations and advertising, making her a proud soon-to-be Double Demon. In addition to her studies, Marisa has taken her love for writing and creativity a step further. She is the self-published author of her debut collection, “Truth or Dare: Poetry,” which is available on Amazon.
by George Brigandi
Compared to most established sectors, like finance, accounting, real-estate, chemistry and even web services, sustainability is very young. Sure, it can be argued that it’s been around since the dawn of humankind – whenever someone tried to reuse a piece of old clothing or regrow a tree they cut down could certainly count as “sustainable efforts” – but the global movement that we see today did not really take hold until the early 2010s. As a result, most university programs that are sustainability-focused are some of the newer ones on a campus, like the Master of Science in Sustainable Management program at DePaul, which I direct.
Like many sustainability professionals, I transitioned into this line of work from a career in something else. For me, it was general marketing. DePaul played a critical role in helping me become who I am today. It laid the groundwork for my new career path with my MBA in sustainable management and entrepreneurship, which I earned from Kellstadt in 2018.
Sustainability at DePaul – How it was
To be frank, the transition outside of the classroom was quite difficult, but I expected that. Although this was only a few years ago, sustainability was significantly less popular and established than it is now. Like most institutions at the time, DePaul didn’t have any sustainability career fairs or sustainability-focused networking events or career development services, and the only sustainability-related student group that I was aware of, Net Impact, was on hiatus.
I had to be extremely creative and persistent in how I found networking opportunities and potential job leads, so I used the resources that were available to me and eventually found my way through a social enterprise channel at the Coleman Entrepreneurship Center. That was my experience and I’m by no means complaining about it. New efforts need to start somewhere and you can’t have it all right from the start.
Knowing this, my colleagues and I have now formed the DePaul Sustainability Group. Those colleagues come from multiple DePaul departments and colleges, including the Department of Management & Entrepreneurship at the Driehaus College of Business, the College of Communications, the Department of Environmental Science and Studies, the School of Public Service, the Department of Geography, the Kellstadt Career Management Center, and the Sustainable Urban Development Graduate Program. The group also has terrific student leaders from Net Impact, Student Government Association and the general student body. We are working hard to make sure the student experience is multitudes better moving forward.
Connecting DePaul’s Sustainability Community
One of the top priorities we’re addressing is the need to cultivate the sustainability community at DePaul. As I mentioned, the sustainability presence at the university is young, fragmented and needs robust development if we hope to positively impact industry in Chicago and beyond.
So we created the DePaul Sustainability Network on LinkedIn, which is open to anyone affiliated with the university, to better expose students to potential job opportunities, relevant news and research, and alumni working in sustainability. Additionally, we’re in the midst of building out a sustainability web platform, where visitors can learn all about DePaul’s sustainability efforts, courses and community in a singular location.
We’re also increasing the number of sustainability events on (virtual) campus, with the culmination being the Sustainability at DePaul Conference, which is happening this year on May 7-8 from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. (Central Time). This inaugural event is meant to not only bolster DePaul’s sustainability community, but further intertwine it with the larger sustainability community of our city, where 80% of DePaul graduates end up working. If you are interested in sustainability and social impact, please register. This conference will connect current students, alumni and local sustainability experts, and discuss the breadth of work that is being done in the sector.
Creating a Sustainable Future
In the university’s recently updated mission statement, DePaul has committed to “promoting peaceful, just and equitable solutions to social and environmental challenges,” an admirable goal that we fully support and want to see happen. The university is heading in the right direction but needs the support of an organized community that has sustainability as its top priority. After all, it’s up to us to create the change we want to see. No single individual or even entity on their own will be able to solve the numerous problems presented by climate change.
As I often tell my students, we’re witnessing the infancy of the most important shift in business in human history. If you’d like to take advantage of this incredible opportunity to help shape the sustainability efforts at the Kellstadt Graduate School of Business and DePaul at large, we hope you’ll join us at our conference in May.
George Brigandi is the director of the Master of Science in Sustainable Management program at Kellstadt and is an instructor in the Department of Management & Entrepreneurship at the Driehaus College of Business. Additionally, he serves as the partnership and development manager at Current, Chicago’s water innovation hub, which is currently working on the first real-time water quality monitoring project in the U.S. to measure microbial pollutants in an urban waterway. Brigandi is a Kellstadt alumnus with an MBA in sustainable management and entrepreneurship, and holds a bachelor’s degree in anthropology and history from Purdue University. A sustainability evangelist, he frequently speaks at local, national and international events and conferences.
By Adam Krynski and Molly Ryanmiller
Throughout January 2021 we competed against nine other teams in a marketing case competition hosted by Barilla, the world’s largest pasta producer, and the Kellstadt Marketing Group, a student organization at the Kellstadt Graduate School of Business. It was the perfect experiential learning opportunity we were looking for as MBA students: the chance to directly apply class concepts, work in teams with other students, and present a solution and receive feedback from Barilla representatives and Kellstadt faculty who served as judges.
Our mighty team of two, Pasta La Vista, came to the competition with diverse backgrounds and little marketing experience. We wanted to tackle a project outside of the classroom with the goals of learning new skill sets, meeting some new friends and gaining additional professional experiences. In the end, we ended up doing that and more—we took home the winning prize!
Below are six key takeaways from our experience. We hope these tips help set you up for success so you too can walk away with a win at your next case competition.
- Try something new and outside of your comfort zone
Case competitions are a great way to explore learning opportunities beyond the classroom, and this was an important goal of ours coming into graduate school. We were interested in pursuing a case competition that allowed us to develop a strategy for an industry that we were both unfamiliar with, so we ended up walking away with new skills as well as a stronger network within Kellstadt.
- Manage your time effectively
As most graduate students would agree, time management is a crucial key to success. When participating in a case competition, you need to set aside time outside of work, school and your personal life to be fair to your other teammates and deliver a product you’re proud of. We utilized a group chat for frequent communication and Zoom for solutioning. These regular touchpoints before deliverables were due worked very well for holding ourselves accountable.
- Don’t shy away from communicating with the company
Communicate with your team but also with the company whose business challenge you’re trying to solve. As with any life challenge you may be facing, there are some unknowns. In this case, Barilla provided us with certain facts and left out others. In case competitions, it’s an unspoken rule that the company expects teams to not only do their own research outside of what’s provided, but also circle back with them for clarifications. Ask questions, share ideas and ask more questions.
- Help the judges visualize your solution
Attention to detail is key when preparing how you will deliver your solution. In our executive summary, we approached the deliverable with a “less is more” attitude. While we made sure to answer all questions from our kickoff meeting and challenge guidelines, we didn’t provide too much detail or solutioning. In our presentation, however, we went a step further by providing additional research, actionable insight and visuals such as graphs and tables, so the judges could truly envision what our idea would look like throughout the entire lifecycle of our recommended strategy.
- Use a confident and natural presentation style
Be professional but also be yourself. If you’re too rehearsed, you’ll come across as if you’re reading directly from your notes. If not rehearsed enough, you’ll come across as unprepared. While you want to make sure you’ve outlined your speaking notes ahead of time, leave some room to be conversational.
- Have fun!
At the end of the day, this experience is meant to be fun. Get to know your teammates on a personal level and you’ll not only walk away with a great experience, but with some new friends too.
Adam Krynski is pursuing his MBA with a concentration in strategy, execution and valuation at the Kellstadt Graduate School of Business while working full-time in corporate finance. He likes to take road trips and take his dogs to the Lake Michigan beach on sunny days. He is excited to cook a new meal with his new pasta prize pack.
Molly Ryanmiller is an MBA candidate at the Kellstadt Graduate School of Business and president of the DePaul Consulting Club. She graduated from Indiana University, Bloomington in 2014 with a BS in informatics, a concentration in public health and a minor in communication and culture. She currently works as a global data and analytics consultant at Deloitte. In her free time, you can find her facilitating mindfulness and meditation classes at Deloitte, riding in a spin class, learning about interior design and out on adventures with her dog Zoey.
By Neil Fotre and Brett Bergstrom
In Disney’s smash-hit show “The Mandalorian,” its grizzled bounty-hunter protagonist has a certain advantage over his adversaries. This advantage is so powerful that his allies and foes alike clamor over attaining it. You might think it’s his cunning strategy, or his strong execution. But it’s not. It’s his Beskar-steel armor.
Just like the Mandalorian, successful businesses have their own version of Beskar armor, their competitive advantage. Depending on the sector, that competitive advantage can take many forms: a patented technological innovation (Tesla), viral marketing (Gym Shark) or supply chain ingenuity (Amazon). But what’s important is that true competitive advantage, once identified and leveraged, enables a company to succeed, even in the midst of market uncertainty.
Blaster-proof competitive advantage is a critical reason that the Mandalorian is able to succeed. However, there are other drivers for his success, just as there are other important pilots of success for businesses. What follows is a list of five foundational principles—straight from the planet Mandalore—that every business should prioritize:
- Competitive Advantage.
Also known as Differentiation. The Mandalorian’s Beskar armor and combat training give him the competitive edge he needs to achieve his performance objectives and goals.
- Purpose.
The overarching need to deliver Baby Grogu (nicknamed Baby Yoda by fans) back to the Jedi gives the Mandalorian a singular drive and passion to complete on-going tasks and responsibilities.
- Network.
If the Mandalorian was on LinkedIn, he would be open to connect because the Mandalorian leverages a vast galactic personal and professional network to fulfill objective-specific requirements.
- Agility.
The Mandalorian always has a plan, but it generally backfires. His ability to pivot quickly and flex his acumen towards another course of action enables him project success.
- Luck.
Yes, luck. The Mandalorian gets lucky at opportune moments (just as remote-first businesses found their valuations skyrocket during the pandemic) and it allows him to catch a break and escape any Sarlacc Pit.
Principles of the Mandalorian can be seen guiding successful organizations throughout the “market-space,” navigating the ever-evolving pandemic frontier. Chewy, an online retailer for pet food and pet-related products is an organization that found itself in a nebula of societal isolation when the pandemic hit, in which added value was placed on companionship. While 2020 may have scrambled the navigational systems and direction of other organizations, Chewy expanded their e-commerce and launched an innovative pet telehealth service. Chewy posted a 47% gain in revenue at the end of their second quarter in 2020.
Zoom’s singular purpose was always to connect people remotely. But stacked up against feature-rich competitors like GoToMeeting, Zoom decided to find its competitive advantage by honing in on the differentiation of simplicity. Its product ace-in-the-hole: an experience that makes it as easy as possible to join and engage in a call. This differentiation vaulted them to the top of their respective field, where the COVID-19 pandemic has made their market-leader status as solid as carbonite.
The COVID-19 pandemic forced businesses of all industries to react, or be Bantha fodder. Peloton is an example of an agile company that, while successful before the pandemic struck, went all-in on a value proposition and identity pivot – and reaped the profits. By reflexively shifting its business to remote wellness, Peloton enjoyed a first-mover differentiation that was buoyed by their strong product offering (a digitally-connected training bike and a strong backlog of content). Its earnings and company value are currently worth a stunning amount of Imperial credits as well as being projected to double to $60 billion by 2024.
Not all companies have done well. Data from Yelp listing current operating statuses suggests that more than 17,000 business were forced to close doors in 2020. If anything proves the business value of Beskar-strong differentiation and agility, it’s a global pandemic.
The pandemic also brought to the light (side), probably more than ever before, the importance of a network. How could small businesses, like restaurants, bars or grocers, survive without a strong network of app-driven delivery services to help them pivot during a precipitous drop in foot traffic? Even the Mandalorian had to utilize the services of mercenary characters that possessed specialized skillsets to aid him throughout his charge. GrubHub, DoorDash and Deliverr, despite their seemingly unreasonable fees that are burdened by the business owner were necessary evils to combat dine-in restrictions.
Businesses need to identify and/or find their Beskar. Adhering to a code and always dawning a figurative protective armor helmet will ensure likelihood of organization survival.
So, search your feelings, reader. You know it to be true. This is the way… to run a successful business.
Neil Fotre is a full-time MBA candidate at the Kellstadt Graduate School of Business and the president of DePaul student organization Kellstadt Partners. He is a former United States Army cavalry officer and current seltzer aficionado. He has an MSJ in investigative journalism from Northwestern University and a bachelor’s degree in English from John Carroll University. In-between D2L discussion posts, he enjoys push-ups and poor attempts at rudimentary math without the use of a calculator. He does not oversell his cooking ability but everything he makes is edible.
Brett Bergstrom is a product manager at a healthcare startup called Caremerge. He has an MSJ in media innovation from Northwestern University and dual bachelor’s degrees in English and economics from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. While South Dakota will always be his home, he prides himself on learning the public transportation system of Chicago. His hobbies include architecting late-night snacks, spending too much money on clothes he doesn’t need and pretending he’s better at pick-up basketball than he actually is.
By Adam Piraino
Switching to Remote Work
Back in March, on what seemed like the last day before the world changed, everyone in the office had their eyes glued to the TV. We were watching the market react to COVID-19. Despite the worst recession since 1987, the S&P 500 surged more than 9%. Phones were ringing off the hook with clients worried about their portfolios, or wanting to take advantage of the situation and put their money to work.
I stood there with the team, on the 37th floor of 150 North Riverside in downtown Chicago, absorbing news of the virus. Unlike my colleagues in the room, I was an MBA student at the Kellstadt Graduate School of Business—and an intern. I had been interning at William Blair since January, working on investment, market and economic research for client meetings and pitches, and helping make investment calls and manage business operations.
Over the weekend of March 14, the director of administration informed us that our office would be working remotely. The only problem for me, as an intern, was that company policy allowed only full-time employees to use remote access on secure client information/accounts and financial platforms. So how was I to continue my work?
As rumors spread across the nation that companies were laying off or furloughing their employees, I figured I would soon be joining the newly declared “unemployed” and searching the web for another internship. However, the firm showed me what it means to take care of their employees. They understood it would take time to go through seven levels of corporate hoops, including approval from the CEO and president to grant remote access to interns, but they were determined to make it happen.
I soon found out that not only was the firm getting approval for us to have access but that they would continue paying us and would allow us to assist advisors with market/investment research. This showed me that William Blair did not view me as just a number or an intern and that they cared about my future growth.
My biggest takeaway from this situation was although we all want to work for the largest, most successful companies, it is important to understand how a company treats its employees not only in good times but also in terrible times (war, recessions, nationwide pandemics, etc.).
Staying Engaged
During my five years in the military prior to starting my DePaul MBA, we had this saying, “Flexibility is the key to air power.” We prided ourselves on being flexible, adapting to changes in a situation and making do with what we have to get the mission done. Without flexibility, we don’t bend—we break when faced with change.
Today, I’m still interning at William Blair and the experience continues to be remote.
While working remotely, there are moments when I don’t want to work, watch that lecture on economic stagnation or read that book. It is easy to find excuses to do other things and it can be tough to focus on a task until it is completed. Through this challenge I have had a revelation: there is nothing but myself standing in my way from accomplishing something. I’ve had to learn to reorganize my day and plan differently. Adapt or fail – that’s how I see it. That’s what we were taught in the military.
With years of experience in a disciplined military office setting that included everyone from a three-star general to government civilian right out of undergrad, I understand what “normal” business etiquette is. However, considering that we are in new territory when it comes to workplace etiquette in a remote setting, I feel like there is some leniency.
For instance, calling an experienced advisor might be viewed as taboo in a “normal” work environment. But since everyone has started working from home, it has often become necessary to call advisors/associates and speak directly with them about certain projects or for guidance. It is just as important in these situations to be respectful, professional and considerate when deciding between a phone call or an email.
At first, I was surprised at how much I was able to learn from a 10-minute phone or video call with someone. The best part of working from home has been the one-on-one time with advisors, peers and leadership via phone, Microsoft Teams and even text. With these conversations, I have been able to continue building personal relationships that will ultimately help me grow my network and build a book of clients for my future practice.
Looking Ahead
If I were to give advice to someone seeking or preparing for remote employment, I would say the grass isn’t always greener on the other side. The things you didn’t like about working in an office could become the very things you miss when working remotely. Don’t take anything for granted. And realize that personal responsibility and self-motivation are key to being able to successfully work in a remote setting.
Overall, I’ve been thankful for this experience of working remotely. It has opened doors to possibilities that I had not considered before, to the fact that I could potentially work for a company in Chicago but live anywhere in the world. Though a part of me prefers to work in an office, remote work has helped me understand where I can take my career and what the world can offer.
Life throws challenges at us every day – some bigger than others – but one thing we can all do is understand what we have control over. Focusing on that aspect, in this case our own attitude, mindset and actions toward others, will help us navigate not only the world of working remotely, but also life.
Adam Piraino graduated from Southern Illinois University Carbondale with a bachelor’s degree in aviation management. Prior to pursuing an MBA with a finance concentration from Kellstadt, he served 4.5 years in the U.S. Air Force as a project manager for the Global Positioning Systems Directorate. Today, he is a private wealth management intern at William Blair & Co.
Marisa Farella is a current MBA candidate and graduate assistant at Kellstadt Graduate School of Business. She graduated from DePaul University in 2018 with her BA in public relations and advertising, making her a proud soon-to-be Double Demon. In addition to her studies, Marisa has taken her love for writing and creativity a step further. She is the self-published author of her debut collection, “Truth or Dare: Poetry,” which is available on Amazon. 
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