University at Buffalo School of Management Alumni Success: BS Business Administration/MBA

hello and welcome to today's webinar we're going to be covering the ub mba combined degree series uh talking about alumni success specific to the bs management mba 3-2 program my name is aaron shaw i'm your assistant director of recruitment for our full-time mba and mms programs and i'm joined today by alum brian wagner hi brian good morning how are you well you know considering everything that's going on in the world i'm doing well we're hanging in there thanks for having me of course let me back up one slide real quick you you may notice that our contact information is here on the slide on your your screen currently so feel free to reach out to us connect over linkedin or send us emails directly with questions that you may have happy to continue the conversation in either facet today we're going to be discussing brian's background story getting to know him a little bit more we'll talk about navigating graduate programs as a whole the value of adding an mba in this scenario to your undergraduate business degree the importance of networking and mentorship will wrap up talking about next steps and other ways to connect with the ub mba community so jumping right in each of our alumni has an extraordinary story to tell and brian is absolutely no exception to that uh i've labeled his background story here on your screen as being the jack of all trades and you'll see why here in a second um so without further ado i'd like to pass it back over to brian to let him share his journey and his background with you brian take it away yeah so i uh went to you beef did an undergraduate degree in accounting and spent three years with that program at which point i decided to go for my mba concurrently with the undergraduate degree so five years total within the school of management and found myself involved with a number of activities within the school of management and the graduate programs and found that to be very beneficial to myself as i entered into the workforce i started off in the world of public accounting working for deloitte i went and got my cpa license still have that today and worked with uh deloitte for about two years at which point i made a little bit of a career change into the pharmaceutical industry worked in a generic pharmaceutical company for cenius cobby as a project controller and from there about two and a half years later was promoted into the role of a senior manager compliance and process excellence so working hand-in-hand with the production facilities on the management and oversight of capital investment projects within the u.s i left forsynias about a year ago a little over a year ago and now work for amitech which is about a 5 billion dollar publicly traded company and i work in the northern new jersey area as the business unit controller for edax and also the controller for spectro us so it's uh as aaron mentioned an interesting and progressive last seven or eight years since i graduated the mba program and it's been pretty beneficial all the experiences that i've had at ub and kind of helped me get to where i am now yeah yeah amazing journey um but i think we can agree that that graduate school sort of being the the cornerstone for discovering uh professional pathways and for the audience's sake uh regardless of if doing your mba you know right after undergrad or integrating it into your overall undergrad experience or taking some time post undergrad to gain some work experience and come back graduate school really does provide that that clear pathway in terms of of career so let's talk more about that chapter of your life and exploring grad school as a whole uh you know i think it's no secret that there's this seemingly endless list of choices when it comes to exploring graduate programs um and again for the audience as you can see here on your screen a pretty extensive list and this is just the programs that fall into the school management portfolio that list of course grows exponentially when you consider programs outside of the school of management and outside the university at buffalo at whole as a whole so it's easy to get caught up uh in the moment of researching graduate programs and trying to decide which direction to go the amount of data and the overwhelming information when exploring grad school programs you know so at some point you may feel like i don't know what to do with all this you're not sure what this information all really means uh what to do with the data my advice follow your passion you know so as brian kind of laid out an mba and we'll talk more about adding the value of an mba but an mba has the potential to to open doors that you couldn't previously open or just had no idea were even in existence but to give you a better idea of the overall journey that is navigating graduate programs let's again hear from brian uh so brian what led to ultimately thinking about grad school as a potential next step yeah i had the doing accounting undergrad i knew i needed um to do a graduate degree whether it was an msn accounting or an mba for the purposes of getting your cpa license so that dictated it a little bit but the question for me was whether i wanted to do graduate degree in accounting or mba and i found that a two-year program versus a one-year program would develop me a little bit more skill set-wise for the long-term career i knew i didn't want a career in public accounting was more interested in the general business side of things and so that's ultimately what i chose to do and was really happy to have done that because i lend on my mba type skill sets um nowadays with work more so than accounting technically um so i think either scenario would have worked out fine for me but i'm pretty confident that had i not um done a graduate degree my career would be much different i would not have um i would not have had my same starting point at deloitte and there it would have deviated a different way yeah and that's we talk about that a lot internally in terms of folks that pursue an mba we call them switchers and launchers those that are looking to switch career pathways and those are looking to launch so obviously in your scenario specifically it certainly helped to launch your career which is fantastic um so again as i previously alluded to lots of options out there what ultimately kept you at ub i think it was the ability to have the combined degree program um so the other scenario that i worked through in my head was finishing with four years of undergrad and then exploring graduate school options at ub and also elsewhere and this gave me the opportunity to effectively complete six years of schooling in five years i knew i needed a graduate degree i wanted a graduate degree and this is what gave me the opportunity to complete a quality program in the quickest amount of time to get out and start my career yeah yeah value is certainly one of the the differentiating factors when when taking a look at the ub mba program specifically so we've hinted at a little bit here but i want to shift the conversation over to the value of adding an mba let's start with what we again internally call understanding the business of your business at the end of the day everything is business and being able to effectively and efficiently operate within a specific domain regardless of industry or function is ultimately at the heart of what every organization does however when referring to combining an mba with your undergraduate degree you're setting yourself up to once again launch a career in the workforce with a combination of management and specialized skills providing a powerful platform in which to launch that career in addition the mba certainly helps you to stand apart and above and pre improve your personal marketability while also being able to meet emerging career needs and complement your ultimate passions uh so with that in mind i once again turned back to brian to talk about how adding an mba has brought an unbeatable combination of acumen leadership and problem solving to his roles in the workplace and ultimately in life so you hinted at it a little bit brian in terms of you know utilizing skills obtained in the mba program in your current line of work uh pretty frequently uh but backing up real quick how did your time in the in the mba program ultimately prepare you for your career yeah it i can pretty easy confidently state the difference between undergraduate experience and graduate experience undergraduate at ub can be quite large maybe doesn't have a super intimate personal touch in the graduate program just became so much smaller and more manageable so that provided me an opportunity to stretch myself out of my comfort zone a little bit and involve myself with different organizations so one of the items mentioned earlier was the trip to new orleans to do some community rebuilding that was something where i became very close with a number of students on the trip still friends with them today which has had benefits both from a personal standpoint and professional standpoint involvement with the graduate management association i would not have done something like that in undergrad but i found myself much more connected with the program with the schools as a graduate student and while more social in nature it actually provided a lot of leadership development where you're giving yourself some opportunity to to to be a leader and to bring people together and so that was something that pushed myself out of my comfort zone maybe pushed myself out of my shell that i was maybe there or within when i was an undergraduate student and i think has really helped long term career-wise for myself building confidence building management skill sets whether that's through the leader court program so i don't think it's any one specific experience that has helped benefit myself but it rounds you out much more than going to school for a purely technical um skill set yeah yeah i agree 100 um and you know you you've talked about it here a little bit but there's there's a heavy emphasis in the mba program in terms of experiential learning uh or as we refer to it as as action learning um so of course you're going to obtain some of those technical skills along with some softer skills through the curriculum uh you know lessons learned in the classroom but as far as the experiential learning or action learning can you recall some of the lessons learned outside of the classroom yeah i think um from a networking standpoint and from uh just a business acumen standpoint so how do you interact in a professional environment i think is really key i think you can be the smartest person in the world but if you um struggle with how you're communicating and how you work with others and how you're interacting um socially in a professional environment is where you can pay a lot of or increase your your dividends if you will on the return um you know a lot of good professional experiences were developed through um the leader corps program would be one and also mba advantage where um you you might think of it as uh oh i have to do this because you know it's a requirement but if you take a step back and actually look at it from the perspective of this is uh these are activities you're participating in that you would not have had as an opportunity as an undergraduate student and the pure social aspect of how that helps you career-wise how are you going to mingle with folks at a work party how do you conduct yourself professionally and that's a lot of those those areas that i didn't really get exposed to much as an undergraduate student but are equally as important as learning your debits and credits yeah yeah sure so outside of those critical skills and you hinted at it here a little bit i would argue that the people that you meet are are just as valuable if not more so so let's talk about those people and the impact that they've had i think at this point in our lives we can all agree that we've at least heard the term networking or mentorship however i would argue that there are far less people that truly understand the the remarkable power of having a strong network and strategic mentors with that in mind you can absolutely not understate the value and importance of networking and mentorship your network and your mentors literally have the ability to put you directly in line with opportunity and because of their importance the mba program has opportunities to expand your network essentially baked right into it you've heard a couple terms already corporate champions leader corps the dean's advisory council the school of management alumni association board campus speakers competition uh clubs case competition clubs uh business competitions engagement with companies which lead to opportunities for practical experiences with internships professional development workshops like network new york coffee cup conversation resumenia and alumni career panels and this is just the tip of the iceberg [Music] at the end of the day networking is a skill and it's one that you can develop and get better at with time and with experience so brian let's talk about your experiences with networking who has helped you to get to where you're at in your career and what advice would you have for folks out there that want to go off in a similar direction i can speak to this one pretty well because outside of my first job with deloitte every other opportunity has come through a connection um so when i um was with deloitte i a good friend of mine nick notarious was working at forsinius cabi he was a fellow joint degree business student and he was with his boss at the alumni awards dinner and he he was also a ub alumni and uh got to meet him um talk for a bit and then about six months later he gave me a call because uh something organizationally was changing within forcinius a role came up that he thought i'd be a good fit for and that's ultimately how i i moved on to forsinius and then when i was with fercinius nick was working there he moved on to an opportunity within ametek they were looking to build out their finance team a bit more and reached out to me as well so it's um i don't like to think of networking as something forceful often where it pays the where it really impacts you is where you least expect it and so just having social interaction and keeping in touch with fellow students throughout the years or alumni you never know where it's going to come into play if you're trying if you're approaching it from the standpoint of purely to get something out of it yourself i think you might be looking at it the wrong way because it's it it really meets both ends benefit and you just have to be ready for it because you never know when you're going to need to reach out and when things will come up so having positive interactions on a day-to-day basis and being yourself and being authentic is um really how you have to approach it yeah yeah great advice and to expand on that potentially here a little bit more for those out there that struggle with networking have you developed a a go-to line or an overall approach to networking beyond just um you know realizing the the purpose behind it not really i you know it's a good question i i don't you just have to be yourself and you can't pretend to be who you're not and sometimes um when networking can be forceful and when it can come off as being unauthentic and i think it can really detract from that experience so i think you just have to be yourself you gotta have a positive attitude um you have to know how to communicate effectively and um just kind of go with it i think if you try and force it too much is where it doesn't work yeah yeah i agree it makes a lot of sense and you know this is uh this dual degree webinar series that we've been doing um that seems to be the theme is just being being genuine uh being you and uh naturally through conversation is where that networking uh becomes a benefit so that's that's fantastic um you know expanding into the network and focusing more on mentors um which is honestly a bonus of networking how have mentors influenced your life yeah you get uh quite a bit i think from working as uh in high school with who my first boss was at the time he found a somewhat similar career path as what i'm doing now and still as a resource 15 years later to to get his perspective on it because his perspective has changed over the years and then you develop new relationships as well and i think it's it's not necessarily having one single point person to go to but you build a little bit of a 360 with maybe your your your current boss i think if you can have your your day-to-day boss also play the mentor role is where you can really have a positive um work experience that's not always something that's easily found but i've had it before and that's been really positive and also a really good piece of that 360. and i've also been in experiences where you don't have that and sometimes that's also a good experience because by having it and by not having it helps you understand how you should be as a manager and how you can better serve your employees yeah yeah again a wealth of advice here is fantastic um if you could if you could drill down and think about just one particular example what was the best advice that a mentor has given you uh go for it just uh sometimes uh you're i'm a little bit more risk adverse than most i'm a little bit more conservative in nature so when maybe some experiences or opportunities come up the best advice has just been i'll just go for it and uh and take the risk and you know something that some folks have said to me is one when when you're thinking about oh i don't know if i could do this or not or it seems like this position might be a little bit over my head they asked me well tell me a time when you've when you failed have you ever failed in a position you've been in and i say uh well not really and they go exactly you'll figure it out so just do it yeah yeah good stuff um so that kind of leads me into my my final question for this segment here um and it's often the case when talking with undergraduate business students that are in line with being eligible to participate in the 3-2 combined undergraduate mba program you know they'll ask me should i graduate and go get some work experience or should i just do it now so looking back on your time and you talked about it earlier um but knowing what you know now if you could go back would you do anything different ooh it's a good question i still in terms of doing my mba when i did i still would have followed this the same approach i think each person's a little bit different i think there is a good value you can get out of going back to school for an mba and i think maybe some of the perspectives are different especially in areas of organizational behavior i think the lessons there might be a little bit more meaningful um but from my own standpoint um i would not have changed getting my degree in accounting in my mba when i did i think i wanted to use it as you mentioned as sort of a launch pad for my career and a lot of the concepts that i learned through um through the degrees paid some reward pretty quickly in my first role and had i not done the mba um things would have turned out differently yeah yeah okay at this point uh i'd like to turn the attention back to the audience and our audience members you may be saying to yourself all this stuff sounds fantastic uh but what do i have to do next can i get in and you know on the admissions team listen we understand this is a huge decision and one that can be very stressful so we want you to know that we're here to help you every step of the way so what do those next steps entail i would say from here after you know viewing this conversation if this isn't in fact one of your very first steps during that research phase continue to research and continue to engage with as many stakeholders as possible ub school of management everybody that falls underneath that roof is very passionate all of our alumni are very passionate and willing to help you in every way shape or form imaginable so reach out have those conversations get additional perspective and insight in an effort to ultimately determine hey is this the right fit for me um at that point if if it sounds like yep this is the direction to go your next your very next step is to reach out to your undergrad advisor and have that conversation with them is they're going to play a vital role in evaluating eligibility for the program at that point if if all signs are go pull together an application and in doing so weigh out your quantitative outliers versus your inward looking materials quantitative outliers being your gpa your work experience and your standardized test scores in doing so you'll get a sense of of how competitive you are from just the stats um and as you can imagine the vast majority of folks who apply are relatively similar um in terms of just the quantitative outliers so the inward looking materials are really the difference makers here so you have the ability to kind of shape and convey that story through things like the personal statements to a certain extent your resume so important pulling together your resume make sure you're including things that show that you're well-rounded outside of just what you've experienced or done in the classroom to this point and provide a window into you the person because ultimately you're the unique aspect of the admissions process beyond that take into consideration ways to continue to bolster your candidacy throughout the entire admissions process meaning that once you apply and click submit that's not the end of the road right so most folks to back up a little bit here are applying for the 3-2 program during the the junior year in which you're going to want to include the fall semester's results so that doesn't mean that we just stopped doing what we've been doing up to that point after the fall semester continued to to do great things in the spring semester and beyond if you're targeting fall 2021 as a potential start date which means that you'd be starting the mba fall 21 replacing what traditionally would have been your senior year uh you can see the dates on your screen the remaining application due dates february 1 april 15th and june 1 being the final april 1 i'm sorry february 1st being our final international applicant deadline so be aware of those if you're viewing this a little bit earlier on in the decision making process and potentially 2022 or beyond becomes target start dates again these application deadlines will remain consistent but the application opens up on july 1st each and every year brian anything to add here in terms of advice for the admissions process specifically got you on you whoops i would just say be proactive about it it doesn't hurt to explore um this get some perspectives talk with some folks if you determine it's maybe not right for you um you've got no uh no in the game at that point so i think you've got um really nothing to lose and you know to just tying it back to some of the advice that i got from previous mentors is just go for it um case scenario is you apply and you don't get in it's it's really not a bad scenario so i think uh you go for it and um take it one step of the time at a time and don't get too far ahead of yourself either yeah yeah excellent at this point uh this is typically where we'd open up for questions so as a recording uh if you're viewing this and you do have questions refer back to that introductory slide where we provide our linkedin profile links along with our email addresses and if you do in fact have questions feel free to reach out because the bottom line is we we want you to stay connected we want to hear from you and this webinar is just one of many ways to engage with us and we look forward to assisting you through the admissions process and beyond um a couple of things to point out here as far as additional ways to engage and get those other insights and those other perspectives we do have current student ambassadors link here on your screen to reach out to them directly i offer one-on-one advising appointments so feel free to check out the calendly link on here and schedule a time to chat that fits your schedule uh other virtual events to be aware of um at the time of this recording coming up in january uh scholarship reception february uh diverse leaders reception uh in march women leading business and in april uh an event specifically tailored towards military and veteran students so you can find those and other opportunities all listed on our recruiting calendar utilizing that link here on your screen a couple more things here the podcast if you're already a podcaster this is a must listen if you're just getting into podcasting or have been toying with the idea this is a great place to start it's a student-led organized and driven podcast talking about topics that are relevant to what we're all experiencing today and giving you additional insight into the life of our mba students this webinar along with every other webinar previously recorded is available in our webinar library so if you're looking to take a deep dive into a specific topic good chance it's already there as the library is fairly robust so check that out and then of course social media you can find us on all the major channels and happy to engage on any of the ones that are listed with that that is going to do it for us here today i want to send a big thank you out to the audience for taking time out of your busy schedules to view this webinar hopefully you gain some valuable insight into the 3-2 bs mba combined program big thank you to brian for joining me and again taking time out of his busy schedule to share his story and his journey um we're for all of you out there we're glad that you're considering the ub school of management mba program we look forward to future conversations and to potentially welcoming you to the ub mba family any last thoughts or advice brian no thanks for the invitation happy to share my perspective and hopefully folks found it helpful if there are any questions or if i can be of any other assistance the contact information wasn't the slide so feel free to reach out yeah awesome stuff so for everyone out there take care and goodbye for now

2021-01-20 10:27

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