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GRADUATE SUCCESS STORIES

If we had to choose one word to describe the success stories of MBA + graduates, it would surely be “diversity.” Our alumni have followed almost every career path imaginable, plus a few that nobody could have imagined! (Please see our alumni profiles below.) Some grads have moved immediately to start their own businesses, while others have worked their way up the ranks in multinational corporations.

This diversity in MBA + career paths is not surprising… our program is designed to help students uncover and pursue their personal strengths and interests. Our emphasis on innovation promotes ‘outside the box’ thinking, which in turn fuels unconventional career paths. In addition, we actively pursue diversity in our student body, including a wide range of ages and work experience. Most importantly, we have built the MBA + program with an uncommonly wide range of possible concentrations, certifications, and specialization tracks. This ability to tailor a specialized degree can add real value to your professional resume!

 

In spite of this diversity, there is one unifying theme among MBA + graduates: they report that the program gave them a thorough and thoughtful preparation for the professional world of business. That is because we understand the importance of personal growth to achieve professional success. Graduates leave our program armed not only with enhanced business acumen, but also with expanded knowledge of self, particularly in regards to professional strengths and weaknesses. Our alumni most frequently cite this knowledge of self as being uniquely helpful as they have charted their varied career paths.

 

Here is what some of our grads have said about the MBA + program at PSU:

 

“PSU provided more than just an academic education—the MBA + program worked on the whole person. Today I am able to provide technical expertise as a CPA, but I am also able to perceive and understand the unique challenges facing my clients and their organizational health. This ability helps me serve them better and ensures sustainability in my career.”
Nancy Young, Senior Manager, Moss Adams, LLP

 

“This is an MBA degree for yourself and your development, not just for making more money. Monetary results come as you develop more knowledge that you can apply to your job, and for your workplace employer.”
Bill Stoller, CEO and Founder, Stoller Group and Express Services, Inc

 

“…the MBA + experience gave me a great overview of all aspects of business. As a result I am more tuned in to the big-picture strategic concerns my clients harbor, and I also feel more equipped to be a strong steward and leader of the business we created.”
Julie Sheldon Huffaker, Partner & Co-founder, On Your Feet Business Consulting

 

MBA + Graduate Profiles

 

NAME: Wayne Vandekraak
DEGREE INFO: M.B.A. ’99 (B.A. in history from PSU ’95)
COMPANY NAME: Solvport
POSITION: Partner & Co-founder

 

How did you start your business?
I had worked for several corporate entities—Wells Fargo and eTrade Financial. In both situations, I faced layoffs or corporate relocation to further my career. I had very little control over my destiny. My wife and I are committed to staying in Portland, and I decided it’s worth the risk to go out on my own. So I gathered four key players that I had worked with and we sat down and drew out a business plan.

 

Why Solvport?
I came from eTrade Financial, where part of my responsibility was ensuring the operations of their ATM portfolio and that included technical support. Our field services manager and I had written a sort of white paper that said if we were ever to do this on our own, this is what it would look like. Our niche was to follow the Dell model, where we provide phone tech support to the location, which is very unique. We’re the first to market. The device breaks down and we provide 24/7/365 help desk support. We empower the owner to fix his own problems at a much, much lower price. Before, you’d pay $200 to $300 for a technician. We provide support for a tenth of that. If that doesn’t work, we dispatch a technician.

 

Why are you passionate about entrepreneurship?
It’s the desire to have more control over your destiny and at the same time build something that is uniquely yours and has your fingerprint on it in regards to corporate culture. I love building stuff and building this company has been one of the highlights of my life.

 

How did the SBA prepare you for entrepreneurship?
A lot of the support vendors that we’re involved with—benefits, accounting—I met through the MBA program. Networking through the MBA program has been invaluable. What an MBA did was give me a really good overview of what a company is made up of from a functions perspective—marketing, finance, operations, strategic initiative, and organizational behavior. In a two-year period, we were exposed to every aspect of a corporate entity.

 

 

NAME: Raj Anand
COMPANY NAME: Southern States
POSTION: President & CEO

 

How did your PSU education prepare you for success in the professional market?
I came to PSU as a 21 year-old from India after getting an EE at the Indian Institute of Technology in Delhi. I had no idea of the complexities of a business organization; PSU gave me the foundation that allowed me to understand how a business functions and succeeds. I specially learned a lot about management, accounting, finance and marketing. This background, and my EE foundation, allowed me to succeed in my career.

 

Outside of academics, what lessons and values did you take away from your PSU experience?
PSU was my first exposure to American people and culture. I was lucky to have landed in PSU because this is where I learned that Americas have a big heart and are accepting of others, and treat everyone with respect and dignity. I learned about equality. I learned that America values self-made men and not inherited wealth. I learned at PSU that one’s value and status in society is more based on the person and his/her accomplishments. I learned about American values: hard work pays off; there is equality of opportunity for all; you are what you make yourself; treat everyone with fairness and respect. These values that I learned are enshrined in the core values of Southern States that are posted around the company.

 

Do you have any good stories/anecdotes from your professional career?
My current career as an owner of SSL came about by a chance remark. I was at Siemens doing M&A work, where I had sold a non-strategic business to Southern States in 2005. A year later I was approached by the owner: he asked if I would take over as CEO of Southern States, as he wanted to retire. We had several meetings, and I decided I was not interested in being a CEO of a small company with a limited future. As I was leaving our last meeting, I remarked to the owner I might be interested if I was offered a partnership in the business. Guess what? A few weeks later I got a call with a partnership offer, which I took.

 

What is your most memorable experience during your academic career at PSU?
The one memory that sticks to my mind is a case study in dr. Roger Moseley’s class. The company was having business difficulties, and teams of students were presenting solutions that involved all kinds of marketing and other solutions. When it was all over, however, Dr. Moseley asked if anyone had looked at the balance sheet and cash flow. It came out that the company was bankrupt with no cash. It always stuck with me, how important cash management is, and how a positive EBT can run out of cash. So I always manage the balance sheet first.

 

The main foundation to the MBA + program is leadership, innovation and sustainability. How has this program inspired/changed you?
The program allowed me to look at a business from a CEO perspective even when I was in the lower ranks of management. That ability allows you to dream, and dreaming helps you develop into a leader capable of running a business.

 

 

NAME: Julie Sheldon Huffaker
COMPANY NAME: On Your Feet (business consulting for corporate communication, change, and creativity)
POSITION: Partner & Co-founder

 

How did your PSU education prepare you for success in the professional market?
Certainly, the MBA experience gave me a great overview of all aspects of business. As a result I am more tuned in to the big-picture strategic concerns my clients harbor, and I also feel more equipped to be a strong steward and leader of the business we created.

But the bigger story is this: I entered the program seeking a next step, professionally - I'd worked in marketing strategy and branding in the first part of my career, but had begun to feel empty. I was looking for the place where business and the human spirit come together, and was hoping that somewhere through the course of being in school I'd find it. I did - but not where I expected it at all.

I had this idea that I would go into international non-profit work, microlending or something related to that. Then I took an improv course (amazing that improv is part of the business curriculum!). The ways of working that improv made visible - the same practices high-performing teams use, that characterized the stellar teams I'd been on myself in different companies - struck a chord for me. With a couple of my fellow students, I started to explore team dynamics, how culture influences business success, leadership development… all the rich stuff of organizational development.  Now, years later, I am still in business with the colleagues that started On Your Feet together during business school, our company continues to grow and I keep learning every day.  Fabulous!

 

Outside of academics, what lessons and values did you take away from your PSU experience?
If you want to lead, you have to invest - relentlessly, compassionately, humbly - in growing your own self-awareness. The classes that most informed who I am in the business world today are the ones that informed who I am as a person: dialogue, improv, and courses like that.

 

What is your most memorable experience during your academic career at PSU?
My real-world business project included facilitating a strategic two-day retreat for the client. I was learning as I went, and was so nervous about getting the results they needed. In my hotel room, late at night at the end of the first day, I was at my wit's end trying to figure out how to rejig the second day and get us where we needed to be. I literally remember thinking, "I could get in my rental car right now and drive away..." I actually took a Polaroid picture of myself - grimacing - with fear and frustration. I will never forget that moment! (Mercifully, Day 2 worked out beautifully and the company is still a client of mine, many years later.)

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