5 Questions with the MBA Admissions Team at UIC Liautaud Graduate School of Business
In our latest installment of the MetroMBA “5 Questions” series, we speak with Alanna O’Connor, Assistant Dean for Student Recruitment for the Full-Time MBA Program at the University of Illinois at Chicago Liautaud Graduate School of Business. O’Connor talks about the many new opportunities, programs, and events taking place at Liautaud this year and beyond. She also gives advice for candidates interested in applying to the MBA program, insight into outside-the-classroom opportunities, and her pick for best Chicago deep dish pizza.
Are there any new programs, centers, faculty members, or events you can talk about?
“Under Dean Michael Mikhail, our faculty body has grown 35 percent. In fact, more than 50 percent of our tenure-track faculty have been hired since he assumed the deanship in 2012 and many have been quoted as experts in national publication including WBEZ (Chicago’s NPR affiliate), The New York Times, Harvard Business Review, Forbes, and The Chicago Tribune.
The UIC Business Institute for Leadership Excellence and Development (iLEAD) is disrupting traditional classroom notions. This one-of-a-kind experience gives students a competitive edge with teaching professional development courses incorporating innovative approaches such as improvisation.
This spring UIC Business launched a new master of science degree program in supply chain and operations management, or MSSCOM. This program is exemplary of a curriculum designed for tomorrow’s supply chain professional. Led by our extraordinary faculty, the MSSCOM offers students a core set of courses in operations management, data, and supply chain management and expertise in the skill set employers seek.
In terms of events, connecting with our campus to determine fit is an essential part of a prospective student’s B-School research. UIC Business offers information sessions and lunch and learns, Open House events, webinars, classroom visit opportunities, and the chance to connect one on one with a recruitment advisor, current student, or faculty member. Understanding our prospective students have busy lives, we offer many opportunities to meet in person, by phone or virtually.”
What is one area of the UIC Business Liautaud Graduate School MBA student experience that you want applicants to pay attention to?
The Liautaud Graduate School of Business at UIC is located just several blocks from the picturesque Chicago River.
“UIC Business is just steps away from Chicago’s business district, which is an asset for our students in terms of internships and jobs. But our faculty are preparing students to compete in a global market through a quantitative approach to business that ensures our students have not only the management skills they will need, but also the facility and comfort with data and analysis to be competitive hires and successful 21st century business leaders.”
What opportunities, outside of the classroom, does the UIC Liautaud Graduate School offer MBA students to get hands-on experience?
“Through the MBA Capstone project, MBA students partner with local businesses and organizations and use the analytic and problem-solving skills they have developed to address the enterprise level challenges of firms. Our dedicated Business Career Center regularly hosts firms for visit days as well as Career Fairs, and Career Advisors provide one-on-one personal support in resume development, mock interviews, and job searches. Speaker series like our Leadership Breakfast, Executives in the Boardroom, and Alumni 4 U give students the chance to learn from and network with business leaders.”
What advice would you give an MBA candidate interested in the UIC Liautaud Graduate School of Business?
“Graduate school is an investment of your time and energy, and the return on that will be measured for you personally and professionally. UIC Business is an AASCB program located in Chicago’s top public research university. With our connections to Chicago’s business world, prime location, faculty experts teaching in-demand subjects, and thriving network of alumni, your life will be enriched with the knowledge and skills you gain and the people you meet who are interested in helping move your career forward. Get involved beyond the classroom with student organizations, utilize Business Career Center services, go to our special speakers and events series, and make time for fun at UIC Business sponsored social networking opportunities.”
Where can you get the best Chicago pizza near campus?
Chicago’s famous (and infamous) Giordano’s deep dish pizza is near the Liautaud campus.
“This can be a sensitive question because there are so many options depending upon how you like your slice, and whether you want to dine-in or carry-out. There are over 900 spots to get a slice of pizza within the UIC zip code. But if we had to pick just one true Chicago pizza, our choice for best would go to Giordano’s for its taste and authentic Chicago style.”
Americans Are Disconnected With Upward Mobility, Says New Kellogg Research – Chicago News
Let’s explore some of the most interesting stories that have emerged from Chicago business schools this week.
How Closely Do Our Beliefs About Social Mobility Match Reality? – Kellogg Insight
New research from Northwestern Kellogg Assistant Professor of Managerial Economics and Decision Sciences Edoardo Teso assessed mobility rates among social classes in the U.S., U.K., France, Italy, and Sweden and found that Americans’ overestimated and Europeans underestimated “people’s chances of climbing from the bottom to the top of the economic ladder.”
According to the article, Teso wonders whether the disconnect between people’s perceptions compared to the reality of social mobility might “explain why the United States often resists income redistribution policies such as higher taxes for the wealthy, while many European nations embrace them.”
“These perceptions are really deeply rooted,” Teso notes.
“America is famously a land of immigrants where many people did in fact build their own fortunes. In contrast, Europe practiced feudalism for centuries, during which a person’s fate was largely governed by their family circumstances,” Teso’s research claims.
You can read more about research here.
PIMCO and University of Chicago’s Center for Decision Research Announce Partnership to Guide Wiser Decision-Mking – Booth School of Business News
To commemorate the partnership between Chicago Booth’s Center for Decision Research (CDR) and PIMCO, an “innovator in applying research to investment decisions,” the CDR laboratories will be rechristened the PIMCO Laboratories for Decision Research, which will “yield scientific discoveries with the potential to improve individual and social welfare.”
PIMCO Group CIO Dan Ivascyn writes, “Through this novel partnership, we hope to nurture exceptional insights into decision making behavior that will ultimately help PIMCO make wiser decisions for portfolios, clients and employees.”
Booth Dean and George Pratt Shultz Professor of Accounting Madhav Rajan writes, “PIMCO’s spirit of experimentation and interest in asking real-time questions about investing and the economy make it the ideal partner for Booth.”
According to the press release, the PIMCO Decision Research Laboratories will “include a new ‘storefront’ behavioral science research lab to foster greater engagement with the public and to broaden the reach and increase diversity of participants in the research studies.”
Rajan continues, “From PIMCO’s plans to disseminate CDR’s research findings, to conducting joint projects in behavioral science, the collaboration will have a transformational impact on our research enterprise.”
You can read more about the partnership here.
MBA Student Carley Mostar Secures Funding for Her Community – UIC Business Blog
Carley Mostar, Gies MBA ’19
The UIC Liautaud Graduate School of Business recently profiled Carley Mostar, MBA ’19, whose “Info Park” project secured $25,000 in funding from the Ford College Community Challenge (Ford C3).
Conceived as a collaboration between Mostar, the UIC School of Architecture, and the community of East Garfield Park, Mostar dreamt a plan to transform “one of the lots into a member-use space for the community to use as our own public or private space.”
Mostar and the group have hit the ground running, working with “community engagement workshops and have even started researching fabricators and vendors to work with in preparation for construction, slated to start in early spring of 2019.”
Mostar explains the importance of incorporating the voices of the community into her “Info Park” plan.
“It’s very important to me when doing this kind of work to make sure that the people who the work is for have their voices centered in the outcome of the project,” she says in a recent interview.
You can read more about Mostar and the project here.
The Tech Giant Investment in Renewable Energy – Chicago News
Let’s explore some of the most interesting stories that have emerged from Chicago business schools this week.
The New Boom – Mendoza Business Magazine
The Notre Dame University Mendoza College of Business recently discussed why tech behemoths like Google and Amazon have begun to invest heavily in renewable energy technologies—and why this largely U.S. phenomenon is about to go global.
The Mendoza Business Magazine article notes that the reason underlying this new trend is due to the fact that clean energy became cheap energy.
“Once the favorable trajectory of renewable energy economics became apparent, it didn’t take long for some of the world’s largest companies to act. Google and Apple signed trailblazing renewable energy deals in 2012.”
It’s likely that these deals helped generate a domino effect where American and Mexican companies “signed deals for just over 10 gigawatts of renewable energy capacity between 2012 and 2017.”
According to the International Energy Agency, “renewables accounted for nearly two-thirds of new power capacity installed globally in 2016.”
The International Renewable Energy Agency reports that the cost of “generating power from onshore wind turbines and solar photovoltaic panels fell by 25 percent and 73 percent, respectively, since 2010, and predicted that all renewable energy technologies would be economically competitive by 2020.”
According to the school, “The market is ready to ramp up outside the United States, too, in part because U.S.-based multinationals are now looking to buy clean energy overseas.”
You can read the full piece here.
Sarah Siderius Gets the Job Done at Google – UIC Business
The Liautaud Graduate School of Business recently profiled current MBA student Sarah Siderius (’19) whose educational experience at UIC laid the groundwork for her stint as a contractor with Google.org, the philanthropic arm of the tech powerhouse.
Siderius explains how her LinkedIn profile helped her land the position. “As a part of my previous role, I helped my employer establish their philanthropic program. Having this experience on my resume caught this recruiter’s eye, which ultimately led to this amazing opportunity.”
Siderius most recently played an integral role in the Google.org Impact Challenge, Illinois, which awards “$1 million in grants to Illinois nonprofits who are creating economic opportunity in the state.”
She explained that she “enjoyed the fact that she was not only able to work for such an amazing company, but that she was able to give back through her work.”
Find out more about Siderius and her new role here.
How the Coffee Industry Is Building a Sustainable Supply Chain in an Unstable Region – Kellogg Insights
The Northwestern University Kellogg School of Business recently profiled the political and ethical hurdles associated with the newfound excitement surrounding the “quality of Robusta and Arabica” grown in the Democratic Republic of Congo right now. According to the article, “Harvesting, washing, and transporting Congolese coffee beans from the area is fraught with peril, from the dozens of militia groups operating in the east of the country to decades of political instability.”
Assistant Professor of Managerial Sciences and Decisions Sciences Ameet Morjaria, whose research focuses on the East African coffee supply chain, explains, “Development dollars have arrived at the shores of the eastern Congo. For those top dollars to have a lasting impact is not straightforward: farmers are poor, lack support, and struggle to get access to finance.”
“Their trees are old, badly maintained, and low-yielding. On top of that, investors worry about the expense and logistics of getting produce out of the country at volume. And lastly there are issues of insecurity and poor governance.”
Morjaria spoke to two experts on the Congolese coffee industry: SHIFT Social Impact Solutions founder Sara Mason and DRC Producer Group Development Platform Head Angel Mario Martinez Garcia.
Mason explains why it’s essential for companies to continue working in DRC.
“We really hope that in a few years, with positive support from the government, there might be a chance to transform the sector into an agricultural growth opportunity that will fully realize its potential.”
She adds that the actual growers are often vulnerable to exploitation due to extreme poverty, lack of education, and limited ability to communicate with the outside world. “Helping to support strong, transparent producer organizations was one of the drivers for creating the SHIFT DRC Producer Group Development Platform.”
Martinez Garcia says, “A quick fix is never going to work in the Congo. And sometimes it’s a challenge to find someone who’s able to provide resources and time and energy for people to work there in the long run.”
“It is really important to continue supporting producers, to continue increasing skills and knowledge. Because they are the ones, even after we end any activity or any project we have there—in a year or 10 years or 20 years—who will still be there working and living and discussing any future of the coffee sector in the Congo.”
You can read more from Northwestern Kellogg here.
UIC Institute for Entrepreneurial Studies Head Helps Tackle Disaster Relief
Nancy Harvey, executive director of the Institute for Entrepreneurial Studies at UIC Liautaud, has been working alongside Janet Lin, an associate professor of emergency medicine, to devise a business plan for community-based training in disaster preparedness. The hope is to expand disaster risk reduction training in Haiti, a nation constantly bludgeoned by natural disasters. Continue reading…
UIC Professor Talks Leadership on Up Close Podcast
Robert Liden, a professor at UIC’s Liautaud Graduate School of Business, recently appeared as a guest on Up Close, an online, audio talk show of research, opinion and analysis from the University of Melbourne, Australia. The podcast has an audience in 170 countries and is downloaded about 40,000 times each month, according to the program’s website. Continue reading…
Liautaud Part-Time MBA Jumps In Latest Rankings
In a stunning improvement over last year’s list, UIC Liautaud’s Part-Time MBA program was ranked #78 by U.S. News & World Report’s 2017 Graduate School Rankings. According to a press release on the UIC website, this was an impressive jump of more than 30 spots from the 2016 rankings.
