Category: Leadership

Posted on

Making Time for Reflection: Module 2 Comes to An End

This post was written by Greg Paylor ’18

The final two weeks of Module 2 have arrived! As have exams, the due dates of many individual assignments, and many team related deliverables. It’s an exciting time and the pressure dial has been cranked up a few notches. In an intensive MBA program such as this one, especially now, I find myself completing tasks and moving on to the next in rapid succession.

Finding time to both reflect on and celebrate successful team projects, or debrief on things that could have worked better, has often taken a backseat to other pressing needs.

One of my favorite assignments from this module came in our Leading for Sustainable Innovation class with Professor Kenneth De Roeck. We were asked to write two “Leadership Reflection” papers on past experiences we have had pertaining to leadership and motivation. Professor De Roeck would then use student responses (anonymously) in class to frame course concepts and organizational behavior theories.

At a very high level, some of the questions that we were prompted with were: “Describe an Experience with Injustice (Unfair Treatment) in the
Workplace”, “Insights about Your Own Less-Than- Ideal Performance,” “Describe a Leader that Inspired (or Inspires) You,” and “Describe Your Experience(s) with Organizational Change.” Sitting down to write
these papers was truly an experience. I found myself thinking about things that hadn’t crossed my mind in years.

As Module 2 comes to an end and winter break begins, first and foremost I am looking forward to spending quality time with my wonderful wife. I am also looking forward to reflecting on these first two modules and really  reexamining and interpreting the experiences that I have had in this program because so much has happened already. It is with reflection that we gain a new understanding and making time for this will be a priority for me going forward.

Posted on

Alumni in Review: Margaret Arzon, Class of 2017

Margaret Arzon is currently working with the Ethical Shareholder Initiative (ESI) as a business consultant. She was interviewed by Isabel Russell, an undergraduate at UVM.

Why did you choose to attend this MBA program?

To learn the skills and tools necessary to build and run social enterprises.

What was your favorite part about the experience?

Networking, learning about teamwork and leadership, and how to run a business.

How are you applying the tools/skills you learned in the program, post-MBA?

I apply tools and skills from the program every day. Just today I was in a meeting and referenced the business canvas model I created with my team in Module 2, for RevitaFiber, and how some of the questions we received about the business applied to the project I am working on now.

What would you tell someone who is considering the Sustainable Innovation MBA?

Definitely do it.

Posted on

Alumni in Review: Meghan Whirley, Class of 2015

Meghan Whirley ’15 is currently working as a Sustainability Procurement Manager for Food Service Partners Inc. She was interviewed by Isabel Russell, an undergraduate at UVM.

What have you been up to since graduation?

Following graduation, I moved to northern California and been working in sustainable food systems and institutional purchasing. I first worked at the University of California – Davis as Dining Services’ Sustainability Manager, then in December 2016, I took a position as the Sustainable Purchasing Manager and Account Manager for FoodService Partners based in South San Francisco.

Why did you choose to attend The Sustainable Innovation MBA program? 

I chose the program for multiple reasons. Primarily, I was seeking to transition into a for-profit business role and to take my experience to the next level. The Sustainable Innovation MBA is unique because it provided me with business skills, and the way to leverage my knowledge better, but truly it trained me to look long-term and with a systems-based mentality in every respect.

What was your favorite part about the experience?

Working in teams taught me a lot in how to communicate and work together in a professional capacity, as well as furthering lessons beyond the classroom. I learned so much from all aspects of the practicum experience, not simply from the material but also by working with Aaron Sonk, my practicum partner.

How are you applying the tools/skills you learned in the program, post-MBA?

I learned so much about myself during the year in The Sustainable Innovation MBA, about my strengths and weaknesses. I carry this love of the truth and feedback — as Joe Fusco would put it — everyday. Applying that to each interaction, and reflecting afterwards, has been so helpful. But also I find that I have more skills in project management and thinking broadly and systemically than many of my colleagues.

What would you tell someone who is considering The Sustainable Innovation MBA?

I have told prospective students that if you’re looking for an MBA there are so many great programs, but if they’re seeking to marry business skills with creating positive impacts, long-term results, and problem-solving in a way that isn’t “business as usual,” then UVM’s Sustainable Innovation MBA is the place to go.

 

Posted on

Innovator in Residence: Marilia Bezerra Offers Nine Lessons and One Question

This post was written by Sarah Healey ’18.

Marilia Bezerra spoke recently to The Sustainable Innovation MBA cohort as the third Innovator in Residence for the year. She is the Managing Partner at CARE Enterprises, CARE’s social enterprise venture that links producers in the world’s poorest communities with the formal markets necessary for those producers to sell their products and services. It focuses on business ventures with the potential for exponential growth and to become game-changers in the fight against poverty.

Marilia’s life has led her on a career path full of sharp turns and road blocks that created her story.

In telling her story she offered nine lessons and pieces of advice to
aspiring entrepreneurs:

Nine Lessions…

  1. Figure out how to become the connective tissue for the problems we need to solve. A fundamental ingredient for all of us stepping into the world is to figure out how to connect people to each other to solve problems.
  2. Telling your story can be limiting.
  3. Be keenly aware of your privilege –- Bezerra talked about how she won the privilege lottery. She grew up during a relatively stable time in Brazil and was raised in a middle-class family that afforded her opportunities in life, but gave her a sense of value of the most basic things.
  4. If you are going to say something, know what it means. When using metrics, many of the numbers mean nothing. For example, the calculation of how many lives a program touched. What Bezerra learned was to ask yourself what it means three time when stating metrics and figures. If at any point you cannot answer, then the metric likely does not have meaning.
  5. Sometimes you will need to take sharp turns to figure out what you are doing, and you need to just go for it! Life takes weird turns, close your eyes and say, ‘Mom & Dad, I got this.’
  6. Fundraising is like running a marathon — it is going to be uncomfortable, but you just keep running through it until it gets better.
  7. How you feel now is not going to last — Bezerra talked about the importance of needing to detach yourself from your story for a point in time. This powerful mechanism allows you to step outside and detach from life to get past the disruption.
  8. Take time off & really take it! –- it is tempting to think about what is next, but Bezerra talked about the importance of taking a real break when you are burnt out.
  9. After doing cool things, the expectation of what is next can be limiting. When you are taking a break and looking for the next steps, people will ask what is next, but do not let that limit your story.

…And One Question

Bezerra finished with a question for aspiring entrepreneurs: How are you going to get really good at working at the edge of chaos?

Posted on

Martine Rothblatt: Innovating Through Radio and Therapeutics

This post was written by Lauren Emenaker ‘18

Martine Rothblatt, Founder and CEO of United Therapeutics, could easily be considered the most interesting and inspiring speaker anyone has heard in many years. Martine visited UVM on October 11, 2017 (International Woman’s Day) and sat with Green Mountain Power CEO Mary Powell for a conversation in front of a sizable crowd at Alumni House. Here’s a brief overview. 

During a break from undergraduate studies, Rothblatt was inspired by traveling and working with a NASA satellite station. She wondered if it would be possible to have something in the Earth’s orbit that could give music to the world. Feeling enthused, she returned to school to study communication. She continued onto grad school and graduated from UCLA with JD-MBA degree. All the while, Rothblatt’s passion for satellite communication continued to remain at the forefront of her life, leading her to become founder and CEO of SiriusXM Satellite Radio.

Continue reading “Martine Rothblatt: Innovating Through Radio and Therapeutics”

Posted on

Considering Leadership Stereotypes in Sustainable Business

This post was written by Julia Lyon ’18 (LinkedIn), a student in The Sustainable Innovation MBA, and a co-editor of the Review.

Picture this: You are employed at a company, in a role that you love, and the CEO is none other than George Costanza. Thinking about his character, do you believe George will be a good leader?

For those of us who are Seinfeld fans, we know that George will likely not be the most effective business leader. But what qualities, assumptions and observations bring us to this conclusion? This question was the opening to the recent Leadership Stereotypes workshop for The Sustainable Innovation MBA students, where the class discussed gender and leadership, implicit biases, and how to apply these insights in leadership and life.

Continue reading “Considering Leadership Stereotypes in Sustainable Business”

Posted on

Innovator in Residence: Laura Asiala

This post was written by Keil Corey, Sustainable Innovation MBA ’18

Recently Laura Asiala, Senior Fellow at PYXERA Global and a Sustainable Innovation MBA Advisory Board member, joined this year’s cohort for an in-class discussion on the role that business can play in addressing some of the world’s most intractable challenges.

Before joining the PYXERA team, Asiala had been the Director of Corporate Citizenship at Dow Corning Company. Over three decades in the corporate sector taught her that environmental and social sustainability are not hindrances to business; rather, they can ensure long-term success and profitability. She carries that vision forward in her current role at PYXERA, where she works to leverage the strengths of corporations, governments, social sector organizations, educational institutions, and individuals to solve complex problems in inclusive and sustainable ways.

Of particular interest to Asiala is how corporations can and must play a role in achieving the United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), also known as the Global Goals. Adopted in 2015, the Global Goals identify specific targets and timelines that aim to end poverty, protect the planet, and ensure prosperity for all. At PYXERA, she is working on aligning multi-sector stakeholders toward those ends.

Continue reading “Innovator in Residence: Laura Asiala”

Posted on

Post-Paris, The Sustainable Entrepreneurship MBA Now More Than Ever

From the Editors

In the wake of the kerfluffle over the United States’ exit from the Paris Climate Agreement, we at The Sustainable Entrepreneurship MBA believe, among others, two very important things.

First, ain’t no stoppin’ us now. Climate change and sustainability, and resource sustainability, represent the most significant economic and business development opportunities in a generation. The business and economic case for these opportunities — to say nothing of the environmental case — is powerful and, arguably, irreversible. According to the New York Times, these opportunities represent a $6 trillion market by 2030. The shift is happening, and the U.S. withdrawal from the Paris Agreement — while discouraging — will do little, if anything, to derail the immense problem solving opportunities, and rewards, around climate change.

Everyday, someone is breaking new ground in the production, conservation, or distribution of clean renewable energy. Everyday, someone is reinventing how we move around — how we transport ourselves and the things in our lives in revolutionary ways that save energy, space, and time. Everyday, someone is innovating and inventing new technologies that change the way we build, rebuild, heat, cool, and live in our homes and businesses while consuming as little as the earth’s resources as necessary.

In short, with or without the Paris Agreement capitalism, disrupted and reinvented, is a force — along with many others — to solve one of the world’s most pressing problems.

Second, our Sustainable Entrepreneurship MBA is part of the solution. More important than ever post-Paris, we must develop a new generation of business leaders who will build, innovate, disrupt, and reinvent climate change-focused enterprises in a world that demands it. In other words, UVM’s Sustainable Entrepreneurship MBA is more important than ever and its graduates increasingly more vital to sustainable businesses.

While traditional MBA education simply turns out people educated in business models, approaches, and ethics that are more a part of the problem than the solution, our mission is to prepare leaders to transform today’s businesses and invent tomorrow’s ventures through a lens of sustainability.

We believe our students and alumni are uniquely prepared to be change agents and to lead within enterprises — or start new ones — that are solving the world’s most pressing problems — including climate change, and with or without a Paris Climate Agreement.

And, in this new reality, we believe our students will be in greater demand by businesses, enterprises, and organizations than ever before.

Learn more, and apply to a program that will not only change your life, but change the world, too.

Posted on

From the Web: In Search of Sustainable Leadership: An Opportunity Mindset

Our search for sustainable leadership has shown how defining vision, values and purpose helps organizations to adapt seamlessly to change. This brings competitive advantage that grows stronger with each challenge, built on courage, enthusiasm and the passion of the human spirit. But before we can define an inspiring vision, we first need to choose a way forward. We will do that better if we first identify a range of options.

Here’s how sustainable leaders are able to identify more opportunities to move forward during times of change.

Learn more (via Sustainable Brands) >>

Posted on

From the Web: US Business Schools Failing on Climate Change

Coca-Cola and Nestlé have recently closed facilities, and Starbucks is bracing for a global shortage of coffee — all due to effects from climate change. Climate change impacts every resource used by businesses: from agriculture, water, land and energy to workers and the economy. No business will be untouched.

Future business leaders are not being prepared for the climate change challenges their companies are certain to face. (Except for those at SEMBA, of course!)

Learn more (via DESMOG) >>