MBA People tab (very) draft content

Student(s)

Can they get any/have I missed any?

Graduate(s)[NB1] 

Plus some excellent quotes in video: https://www.dropbox.com/sh/lddd5yqefwn7l26/AACCF6sZ6CgRHx3ABfQUpLFHa/MBA?dl=0

http://www.victoria.ac.nz/som/study/professional-programmes/mba/profiles

Paddy Faisandier

Director of The Contingent

Take your career to the next level/The start of starting something new/The step up to your start-up

Paddy says his MBA gave him the confidence to start up The Contingent.

“It validated a lot of my experience. It gave me some genuine knowledge and put things in my hands that I didn’t have before.”

Video: https://youtu.be/IHSayEVKudM?list=PLIN52jSigpir8c6EUEiq1Mqnx0m-NeCtL

Toni Janes

Enterprise Change Manager at ACC

Transform your thinking

“The MBA definitely gave me enhanced critical-thinking skills. There’s no question about that. I think a lot more laterally, and the ability to reframe situations and look at them from different perspectives certainly helped with my organisational skills.”

Study while you work

“Once I actually started actually looking at how I could actually make time in my life for study, it became pretty easy. In hindsight, I probably should have started a bit earlier than I did. Keeping balance is important, so that the MBA is a component of your life, but it doesn’t consume your life.”

“If you’re considering doing an MBA, don’t hold back. Don’t question whether you can find the time or make the time, it’s amazing how you can create time that you never thought you had. The financial cost is neither here nor there. It’s actually the cost of not doing the MBA. It’s an opportunity lost.”

Stand-out staff

“I chose to do my MBA with Victoria University after looking at other options and what was available. When I researched the cost and the lecturers that were actually involved, Victoria stood out.”

Video: https://youtu.be/V0LA2GO-zbA?list=PLIN52jSigpir8c6EUEiq1Mqnx0m-NeCtL

Dave Bell

General Manager of printing.com

Entry based on experience not just education

Dave [is general manager of printing.com but being appointed to a role like that was a far off dream when he] left school at 17 with no qualifications.

“I couldn’t see the relevance of most of what I was taught at school and failed just about everything as a result.”

[He spent a couple of years working at unskilled jobs before ]deciding he needed a formal education to have a rewarding career. Dave enrolled in a wide range of papers at Victoria University but struck the same issue[ he’d had at secondary school].

“I listened to all this theory but couldn’t see how it applied to the workplace.”

Practical skills you can apply straight away/Immediately relevant

Dave began part-time MBA study in 2008.

“Twenty minutes in I found myself thinking I could have used this information today, or two weeks or two years ago. Suddenly, instead of wondering when the class was going to be over, I was thinking I need to take notes as I can use this stuff at work.”

In 2011, Dave took on the job of building a network of stores for printing.com[, taking responsibility for developing and implementing a strategy that saw the company bring 36 businesses into its stable].

“The tools to do that came from MBA study. I would never have known where to start and would never have been given the opportunity without my MBA.”

Gisella Carr

Film New Zealand Chief Executive

Take your career to the next level/Shape you career

“MBA study is one of the things that has shaped my career.”

Transform your thinking to build you influence

“What motived me to do an MBA was a desire to deepen my intellectual understanding of management. At the same time, I saw that, around the Arts Council board table, people with a background in law and accounting often carried more weight on a lot of topics than people with an arts background.”

Broaden your skill set

“When I started working as a consultant a few years later I realised the breadth of the degree had given me a wide range of skills.”

Ross Hughson

Former Chief Information Officer (CIO) for Westpac and Inland Revenue

Practical skills

"I led mergers, teams, acquisitions, had a year as General Manager Marketing and wrote the company’s strategic plan—all things enabled, in part, by my MBA.”

John Loughlin

Former chair of ZESPRI Group

Broad scope/Broaden your skills to boost your career

John believes the qualification was also a factor in his early career development. A year after graduating with his MBA, he was head hunted by Westpac to manage investments in the bank’s financial services division.

“That’s where my study on strategy and marketing showed its worth. I had responsibility not just for investing funds, but also deciding where and how we would do it, the capability we required, how we would market ourselves and our strategy going forward. The role required a genuinely well rounded manager.”

Practical/experience counts

“The important prerequisite is to have enough practical business experience to make the course more than a theoretical exercise.”

Gene Turner

Partner at Buddle Findlay

Practical lessons put to work immediately

Gene took many of the ideas he encountered during MBA study back to Buddle Findlay.

“Law firms are unusual business organisations and, like the law, do a lot of things based on historical precedent. I was able to suggest and implement a lot of things from the MBA to make quick improvements in areas like training, knowledge management, feed forward coaching, operational efficiency, using IT, strategy and strategic marketing.”

“But the greatest benefits have come from stronger self-belief in what I can achieve and in being able to make more contribution to the success of the firm[.”

“I think we run a lot more effectively now and we’re achieving good results] – our team’s revenue is around 50 per cent higher than it was in 2008 and we’re rated by leading legal directories as Tier 1 in the areas I work in.”

Grant Avery

Director at KPMG

Entry by experience

He didn’t feel at a disadvantage when he enrolled in the MBA, despite it being his first foray into university study.

“Don’t be put off by not having done an undergraduate degree. I didn’t find the academic demands any harder than other students did.”

Connect

“One of the things the MBA gave me was the opportunity to work alongside other high flyers and professionals – I missed that when working for myself.”

Build influence

“I could go to meetings with very high level people and be confident with the language, terms and the practical experiences they were talking about. I was also better able to take part in discussions and argue my point of view.”

Deborah Battell

Banking Ombudsman

Transform your thinking/learning to think strategically

“The course raises your thinking beyond the everyday—you learn to look long term, see a range of possible solutions and evaluate and analyse the options in a commercial context.”

“It armed me with new skills and a new way of looking at the world.”

Connect your career

She became a strategic management consultant for KPMG, a role which came about “through my MBA network”.

“I like problem solving and working at KPMG gave me exposure to a wider set of industry issues and the chance to apply those strategic and analytical skills I’d developed during my MBA.”

James Te Puni

Chief Executive Officer of Hurricanes and Wellington Rugby

Connect with experts

“In addition to fantastic teachers, my fellow students were an amazingly diverse group of people from different countries and industries who brought a wealth of knowledge and experience to the group.”

He gets together twice a year with the people in his MBA study group, who he says remain among his closest friends.

The value of academic excellence

He researched MBA programmes around New Zealand and says “Victoria came through clearly as having a strong academic record”.

“My wife was also studying for her MBA at Victoria at the time and I could see the value of the programme.”

Richard Starr

Fonterra Key Account Manager

Tools to take your career to the next level

 “The MBA gave me the management toolkit and the confidence to step up and to lead in ambiguous and complex situations, and a business language that allows me to deal with people from all areas of the organisation.”

Professional and personal benefits

“You learn a lot from the course content in lectures and from the Faculty, but I probably gained most from working closely with my MBA colleagues because of Victoria’s collaborative approach.

“My whole MBA experience was one of the best things I’ve done both personally and professionally.”

Vesna Wells

National Property Management Specialist at Realestate.co.nz

Practical application

“I loved the course, particularly the practical component and the ability to apply what I was learning as I went.”

Staff who deliver

”All credit to the lecturers on the programme - we were a tough audience of ambitious people who wanted the best from our studies and they delivered on that.”

Parvathy Muraleedharan

Quality assurance team leader at Xero

Generalist – broaden your thinking/boost your performance

“I chose the MBA programme because, as a computer engineer, I was driven by technology and software implementation alone and I wanted to counter that with a management flair and look at different ways organisations could grow.”

Study while you work

“We had two lectures a day. The first session was 5.40–7.30pm and the second 7.40–9.30pm. Although this may sound painful and tedious, it wasn’t. Classes were not lecture driven alone. There were many group discussions and class activities.”

Staff[NB2] 

Can they get any/have I missed any?

Advisory board?] http://www.victoria.ac.nz/som/study/professional-programmes/mba/advisory-board