Wharton EMBA Blog

The University of Pennsylvania recently welcomed this year’s incoming EMBA classes to Wharton. Despite the tough economy, executive MBA programs remain valuable investments and Wharton is a top choice among applicants. Competition was strong for admission into our first-year classes!

The classes in both locations - San Francisco and Philadelphia – are impressive and diverse students. The 116 students in Philadelphia have an average of 10 years work experience in industries such as healthcare, financial services, energy, real estate, aerospace, and insurance. Others work for the military, the government, or nonprofits. More than 45% of the class holds an advanced degree and 55% are sponsored by their employer.

Nearly a quarter of the East Coast program class is comprised of women and about a third of the class is originally from outside the U.S. The group commutes every other weekend from locations as near as New Jersey and Washington, DC, and as far away as Florida, Texas, and Ontario.

The 96 first-year students at Wharton|San Francisco have an average of 11 years work experience and nearly half of the group holds advanced degrees. The students – of whom 20% are women -- work in industries including semiconductors, biotech, venture capital, technology, and entertainment. Thirty-five percent are sponsored by their employer and 40% are originally from outside of the U.S.

The majority of the first-year students live in the Silicon Valley, San Francisco, and Marin County. However, many commute to the program from locations in the East Bay and southern California as well as Arizona, Idaho, Nevada, Kansas, Texas, Washington, and Colorado.

We’re looking forward to two great years with both groups!

For more detailed statistics about Wharton’s EMBA classes, go to: Class Profiles

When Brian Egras was a student in Wharton’s East Coast EMBA program, his study group called itself the “Townies” since all of the members were from the Philadelphia area. After graduation, staying connected was as easy as meeting for dinner or drinks.

However, just two years after his graduation in 2006, staying connected became a lot more complicated. By then, members of his group had moved to Boston, San Francisco, Singapore, Hong Kong, Shanghai, and Sydney.

“The lesson learned,” he says, “is to not underestimate how fast or far apart you might move from your friends in the EMBA program.” Despite their distance, the “Townies” and other members of their class keep in touch regularly, belong to various LinkedIn Wharton groups, maintain a blog with classmates’ updates, and organize yearly class reunions.

The importance of maintaining your Wharton EMBA network is a message that Egras recently shared with second-year students at the program’s annual Graduation Transition Dinner. “Don’t wait around until you need someone. You need to keep your network alive constantly,” said Egras, a senior advisor at Tyco Electronics in Philadelphia.

“When banking took a hit in the economy, we called our classmates in the banking industry to see how they were doing and if they needed any help,” he said. “And keeping in touch is a great way to learn how other people have made career transitions, moved to different job functions, or even negotiated job packages.”

Monica McGrath, an adjunct assistant professor in Wharton’s Management Department, also spoke at the dinner about the importance of sustaining a network with classmates who not only have shared the same experience of earning an MBA in an intense residential two-year program while balancing jobs and families, but also have significant knowledge and skills in a diversity of industries.

“You don’t just leave Wharton and become a CEO and know everything.  This is a network of people who can provide resources in new areas, who can serve as sounding boards, and who can become trusted advisors who appreciate what you’ve gone through,” said McGrath.

Egras, McGrath, and the other speakers provided plenty of ideas for how to stay connected, ranging from joining alumni clubs and subscribing to Wharton publications like Knowledge@Wharton to attending Wharton conferences and appointing classmates to specific tasks such as helping to connect alumni within their regions.

“We know how busy everyone is and that it can be difficult to stay engaged once students go back to ‘real life,’ but the Wharton EMBA network and resources are too valuable not to take advantage of,” says McGrath.

Read more about the Wharton EMBA Alumni Network.

Read more about Wharton EMBA Alumni Connections. 

Related blog:
Staying Plugged In: Executive MBA Alumna Marla Driscoll Talks about Houston Alumni Club

Despite the rough economy, it’s still a great time to start a business, according to VCs at a recent panel discussion at Wharton|San Francisco.  The panelists – all Wharton alumni -- gathered last month to discuss current developments in the VC community and the impact on entrepreneurs.

Laura Onopchenko, who graduated from Wharton’s West Coast EMBA program in 2007 and is director of Wharton Entrepreneurial Programs (WEP) at Wharton|San Francisco, says the event – the first of several upcoming Friday night panels -- drew more than 160 students, alumni, and guests. “This is a hot topic not only for entrepreneurs, but for anyone who wants to get a pulse on entrepreneurship, find resources, and network within the Wharton community.”

The panelists included Wharton undergraduate alumnus Jim Lussier, general partner at Norwest Partners, Wharton MBA graduate Jim McElway, partner at Weston Presidio, and Wharton San Francisco EMBA graduate Ashmeet Sidana, general partner at Foundation Capital. The event was moderated by the new executive director at Wharton|San Francisco, Doug Collom, who is a partner at Wilson Sonsini.

After the panel discussion and Q&A, the event ended with time for networking. “The newest San Francisco class started recently so this was a great event for them to meet the extended Wharton alumni community and hear about a topic that is essentially part of our ecosystem in this area,” says Onopchenko, managing director at Techfarm Ventures.

West Coast EMBA students also had an opportunity last week to participate in Wharton’s Entrepreneur-in-Residence (EIR) program, which brings successful entrepreneurs to campus for one-on-one discussions with students about their own aspirations as entrepreneurs.  Last week’s EIR, serial entrepreneur Gordon Campbell, general partner at Techfarm Ventures, shared his observations on the current environment for start-ups and reflected on his own experiences as an entrepreneur.

Read more blogs about Wharton|San Francisco:

Ready to Launch: West Coast EMBA Team Wins Top Prize in Wharton’sWe Business Plan Competition Business Plan Competition 

From Contacts to Office Space: EMBA Students Find Entrepreneurial Resources at Wharton in San Francisco “Incredible”

Web-Based Services Workshop at Wharton West an “Intense” Experience

From Speed Coaching to Interview Workshops: Women’s Events in Wharton’s EMBA Program Provide Professional Development and Networking Opportunities

Congratulations to this year’s graduating students in Wharton’s Executive MBA program!

Students in Wharton’s West Coast EMBA program graduated at a May 9th ceremony in San Francisco with guest speaker Peter Robertson, retired vice chairman of the board of Chevron Corporation. The 89 graduating students are quite a diverse group. In addition to doctors and lawyers, the class includes nonprofit professionals and entrepreneurs as well as members of the military, media, and government. Students also work in industries such as healthcare, biotechnology, and financial services.

They hail from places near and far including San Francisco, the Silicon Valley, Seattle, Romania, Russia, India, and China. Three of the students began the program at the Philadelphia campus, but came to Wharton West for their final term.

The 110 graduating students in Wharton’s East Coast EMBA program received their degrees May 17th in Philadelphia at a ceremony featuring speaker Nobel Laureate Muhammad Yunus. This group also represents a variety of industries including aerospace, healthcare, insurance, real estate, and finance. With many students holding advanced degrees, some came to Wharton with backgrounds in traditional areas such as medicine, law, and engineering, but others had backgrounds in international relations, agriculture, physics, and music.

While the majority of students are from the East Coast, some came from states such as Louisiana, Michigan, Oklahoma, and Texas. The class also represents many countries including Brazil, India, China, Canada, Finland, Pakistan, and Nigeria.

We wish these newly minted Wharton MBA alumni the best of luck!

Congratulations to West Coast EMBA students Christiaan Schaeffer, Dr. Erich Horn, and Srini Namineni for winning third place in Wharton’s Business Plan Competition (BPC)!  Not only were they the highest ranked BPC team ever formed from Wharton West, but they also won $5,000.

The team was formed in Ron Pierantozzi's Entrepreneurial Ventures course when they were assigned to form teams and write a business plan. Erich, a practicing eye surgeon, had a friend in the field working on technology that would make artificial eyes look more natural by appearing to dilate. His friend was interested in having Wharton students work on the business aspects of the product so the group pursued that idea for the assignment.

The team soon began using the business concept as a basis for projects in other electives as well such as Prof. Leonard Lodish's Entrepreneurial Marketing course and Prof. Karl Ulrich's workshop on the Development of Web-based Services .  Christiaan jokes that it was “a class project that got out of control.”

Through the classes, the team came up with a revenue model where they would work with ocularists – who custom-make artificial eyes – to sell the “RealisticEye” product to patients. The product includes a polarized disk that is embedded in the artificial eye so the pupil appears to dilate as well as special polarized glasses that activate the effect. With more than one in 400 Americans currently wearing an ocular prosthesis in one eye due to injury or disease, the potential U.S. market exceeds more than 750,000 people.

After winning third place at the BPC’s Venture Finals, the group was excited and ready to move forward with the business, which will likely be run out of Oakland, CA where Erich has his practice. The team is currently in the process of incorporating with the help of the legal services they won in the competition and are adding some improvements to the business plan based on the judges’ comments. 

“All in all, we are ready to go,” says Christiaan.

And we wish them all the best of luck!

Charla Serbent graduated from Wharton’s EMBA program in 2007, but the journey she took to earn her Wharton MBA degree was unique.  During her last semester in the EMBA program, she became the general manager of Asia Pacific for industrial coatings for PPG Industries, which required her family to move from Pittsburgh to Shanghai. As a result of that move, she also needed to switch from the School’s East Coast campus in Philadelphia to the West Coast campus in San Francisco.

The flexibility to switch campuses was part of what attracted her to Wharton’s program. “I had a pretty high degree of certainty that sometime during the program I would change jobs and locations,” she explains. “When I was looking at schools, I thought, ‘Why make a compromise and pick a closer school when I could be moving soon anyway and I can commute to Wharton from anywhere?’”

She adds, “It was difficult to find time in my career to get an MBA because I had been working for quite a while and had 330 employees, managing all of North America. So I wanted to get an MBA at a school where I felt it was worth taking the time to do it and the fact that there were two coasts for Wharton’s program meant I could commute without too much difficulty even if I moved to Europe or Asia.”

In fact, Serbent says that switching coasts during the program was pretty simple. “The faculty and staff were very supportive and it ended up being the perfect balance because I could complete by MBA without having to take time off or pass up a great career opportunity.”

And joining new classmates at Wharton West wasn’t a problem. “It’s a tight community, but I jumped in right away and was welcomed into my study group and project teams,” says Serbent.

As for the long commute from Shanghai, she admits that it wasn’t easy. “Any time you make the decision to do something like work – especially with a job that requires a lot of travel -- and do a challenging MBA program, you are making the decision that you will have a challenging schedule for the next two years, but it’s worth the opportunity cost.”

Looking back, she says it was all worthwhile. “I had moved into a fairly large position with my company with a lot of employees, but I had been learning things like management and financial concepts bit by bit the hard way because my background was engineering. Wharton’s EMBA program provided a great framework,” she says.

Even though Clement Pappas works for his family’s juice bottling business, the decision to earn his EMBA degree at Wharton was a no brainer.

“While it’s likely that if I do a good job I will have an upward career path in my family’s business, I’m also aspiring to be CEO or, at a minimum, work in upper management,” he explains. “I wanted to learn more about all aspects of the business and Wharton has an excellent curriculum that covers every discipline – finance, management, supply chain, strategy, marketing, pricing, new product innovation, and a lot more.  It’s definitely helped me to become a much better, more informed, and more well rounded manager.”

Pappas, who is currently vice president of the Natural and Specialty Sales Division of Clement Pappas Company, based in New Jersey, was even able to take an independent study course on family business, using his company as the basis for a research project. The topic was hiring, retaining, and motivating nonfamily members in a family business, and his paper has since been used as the basis for several HR policies under consideration.

He notes that in addition to broadening his business knowledge, the degree also provides respected credentials. “One thing you face in a family business is that some people will inevitably assume you are just the boss’ son and will get the job no matter what,” he says. “There are a lot of great things about working for your family business, but one challenge is that you often have to prove yourself more than other employees.  Beyond strong job performance, a Wharton MBA is another way to prove myself because it puts a highly respected qualification on the board.”

Another benefit of the program, he says, has been all of the networking that comes along with the intense residential program. “I haven’t done any deals with classmates yet, but one day we may be interested in taking on a private equity partner and I will definitely have some connections in that department,” he says.

“I absolutely recommend Wharton’s EMBA program for others working in family businesses,” adds Pappas, who graduates this spring. “A lot of people may pursue an EMBA degree to help find a new job or gain a promotion, but for people like myself in a family business the knowledge gained and credentials earned are incredibly valuable. Wharton’s program has not only accomplished my goals, it has also exceeded my expectations.”

After running a company with her father in Russia in the 1990s, Maria Merchant’s dream was to someday launch her own business. However, she lacked a business education, as well as contacts in the U.S.

When Rohit Harve was looking at the curriculum offerings for Wharton’s EMBA program, the Global Consulting Practicum (GCP) seemed like an ideal blend of global learning and consulting. The unique course pairs teams of Wharton full-time and executive MBA students and faculty with teams from partner universities in countries such as China, India, Peru, Taiwan and Israel to consult with a client company interested in entering or expanding its position in the U.S. market.

Harve, now a first-year student in Wharton’s East Coast EMBA program and associate director of manufacturing technology for Bristol-Myers Squibb in New Jersey, is enrolled in the course and says he’s already “selling” the GCP to all of his classmates because it’s been so much fun. We asked him to share some of the highlights of the course so far and here’s what he said:

“Our GCP team went to Taiwan in December for a week where we were partnered with students from National Taiwan University and met our client, a software company. The first step was just to build our team because unlike in a company where there is a reporting structure, no one is really reporting to you here.

It was a great learning experience to work with a global international team and a client who speaks very little English and become their trusted advisor. We take for granted that everyone speaks English in the U.S., but here you need to leverage your knowledge about the business and their culture. It’s not as important to get things done quickly, but in the right way that is comfortable for the client.

Also, you don’t always realize how important it is to network with people when you work within a company. But in this case, you need to do market research so you have to cross barriers and talk to people who know nothing about you. The nice thing with the GCP is that people listen when you say you’re a Wharton student working on a project. When you ask for five minutes of their time, they give you 20 minutes. I’ve talked to more C-level people in the last few months than in my years of working. The GCP is a powerhouse when it comes to networking and opening doors.

The GCP is perfect for EMBA students because we already have some background in fields like engineering, marketing, or consulting and we have a knowledge base we can leverage along with what we are learning in the program. All of my classmates are hearing about how much fun we’ve had because in the end we are here to learn as well as have some fun.”

First-year EMBA student Katherine Chen, a director at American Express in New York City, is a member of Rohit’s GCP team. We also asked her to share some of her experiences with the course and here is what she said:

“I have a strategy background in the financial services industry and I thought this would be a great opportunity to expose myself to a different industry. It can be challenging to manage the course with the EMBA schedule because we are working remotely in a virtual environment with an overseas team in a different time zone. There are a lot of conference calls and emails.

When we went to Taiwan, we spent a lot of time with our client to understand their product and decision-making process as well as their corporate culture. It wasn’t like a typical consulting situation where everyone is from the same background and it’s easy to get a proposal together very fast. In this situation, we spent a lot of time working out different ideas, on internal alignment, and influencing each other.  Our team really bonded and it was good we could work together to reach our various milestones.

This course has made my MBA experience even more valuable for me.  Going out of your comfort zone and doing something that is different from your usual day-to-day routine is a good experience. And the course helps you validate some of the things you’ve done in your own work. It builds up confidence in the way you deal with things.”

For more information about the GCP, go to: http://mktgweb.wharton.upenn.edu/gcpcourse/
For a listing of 2009 GCP projects, go to:
http://mktgweb.wharton.upenn.edu/gcpcourse/students/2009Projects.html

While it wasn’t exactly like the TV show Survivor because no one was voted out of Wharton, students in the recent West Coast workshop on the Development of Web-Based Services did vote to eliminate  ideas for web-based products or services they had come up with during a recent four-day workshop.