Wharton’s EMBA program is known for having a global focus with its International Seminar; however the addition of global modular courses has taken this to a whole new level. Launched in 2010, the week-long  mini-courses offer students opportunities to learn about topics such as financial institutions in Abu  Dhabi, supply chain management in Shanghai, innovation in India, and leadership and conflict resolution in Rwanda.

Having recently returned from the course in Rwanda, we asked EMBA students Marla Bleavins and Bill Williams to tell us about their experience. Here’s what Marla, a second-year student at Wharton | San Francisco who is a special projects manager for Los Angeles World Airports, had to say:

“Most Americans know about Rwanda because of the tragedy of genocide that happened there in 1994, but we aren’t as familiar with the progress the country has made since then. It’s the fastest growing economy in Africa and one of the safest and least corrupt countries on that continent so I was intrigued to learn more about it through this course, which was taught by Prof. Katherine Klein and called, ‘Leadership, Conflict, and Change.’

Get insights on the future of jobs from a top Wharton professor, learn more about our EMBA program from Philadelphia and San Francisco alumni, and see what our new campus looks like in San Francisco, then make sure to join us for a virtual reception on Mon., January 23 from 9:00pm-10:00pm EST / 6:00pm-7:00pm PST.

Hosted by Vice Dean Anjani Jain, the event will feature a presentation by renowned labor expert Prof. Peter Cappelli on how the global economy is impacting careers and what this means for the future of employee development. Prof. Cappelli, who teaches negotiations, also will share tips that may help you secure support for your MBA studies and career development.

Afterward, a panel of alumni from our Philadelphia and San Francisco EMBA programs will discuss how the Wharton MBA and network have shaped their careers.  You’ll have an opportunity to ask questions of both Prof. Cappelli and the panelists via your computer or mobile device.

In addition, West Coast COO Bernadette Birt will take participants on a virtual tour of our beautiful new San Francisco campus.  A 21st century learning environment, you’ll see how our technologically advanced facility was designed to provide the most cutting-edge and connected classrooms possible.

To register for this live webcast on Jan. 23, click here.

Congratulations to East Coast second-year Executive MBA student Mike Patterson for winning a National Science Foundation Innovation Corps Award!

Patterson and his teammates from the University of Pennsylvania were selected for their venture, Graphene Frontiers.  We asked Patterson to tell us about what it means to have won this award and how he became involved with this startup. Here’s what he said:

“Winning the NSF award was great.  Not only did we win $50,000 for our postdoctoral fellow Zhengtang Lao to work on the venture full-time, but we gained credibility.  The NSF picked only a handful of teams nationwide, and so the award is a validation that we’re onto something big.

Wharton Accounting Professor Christopher Ittner isn’t trying to teach all of his students to be accountants. In fact, the focus of his Managerial Accounting class – a core course in Wharton’s EMBA program - - is on the decisions that managers make using financial data as opposed to the data itself.   We asked Prof. Ittner, whose research areas include performance measurement and cost management systems, to tell us more about the class and what it’s like to teach exec MBA students.  Here’s what he said:

“I’ve been teaching this course in Wharton’s East Coast EMBA program for 15 years and at Wharton | San Francisco for 10 years. And I’ve taught this same course to the full-time Wharton MBA students for the last 20 years.  Needless to say, I understand the material really well!

“It’s very different from a financial accounting course since we talk more about internal decision making and whether the numbers coming out of the accounting system are relevant or not to your decisions.  EMBA students tend to like it a lot because this is what many of them are doing in their jobs every day.

“I really enjoy teaching execMBA students.  Although it’s the exact same course as I teach to the full-time MBA students, the EMBAs bring a different perspective since they can go back to their jobs and apply what they learned right away.  And the EMBAs often bring issues from their work to class, which we discuss as a group.

“In addition to students bringing their real-world examples into class, I often bring examples from my consulting work as well as my research findings into the classroom.

“While you might think that we talk a lot about the economy, it’s not that big of a theme in the class.  Other than it being a riskier environment for decision making because we live in a more turbulent world, the fundamentals of decision making have remained the same regardless of whether people did it well or not leading up to the crisis.

“What has changed in my class is that the industries used as examples have expanded.  Now, we talk a lot about healthcare as well as other areas like the service sector, the motion picture industry and even nonprofits.   The course applies to more than just big manufacturing companies because everyone needs to use financial data to make managerial decisions.

“Another thing I enjoy about teaching EMBA students is the opportunities we have for interaction with the students.  Not only do our classes run for three hours at a time, but we eat lunch and dinner with them.  In San Francisco, our offices are right next to the EMBA area.  We get to know the students a lot more which frequently leads to ongoing relationships years after they have graduated.

“As for flying out to Wharton | San Francisco to teach this course, this is not something that is required of faculty, but rather something we want to do. The majority of us have been choosing to fly out there to teach since the West Coast program was launched 10 years ago.  We do it because we really like teaching these students.

For more information on classes in Wharton’s EMBA program, please click here.

When Brian Davis, a first-year EMBA student, signed up for a six-hour tour of the Gettysburg battlefield, it wasn’t because he’s a history buff. Rather, the director of communications for Allegiant Travel Company in Las Vegas, NV saw it as an opportunity to learn more about leadership and spend the day with classmates.  

“I’m still in awe at the opportunity to be here at Wharton and it’s such a short window that I want to say yes to any opportunity to learn that fits into my schedule,” says Davis, who recently spent a class weekend in Philadelphia with his fellow first-year classmates from Wharton | San Francisco. The Gettysburg tour was an optional Leadership Development Workshop offered to students from both coasts.

Each year, second-year students in Wharton’s EMBA program vote on a location for their International Seminar trip. With options including India, China, Turkey and Brazil, it was a tough decision, but in the end both the East and West Coast classes voted on Brazil.

The BRIC country’s position as Latin America’s largest economy and its strength in a diversity of areas such as steel, oil drilling, and renewable energy attracted the students’ interest. During the week-long trip, they visited local and international companies to learn more about challenges and opportunities in the region.

We’re all excited about Wharton | San Francisco’s move in January to the Hills Plaza Building on the San Francisco Embarcadero. Not only will it provide us more space, but the facility will also feature “a 21st century learning environment.” To learn more about the technology going into the new space as well as other technology initiatives in Wharton’s MBA Exec program, check out Wharton CIO Deirdre Wood’s latest blog on the Wharton Magazine site:

“Kicking off a new academic year is always an exciting time, but that is particularly the case this year as we’re immersed in designing and building classrooms of the future. Wharton’s upcoming move to a new San Francisco facility has provided us an opportunity not only to design the most cutting-edge and connected classrooms possible, but also to bring that technology back to our campus in Philadelphia. As a top business school, our constituents expect a 21st-century learning environment, and we are providing that on both coasts.” more...

Congratulations to Sumant Ramachandra, WG’09, who was recently named one of the 100 most inspiring people by Pharma Voice. With an MD and PhD already under his belt, he entered Wharton’s EMBA program to gain a business education and transition from technologist to business leader. We asked Sumant, who is now the chief scientific officer of Hospira Inc. in Lake Forest, Ill., to tell us more about how his Wharton education has impacted his career. Here’s what he had to say:

Working in Los Angeles as the debt and treasury manager for LA World Airports, Marla Bleavins looked at several nearby business schools with EMBA programs when she decided it was time to pursue her MBA degree. However, in addition to wanting a high level of academic rigor, she also wanted to  differentiate   herself from others in the LA area so she set her sights on Wharton.

Each year, second-year Wharton EMBA students spend a week abroad examining how businesses develop and implement strategy in a competitive global context. While that trip is the culmination of their International Seminar, it’s not uncommon for students to organize additional treks to gain further insight into the economic, political, social and cultural factors that influence business in other regions.

Last month, a group of 21 students from Wharton | San Francisco participated in a trek to Beijing and  Shanghai. We asked second-year student Hari Kannan, a technologist at VCE in the Silicon Valley, to share some highlights from the trip. Here’s what he had to say:

Before coming to Wharton’s EMBA program, Hanson Wong, a principal consultant at Risk Management Solutions in New Jersey, had never swum in the waters of Antarctica, hiked across a desert or summited a volcano. In fact, he had never even gone camping much less rappelled down mountains or zip lined   across steep chasms. However, during his two years at Wharton, he did all of these things through the Wharton Leadership Ventures Program.

“My first venture was to Antarctica, which most people only ever see from a cruise. We not only camped there, but a few of us also decided to jump in the water twice. How many people can say they did that?” says Wong, noting that he added on a week of hiking in Patagonia after that venture.

When Jim Smith entered Wharton’s executive MBA program in 2005, he also launched the Digital Network Group, an IT and management consulting firm with a mission to create economic and social value for local communities. Wanting to work with professors on his particular interests outside of the core classes, he sought out independent study projects that would help him develop his business. 

As a first-year EMBA student, his initial project was with Prof. Terry LaPier on leading social change through the application of information technology. “That experience provided me with an opportunity to develop a framework that effectively leverages the business, government, nonprofit and academic sectors in a cohesive, systematic and repeatable fashion,” he says. “Through that study, I came up with an idea to build a computer assisted mentoring system for students, as well as a platform to help nonprofits improve their own capacity to provide services – both of which are key elements of my business today.”

Divi Gupta graduated from Wharton’s executive MBA program in 2010, but he’s been a frequent visitor on the Philadelphia campus over the last few months. Taking advantage of the lifelong benefit that allows alumni to audit Wharton EMBA classes for free, Gupta explains that he’s been returning every other weekend for finance electives.

We proudly congratulate our newest Wharton MBA alumni!

They’ve accomplished so much in the last two years, balancing work, family, and the rigors of school. They commuted from near and far, many have gotten married, even more have expanded their families, and everyone has made life-long connections.

Coming from a diversity of backgrounds, the 96 students in our Wharton | San Francisco graduating class include successful entrepreneurs as well as executives working in fields like healthcare, technology, energy, consulting, and investment management.  During the program, four got married and 15 had babies with several more due this summer.

Most of these Wharton | San Francisco grads live in Silicon Valley, San Francisco and the greater Bay area, but many commuted from southern California as well as Arizona, Colorado, Idaho, Kansas, Nevada, Texas, and Washington.  And just under 40% of the class was comprised of international students.

Graduating in a May 8th ceremony at Herbst Memorial Theater in San Francisco, their featured commencement speaker was Larry Baer, President and COO of the San Francisco Giants.  29 of those graduates also attended the MBA graduation ceremony in Philadelphia, held on May 15th at the University of Pennsylvania’s historic Franklin Field, with many gathering at the Inn at Penn for a special celebratory breakfast with friends and family.  The East Coast ceremony featured keynote speaker Vikram Pandit, CEO of Citigroup.

The Philadelphia based East Coast class of 114 graduating students also represents a wide variety of industries including consulting, financial services, healthcare, aerospace, and real estate.  Similar to the West Coast class, many students expanded their families during the EMBA program, with seven students who were married and nine babies born.

Most of the Philadelphia class came from Northeast Corridor – Massachusetts, Connecticut, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, and Washington, D.C., but several commuted from Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, Texas and even Ontario, Canada.  International students represented more than 35% of the class.

Graduation is an exciting and important achievement and we wish everyone the best of luck!   Please stay in touch!

As social responsibility becomes a priority for both large organizations and new startups, the Wharton Program for Social Impact is likewise growing in popularity with current and prospective students. Raghavan Anand is a first-year Wharton | San Francisco Executive MBA student who has extensive experience in education- and healthcare-related non-profits.  He spoke to us about what social impact means to him.

What does it mean to be the world’s most expensive MBA program?   While it is a significant cost, students and their sponsors get tremendous value from our program.  Wharton EMBA students on both coasts receive the same education as our full-time MBA students.  They are taught the same classes by the same professors for the same number of hours. They also are held to the same standards of performance and intellectual rigor.  This is the full Wharton MBA program offered in a format to accommodate the schedules of busy executives.

While you might think that most executive MBA students come from corporate environments, there are plenty of Wharton students who come from other backgrounds. Alumnus Stephen Tang is a good example.

After finishing his PhD in biotechnology, Tang started up a technology assessment consulting firm and became the assistant director of the Center for Molecular Bioscience at Lehigh University. However, he quickly realized that he was just as interested in the business of science as he was in the science itself. But to pursue a career path in business, he knew he would need “more seasoning” in business so he applied to and was accepted into Wharton’s EMBA program.

Before starting Wharton’s MBA for Executives Program in Philadelphia in 1995, Aris Chicles was on a general management track in industrial marketing at Owens Corning. However, during the program, he became very interested in corporate strategy and M&A and was able to transition into that area within his company. Subsequently, he worked in a similar role at American Standard Companies before joining ITT in 2006 as senior vice president of strategy and corporate development.

Frank Jimenez had a different path to both Wharton and ITT. Starting out as an attorney in Miami, he later worked for Governor Jeb Bush of Florida before moving to Washington, D.C. where he worked as chief of staff to the secretary of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. By the time he started Wharton’s EMBA program in 2003, he was one of seven deputy general counsels for the U.S. Department of Defense. Later, he became general counsel of the U.S. Department of the Navy, serving through the first 100 days of President Obama’s administration. In 2009, he transitioned into the corporate sector, joining ITT as vice president and general counsel.

New energy and clean tech are hot areas these days, especially at Wharton. With so many students interested in these burgeoning fields, Wharton’s recent Energy Conference was a great opportunity for undergraduate students, full-time MBA students, executive MBA students, faculty, and alumni to connect.

Ian Lombard was director of the technology products group at his computer products company when he decided that it was time for a change.  He wanted to transition into a different industry, but his undergraduate degree was in molecular biology, which limited his options.  His path forward turned out to be Wharton’s MBA Program for Executives in San Francisco.