“One reason sponsors choose to partner with us is they want to hear from this generation, and they are interested in what our students really think. They appreciate the evidence-based recommendations our students provide them,” says Lynne Segall, associate dean of management practice initiatives.

But another big benefit is that students bring an outside perspective. They’re not constrained by organizational realities or past decisions. That perspective is refreshing.

Lynne Segall

Monica Parker, founder of Hatch Analytics and author of “The Power of Wonder,” was the featured speaker at the Showcase event. She engaged in conversation with John H. Harland Dean Gareth James.

Experiential learning opportunities like IMPACT are a big priority at Emory, Dean James says. “This gives them the real-world experience and problem-solving skills they need to secure first-class internships and full-time offers in their field of choice.”

This year’s 16 organization sponsors included lululemon, Coca-Cola, Lowe’s, PAWS Atlanta and Theragenics. Fourteen sponsors attended the showcase in person. Segall says organizations often have rave reviews about the depth of analysis and perceptive questions their assigned student teams bring to the projects.

The IMPACT course is a core part of the curriculum and required for every MBA student. Over the course of a semester, students serve as consulting problem solvers. They apply concepts they learn in the classroom, including an IMPACT class they take the semester before.

One of the principles of the program is to let questions do the heavy lifting.

“That really plays out throughout the whole process, giving sponsors a fresh perspective, helping students focus their work. And at the showcase, hearing the questions the judges were asking gave sponsors different insights into the problems they’re hoping to solve,” Segall notes.

For the Win…

Emory University was the client for the winning student team of Zana Hekmat 24MBA, Lauren Elliott 24MBA, Alex Gonzalez 24MBA, Trang (Lily) Trinh 24MBA, Jesus Castellanos 24MBA, and Katharina Fickendey-Engels 23MBA. The university and Emory Healthcare—together the largest employer in metro Atlanta—access the bond market as a single entity to fund major capital projects and operations. The question on the table was should Emory University and Emory Healthcare issue debt as independent entities. To answer this, the team developed a recommendation framework, analyzing the impact on the Moody’s credit rating as standalone entities.

They also analyzed the industry, competitors, debt capacity, cost of debt, and the strategic and reputational impact of the potential spilt.

“While the actual recommendations made by the team are protected by a non-disclosure agreement, we can share that the team’s recommendation predicted what a resulting rating would be,” says Hekmat, who ran a multilinear regression model to tackle the question.

Hekmat says he knew the team was hitting the mark during the client presentation when gathered executives started nodding their heads and smiling at one other. And during the Q&A with the judges, he and his teammates were contributing equally—a testament to a good rapport they felt from the start.

“We are immensely proud of winning first place in the IMPACT Showcase Competition, as it recognizes our team’s exceptional dedication and expertise in navigating a challenging strategic valuation project and providing a crucial credit rating recommendation,” Hekmat says. “We are grateful for this achievement and the opportunity to make a positive impact on our client’s success.”

A Catalyst for Connection

The signature Goizueta Business School event drew nearly 200 judges. Over half were alumni, Segall says, adding that the showcase is consistently one of Emory’s biggest alumni gatherings of the year. They join hundreds of students, faculty and sponsors in an atmosphere super-charged with excitement and possibility.

“It’s such a fun day,” Segall says. “During the plenary, I had everyone raise their hand if they were an alum who had done a project. Something like 75 percent of the hands in the room went up.”

“What’s special about the showcase is, to my knowledge, no other school does anything like this,” Segall adds. “It’s really a showcase of all of the above and ends up serving as the catalyst for longstanding connections in career and beyond.”

Goizueta IMPACT provides an opportunity for students to accelerate career readiness by learning proven structured problem-solving principles, tools, and frameworks and then applying them to real-life business situations. Client partners span a wide range of industries and projects offered vary each year. Overall, projects are focused on an issue of strategic importance to the organization and provide a “messy, ambiguous problem” to be solved. Learn more about this invaluable experiential learning.

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Their technology-driven strategy landed them in the recent finals of the 2022 John R. Lewis Racial Justice Case Competition (JLCC), where they earned a $5,000 award as Emory’s highest finishing team.

A program of The Roberto C. Goizueta Business & Society Institute, JLCC is the first student-run case competition focused on racial justice. Participants research the history of systemic racism in the U.S. and provide bold, innovative, and actionable recommendations for Fortune 500 companies seeking to solve racial inequality inside and outside their organizations.

For Shanae Smith 23MBA, the competition gave her a way to fight back.

“It was hard seeing the disparities that exist in our society and choose not to do something about it. JLCC gave us all the platform to not only say, ‘here are the issues,’ but also ‘here is what you as a business can do about it,’” she said.

This competition really challenges the companies we work with to essentially put their money where their mouth is. Given the potential impact I could have, it was an opportunity I was not going to pass up.

Shanae Smith 23MBA

Inspiring Words from Former United Nations Ambassador Andrew Young

Director of The Robson Program for Business, Public Policy, and Government and Associate Professor of Finance Jeffrey Rosensweig arranged for Andrew Young – the esteemed Robson Distinguished Lecturer – to step into the role of addressing participants of the JLCC this year. “This competition is likely the most significant new program at Goizueta in many years,” he said. “It has addressed a very real need and shares real-world solutions to our nation’s very deep systemic inequities and racial inequality.”

Rosensweig invited Young—the former United Nations Ambassador, Atlanta mayor, and iconic civil rights leader—to speak to competition participants. In a conversation guided by Natalie Allen, former CNN News Anchor and the primetime anchor for Newsy, the two discussed the evolution of the movement for civil rights change, the hurdles overcome, and the work yet to be done.

In a perfect synergy of the competition’s mission and purpose, Young shared personal stories and spoke about how students with vision and courage will change the way business is done and change the world.

A colleague and friend of Martin Luther King Jr., Young recalled the achievements of their vibrant student days. “We wouldn’t have a civil rights movement without students,” said Young. “Students have the courage and the vision, but they also have the opportunity to grow up together.”

The Racial Gap in Health Care

For Goizueta, Smith joined Katie Hoole 23MBA, Michael Laguna 23MBA, and Aliya White 23MBA to compete as Team Disruption. The name reflected their desire “to create solutions that disrupted the norm,” White said. “The goal of the competition was meant to be bold, and we are addressing racial injustices from a business context, something businesses don’t normally do. The name Team Disruption embodied our boldness, our challenge to the status quo, and the potential for something new.”

They advanced to the JLCC finals by having the strongest proposal related to consulting and professional services. Accenture’s problem statement: “How can we lessen the inequity of quality of care between Black, Indigenous, people of color, and white people?”

Team Disruption’s presentation vividly portrayed the racial gap in health care. They pointed out that Black women today are three times more likely to die in childbirth than white women, and Black and brown Americans are over two times as likely to die from the impacts of COVID-19.

In a 2020 Kaiser Foundation poll, 7 of 10 Black Americans said they are treated unfairly by the health care system and 55 percent said they distrust it. Of the 28 million Americans who are uninsured, 13 million are Hispanic or Latinx, and 5 million are Black.

Understanding How Historic Inequity Relates to Treatment Today

The reasons are systemic. Over centuries in the U.S., people of color were used as test subjects in dangerous medical research such as syphilis “and today we continue to have policies that marginalize communities of color,” Hoole said. “This has all led to distrust between communities of color and the health care industry. It is imperative that we address this issue now.”

“For some, the global pandemic shed light on the disparities of access for health care, but for Black and brown communities, this is something that we’ve known all along and have been experiencing for years,” White said. “This is why we decided to focus on the health and public sector. It is something that we’re passionate about. It’s relevant to us all. And it’s been affecting all of us for a long time.”

The four had first connected through the Consortium, a program dedicated to enhancing diversity and inclusion in global business education by striving to reduce the significant underrepresentation of African Americans, Hispanic Americans, and Native Americans in business school. To add authority to Team Disruption’s recommendations, the four revealed their own experiences with health care inequities, which had motivated them to form the team in the first place.

Smith’s parents, after moving from Jamaica, struggled to find affordable health care for her grandmother. Laguna’s parents came from Romania and Panama and had to find health care for him and his siblings. White’s mom survived breast cancer, including surgery on the wrong breast. Hoole, a former Title I schoolteacher with Teach for America, saw that her students’ lower socioeconomic status led to lesser health care.

When John Lewis passed away, his casket was on display at the Capitol Rotunda and I went to pay my respects. John Lewis has always been well respected and an icon in the Black community and I have always been in complete awe and respect of John Lewis and his mission in life. One of the reasons I can go to Goizueta and pursue my MBA as an African American is because John Lewis fought to end legalized racial segregation in the US. When I first learned of the competition, I knew this was an opportunity to address racial inequality from a different lens and get into ‘good trouble’ as John Lewis would say.

Aliya White 23MBA

Access, Training, and Advocacy

Team Disruption’s recommendations leveraged Accenture’s existing technology to build bridges with Black, Indigenous, and people of color who need health care. Accenture is a global professional services company across more than 40 industries, employing 674,000 people and serving clients in more than 120 countries; its first-quarter 2022 revenue in the health and public service sector was $2.7 billion.

Using interviews with leaders in the health care value chain, and surveys of 350 health care consumers, Team Disruption presented a three-part proposal:

Part One: Accenture’s virtual assistant, Ella, who provides medication reminders, vitals tracking, and appointment scheduling, could be programmed to better relate to diverse audiences and increase access. Ella could provide local transportation options to health care providers, make health insurance recommendations based on socioeconomic status, point to advocacy resources, and offer language assistance.

This is important because Kaiser Foundation data showed that 18.4 percent of uninsured adults said signing up was too hard or confusing.

Language barriers, age, lack of financial resources, and limited access to health care and resources could mean life and death for some individuals.

Michael Laguna 23MBA

Part Two: Accenture can harness its Avenues virtual reality training technology to train hospital staff on diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) and measure its effectiveness. Avenues currently is used for caseworkers, and 75 percent of trainees feel more prepared to succeed. If used for health care workers in Georgia, this technology “could impact 127,000 health care workers in succeeding in situations involving racial bias,” Smith said.

This change could help sickle-cell anemia patients, for example, get pain medication. In one study, 63 percent of nurses treating sickle-cell believe “that addiction manifests itself in sickle cell patients, which is not true, and 30 percent of those nurses didn’t want to give those patients pain medication,” Smith added. “We believe that with a little bit more training on implicit bias we can really help these patients to feel heard.” 

Part Three: Through its Change Management Program, Accenture should hire program managers for health equity, who would ensure the Ella and Avenues programs were implemented and would serve as an advocate for Black, indigenous, and people of color.

A program manager for health equity “is an integral change that needs to be made to the organizational structure of a hospital to really bridge the gap in care,” Smith said. “We found that through our research if there is a DEI initiative, it’s usually on the doctors to discover any error, implement solutions, and make sure that change gets executed. The program manager for health equity would be able to take all of that work off the doctors’ shoulders so they can focus on care.”

In summary, White said Team Disruption sees “the cost to Accenture as very minimum, but the potential of entering this new space is going to be huge for access and training. Accenture will be able to make a huge dent in addressing these disparities.”

Local Beneficiary: Hungry Atlantans

The 2022 JLCC drew 76 applicant teams from more than 40 universities who competed for monetary prizes up to $20,000. The field narrowed to 20 semifinalists: four teams going head-to-head to solve one of five racial justice problems posed by Accenture, IBM/Call for Code for Racial Justice, Moderna, Taco Bell, and UPS.

“The John Lewis Racial Justice Case Competition is a bridge connecting students’ intellect, training, and creativity to business solutions for the pressing needs of society today,” says Lynne Segall 99MBA, associate dean for management practice initiatives and the competition’s faculty advisor. The teams “have given our sponsors a lot to think about and act on.”

During this year’s competition, students from the Yale University School of Management took first place, the University of Southern California Marshall School of Business team took second place, and the Georgetown University McDonough School of Business team took home the Audience Award.

Team Disruption moved into the finals, and a chance for the grand prize, by outpacing three semifinalist teams: Techquity Agents (representing Cornell SC Johnson Graduate School of Management), Carry the Torch (from Johns Hopkins University’s Carey Business School), and Team Act (from The Wharton School). Cornell was among Emory’s four JLCC co-sponsors, including Howard University School of Business, Rice Jones Graduate School of Business, and Yale School of Management.

The five finalists delivered 20-minute live presentations on January 21. They were judged on the potential for impact, the feasibility of recommendations, the creativity of solution, boldness, research quality and evidential support for recommendations, story structure and narrative, slide craft, and presentation delivery.

Each prize-winning JLCC team donates half to a nonprofit involved with racial justice work. Team Disruption donated to Free99Fridge, which provides high-quality produce at no cost to anyone who wants or needs it via their community fridge network in Atlanta.

“We discovered a shared interest for addressing food insecurity,” White said of her teammates. “We wanted to support an organization that was local to Atlanta, supports people of color, and where we could see an impact—$2500 worth of groceries could feed a lot of people.”

Future Growth in Racial Justice Begins with Awareness

Since its inception, the John R. Lewis Racial Justice Competition has raised awareness for business and community to unite in crafting solutions and implementing meaningful change. “This competition is about so much more than the win,” Rosensweig said.

“Our process begins an important dialogue between our corporate sponsors and their top-level executives and some of the best and brightest student minds in the country,” he said, noting Goizueta’s role in hosting the competition each year. “JLCC has staying power, and as its renown grows, we expect our corporate sponsors will compete for the opportunity to benefit from student competitors’ intellectual and analytical thought process as well as their boots-on-the-ground perspective of what racial justice truly means within our communities. JLCC is the springboard for necessary and ongoing change across the United States.”   

As the competition’s faculty advisor, Segall encourages readers to learn more about how you can participate as a team member, corporate sponsor, volunteer, or audience member at Goizueta’s annual John R. Lewis Racial Justice Competition.

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Emory University’s Goizueta Business School today announced the semi-finalists of the 2022 John R. Lewis Racial Justice Case Competition.

To broaden the nationwide impact of this vital initiative that launched in 2021, Goizueta Business School serves as the overall competition organizer and host school. Goizueta has partnered with Cornell University SC Johnson College of Business, Howard School of Business, Rice University Jones Graduate School of Business, and Yale School of Management. Goizueta also welcomes its corporate sponsors Accenture, IBM / Call for Code, Moderna, Taco Bell, UPS, and Momentive.ai.

As the focus of the competition this year, entrants were invited to complete industry-specific applications for the categories of consulting and professional services, food and beverage, healthcare, technology, and transportation and logistics. This year’s competition drew 76 applicant teams from more than 40 universities who will compete for monetary prizes ranging from $5,000 to $20,000. All prizes are a one-to-one split, with 50 percent given to the winning team and 50 percent donated to an organization advancing racial justice of the winner’s choosing.

“I’m thrilled with the quality of the applications this year. It is clear these student teams invested in research to understand their chosen industry and they provided thoughtful ideas about the issues they identified,” says Lynne Segall 99MBA, associate dean for management practice initiatives and senior lecture of Organization & Management. “I hope each team that submitted an application feels proud regardless of whether they are advancing, and I encourage them to keep these issues front of mind as they move on in their careers, as we need all leaders focused on addressing systemic racism.”

In the preliminary round, applicant teams were judged on their ability to identify issues of racial justice in their specific industry and describe business’ role in solving said issues, their problem-solving approach, their rationale for selecting an organization to which their winning would be donated, and their demonstration of why their team represents diversity.

In the semifinal round, applicant teams will be judged by corporate partners, racial justice nongovernmental organization (NGO) partners, faculty, and elected officials who used a numerical scoring system across the following criteria: potential for impact, feasibility of recommendations, creativity of solution, boldness, research quality and evidential support for recommendations, story structure and narrative, slide craft, and presentation delivery.

Twenty Semi-Finalist Teams Announced

Goizueta is proud to announce that the semi-finalist teams advancing to the next round of the competition are:

• Accenture (Consulting & Professional Services)
  • Cornell University, Samuel Curtis Johnson Graduate School of Management
  • Emory University, Goizueta Business School
  • Johns Hopkins University, Carey Business School
  • University of Pennsylvania, Wharton Business School
• Taco Bell (Food & Beverage)
  • Indiana University, Kelley School of Business
  • University of Southern California, Marshall School of Business
  • University of Virginia, Darden School of Business
  • Yale University, School of Management
• Moderna (Healthcare)
  • University of Florida, Hough Graduate School of Business
  • Indiana University, Kelley School of Business
  • Northwestern University, Kellogg School of Management
  • Rice University, Jones School of Business
• IBM / Call for Code (Technology)
  • University of California – Berkeley, Haas School of Business
  • University of Southern California, Marshall School of Business
  • University of Washington, Foster School of Business
  • Yale University, School of Management
• UPS (Transportation & Logistics)
  • Earlham College
  • Georgia Institute of Technology, Scheller College of Business
  • Georgetown University, McDonough School of Business
  • The University of Texas at Dallas, Naveen Jindal School of Business

The Origins of the John R. Lewis Racial Justice Case Competition to Address Systemic Racism and Racial Inequality

This first of its kind competition was held January 21, 2021, spearheaded by Willie Sullivan 21MBA to examine how companies can address racial injustice within their organizations. A team from the USC Marshall School of Business took first place, the Goizueta Business School team took second place, and the Harvard Business School team took home the audience award.

The 105 team applicants were narrowed to 24 teams of students from across the country that investigated how their assigned corporation could best use its resources to address issues of racial injustice and disparities in wealth, health, and education. Named for the late Atlanta Congressman, Fortune 500 companies including Walmart, Salesforce, HP, Johnson & Johnson, Southern Company, and Truist Bank joined as corporate partners to serve as models to help their organizations address structural racism.

“2020 was a time of reckoning; it enabled those who could not or historically chose not to see the deep roots of inequity in America to not only open their eyes to these realities but also to intentionally move in solidarity with black communities in the name of racial justice. While we are no longer sitting in that moment, the need for transformative racial justice work in both business and society persists, as it has for centuries,” says Jasmine Burton 22MBA, co-managing director. “As a coordinating leadership team, we are thrilled to see that diverse students across the country are continuing to use their skillsets and mindsets to showcase their commitment to racial equity, while also seeking to support companies in making lasting change to their DEI practices both within their companies and beyond.”

A program of The Roberto C. Goizueta Business & Society Institute, the John R. Lewis Racial Justice Case Competition brings together current business leaders and top students from across the country to go beyond short-term solutions and bring lasting change. The final round will be virtual and hosted by Emory University. Please register to join the final Zoom presentation on January 21, 2022. #JohnLewisCC22

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Applications are now open for Goizueta Business School’s second John R. Lewis Racial Justice Case Competition. The competition seeks student leaders to investigate how companies can address racial injustice within their organizations. The 2022 competition expands its leadership by including students from prominent universities across the country to organize the event and host the semifinals. The application deadline for student teams is November 19, 2021.  

Partner universities include Cornell University SC Johnson College of Business, Rice University Jones Graduate School of Business, Yale School of Management, and Howard University School of Business.

“At Goizueta we know the issues of injustice and inequality are so big that we can’t be territorial,” said faculty sponsor Lynne Segall, associate dean for management practice initiatives. “We need to lock arms and be in this together, leading a broader coalition of university students to make a difference.”

This year, volunteer judges will select 20 semifinalist teams that will be assigned to one of five corporate partners. In December, each team will be given a case prompt specific to their corporate partner’s racial justice and equality goals. The students will then work to create bold, innovative and actionable racial justice and equity initiatives targeted to create lasting change.

“At Goizueta, we prepare principled leaders to have a positive impact on business and society,” said Karen Sedatole, Interim John H. Harland Dean of Goizueta Business School. “I am so proud to see our students and partners coming together to push for critical change to strengthen business and communities alike.”

The John R. Lewis Racial Justice Case Competition was started in 2021 by MBA student Willie Sullivan. He saw dozens of businesses releasing statements on racial injustice and wondered what actionable steps were being taken. With business representing the most trusted institution throughout the country and globally, he asked, “What are companies doing to address issues of racial injustice?”

In its inaugural year, the first-of-its-kind competition had more than 500 students from 52 universities participate. 

• The winning team from the University of Southern California Marshall School of Business created a plan for Johnson & Johnson to use products and incentives to inspire one million Black girls to study STEM. 
• Other companies that participated in the 2021 competition include Walmart, Salesforce, HP, Southern Company, and Truist. 

The competition is part of The Roberto C. Goizueta Business & Society Institute. The institute represents an elevated commitment by Goizueta Business School to explore how businesses can create long-term value, while addressing the social and environmental challenges of our time. The goal is to reimagine business to solve society’s biggest problems.

“Cornell, Rice, Yale, and Howard will help extend our reach to more applicants, new sponsors, and more people interested in the finals,” says Kegan Baird, Goizueta Business School 22MBA, who serves as managing director of the case competition. “It’s incredibly unique to have the opportunity to participate in or lead something like this in an MBA or academic career. It feels wonderful to take action and make something meaningful happen.” 

To learn more about how you can get involved with the John R. Lewis Racial Justice Case Competition, visit emory.biz/jlcc.

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About 75 miles east of Goizueta Business School, Dave Thillen began realizing in 2020 that his deeply rooted, effective, volunteer mentoring program could benefit from professional consulting.

For decades he had loved the frontline work of supporting hundreds of rural teenagers to set individualized life goals and begin to achieve them. The students attend the Title 1 Greene County High School with 98% of families reporting low income and 90% of students identifying as minorities, including a seasonal migrant worker population. Thillen matched students with mentors, mostly retirees, living near Lake Oconee. As donors came forward, last year he formed the Thillen Education Foundation, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit, with a board of directors. “A starter kit,” he called it.

The need for professional consulting grew quickly with the program. This semester, 82 career coaches are working with 350 students. In the fall, 110 coaches have committed to work for years with 450 students until they graduate. Walmart, GMS, Ernst & Young, and other corporate partners are involved along with local government, schools, and community partners. 

As an incentive to learn and participate in personal coaching and mentorship, Thillen gives each graduate a minimum $1,000 “Dave Dollars” earned scholarship, so the foundation needs to function as a trustworthy steward of its donations.

“Student mentoring is like a planting a garden,” said Greene College & Career Academy CEO John Ellenberg. “You go ahead and plow because you know it’s going to rain. Now it’s raining, and we needed the expertise of Goizueta’s MBA students to show us how to scale our operations.”

How could the foundation work better to help the high school students even more? That question led the Foundation to Goizueta Business School’s IMPACT program, which tapped Modular Executive MBA students to come up with concrete answers to sharpen Thillen’s work. 

MBA Students Flex their Multi-Disciplinary Muscles for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion

Sandy Duke 21MBA, a student team member from Macon, called the Thillen consulting project a chance to flex “our newfound MBA muscles and skills from all of our disciplines.” His team members work in finance, email integration, and academic information systems. He is a former surgeon and is now executive vice president and chief clinical officer for Atrium Health Navicent System.

“The bonus was that Thillen is a nonprofit,” Duke said. “At this point in our society, there are so many issues of disparity and equity. At my hospital, I lead vaccine distribution, and we are looking at disparities and inequity in the vaccine and disease processes. This project really showed me that we can’t solve for disparities when our basic needs are not being met. Working on this project was the cherry on top of my MBA experience.” 

The three MBA teams delivered so well that within a couple of weeks, Thillen, 76, has already implemented their recommendations for his foundation, including new roles and responsibilities for his board of directors, establishment of a board of advisors, investment in a new website, and implementation of a new customer relationship management (CRM) system. “In fact, we’re delighted to share with the teams that our funding has grown since April by $275,000, in part because of their targeted advice.” 

The IMPACT process was eye-opening. “It was really cool that so many MBA students from so many backgrounds all brought something to us,” Thillen said. “We knew we needed help reshaping our work. They understood what we are about and where we are at. They were a true group of professionals who gave us something completely unique, and so on target with what is happening in the world today.”

Every Goizueta MBA student must complete an IMPACT course, in which they solve real-life problems for businesses that have requested consulting assistance. Thillen Foundation was among 20 organizations that Goizueta MBA students consulted with in spring 2021. More than ever, the IMPACT program is addressing issues of diversity, equity, and inclusion.   

“Goizueta Business School believes that business and society working collectively can deliver a more equitable and sustainable world, and the IMPACT curriculum provides experiential opportunities for our students to get involved and make a difference,” said Lynne Segall 99MBA, senior lecturer in Organization & Management and associate dean of Goizueta IMPACT. “Working with partners like the Thillen Education Foundation, our students grapple with real-world issues, which expands their cultural knowledge and builds their skills.” 

Connecting Despite Social Distancing 

During the discovery phase of the project, the MBA teams mostly worked with the information that Thillen could provide online and virtually. Among Duke’s MBA team’s recommendations were endowment funding and strategic recruitment of board members for their legal, financial, marketing, and fundraising skills. 

Duke, however, arranged a visit that produced more targeted consulting recommendations for Thillen—and profound impact for Duke personally.  

“Consulting isn’t simply looking in a textbook and you know what to do,” Duke said. “It’s stepping into a role that balances academic work with the unique needs of the organization that needs consulting. It’s looking at the assets that the organization brings, and the limitations imposed on the organization. I didn’t feel I could do that easily on Zoom.”

On site, he understood better what was at stake for Thillen and the community. The large closet with food, clothing, shoes, and basic hygiene items for students in need hit him the hardest. 

“There are pockets in the community that do not have running water,” said Duke. “The program needed a roadmap in the near term and long term for lasting impact for generations. Being on site, I appreciated the scope of what they were doing and what the kids needed. I had a better sense of Dave and the spoken and unspoken desires for the organization, especially about making the Thillen Foundation sustainable beyond Dave Thillen’s lifetime.”

Without the recommendations, “We might have morphed eventually to what we have now, a board with a very purposeful output,” Ellenberg said. “Our impetus to change that dynamic came from having a whole bunch of MBA students saying that we need this from the get-go.” 

“The IMPACT teams helped accelerate our time frame for everything,” Thillen said. “This was not just an exercise. Their recommendations were imperative.”

The impact was shared: Thillen challenged the Goizueta teams to map out their own goals in a structured, thoughtful, life plan. 

Duke took stock. He had served on nonprofit community boards for scouting, health care, and religious organizations, and had selected the Goizueta Modular Executive MBA program for its rigor, reputation, and alumni network. The Thillen project sparked him to consider his own personal legacy. 

“Being in his community and talking to Dave Thillen has helped me calibrate what I want to do and the impacts I want to leave long term,” Duke said. “I was surprised at what I learned at that intersection of academia and his personal passion project, because what he has done in that community is not little. I’m continuing to contemplate what that means for me.”

Ultimately the impact of the MBA teams’ work on behalf of Thillen Education Foundation may reach much further than families who are underserved in Greene County. With businesses embracing diversity, equity, and inclusion as part of their core principles, the students could be helping change the face of business.

Through the support of Goizueta students, each day the Thillen Foundation is shaping lives and supporting kids to ignite their full potential. “Our work is a little louder now because of social justice and inclusion,” Thillen said. “The whole point of this work is that when we ask who can run major corporations, the answer can be some of our program kids. And that’s exactly why we continue to work so hard to make an impact.”

Goizueta IMPACT provides an opportunity for students to accelerate career readiness by learning proven, structured problem-solving principles, tools, and frameworks and then applying them to real-life business situations. Clients span a wide range of industries and projects offered vary each year. Overall, projects are focused on an issue of strategic importance to the organization and provide a “messy, ambiguous problem” to be solved. Learn more about this invaluable experiential learning. 

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IMPACT is a required class that matches student teams with companies and organizations to develop strategies to solve their real-world business problems. With projects in consumer products, higher education, healthcare, municipal government, communications, financial services, and energy, among other industries, the 20 organizations participating in the spring 2021 semester received fresh insights and well-researched consulting recommendations. The students were able to put theory into practice. Roughly one-third of the projects tackled challenges involving diversity, equity, and inclusion.  

“Goizueta IMPACT extends the value of the business school into the business community, and addressing diversity, equity, and inclusion is one of the most critical challenges in business today,” said Lynne Segall, associate dean, Goizueta IMPACT and senior lecturer in Organization & Management. “Because each student tackles a timely issue for a company or organization, the Goizueta MBA degree has greater value. It’s a win-win-win for the school, our students, and the community partners that we appreciate so much.”  

Among others, the projects included a major company looking for marketing solutions in a Latin American country experiencing pressure from currency devaluation; a public organization that wants to respond more efficiently to requests from people who are not proficient English speakers; and a major environmental nonprofit needing to ensure its investments align with environmental, social, and governance (ESG) best practices. 

Here is a more in-depth look at three recent IMPACT projects:

A Joint Venture to Train and Employ Homeless People and Veterans

First Step Staffing, which provides janitorial services at Emory, prioritizes employment for men and women experiencing homelessness and those who are veterans in need, so they can take the first step out of poverty and homelessness. Founded in Atlanta in 2007, First Step is now the largest nonprofit, alternative staffing agency in the country, and is 95% self-sustaining with earned revenue from business customers. 

A partnership with Goodwill of North Georgia, which provides work training, was a possibility, but the two organizations needed help hammering out what the arrangement would look like. 

“In looking for more ways to have even bigger impact, we explored a formal collaboration with First Step Staffing,” said Jenny Taylor, vice president of career services for Goodwill of North Georgia. “What it took to bring it to actionable next steps was the bright, talented team of Emory MBA students and their IMPACT project. This is the second time we have worked with IMPACT, and this is the second time the student team won first prize from the judges. It is a testament to their stellar work.”

“I had worked with a team of students from Emory before and knew they provided a professional approach to their projects,” said First Step CEO Amelia Nickerson. “The IMPACT program provided targeted, in-depth research, and potential solutions. Our goal was to have several forms of partnership vetted with budgets and timelines, which we received.” 

She went on to say, “The team from IMPACT met and exceeded my expectations, providing a thoughtful level of research and presenting conclusions and recommendations concisely with easy-to-follow next steps. I would recommend the program to anyone! Really great experience.”

A Menu of Offerings to Help Feed Autistic Children 

The Children’s Feeding Program, at Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta, helps children who have chronic and severe feeding disorders. IMPACT student teams were asked to develop a go-to-market strategy for a new, highly effective therapy to treat eating disorders among autistic children. 

“Our initial question focused on a specific treatment model, called the Autism MEAL plan, which involves a treatment manual that our group viewed as the potential market opportunity,” said Emory University School of Medicine Associate Professor of Pediatrics William Sharp.

His team asked IMPACT for recommended next steps for extending the Autism MEAL plan to families outside metro Atlanta. 

The student team saw a broader opportunity: the Children’s Feeding Program could provide training and continuing education for frontline providers serving children with feeding disorders. 

“The Autism MEAL plan could be part of this offering, but not the lone focus of our expansion efforts,” Sharp said. “IMPACT was a valuable experience that met our expectations by providing a novel perspective about the treatment landscape and how our team has the potential to provide a solution to an unmet need.”

Diversifying a Customer Base for Personalized Beauty Products

Function of Beauty is a startup that uses technology to customize skin, body, and hair care products, and offers trillions of possible formulations so each customer receives a product as unique as their fingerprint. The company recognized that their current customers are not reflecting the diversity and inclusion that Function of Beauty can serve. 

“My hope was to have some smart people, who are removed from our day-to-day realities, unpack our problems and questions and come back to us with actionable insights and plans that we could move forward with,” said Chief Marketing Officer Lorna Sommerville.

Sommerville connected to IMPACT through her friendship with Omar Rodriguez-Vilá, associate professor in the practice of marketing and academic director of education at The Roberto C. Goizueta Business & Society Institute. Both had worked at The Coca-Cola Company. 

IMPACT students helped Sommerville and her brand team understand the perceptions and needs of Black, indigenous, and people of color, and develop product changes to better serve their needs. Students also consulted on leveraging Function of Beauty’s sustainability efforts in marketing.  

“The weekly check-ins were always good discussions, with the IMPACT teams posing tough questions, pushing us to ask ourselves why we’ve been approaching things the way we have, and how we could improve,” Sommerville said. 

“The teams uncovered great consumer insights, and then provided frameworks through which we could think about the areas that needed to be addressed. They left us feeling really clear as to what we had to go and do. Now we just actually need to do it!”

Interested in becoming a Goizueta IMPACT client? Learn more about our project-based partnerships.

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In the fall semester, students are immersed in Goizueta IMPACT’s core curriculum—courses and casework specifically designed to build the foundational skills necessary to excel in any area of business and to learn a structured approach to solving those messy problems. In the spring semester, students apply their newly minted practical skills to real world, ambiguous problems on behalf of clients such as Delta Air Lines, The Home Depot, Porsche Cars North America, Kimberly-Clark, Mailchimp, nonprofits, and community organizations. “The IMPACT project was a fantastic way to leverage everything we’d learned the previous semester,” said Sharma. 

For Spring 2021, 26 MBA teams and six BBA teams worked on a total of 23 real-world projects for 18 different sponsor companies. To earn a spot in the Showcase, each team gave a three-minute “elevator pitch” that outlined their project recommendations. Pitches were recorded and all students were randomly assigned six videos to watch and respond to a question. The top 14 teams presented their final client recommendations to more than 250 judges (a mix of alumni and business leaders), who identified the top three teams and crowned the first-place team “Goizueta Gold.” 

Like last year, 2021’s Showcase took place online, albeit with a few new features. Industry and “mini-reunion” breakouts were added to the schedule to enable alumni to connect. “It was our way to mimic running into your classmates on campus,” said Kore Breault, program director, Goizueta IMPACT. Showcase organizers also introduced “Goizueta Greats,” 10-minute, TED-like talks by Goizueta faculty “to give something back to the project sponsors and judges who were giving so much to us,” added Breault.

Sharma, along with Zad Adloo 22MBA, Kegan Baird 22MBA, Cesar Castro 22MBA, and Matthew Mastriforte 22MBA, captured “Goizueta Gold” on behalf of Goodwill of North Georgia. The non-profit had tasked Sharma’s team with exploring the feasibility (and building a business plan for the potential launch) of a joint venture between it and a non-profit staffing company. “We all trusted each other and we worked so hard for the client,” Sharma explained. “I learned so much from my incredible team. I already know that I have really strong friendships going into second year.”

A faculty advisor worked closely with each team to ensure it was on the right track and had the resources it needed. Jeff Rummel, associate professor in the practice of Information Systems & Management worked with Sharma’s team. Teams also had a second year IMPACT Coaching Fellow—a student who completed the Goizueta IMPACT project the prior year. Willie Sullivan, 21MBA worked with the first-place team. Elizabeth Hitti 21MBA, who will join Georgia-Pacific in a strategy role this July, worked with the second place team (Rachael Augostini 22MBA, Jessica Lewis 22MBA, Jonovan Sackey 22MBA, Nainika Sehgal 22MBA and Sam Wang 22MBA) and third place team (Julia Dong 22MBA, Brandon Makinson 22MBA, Kyle McLain 22MBA, Zachary Nusbaum 22MBA and Jakob Perryman 22MBA), both of which had been assigned Georgia-Pacific projects. Saloni Firasta Vastani, associate professor in the practice of marketing, served as faculty advisor for the Georgia-Pacific teams.

Hitti’s two teams had very different working styles. One team addressed the project much like Hitti, who was a consultant at Deloitte before coming to Goizueta, would have. The other team took a different approach. “There came a point where I was like, this isn’t how I would do it, but they’re doing well,” she explained. “That mindset shift was great for me. Sometimes you can learn more from the teams that do things differently.”

Each team was allotted 25-minutes for its Showcase presentation, and another 20 minutes for Q&A. The final scores were tabulated based on the team’s problem solving and recommended solutions as well as the team’s delivery, ability to communicate ideas, storyline, slide deck, and how it managed the Q&A. 

For the last 10 years, Carrie Schonberg 97C 03MBA has attended the IMPACT Showcase as a judge. “The Showcase is one of the events I most look forward to each year,” said Schonberg, who enjoys re-connecting with faculty and staff (many of whom were at Goizueta when she was a student). During her time at Goizueta, Schonberg, chief marketing officer, Ashton Woods Homes, competed in Goizueta Marketing Strategy Consultancy, or GMSC, the precursor to Goizueta IMPACT. “These projects are a great way for corporations to get a different level of insight and perspective than they would get from people in their own company,” she said. 

Kevin Kyer 05MBA, who lives in Geneva, Switzerland, was happy to be able to take part in the both the 2020 and 2021 virtual Showcases. Kyer, Hatch CoLab’s executive-in-residence and a self-described digital transformation leader, hopes to see a permanent, “hybrid type” way for alumni who can’t be on campus to attend the Showcase online. “It expands the experience to make it available to more people and to have their feedback,” Kyer explained. “It’s a great way to connect better and learn more.” 

Meeting Goizueta Greats and Reconnecting with Alumni 

In addition to his role as a judge, Kyer joined a mini-reunion and dropped into a Goizueta Greats session, of which there were five. Omar Rodríquez Vilá, associate professor in the practice of marketing and academic director of education at The Roberto C. Goizueta Business & Society Institute gave a talk titled, “Towards a definition of an anti-racist brand: concepts, actions, and tools to advance the practice of racial equity in the marketplace.” 

Other topics included “Startups and big companies: ‘It’s complicated,’” given by Amelia Schaffner, director of entrepreneurship, The Roberto C. Goizueta Center for Entrepreneurship & Innovation, and “Revolutionizing finance by valuing your customers,” presented by Daniel McCarthy, assistant professor of marketing. Erika Hall, assistant professor of Organization & Management and faculty advisor at The Roberto C. Goizueta Business & Society Institute, talked about “The effect of the racial labels African-American and Black on societal and organizational outcomes,” and Wes Longhofer, associate professor of Organization & Management and executive academic director at The Roberto C. Goizueta Business & Society Institute, discussed his most recent book, Super Polluters: Tackling the World’s Largest Sites of Climate-Disruption Emissions and what it tells us about our energy system and the future of the planet.

“Goizueta Showcase is a day where we showcase not only our students, but our project sponsors, faculty and school,” said Lynne Segall, associate dean, Goizueta IMPACT. “I am so proud of our students, thankful to our project sponsors and appreciative of the many judges—everyone played an important role in making Showcase a success.”

Take part in learning more about the Goizueta IMPACT Showcase, watch Goizueta Greats videos, and read more about the student teams and their real-world projects.Read more about Goizueta IMPACT. 

Listen to the Goizueta Effect Podcast on “Reimagining Business as a Catalyst for Social Change” with Wesley Longhofer.

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In fall 2019, Kamile Lister 21EvMBA entered the Evening MBA program at Goizueta Business School and made a calculated decision that would transform her future plans and the way nurses care for patients. Lister’s crossroads toward consultancy came in the IMPACT class, which requires all MBA students to solve real-life problems for businesses that have requested consulting assistance.

Some of Lister’s classmates chose to work on an issue with a big corporation in metro Atlanta, but Lister was intrigued by a new innovative data science initiative at the number two graduate nursing school in the U.S., Emory’s School of Nursing.

NeLL, which stands for Nursing electronic Learning Library, is a suite of apps for teaching, learning, and practicing nursing data science. NeLL is linked to more than a trillion anonymized healthcare data points. In pilots, Emory nursing students could quickly see NeLL’s ability to reveal whether trends they were witnessing at the bedside, with their patients, were evident in a broad spectrum of patient data; these insights are now propelling system-level, nurse-led solutions to healthcare challenges.

“NeLL addresses several academic and practice needs,” says Linda McCauley, PhD, RN, FAAN, FRCN, dean of Emory School of Nursing. “For one, nurses are generating huge stores of data that hold the clues to factors associated with better outcomes in health. However, much of that data—which nurses spend inordinate hours charting and logging—goes overlooked and remains unused.”

“On top of that,” she continues, “there are widespread barriers to nurses gaining the technical skills they need to tap into these large datasets and answer questions directly relevant to care. Because NeLL includes nursing-sensitive data (among other types)—and because it includes teaching apps—it solves for analytics issues that have existed in nursing for decades.”

With so much potential in the tool, Emory School of Nursing needed a go-to market strategy to expand its reach to new markets. They turned to the Lister and the IMPACT team at Goizueta Business School – and the rest is history.

Data Informs Decision Making

“Any precise and lasting change in healthcare needs to start with data,” said Rose Hayes, the nursing school’s director of engagement. “Because of the incredible scope and quality of NeLL’s data—and its ease-of-use—we knew NeLL would resonate with many markets. But we had to find the right market: One that would uphold our mission and keep nurses and patients at the center of focus.”

“We approached the IMPACT program,” continued Hayes, “to build this long-term vision, informed not just by strong values, but also the latest best practices in business, analytics, and informatics. That’s what they delivered—and it has been a phenomenal, mutually beneficial partnership ever since.”

So how does NeLL put data to work? Nurses observe and assess patients all the time; and they use their intuition and clinical knowledge to consider whether a patient’s current state could be linked to broader patterns of illness and care. They make notes in patient charts, fill out assessments, complete reports related to national quality indicators, and more. NeLL scientists have cleaned and organized vast stores of nursing-sensitive data (and many other types of data) to make them instantly searchable and downloadable.

NeLL offers more than data alone. It contains teaching and learning apps to ensure schools can prepare the next generation of nurse leaders—and that nurses at the bedside can become digitally enabled for the 21^st Century. The data repository is constantly growing. With this level of access, nurses can use NeLL to design intervention studies, processes, products, and businesses. A NeLL tagline: “Every nurse can be a changemaker. They just need the right data.”

“With access to this database, we can make observations and research that can potentially save lives,” said Emily G. Newell 18Ox 20N, whose honors research used NeLL to calculate savings when a nurse monitors the anesthesia level in heart patients who have had transcatheter aortic value replacement surgery. Newell was among 10 Emory nursing students, from undergraduate to doctoral levels, who piloted NeLL. They uncovered insights such as racial disparities in opioids administered to breast cancer patients.

“NeLL can be used to explore factors contributing to health disparities as well,” said Hayes. “Because it contains rich demographic data from across the spectrum of care, that information can be cross-referenced with health outcomes and other data points to better understand inequities—and enable data-driven approaches to address them.”

The Impact of Goizueta IMPACT

IMPACT empowers Lister and every MBA student to be more ready to succeed in business and provides value to local businesses and nonprofits. The program started three decades ago as a student club for marketing projects. Goizueta Business School is one of only six schools in the nation that includes such experiential learning opportunities as a graduation requirement for MBA program students.

“Our secret sauce is execution—the way we do it,” said Associate Dean Lynne Segall 99MBA, who directs IMPACT. “We invest in project-based learning and we are proud of the ecosystem we have created to ensure that our students deliver high impact work.

IMPACT program director Kore Breault determines which projects the MBA students will consider. “NeLL was a unique business issue tucked into the School of Nursing, she said. “There was no clear solution so it provided the students a great opportunity to learn about another school at Emory while wrestling with a real-time issue.”

The nursing school needed to monetize NeLL as a teaching, learning, and research tool, and to make it self-sustaining. It needed to follow Emory’s legal and ethical guidelines, especially involving patient privacy. The NeLL team asked IMPACT students to analyze, evaluate and rank funding options and assess their return on investment. The eight IMPACT student teams also would identify and assess possible end users and partnerships for NeLL.

Alok Gupta 09MBA, the faculty advisor, assigned Lister to one of those teams. With assistance from the business school’s librarians and alumni, the teams analyzed NeLL’s stakeholders and main obstacles to market. They came up with possible solutions that were presented with advantages and drawbacks.

“We had to look into education, nursing, and hospital programs to see where this database would have the most sustainable value,” Lister said. Some of Lister’s classmates had consulting experience, but not in higher education or health care. NeLL impacted them, too.

“We had to follow the paths and identify any concerns, risks, or legal considerations, and represent our findings in a nutshell to the nursing school.”

Hannah Courtney 21MBA had consulted in the energy and utilities sectors, with data and artificial intelligence; IMPACT gave her a rehearsal space for testing new tools for new clients. Through NeLL, she learned about health care informatics and the Six Thinking Hats, a strategy to diversify her mental approach to problem solving. She was ecstatic to hear about NeLL’s rollout.

“IMPACT was a resounding, positive experience,” she said. “Now more than ever, with COVID-19 healthcare and different patient outcomes, NeLL gives nurses the ability to unlock a lot of knowledge.”  

Classmate Reena Patel 20MBA said NeLL demonstrated how private educational institutions like Emory operate without Sarbanes-Oxley regulations for corporate disclosures and accountability.

“I learned how to deal with ambiguity in complex situations,” said Patel, a CPA with corporate consulting experience who now works at Amazon. “I expected to learn mechanisms for both personal and professional life—structured problem solving, complex situational communication tactics, critical assessments and analysis, and advocating for a company as an independent consultant. This IMPACT class exceeded my expectations.”

Lister’s confidence grew as she met her teammates, who worked at Porsche, The Coca-Cola Company, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and in real estate. “Those are huge names, and I am in higher education,” she said. “I knew consulting was where the best of the best went, and you had to be really sharp, well-rounded, and flexible. Working on NeLL, I could see what I needed to achieve, and how to develop the abilities and capabilities for consulting.”  

NeLL Rolls Out

The nursing school has enjoyed the ongoing return on investment and GBS partnership resulting from the IMPACT collaboration. Likewise, Goizueta has been pleased to expand its reach, resources, and opportunities in the healthcare sector. 

“IMPACT has led to strong relationships for Emory Nursing within and beyond Goizueta,” Hayes said. “They helped us see the market landscape from a global 360-degree view and determine the most strategic plan for our product. IMPACT students even showed us where our nurse scientists can have built-in allies and connections far beyond our current collaboration.”

As the NeLL rollout nears, the IMPACT program presented its showcase of student work on May 13. The day served as a homecoming: In 2021, more than 350 registered judges, including 282 alumni, represented 26 states and 12 countries. IMPACT relies on alumni judges to pay forward the feedback that they received in this experiential class.  

“IMPACT is intense,” agreed Gupta, a self-employed consultant to mid-market merger and acquisitions firms. “IMPACT is not one and done for our MBA students. It’s a skillset to help you in the long run of your career.”

At Goizueta, MBA students, solve real-world challenges for corporations, nonprofits, and other organizations, building a bridge from theory to practice. Learn more about the power of IMPACT to influence critical endeavors like NeLL. 

To partner with the Project NeLL team or find out about making NeLL available to your organization, contact ProjectNeLL@emory.edu.

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The Roberto C. Goizueta Award for Leadership is the highest honor given to a student graduating from Goizueta Business School. Funded by The Goizueta Foundation, it is presented annually to two graduating Goizueta Business School students—one BBA and one MBA—who during their time at school have embodied the values and leadership qualities exhibited by Mr. Goizueta. Candidates are evaluated based on key criteria including: a love of learning, inspirational leadership, creative thinking, courage and commitment, transparency and trust, and excellence and integrity. Each honoree receives a $25,000 award and identifies the faculty or staff member at Goizueta who had the greatest impact on them during their time as a student. The faculty or staff members selected each receive a $5,000 honorarium. 

“At Goizueta, we are preparing principled leaders to have a positive influence on business and society,” said Karen Sedatole, Interim John H. Harland Dean of the Goizueta Business School. “Students like Lori and Willie are shining examples of our core values in action. We value our partnership with The Goizueta Foundation and their unwavering support of convening the brightest minds to solve the world’s biggest problems.”

“We are honored to support this important award,” said Olga Goizueta Rawls, board chair and chief executive officer of The Goizueta Foundation. “I congratulate Lori and Willie on receiving the Roberto C. Goizueta Award for Leadership and on their many important contributions to the Goizueta Business School community and their peers, which have also helped to bring recognition to the school and its programs.”

Meet Lori Steffel 21BBA: Student Government President, Community Changemaker, and Teaching Assistant

With a deep commitment to scholarship and community, Lori Steffel maintained high honors during the COVID-19 pandemic while also serving as the Emory University Student Government Association president, overseeing four divisional councils, managing a $1.4 million budget, and balancing numerous campus leadership responsibilities. Steffel was also the lead teaching assistant for two core classes in the undergraduate curriculum: Strategic Management and Business Law. 

Among her many achievements, Steffel created an Undergraduate Student Leadership Council, initiated the Student Artisan Market and Emory Food Security Fund, co-launched the Emory Votes Initiative, and created a Transportation Committee to evaluate making shuttle routes more responsive to student needs during the pandemic. 

Steffel’s fellow BBA seniors and peer leaders wrote, “It is hard to find someone at Emory who Lori does not know or who has not been touched by her intellect and kindness. During her tenure as SGA President, she has been a fearless advocate for students and the Emory community.”

Inspired by her mentor and Professor in the Practice of Business Law Allison Burdette, Steffel praised the educator for whom she has been a teaching assistant.  “She weaves her students’ lives into class examples to help us remember the content, and she also takes an interest in us beyond the classroom,” Steffel wrote of Burdette. “All of this becomes even more impressive when you factor into account that she teaches every single student in the business school; her ability to connect with and support students is unmatched.” 

Meet Willie Sullivan 21MBA: A Powerful Voice for Justice

For opera singer Willie Sullivan, portraying the role of Alfredo in the Verdi opera “La Traviata” was both moving and powerful. With his rich tenor voice, he imbued awe within a hushed audience that savored his every note.

At that moment in his life, Sullivan could have no idea that he would graduate as a National Black MBA Scholar of Goizueta Business School’s Class of 2021, where his powerful voice would once again become the instrument for inspiring emotional response — this time in the realm of racial justice.

Ever conscious of how classroom learning can translate into real-world impact, Willie Sullivan, along with Goizueta leaders and classmates, conceived of, envisioned, and managed the execution of the inaugural John R. Lewis Racial Justice Case Competition. The competition inspired over 500 students from more than 50 universities and leading businesses including Walmart, HP, Johnson & Johnson, Truist Bank, Salesforce, and The Southern Company to create innovative and actionable racial justice initiatives for those companies. 

Associate Dean for Goizueta IMPACT Lynne Segall noted, “After hearing Willie talk about his vision, it was impossible for anyone to say no.”  

Sullivan also received the Fall 2020 MBA Core Values award for Courage. In February, he was honored with the Leaders in Corporate Citizenship “Rising Star” Award” by the Atlanta Business Chronicle. 

“As I have often said, real societal change is hard,” Sullivan noted. “It takes people showing up over and over again, even when the camera crews and media have moved on. It takes showing up when you are tired, stressed, or dealing with other issues.”

For her passionate support of the John Lewis Case Competition, Sullivan recognized Segall as the faculty member who most influenced his Goizueta journey. “Professor Segall stayed committed to this competition through family commitments, a large course load, and being an active member of her civic community,” he said. “I am still surprised with how much she is able to accomplish. I don’t even question it. I am just thankful she came into my life when she did in order to make my vision a reality, and to continue the work of John Lewis, Martin Luther King, and so many others for racial equality.” 

Learn more about the critical work of The Goizueta Foundation to inspire motivated young people to learn and succeed. Find out how The Roberto C. Goizueta Business & Society Institute is transforming business to solve society’s challenges through cutting-edge research, innovative programming, and principled leadership. 

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The 105 team applicants were narrowed to 24 teams of students from across the country that investigated how their assigned corporation could best use its resources to address issues of racial injustice and disparities in wealth, health, and education. Named for the late Atlanta Congressman, Fortune 500 companies including Walmart, Salesforce, HP, Johnson & Johnson, Southern Company and Truist Bank joined as corporate partners to serve as models to help their organizations address structural racism.

The winners of the inaugural John R. Lewis Racial Justice Case Competition will divide their monetary winnings between the team and the racial justice/inequality organization of their choice.

• First Place ($20,000) – USC Marshall School of Business working with Johnson & Johnson. Half of the winnings will be donated to Step Up for Students and Black Girls Code.
• Second Place ($10,000) – Emory University’s Goizueta Business School working with HP. Half of the winnings will be donated to One Goal of Metro Atlanta.
• Audience Award ($10,000) – Harvard Business School working with Truist. Half of the winnings will be donated to The Advancement Project.

Goizueta launched the student-led idea last summer after the police shootings of Breonna Taylor, George Floyd and Ahmaud Arbery. Sullivan saw businesses releasing statements on racial injustice but wondered what happens after the statements are posted. He wanted to create a competition that looked beyond the press release and into what could be done to address racial injustice and create lasting change.

The six finalist teams included:

1. Harvard Business School working with Truist
2. Yale School of Management working with Walmart
3. MIT Sloan School of Management working with Salesforce
4. USC Marshall School of Business working with Johnson & Johnson
5. Emory’s Goizueta Business School working with HP
6. MIT Sloan School of Management working with Southern Company

About Goizueta Business School at Emory University

Business education has been an integral part of Emory University’s identity since 1919. That kind of longevity and significance does not come without a culture built around success and service. Emory University’s Goizueta Business School offers a unique, community-oriented environment paired with the academic prestige of a major research institution. Goizueta trains business leaders of today and tomorrow with an Undergraduate degree program, a suite of MBA programs (Full-Time One-Year MBA, Full-Time Two-Year MBA, Evening MBA, and Executive MBA), a Master of Science in Business Analytics, a Doctoral degree, and a portfolio of non-degree Emory Executive Education courses. Together, the Goizueta community strives to solve the world’s most pressing business problems. The school is named for the late Roberto C. Goizueta, former Chairman and CEO of The Coca-Cola Company.

Contact:
Mitch Leff, Leff & Associates, (404) 861-4769, mitch@leffassociates.com
Kim Speece, Leff & Associates, (404) 849-6579, Kim@leffassociates.com

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The John R. Lewis Racial Justice Case Competition is the first case competition focusing on the intersection of business and racial inequality, and the family of Lewis, gave permission for its naming.

“We wanted to do something actionable,” said Willie Sullivan 21MBA, speaking of his MBA classmates. His inspiration came from a Harvard Business School case note on racial inequalities in American history.

“We had protested, given money, and were looking for what else we could do,” Sullivan recalled. “How could we take a business case note and have students come up with strategic frameworks for a major corporation to do something about large societal issues?”

Because Sullivan had lived in Missouri in 2014 when rioting erupted in Ferguson over the police shooting of Michael Brown Jr., he expected reaction to George Floyd’s death from people of color, but not from so many of his Goizueta MBA peers from such varied backgrounds. But in June during an open meeting to discuss events called by Brian Mitchell, associate dean for the Full-Time MBA Program, the idea of a case competition was born and fast-tracked.

Sullivan stepped up as managing director, pitching corporate sponsors and coordinating 32 MBA students and eight Goizueta faculty and staff. The John R. Lewis Racial Justice Case Competition is structured to be welcoming to all.

“We wanted something to open the door for people who are new to this,” Sullivan said of diversity, equity, and inclusion work. “We wanted to take students who weren’t engaged with this subject to take human capital and apply it to the big structural issues of a company. My feeling is that it will take a large group of people of all ages and skills to solve issues of injustice.”  

Lewis’ death in July 2020 “seemed like a sign to connect with his family, and it worked out well,” Sullivan said. “He is such a staple in Atlanta and has a personal connection with Emory, and there’s that gorgeous photo of him at the Emory commencement. It was a no-brainer to name the case competition after him.”

The competition opened for entries November 9, with a November 30 deadline. The 105 teams from 52 universities represented undergraduate and graduate teams from the most prestigious business, public policy, public health, law, social work, and medicine schools in the U.S. Two dozen judges, mostly from companies with a social justice mission or from universities, screened the entries to produce the 24 semifinalists announced December 7.

Because universities could enter more than one team, the semifinalists include multiple teams from Goizueta, Harvard Business School, MIT’s Sloan School of Management, Northwestern’s Kellogg School of Management, UC-Berkeley’s Haas School of Business, and USC’s Marshall Business School.

The following universities are represented by a single semifinalist team: Penn’s Wharton School of Business, Yale School of Management, Boston University’s Questrom School of Business, Carnegie Mellon’s Tepper School of Business, Cornell’s Johnson Graduate School of Management, Dartmouth’s Tuck School of Business, Rice University’s Jones Graduate School of Business, University of Alabama’s Manderson Graduate School of Business, UCLA’s Anderson School of Management, University of Rochester’s Simon Business School, University of Virginia’s Darden School of Business, and Vanderbilt’s Peabody School of Education.

Each semifinalist team is currently conducting research with support from SurveyMonkey and forming recommendations for one of six event sponsors (HP, Johnson & Johnson, Salesforce, Southern Company, Truist, and Walmart). The last leg of the competition will be held online on January 21, during Martin Luther King Jr. Week. The six remaining teams will make their final presentations before a panel of judges and the winner will be announced. The event will be open to the public. First prize is $20,000 and half of prize money will go to a company chosen by the winner that must be involved in racial reconciliation and inclusivity work. 

Each team is answering this question: How can that corporation best use its various resources (not just financial) to address issues of racial justice in one or more of three areas: wealth/income disparities, health outcome disparities, and educational/skills attainment gaps?

How the student effort began

The question began forming at the June meeting shortly after Floyd’s death. “That was a moment of absolute urgency,” recalled Mitchell. “George Floyd’s murder was horrific, and also the latest in a series of racist and violent acts that included the killings of Ahmaud Arbery and Breonna Taylor in a span of a few months. I did not have a specific outcome in mind when I brought the students together, but I did feel compelled to match the urgency of the moment by opening a space for us to talk candidly as a community about what was happening and how we felt about it.”

Mitchell said he “wanted to assure our students that they are part of a community that values social justice, abhors racism, and is outraged by what we were witnessing. I did not want them to feel isolated or unheard just because school was not in session. And personally, I wanted to share my own thoughts and feelings as an African American man experiencing this crisis in a deeply personal way.”

Vulnerability and courage were critical to the case competition getting off the ground, Mitchell noted.

The students who participated in the gathering after Floyd’s death “were speaking up and sharing their experiences and vulnerabilities,” he said. “A few students wondered aloud about wanting to help but did not know how they could make a difference, which took some courage to admit among peers. In response to that, Willie Sullivan singlehandedly demonstrated our core values by pushing back on the idea that anyone had limits on the amount of influence they could have.

“Willie reminded everyone that having a Goizueta MBA was going to open doors that could lead to vast resources and reach, which could be applied to bringing about a more just society. In that moment Willie challenged everyone to broaden their thinking from ‘what can I do?’ to ‘what can I get my company to do?’ It was brave, brilliant, and inspiring.”

To come up with a brand-new competition structure, Goizueta student organizers and their faculty volunteers borrowed from case competition models and project-based experiential learning. “This design is completely original,” said Lynne Segall 99MBA, associate dean, Goizueta IMPACT, which connects companies to Goizueta students, who then apply theories from the classroom to help solve real-world business problems.

How did an untested concept hatched in June evolve to include so many major corporate partners and peers from across the country? Answer: Nonstop learning by doing.

“There was no real window to do detailed planning to figure everything out up front,” Segall said. “So we have been flying the plane while designing pieces and parts of it. It’s working because we have a committed group of student leaders who are fully engaged.”

Leading the way is Sullivan, 33, a Goizueta National Black MBA Scholar with a nontraditional MBA background. From Jonesboro, Arkansas, he majored in music as an undergraduate at Arkansas State and trained as an opera singer in the master’s program at University of Michigan. He most recently worked in development for the latter, and chose Goizueta Business School partly to escape northern winters and to live in a major city. When he graduates in the spring, he will continue at Deloitte, where he interned as a senior consultant in human capital strategy.

Bringing ideas to life

Prospective Goizueta MBA students are welcome to preview what the Goizueta program is like through the John Lewis Case Competition itself and the story of how it came to be.

“What Willie’s experience shows is that if you have an idea and the grit to make it happen, this institution will stand behind you,” Segall said. “I tell prospective students, if you want to go beyond just getting an MBA, and instead have a full MBA experience, then this is the place. I know this firsthand, both as an alumna and as a faculty member. There are countless examples of other Goizueta students innovating and contributing to the success of the school. It’s not a surprise that we are able to attract high caliber talent with initiative.”

For Mitchell, the event “demonstrates our commitments to strengthening the relationship between business and society, and to developing principled leaders who will have a positive influence on both. The establishment of the competition also reflects the value of our community and what we describe as our ‘intimate learning environment.’ Willie Sullivan had the courage and vision to create this competition.”

Continuing Mitchell added, “Importantly, Willie also had the relationships, trust and access to senior leaders throughout the school to bring it to life in such an incredible way on such a short timeline. Willie is leading an incredible effort in launching this endeavor, from fellow students up to our Interim Dean, Karen Sedatole. That level of community engagement has attracted sponsors, judges, and media to the competition, and it is a hallmark of the Goizueta Business School.”

Attend the online finals of the John R. Lewis Racial Justice Case Competition on January 21 by registering online.

The post From 2020 unrest, MBA students create John R. Lewis Racial Justice Case Competition appeared first on EmoryBusiness.com.

One avenue the team took advantage of was to partner with Lynne Segall, associate dean of Goizueta IMPACT, to offer an applied consulting experience senior seminar course to 31 BBA students.

“Those students had the opportunity to consult with a nonprofit client and gain some real experience to put on their resume, as well as earn a senior seminar credit towards graduation,” Hershman said.

The BBA CMC also continued to offer appointments through the summer, with two hundred-plus students taking advantage.

“My team put a lot of thought, effort, and attention into what can be done this summer from a personal and professional development perspective as opposed to only focusing on searching for an internship,” Hershman said. “We reframed our conversations around how to help students think about all the different ways that they could grow.”

Virtual internship impact

Their efforts paid off as students like Chike Onyia 21BBA completed virtual internships. Onyia completed a virtual internship with Citi.

Citi provided several extracurricular opportunities by assigning all interns to different groups spanning across various departments. Students were tasked each week with creative challenges that could be completed virtually.

“Through these projects, I made a lot of connections with my fellow interns and even more importantly, made friendships that will last for a very long time,” Onyia said. “Citi used a variety of different routes to make our experience as memorable as possible given the atypical virtual environment we found ourselves in.”

Additionally, the company hosted several virtual events such as magic shows and watching Hamilton live on Broadway.

“The culture was incredible, and everyone was so willing to help me and educate me about what their specific jobs were,” Onyia said. “By the end of the internship, I was not only able to figure out where I wanted to position myself in the firm, but I also gained a lot of really good connections along the way. Citi was prepared to go across the full spectrum to make us feel like we did not miss out by having a virtual internship.”

Trekking virtually along

Students had the opportunity to participate in virtual career treks, often a week-long, high-touch experience where students get to visit and meet with a variety of companies and alumni in a particular industry.

This year, Sarah Leist, director of employer relations, led the charge in helping the BBA CMC “figure out how to make the treks virtual by engaging with our companies,” Hershman said. “Sarah talked them through what our students were seeking to learn and gain and made those treks more interactive.”

One benefactor, Madison Cherry 21BBA, attended the Rotational Program Trek and Consulting Trek, the latter included virtual meetings over two-days with Bain & Company, Capgemini, Deloitte, EY, Insight Sourcing Group, Applied Value Group, and FTI Consulting. Each company started with an information session and then moved to breakout rooms where students had the opportunity to speak and engage with alumni who worked at those firms.

“The breakout rooms made the trek much more personal,” Cherry said. “Most company sessions had enough alumni to meet with five to ten students. These small groups made everyone feel more comfortable to ask questions and participate.”

After attending the treks, Cherry felt better equipped to navigate the full-time recruiting opportunities in a virtual world.

“The thought of landing a job in the wake of a national pandemic seemed daunting at the beginning of the summer,” Cherry said. “However, the treks provided me with a lot of confidence. I realized companies planned to recruit, and alumni were more than willing to help students.”

Engaging alumni virtually

One silver lining of the virtual learning environment, according to Hershman, is the ability for students to interact with alumni all over the world.

“We’re able to engage alumni that we never would have asked because of geographic constraints previously, so we’re able to have folks from all over the country and all over the world from different companies interact with our students virtually,” Hershman said. “We’re able to involve more alumni in ways that we haven’t before.”

One such alum is Yasmeen Johnson 19BBA who works at PwC in Chicago. She participated in the BBA CMC Alumni Panel and Networking Night where recent graduates shared their experience in consulting. Panelists were able to answer questions from students and join breakout rooms to have small group discussions.

“It is really great to see how involved and engaged students are during these virtual experiences that were previously in-person,” Johnson said. “I think this also shows how ‘change-agile’ this generation is, which will lend very well to working in the corporate world.” 

She also participated in the strategy & management consulting career panel for pre-BBA and newly admitted BBA students, where panelists focused on answering questions about the area of study and how it applies to the work being done post-graduation.

“I cannot stress enough how important it was for me to interact with alumni and other professionals during my recruiting process,” Johnson said. “It is extremely valuable for students to interact with other alumni to build relationships, learn more about a firm/company from an alumni perspective and cultivate an Emory community outside of the ‘walls’ of the business school. I encourage all alumni to stay connected and get involved.”

The work and support continue

In addition to offering networking and virtual skill-building programming, Goizueta’s BBA CMC also redesigned its professional development course by making it more accessible for students in different time zones, incorporated more asynchronous content, and created interactive learning activities for the live class sessions.

“The class has been intentionally designed in such a way to prepare students for their internship search this semester, for their full-time search next year and for subsequent searches that go well beyond,” Hershman said. “It’s not just about getting a job right now, it’s about building the skills and teaching them how to fish, so to speak, so they can be successful in the future.”

Hershman said the BBA CMC’s goal is to help create a community and an environment where students can find success, pandemic or no pandemic.

“Goizueta students are incredibly resilient. One of the things that I’ve really appreciated about our engagement and interactions with them is that all of our students understand that this is something bigger than them and us,” Hershman said. “Our students have been really eager to engage virtually, and in some ways, some of our programming is better than it was because we’re able to engage new and different elements.”

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