Join us from 12:00 – 1:00 p.m. on Friday 25 June for Smurfit Women, Inspiring More‘s Pride Month Webinar: “Diversity in the Workplace.” We are honoured to be joined by Sara R. Phillips, Chair of the Transgender Equality Network Ireland (TENI) and Aongus Hegarty, President of Dell Technologies for International Markets. Sara and Aongus will discuss their experiences around building greater inclusion and equality for the LGBTQI community in society and in the workplace.
Sara R Phillips has been involved with trans activism for over 25 years. She is currently in her third 3-year term as Chair of the Board of Directors of Ireland’s national trans organisation, Transgender Equality Network Ireland (TENI). She is the founder, researcher and archivist of the Irish Trans Archive and was one of the lead negotiators to the Gender Recognition Act 2015, serving on the Governmental review of the act in 2018. In that same year, Sara was honoured as Dublin LGBTQ Pride Grand Marshall. She is also a board member of the National Women’s Council of Ireland, the Treasurer of both the International Trans Fund in New York and Transgender Europe in Berlin. Sara is currently the National Manager in Ireland for multinational construction materials manufacturer CPG-Europe.
Aongus Hegarty serves as President of Dell Technologies for International Markets, an organisation spanning 170 countries where he has responsibility for all revenue, customer relationships and strategy. A respected communicator on business, innovation, leadership, digital transformation, sustainability and diverse and inclusive workforces, he was recognised by The Economist Global Diversity List as one of the Top 10 Diversity Champions and was appointed by the Irish Government to join the Better Balance for Better Business (BB4BB) Review Group to help increase participation by women on boards in listed and private companies. At Dell, Aongus co-leads the Global Women’s Network, is a member of the Global Diversity Council, chaired by Michael Dell, and co-leads the company’s Customer Advisory Boards.
December 8, 2017. I landed in Dublin for the first time with my husband and my then 5-months old son, Yahya. One year later I reached a point where I was sleepless, jobless and hopeless!
I worked as an architect for more than seven years back in Egypt. I enjoyed my career to the fullest, and was excited to start elsewhere and broaden my experience. I knew that finding a job in Dublin wouldn’t be easy, but it turned out to be nearly impossible: I had no connections; my experience was unrecognized and I kept enduring one rejection after the other. I had so many reasons to leave and I kept saying, ‘Dublin, I like you, I want to stay, but something’s gotta give. You have to give me a reason to stay!’
January 2019, I came across the MBA experience day at UCD on LinkedIn. And that was it! The moment I entered the campus, I had this gut feeling that this is where I want to be, and this is where I will be. A couple of months later, I had my first acceptance letter from UCD and although I couldn’t secure a scholarship at the time, I knew it was worth coming back for. In July of 2020 I finally made it. With a spot in the MBA program and a generous scholarship, I couldn’t be happier to say I’m a UCD Michael Smurfit Business School FTMBA candidate for class 2021.
Zoom Star Yahya!
Since Yahya has been starring in most of the lectures, breakout rooms and meetings, I might as well reveal the surreal life of pursuing an MBA with a 3-year-old on the loose. After a pretty messy start in the first couple of weeks, I realized that I need to get myself together if I wanted this to work. There has been a learning curve to everything on the MBA, and managing family obligations was no exception. I had to adapt my mindset that I would do my best, bearing in mind that there will be few compromises here and there. I had to plan ahead, and when planning wasn’t enough, I had to micro-plan. I thought I had it all under control, but things got more complicated. By the beginning of the second trimester and with the new measures of lockdown, schools were closed for more than 6 weeks. Being flexible to unpleasant surprises was yet another skill I had to embrace. Nothing about parenting is easy, just as nothing about a full-time MBA is easy, but it’s doable and it’s definitely worth it. Going back in time, I’d do it all over again.
After all the planning, hard work and pressure; finding that one thing that gets you up in the morning is key. I’m thankful for UCD Business Alumni for setting a 30-day walking challenge. Getting-through a long day of lectures, deliverables, cook, laundry, dishes and finally putting the little one in bed, those 10kms in the evening were the highlight of the day.
Joining the MBA has been the most strategic, rational and emotional decision I have ever made.
Yahya Elkordy, UCD MBA Candidate Class 2045
To me, UCD is a little bit more than just an MBA. It gave me all the knowledge, confidence and relationships I was looking for. But most importantly, it kept me coming back.
“I can be changed by what happens to me. But I refuse to be reduced by it.”
Maya Angelou
I would like to consider myself a reasonably resilient person. On the Resilience Assessment Questionnaire (RAQ), I scored a 147 (/175), which should be a significant number to those of you who like snooker. That doesn’t for a second mean that I haven’t at least considered throwing in the towel on a number of occasions. Sometimes, things seem insurmountable, and I’ve had to take a step back, gather my thoughts, remembered why I was trying to achieve something, and who I was doing it for.
Here’s the thing. How do you speak about resilience without almost wishing that you had Baz Luhrmann’s “Wear Sunscreen” reassuringly playing in the background? Most of us think of it along the lines of the ability to bounce back, to bend but not break, and perhaps even to demonstrate personal growth in the presence of adversity. The American Psychological Association defines resilience as “the process of adapting well in the face of adversity, trauma, tragedy, threats or even significant sources of stress…” These reactive analogies are useful, but they don’t reflect our own unique, complex, innate biology, nor do they explain the social, culture, and psychological determinants which influence our responses. Truth be told, resilience is an incredibly personal experience, and dynamic, and something you can’t really contemplate until you face these challenges.
Business attempts to distil resilience into actionable points. Companies use these then to develop long-lasting systems using terms such as redundancy, diversity, modularity, adaptability, prudence and embeddedness. They talk about investing in procurement as a protective factor. The Global Workplace Study (2020) of resilience against COVID-19 illustrated a couple of unexpected, but important findings:
Resilience is a reactive state of mind created by exposure to suffering
The more tangible the threat, the more resilient we become
From an industry perspective it all boils down to three things: Routines, Simple Rules, and Improvisation. One cannot predict geosocial or economic, or even pandemic-related upheavals. However, through simulation, altering routines, using heuristics, and improvisation, leaders can build organisational resilience, much like hospitals simulating trauma/infectious disease outbreak protocols, or military personnel preparing for missions.
I’m used to being told “no”. That’s generally what happens in the health service. I’m used to models of poor behaviour and leadership which set things up for failure, and I had always taken the approach to barriers as I would have on a rugby pitch: at top speed. However, the closest I had ever gotten to not being able to find a solution was in the first couple of weeks in Canada after bringing the entire family over for my fellowship. We were in a strange country famous for its bureaucracy, on our own and floundering, looking for some normality, and something to go right. It may seem strange, but a surgical fellowship is not arranged, it’s facilitated. You bear the full cost and hassle of moving, visas, accommodation, schooling, licensing, social security, insurance etc., of which only a tiny amount can actually be carried out before you emigrate. It was outside yet another unconstructive government office appointment, soaking in a thunderstorm with 3 crying kids, that I looked at my wife Sonia, and said, ‘I don’t think I can do this anymore.’ The consequences were enormous, but she looked at me and smiled and said she’d support me no matter what. That we were a team.
Long story short, we didn’t go home, and we made things work. Coming home to Ireland in 2020 from Toronto in the middle of COVID-19, we faced 8 cancelled sets of flights, having nowhere to live (our house still had tenants in it), and not even being sure if I had a job as I hadn’t formally signed a contract, and yet we knew that together through perseverance, grit, or just blind faith, something would just work itself out. Routines (Continue with work, and homeschooling. Keep looking for flights and animal transport. Keep in touch with friends, family and hospital back home). Simple Rules (Keep talking and communicating. Accept frustration . Don’t over-finance for potential flights. Don’t worry the kids. Don’t give up). Improvisation (Be willing to travel through any airport. Don’t need to necessarily travel with the dog. Might have to stay in Canada. Could potentially go to the US. Might need to split flights. May need to work in a random locum job as a non-consultant doctor if necessary).
I’d like to think that I’ve become more resilient as time has gone by, and I fervently believe resilience is something that you can learn. Only a couple of week ago, my middle son had to be rushed back to the operating room for a bleed 5 days following removal of his tonsils and adenoids. We were in the middle of the end of year exams during this unpredictable situation, and yet my experience, and knowledge of similar situations, allowed me to acknowledge the crisis, and a plan of how to work around it.
I would study and write in the hospital room, and do shift changes with my better half. I understood that emotion and concentration would both compete for my time, and that each would have to be (metaphorically) fed in order to allow me to function. Furthermore, I knew that I could afford to work at 70-80% and still be reasonably productive. Routines (Continue with non-movable items like the school run, kids’ dinner, bedtimes, work commitments). Simple Rules (Allow for emotion, understand and accept that productivity will temporarily decline, eat, spend time with the kids, respect deadlines). Improvisation (Work in the hospital rather than at home, relay shifts between home and hospital, have friends and family on standby [COVID-permitting], move non-urgent work meetings and clinics).
Multi-tasking
There have been many other moments, but again, it’s personal. How can I compare my experiences to others? For some resilience is based on chronic low levels of adversity and stress, for others it may be based on single life-altering events. I think I’ve had it easy compared to some of my friends–or is that just the resilience speaking?
At an individual level, resilience has been shown to positively influence workplace satisfaction and engagement, improve overall well-being, and reduce levels of depression. Importantly however, it is also positively affected through strong relationships and networks within our own lives. These can modulate our perception of the demands placed on us, and help us see a path forward to persist: much like my wife did in that stormy day in Ottawa.
Conflict, adversity, and failure are inevitable. They can appear to the unrehearsed mind like raging infernos. The crux is therefore how to manipulate those fires to ignite you, rather than consume you. You don’t need to carry that burden alone.
Mark your diaries for 20 May, 7:00 – 8:30 p.m. Irish Summer Time, for an MBA Information Evening. One of a series of events introducing various aspects of the UCD Smurfit MBA to prospective students, next Thursday’s event will focus on leadership and careers.
Dr Ailish Lynch will give an overview of UCD Smurfit School’s Leadership Development Programme, after which Training Consultant Fintan Ryan will deliver a ‘taster’ LDP session: ‘The relevance of teamwork to your individual MBA journey’.
Our MBA Careers Manager Mark Davies will be lead an Alumni Panel discussion of Career Services with Ger Perdisatt EMBA ’11, Director, Technology Strategy, Microsoft, John Keegan MBA ’18, Manager Business Consulting at EY, Marjorie Barrios Boland EMBA ’10, Head of Global Real Estate Transactions, Americas, EMEA & APAC, Indeed.com and Sree Koonath MBA ’20, Commercialisation Manager at CeADAR Ireland.
Attendees will also learn about our MBA Programme options, including the new Modular Executive MBA. Representatives from our Admissions and MBA Programme teams will be on hand to provide an overview of the programme delivery options, talk you through the application process, and answer any questions you might have. If you are considering an MBA, then this is an opportunity not to be missed. You can learn more and register for the event here.
Anyone will tell you, I am a meticulous planner. When I left my undergrad in 2013, I outlined goals for the next 5 years and strove to achieve every one of them. In 2019 I decided I would do an MBA starting in 2021, which would leave enough time to save and buy a house (very ambitious). I had everything mapped out short of what I was going to eat for breakfast in the morning.
For almost everyone globally, our lives were turned upside down when governments announced lockdowns in March 2020. My future plans had a spanner thrown in the works. I was supposed to get married in September 2020, enjoy a year of marriage, and then start my MBA course in Smurfit in 2021 (pending successful application of course). After a couple of months of baking banana bread and being bored, I sat down in my garden and realized that this was not going to happen. All plans were being pushed out, including the big day.
I can’t claim credit for this – all my wife’s doing!
I made the decision then and there to fast forward my application and then work out how I would adapt to the situation if I got accepted. I had worked for the same organization since I left my undergrad degree, and was absolutely terrified of leaving the safety of a steady job to become a full time student again. However this was exactly why I chose to the MBA: to push myself out of my comfort zone, to challenge my pre-conceived notion of what my “place” in the world is, and to have those difficult & awkward conversations on what impact do I want to have on my environment.
Semester 1 Study Group 5 enjoying Christmas pints outdoors between lockdowns
Doing the MBA was an opportunity to change career direction into Fintech, an area I am genuinely passionate about. Despite the remote-learning situation, I spearheaded the revival of the Fintech society and made a point to build an environment where students could share their perspectives on Fintech or similar. We arranged industry-leading speakers to talk about Blockchain, Artificial Intelligence, Ethical Banking, and Sustainable Finance; we have more speakers scheduled for the summer months. If I were to give any advice to people considering doing an MBA, it would be to get involved in societies: it’s an excellent way to broaden your network, both internally and externally.
In retrospect, changing my plans to fast-forward my MBA was the best thing I could have done. At the time of writing, my wife and I (we got married despite COVID, who needs a big wedding!) have just had our first trimester scan of our first child, who is due to arrive in early November – just in time to finish up the MBA!
Baby Mathews coming 7th November!
Although my classmates & I have missed out on international travel this year, I believe that we have developed the additional communication skills required to remotely influence that will be so prevalent in our future professions. In this sense, adaptability has been the soft skill that we as an MBA cohort will have in abundance and be able to apply to our chosen careers. I can truly say the MBA experience this year has been transformational and would recommend it to anyone that is seeking to develop both personally and professionally.
‘Do we know each other?’ read the title of the survey that I rolled out to the Full-Time MBA Class of 2021 at UCD Smurfit Business School. Surprisingly, ~80% of those who responded agreed that they have never had a conversation (at least once) with each one of their classmates! Blame it on COVID, due to which the cohort faced radical changes to the new way of education. With this came layers of challenges, one of which was the reduced depth in conversations.
In an effort to lower the ~80% gap and increase engagement among colleagues, I decided to start ‘Unlearn with Naman’ video podcasts. Unlearn with Naman is a series of candid conversations with people from various backgrounds. In each episode, I unravel stories and interests to learn from people’s diverse experiences. It is a small initiative to help people from my class to get to know each other better.
Why did I decide to call it ‘Unlearn with Naman’? We all know the importance of learning but I firmly believe that unlearning plays an even bigger role in the life of an individual. Unlearning requires one to first question everything that they have assumed was ‘true’, in order to learn a new way of thinking and behaving.
Coupled with the decision to pursue an MBA, COVID-19 brought one of the biggest changes for people enrolled in a B-School. To embrace the new ways of viewing the world and to re-shape life, most of us had to adapt to new beliefs and welcome the change. To understand my classmates’ motivations to take on this challenge, I felt that the podcast should centre around ‘unlearning’.
Since the launch of my initiative, I have interviewed five profiles within the class. Below are the video features to date:
Conor Hyland has over 10 years of work experience, most of which has been spent working in the Middle East (Dubai). He has worked with companies such as LinkedIn, Microsoft, and Enterprise Ireland, amongst many others.
Jasmine Westbrooks hails from Chicago and is currently pursuing an MBA at UCD Smurfit. She has over 7 years of experience working in Finance and has been associated with Fortune 500 companies such as Abbott Laboratories and Constellation Brands–which, by the way, is the largest beer import company in the US.
Shashwat Acharya has over 7 years of experience during which he has worn many hats. He has worked at Mindtree Ltd, India’s leading IT and outsourcing company, and at ABInbev, the multinational drink and brewing giant. Shashwat also gone on to start his own company, Sababa Miteri, which is an eCommerce platform for maternity wear in India.
Nathan Jones has 6 years of experience working in the US during which he was associated with the American Psychological Association at Capitol Hill. He has also worked with two fast-paced startups including a project management education company and a benefits administration company which has been recently acquired by CVS Health, the largest pharmacy services provider in the US. In addition to this, Nate is a licensed cosmetologist. When he is not occupied with the burdensome MBA, he can be found writing songs on Budgets!
Noreen Mahmoud has over 7 years of experience in Architecture and Interior design. In her last role, she worked as a Senior Interior Architect with ECG Consultants, a legacy engineering consultancy firm in Egypt. Noreen’s work has been featured in an exhibition in Venice, Italy and she has also volunteered to help build a primary school in Kampala, Uganda.
It has been just under a month since I started interviewing my classmates. I had my fair share of scepticisms before starting the series. Why wouldn’t I? I had never been remotely associated with video podcasting. Four weeks later, my channel has garnered 600+ impressions and a watch time of over 28 hours. Not only has the experience been rewarding, but also it has given me the chance to bridge cultural gaps by getting to understand people’s experiences better.
Perhaps the biggest learning is that you will always be unsure – today or tomorrow. The best time to take a leap is now! So… what’s stopping you?
Now more than ever, Ireland needs creative business leaders. If you’re considering an MBA (or a Business Masters) but feel held back by your financial circumstances, one of the Aspire scholarships–which cover up to 50% of the cost of a master’s degree at Smurfit–could be right for you.
Right this way to the next step in your career!
Since 2010, the impact of the Aspire Programme has been tremendous. Thanks to the donor’s generosity, many students have benefitted from financial support towards the cost of their tuition fees. Our Aspire graduates have excelled in their fields, and many have gone on to establish their own business ventures or are employed in leading companies such as Google, McKinsey, Citi, KPMG, PwC, Accenture, AIB, Paddy Power Betfair, Avolon, Microsoft, LinkedIn, and Facebook, among others.
You can find more information on the benefits of the scholarship in this video, and learn about application procedures here.
I’ve had the pleasure of working with two fantastic teams over the course of two trimesters. These are not hierarchical teams but flat teams. I consider them co-operatives: no-one’s opinion is worth more than another, everyone’s voice is valued, and they are based on trust.
A common view from a socially-distanced MBA
I’ve never worked on teams like these before. I’ve learned to keep my mouth shut (or try to), and listen. I’ve learned to relinquish control. I’ve learned that leadership involves identifying where you can have the most impact, where you can help the team, and pursuing that. It’s not about ego and it’s not about control. It’s about what actions you can take that will have the best outcome for the group. Often that involves stepping back, recognising others’ talents and capabilities, knowing they are greater than your own. It involves stepping forward into the gaps as you see them appear. It’s about helping, and taking the initiative, and playing your part. It involves asking for help, identifying your own failings and being open about them. Having the strength to do that builds trust and camaraderie.
It’s not that I’ve done all of the above–but I’ve observed others doing it, and I’ve been impressed. I appreciate it, and I’m grateful. I feel a depth of gratitude and loyalty to all I’ve worked with so far. Without a doubt, the experience of working with these teams, these people, is what will last longest from this MBA. That’s the transformative experience. Thinking back on this year, that’s what I will remember most. So thank you Jess, Naman, Nate, Caitlin, Sumit and Andrew! We’ve been through the trenches together.
It’s been a challenging year. As I’ve considered it, in some respects it’s been about resilience. The MBA has developed this resilience, and a confidence to step into the unknown, to know it’s possible to reach out to those in the know, ask for help, and to learn. These are skills on their own and need to be developed. As such, I’ll leave the MBA ready for what comes next.
My desire to learn has grown over the course of the year. I’ve learned a little bit about everything in the MBA, and seen how it all ties back together to one whole. As such it’s been a fascinating journey and has inspired further thought. Learning has developed into a habit, one I wish to continue. It’s now a key focus in my search for my next role. I want it to be a learning one.
So with that in mind, to close, I’ll take the opportunity to say thank you to all my classmates, lecturers and coaches for the education.
Interested in moving to Dublin to earn Ireland’s top-ranked MBA? Based abroad, and not sure how that process would work for your situation? Mark your diary for 29 April at 3:00 p.m. Irish Summer Time, and come join UCD Smurfit Admissions and Careers managers, as well as a panel of current international MBA students, for the MBA Information Webinar for International Students.
You can find more information, and register for the event, here.
If you’ve attended any of the UCD Smurfit MBA events for prospective students, you’ve heard a bit about the Modular EMBA launching in autumn 2021. Designed to offer a low-residency option to those with busy personal and professional schedules, the Modular EMBA presents all the material of our acclaimed Weekly EMBA, delivered through a combination of independent work and intensive, on-campus monthly class meetings.
An article in the Irish Times for 12 April offers a fuller description of the new delivery method:
Typically, students will be on campus once a month (Friday and Saturday) and will undertake a number of week-long modules over the course of the two year programme. This move to blended delivery will appeal to applicants juggling busy work and home lives.
“We are trying to facilitate people who may live outside Dublin or who are busy with their careers,” says Prof Cal Muckley, academic director of the MBA programmes at Michael Smurfit Graduate Business School.
“We bring people in for one weekend per month on a Friday and Saturday each semester. We deliver one module each month over the two years of the programme and students engage in online learning before each one. All the modules have been redesigned to fit in with the new delivery mode.”
Irish Times, ‘Smurfit MBA Programme shifting to a modular format,’ 12 April 2021
The UCD Smurfit Admissions Office has several events for prospective students coming up, and we invite you to attend to learn more about the MBA’s various delivery methods, application process, and available scholarships. You can learn more about each event, and register for any that appeal to you, at the links below:
