Favorite MBA Professors Of The Class Of 2021

“My favorite professor at Sloan is Zeynep Ton, who teaches an operations strategy class called Management of Services: Concepts, Design, and Delivery. The class I took from her explored how to design and manage operations to create value for customers, employees, and investors simultaneously. I loved that the content of the course forced students to think about the role of front-line service employees, and appreciate how operational excellence is interdependent with a happy and motivated workforce. Professor Ton’s energy and passion came through even in the remote learning environment as we learned how to implement operational choices that create good jobs and long-term profitable enterprises.”
Olga Timirgalieva, MIT (Sloan)

“My favorite professor would have to be Professor Franklin Allen. He had such a command of his subject that no hypothetical scenario we conceived could stump him. Even the short squeeze on Game Stop was just another day. Sometimes, when a professor is highly knowledgeable in their area, they lose touch with basic concepts first-time learners may struggle to understand. Not Professor Allen. He expertly guided us all through the rough spots. I appreciated the way his courses were laid out from day one with notes, practice problems, textbook readings, and the lectures — all lining up perfectly to build the concepts cohesively. Even though the assigned case studies were infuriatingly difficult, it was clear to see the application they would have in the real world, and why it was vital we struggle in this supportive environment. My background is engineering, but I feel fully prepared for corporate finance.”
Luke Lindsay, Imperial College

“My favorite professor is Juliana Schroeder who teaches Negotiations & Conflict Resolution. Despite the virtual setting, the course was very practical in providing us with frameworks for tackling different real-life negotiation scenarios, from asking for a job promotion to multi-stakeholder negotiations within a global company and the cross-cultural friction involved. Juliana truly cares about her students and provides insightful feedback by offering one-on-one consultations to negotiate job offers. In my case, she also supported me with a strategy to handle the negotiation with a complicated tenant at my apartment in Lima.”
David Bolívar, UC Berkeley (Haas)

“This is a really tough one, but I have to go with Lance Young. Lance’s passion for teaching is immediately evident when you take one of his finance classes. He brings an energy to the classroom that pulls you in and his primary concern is your level of understanding. He is quick to offer alternative examples and pivot his method of explaining key concepts when he can tell you aren’t getting the key point. Lance also ensures that students learn from each other by cold calling to facilitate open discussions, but in a way that never makes you feel on the spot or at risk of embarrassing yourself. His emphasis on teaching the strategy behind financial decisions and evaluations connects classroom concepts in applicable ways that are valuable. regardless of whether your future focus is finance or not.”
Brian Wright, University of Washington (Foster)

“Frank Rothaermel’s strategy core class really stands out to me because that was a pivotal moment in unlocking the big picture thinking you come to a top business school to learn. I come from a non-traditional background and therefore did not have a great deal of experience analyzing how interconnected the activities of a firm need to be to be successful. It was cool to go from a Porter’s Five Forces neophyte to intelligently discussing strategic initiatives with my incredibly talented classmates.”
Marcus Harmon, Georgia Tech (Scheller)

“I won’t be the first Owen student – and probably not the last – to answer that I can’t imagine my experience at Owen without Professor Brian McCann. As both an Owen graduate himself, and the well-deserved winner of many teaching awards at the school, he embodies what we strive for at the school: being both sharp thinkers and highly collaborative team players. In addition to his highly popular (and not easy) classes, Brian devotes his time to Owen and its students by leading and advising on a variety of fronts outside of the classroom. Personally, I was lucky to develop a friendship with Brian through his role as faculty advisor for the Owen Strategy and Consulting Club (OSCC), when we had to adapt many of our existing processes and events for a virtual setting. I also appreciated his interest and support during the re-launch of Owen Board Fellows. Whenever I work with Brian, I know I will be both challenged to think critically and supported by him fully – a combination that can be rare and yet is so valuable for MBA students looking to learn and grow.”
Kaitlyn Barrett Wilson, Vanderbilt University (Owen)

“I definitely have a few, but Professor Rick Desai had a particularly large impact on my personal and professional growth. Rick was my teacher for New Venture Development, a class that helps startup teams focus on testing and validating product-market fit. In the early stages of developing a company, it is easy to worry about providing the perfect solution or perfect experience to your customers. Being a perfectionist, this was particularly hard for me. Rick has really pushed my team and I to think critically, not worry about insignificant details, and continuously test our hypotheses and iterate on them after we learn.

I have a quote that he said in class written on a sticky note next to my monitor that consistently grounds me and has really helped propel my startup, Cravosity, forward: “If you figure out how to deliver value, you can always figure out how to scale, make money, and perfect the technology”. By being vulnerable and sharing his own mistakes, as well as being so available to meet with us for office hours, I’ve really learned so much that I will not only apply to Cravosity, but also carry with me throughout my professional and personal life long-term. Thank you, Rick!”
Malvi Hemani, Northwestern University (Kellogg)

“Professor John Joseph is one of my favorite professors. He is very knowledgeable, competent, charismatic, approachable, and committed to helping students. One example I will always remember vividly was getting his help during our intensive case competition. After we sent him our case competition deliverable draft around 3 am, I received a text three hours later: “Lucio, please call”. I realized he noticed part of our financial model was not in the right direction. He was genuinely concerned with the limited remaining time we had to correct the work. During the process, he went the extra mile to introduce us to his network of expertise. His dedicated commitment and willingness to help students was invaluable in my MBA learning journey.”
Lucio Chen, UC Irvine (Merage)

“My favorite professor so far is Kinda Hachem, who taught Global Economic Markets during first-year. To be honest, I am not an economics person at all – but Kinda’s teaching style made the class absolutely riveting. She is not afraid of contradiction and embraces debate in the class. She has a knack for distilling complex economic theory into digestible anecdotes and metaphors that bring the entire class to communal understanding without oversimplifying the richness of the topic. And with her dry and witty manner, you’d be hard pressed to make it through a class without at least a few laughs, which is doubly impressive given the density of the subject matter!”
Katie Cech, University of Virginia (Darden)

“Professor Rodrigo Manero. Professor Manero came into a difficult situation when he started teaching at IE. Unlike a more specialized graduate degree, the MBA is a general degree. This meant our financial markets class had a wide variety of skill levels in it. Add to this, as a native Spanish speaker, he was teaching in his second language. In the first few weeks of class, many of the students were lost. Many professors would have shrugged and continued on, but Professor Manero did not. He listened empathetically to each student’s concerns and immediately implemented strategies to improve their experience. Despite the difficulties, he never wavered in his patience and kindness with the class, even going so far as to hide a heartfelt goodbye message to us in our final class’ notes. For me personally, he taught me many things outside of the financial markets curriculum: he modeled grace in the face of difficulty. He showed perseverance and empathy. Above all, he was endlessly kind. He offered kindness to those who offered none to him in return. Lastly, he showed kindness and faith in me and my abilities that I didn’t see in myself. I believe that a lot of the learning you do in an MBA is not necessarily in the curriculum and Professor Manero made that happen for me.”
Christina Gohl, IE Business School

“Drew Pascarella, Associate Dean. Drew runs the Investment Banking Immersion in a way that can be best described as a bootcamp for bankers. Rather than completing old case studies, each week we would complete a model or presentation based upon a real company and would present it to the class. Each of your decks is marked up with the same comments you would see from your senior team members over the summer. Drew also goes above-and-beyond by tailoring the material to market conditions, switching the curriculum to better reflect the market after the pandemic took off last spring. The material is so relevant to your work as an associate in investment banking that my summer internship felt like a direct extension of the immersion.”
Lawrence Nault, Cornell Johnson (Johnson)

“I have met many wonderful professors throughout my MBA journey, but I believe the one professor that had the most significant impact on me was Elise Boyas. I only took one prior accounting course in my life, and it was not a positive experience. I did not enjoy nor understand the subject matter. Though I was hoping it would be different this time around, I was confident that this would not be a class I would relish.

However, Elise Boyas proved me wrong almost immediately. On the first day of class, she had so much energy, all I could think about is how a professor can be this excited about accounting? Throughout the course of the semester, she changed my entire perspective on accounting. It wasn’t as boring as I thought and was, in fact, quite fascinating. Even though I struggled at times throughout the course, I learned a great deal of critical skills that I use even to this day. This sentiment would never have arisen without Elise dedicating her time and energy to making sure I understood and truly learned the material. Elise instilled confidence in me when I did not have it in myself. She was the professor that I could always count on to be in my corner when I felt that I could not push further.

A testament to her passion for her students can be seen in the fact that, even after taking Elise’s course, she was always invested in my success. She gave great advice that helped my team with coming up with our winning solution for our Key Bank Case Competition and would routinely email me to check in with progress throughout the program. While there were other incredible professors during my time, Elise stood above the rest with a passion and enthusiasm for her students that have, and likely will remain, unrivaled. But I would be remiss if I did not give Professor Prakash Mirchandani a quick shout out for always being such a great resource and always willing to help me anytime I needed.”
Bianca Joi Payton, University of Pittsburgh (Katz)

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