New Study Explores The Role of Grades In MBA Recruiting

Santa Clara University Leavey School of Business

Santa Clara University Gets $10 Million Alum Gift for New STEM Campus

“Leave the world a little better place than you found it.”

Those are the words that a Catholic nun told elementary school-aged Stephen A. Finn. Over the years, Finn has tried lived by these words. Since earning an MBA from Santa Clara University (SCU) in 1976, Finn has donated nearly $25 million in gifts to his alma mater. His most recent donation was a $10 million gift to help fund SCU’s new STEM campus, the Sobrato Campus for Discovery and Innovation, which will create classrooms, labs, research, study and office space for the School of Engineering and the College of Arts and Science. Finn recently sat down with SCU to discuss how Silicon Valley is the land of opportunity and why giving back to his community means everything.

“Everywhere you are in Silicon Valley—whether it’s today, 10 years ago, two years ago, next week—you’re at the right place at the right time because what we have here is opportunity,” Finn says. “There’s more opportunity here, I bet, than there is anywhere in the world. And success is the intersection of opportunity and preparation.”

A BAY AREA LOCAL

Raised in an Irish Catholic family, Finn is the eldest of six children. He grew up in Santa Clara and Willow Glen, where he attended San Jose’s Pioneer High School. His father, a successful custom home developer, had taught Finn the importance of money, and hard work. As a summer gig, Finn’s father got him a job as a janitor at Langendorf Bakery in San Jose.

“All janitors, no matter their experience or age, earned the same $3.10 per hour,” Finn recalls.

After graduating college from San Jose State, Finn spent time working at a payroll services company. His true calling, however, was tech sales. Only problem, Finn says, was he didn’t have any MBA.

“You couldn’t sell the high-end, really cool products that paid a lot of commissions unless you had an MBA or an EE,” says Finn. “So I was sitting here in Silicon Valley and there was all this opportunity. Those fish were swimming by, off the front of the dock, but I couldn’t get one because I didn’t have the right hook. I had to get my MBA to be prepared for the opportunity and success,” he says.

So, he pursued an MBA at Santa Clara University, where he spent nights taking classes and working during the day. Finn says he cherished the close friends he made in B-school the most. Some of those friendships have lasted for nearly 46 years.

BUILDING SUCCESS, GIVING BACK

After B-school, Finn joined one of Silicon Valley’s first cloud computing companies, and by 1981, started LCS Investor Services, a data management service provider. In 1988, he purchased Gemisys Corporation, a company that provided back office services to financial institutions. In 1992, he created Trust Company of America, which he sold to E*Trade in 2018.

The profits made from selling his company offered Finn a new freedom to enjoy life and give back to his community. In addition to his donations to SCU, he’s become a major benefactor at Cristo Rey San José Jesuit High School, a college prep for first-generation students from low-income families. It’s just his way of making the world a better place, just as the nun taught him long ago.

“It’s an opportunity to seed young people’s success for their whole life,” says Finn. “And that floats my boat.”

Sources: Santa Clara University, Santa Clara University

Questions about this article? Email us or leave a comment below.