Meet The Minnesota Carlson MBA Class Of 2025

Meet the Carlson School of Management’s Assistant Dean Phil Miller

P&Q: What have been the two most important developments in your MBA program over the past year? What type of impact will they have on current and future MBAs?

Miller: We are excited for the launch of our new certificate in Sustainable Environmental, Social and Governance Leadership. While the certificate is an external credential, it has led to significant collaboration with our Humphrey School of Public Affairs and Institute on the Environment to create a deep, inter-disciplinary suite of courses that can be completed as a specialization in the important and emerging area. We feel it highlights significant University-wide strengths and makes them available to MBA students. It has also catalyzed the addition of MBA electives in the space.

We are also pleased that we were able to add an embedded mental health counselor to our team in partnership with central University Student Counseling Services. We are like so many of our peers in noting the rise in student challenges and were able to serve this need with localized resources that understand the specific needs of graduate business students. Our new counselor has been wonderfully supportive and has seen strong uptake. Of note, students appreciate the anonymity of chatting with a counselor who they understand to have strict confidentiality requirements. While staff are supportive, they see the student advising team differently. Having both is proving beneficial for students and staff.”

P&Q: Give us your one-minute pitch for your business school. What makes you unique?

Miller: When you choose the Carlson School, you’re making a wise investment in yourself for a variety of reasons. You’ll receive a rigorous education from world-class faculty. You’ll be centered in an unparalleled business community that’s home to 15 Fortune 500 companies and six of the largest privately held companies in the world. That contributes to unprecedented opportunities for our signature experiential learning opportunities as well as regular and meaningful networking. You have varied opportunities for global exploration. And you’ll build lifelong connections with a diverse community of peers.

P&Q: Sustainability has emerged as a major attraction to prospective MBA students. How does your full-time MBA program integrate sustainability across its curriculum?

Miller: Sustainability remains one of the most important issues facing our future and the Carlson School has found ways to integrate this into our curriculum. As noted above, we have significantly enhanced our elective offerings while working to embed content in our core/required classes. I would also highlight our experiential learning Enterprise Programs where students are tackling these important issues for some of the world’s largest businesses.

 In the Funds Enterprise, which allows students to manage a real investment portfolio, we are signatories of the Principles for Responsible Investment (PRI). That means we have pledged to incorporate environmental, social, and governance (ESG) issues into investment analysis and decision-making processes.

Susanna Gibbons, our managing director of the Funds Enterprise, has been inducted as an Institute on the Environment (IonE) Fellow at the University of Minnesota and is passionate about teaching sustainable investment practices. IonE seeks to solve today’s complex environmental challenges by bridging disciplines and sectors to lead the way toward a future where people and the environment prosper together. IonE Fellows are senior researchers and thought leaders who have a track record of applying their research to real-world situations.

P&Q: What are some key elements in your teaching of leadership? What types of options does your school offer that deepens student experience with leadership and makes them more competitive in the marketplace?

Miller: Leadership development is crucial to any MBA program and that is no different at the Carlson School. When talking to our MBA alumni, we’re often told that their coursework and study has exceeded the demands of their career. They feel they’re ahead of their peers when it comes to leadership skills. 

In the Full-Time MBA program, students are required to take Leadership and Personal Development. The course’s focus is to prepare and equip students to improve their confidence and capabilities to lead themselves, their projects, and others in the future. We do this by providing them opportunities to develop their understanding of effective leadership, examine where they are in their development as a leader, and hone their leadership skills. All students actively participate in discussions and exercises, practice leadership behaviors, reflect on their behaviors, chart ways to “take action” on their personal and professional priorities, and create a customized leadership development plan, which we hope proves to be the most formative deliverable of your graduate studies.

Along with that, the Carlson School offers a variety of electives and a management specialization for students who are most interested in leadership development to hone their skills for the career of their dreams.

P&Q: Three years ago, P&Q asked you to share how you’ve integrated AI, STEM, analytics, and digital disruption into your programming. Since then, what types of enhancements have you made in these areas?

Miller: We have addressed these trends in several ways. First, we have launched a STEM-designated MBA credential. Our Management Science MBA has attracted significant interest in the market. It has addressed a desire on the part of many students for a more overtly quantitative path through our MBA. It has assisted our international (non-U.S. work authorized) students with improved placement outcomes and our U.S. work-authorized students with improved traction in competitive fields.

Second, our faculty have worked to create a clear analytics suite of courses across disciplinary areas. Starting with a foundation of baseline courses (Business Analytics for Managers 1 & 2), students can choose from a menu of MBA-designated analytics courses. Students with strong capabilities may also take graduate courses in our Analytics and Finance programs to enhance their MBA options.

P&Q: What is your biggest student-run event of the year and what does it reflect about your school?

Miller: The largest student-run event of the year is the Carlson 4 Community (C4C) charity auction. C4C was created in 2005 by Full-Time MBA students to bring together students from the MBA program, master’s students, and the school’s alumni and faculty to support local charities and causes.

 C4C promotes volunteerism and community involvement within the Twin Cities, C4C has created various opportunities for Carlson students to give back. The biggest event is the annual Carlson MBA Charity Auction, which benefits a different local charity each year as selected by the student body. Last year, this group raised a record-breaking $61,551 for Operation No Limits (ONL), an organization dedicated to supporting at-risk youth.

I think C4C reflects the very best in our students at the Carlson School. It fosters a sense of unity, empathy, and social responsibility among the students, faculty, and staff. By collectively rallying behind a cause, we demonstrate our commitment to making a positive difference in the world beyond our academic pursuits.

P&Q: How many courses outside the business school can MBAs take during your program? To what extent has your business school embraced coursework from other schools and departments at your university? Are students from other schools and departments at the university allowed to take MBA electives?

Miller: MBA students may count 8 credits of coursework outside of Carlson towards their degree. They may take more as fit in their tuition/credit bands as well. 

Graduate students from around the University may take Carlson courses, with some constraints. Day sections are reserved for our FT & STEM MBA students. But within our PT & OMBA courses, we have significant cross enrollments. I teach a problem solving course and this past term had public policy, engineering and environmental sciences graduate students enrolled. We find they enrich the diversity of perspectives in our courses.

Meet the Minnesota Carlson MBA Class of 2025

Name	Hometown	Alma Mater	Last Job
DivineMercy Bakare	Brooklyn Park, MN, and Lagos, Nigeria	University of Minnesota	Smiths Medical
Lena Anderson	Guaynabo, Puerto Rico	United States Military Academy	U.S. Army
Logan Grayson	Duluth, MN	University of Minnesota	Entrepreneur/Business Owner
Maurice Hicks	Upper Marlboro, MD	Carleton College	Mayo Clinic
Mei Yee Chew	Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia	University of the Ozarks & Columbia	Teach For Malaysia
Mollie Dube	Satellite Beach, Florida	Florida State University	Hennepin County Medical Center
Olufemi Odumosu	Lagos, Nigeria	Oxford Brookes University	GEA Group
Ore-ofe Olakunbi	Ibadan, Nigeria	Federal University of Agriculture	Animal Care Services Konsult
Samuel Anderson	Saint Cloud, MN	United States Military Academy	U.S Army
Shagun Shukla	Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh, India	University of Minnesota	Evolvus Inc.
Young Ma	Cheongju, South Korea	University of Minnesota	Ecolab
Zane MacPhee	South Pasadena, California	Whitman College	Minnesota Twins Baseball Club