Cadence Martin

Scheller College of Business, Georgia Institute of Technology

“A researcher’s deliberation colliding with an executive’s impatience, dead set on improving the world.”

Hometown: Atlanta, GA

Fun fact about yourself: I’ve performed stand-up at The Comedy Cellar in New York.

Undergraduate School and Degree: The University of Georgia, B.A. Economics & B.A. English Literature; New York University, M.A. Economics

Where was the last place you worked before enrolling in business school? Kresnicka Research & Insights, Consulting Analyst

Where did you intern during the summer of 2023? PwC Strategy&, Atlanta

Where will you be working after graduation? PwC Strategy&, Washington, D.C., Consultant

Community Work and Leadership Roles in Business School:

President of MBA Net Impact Chapter: I served as a junior representative for Net Impact during my first year and transitioned to president during my second year. Leadership has been an exciting challenge and has granted me a front-row seat to understanding the ecosystem of Georgia Tech’s involvement in all aspects of sustainability. Net Impact’s global reach has also connected me to a community of sustainability professionals and MBAs across the country and in Atlanta.

Co-chair of Philanthropy Committee: With my classmate JP Basham and the help of our first-year representatives, I organize monthly(ish) philanthropic events and projects for our program. Amid the deluge of activities and events inherent to an MBA, involvement with the Philanthropy Committee has ensured that I take time out to donate time to causes that I care about. It has also complemented my Net Impact involvement nicely – we cohosted an invasive species removal project last semester, and we’re planning a hike to pick up litter during Earth Month.

Two-term Senator for Graduate Student Government: I have served as a senator representing Scheller in Georgia Tech’s Graduate Student Government during both years of my MBA. It has been a lesson in patience and the importance of effective governance procedures. I’ve been amazed by the extent to which a business approach to process, organizational behavior, and consumer research benefits the brilliant people studying technical fields across the highway and how their meticulous deliberation adds to our approach.

Ray C. Anderson Center Sustainability Fellow: Last year, I had the opportunity to work through a project which attempted to measure the carbon footprint of Georgia Tech’s waste management services. I was extremely fortunate that my team included a student from our Master of Sustainable Energy and Environmental Management program who was willing to walk me through more technical concepts than we learn in our coursework like life cycle analysis. It turns out that we can save a lot of carbon by teaching Greek life about growlers.

Board Fellow with Second Helpings: After taking Responsible Corporate Governance, I became interested in volunteering for a board. Fortunately, Scheller has a Board Fellows program that matches MBA students with boards of local nonprofits. In addition to gaining a hands-on understanding of the ecosystem of food waste and redistribution in Atlanta, I have gotten to see a governance leadership change up close.

Peer Leadership Committee Mentor: Each year, second-year students sign up to serve as mentors for our first years. My mentees have been wonderful, which means mentorship largely consists of hanging out with very cool people and providing a ballast against the buffeting of stresses that have arisen from entering a new program, moving to a new country, and recruiting.

Consulting Club Case Coach: I am one of the certifiably insane people who loves casing. Last year, our consulting club case coaches spent a huge amount of time mentoring and coaching us over the learning curve to prepare us for interviewing. I was delighted to be able to pass it forward this year by helping our new class.

Trees Atlanta Volunteer: Trees Atlanta does fantastic work to protect and improve the extensive public greenspaces in Atlanta, and I have worked with them on projects like removing invasive monkey grass and tree planting.

Merit Scholar: I was extremely fortunate to receive three merit scholarships courtesy of both Scheller alumni and corporate partners.

Which academic or extracurricular achievement are you most proud of during business school? While I find the work I have done as Net Impact President most mentally engaging, I think I am proudest of my role as a consulting case coach. Recruiting is a gauntlet which very few of us are prepared to face. I have found it extraordinarily fulfilling to watch our amazing first years transform into confident problem solvers. Even more, I feel it is rewarding to help them manage the mental and personal challenges that come from intense pressure, reassessing after some hopes went unrealized, and, of course, celebrating the elation of goals secured.

What achievement are you most proud of in your professional career? Good research takes a village, so as a researcher, all victories are shared. However, there are occasional breakthroughs that are unlocked only through the unique perspective of one teammate. Those are the contributions I have been proudest of. For example, when we were researching the values that drive political polarization in news audiences, I proposed a new angle — asking which of their own party’s policies people felt were most misunderstood and what, if anything, they wished their party would adopt from the other side of the aisle. That additional wave of research helped us understand points of sensitivity and commonality, which yielded critical insights about how to present reality to a fractured audience.

Why did you choose this business school? I came back to school to pivot. While I loved my job in media research, I wanted to spend the effort of my career on reducing the environmental harm of our economic system. Scheller offers a concentration in sustainability, a tremendous support system in the Ray C. Anderson Center for Sustainable Business, and access to one of the best technology innovation institutions in the world. I have benefitted from all of these. However, I have also benefitted, serendipitously, from the welcoming and collaborative culture in which Scheller prides itself. To say that it has been transformative would be a gross understatement.

Who was your favorite MBA professor? In my second semester, a second year named Molly O’Neil somehow convinced me to take a Responsible Corporate Governance class that met for seven hours on Saturdays. Our professor, Roy Richards, is the former CEO and chairman of Southwire and made those Saturdays some of the most engaging classes of my academic career. Apart from teaching us about the structure of effective corporate governance (a topic I knew next to nothing about), simply participating in his course was a masterclass in effective and inspiring leadership. He is a wizard at drawing out thoughtful conversation and creating an environment of deep, pervasive respect.

What was your favorite course as an MBA? Scheller offers a course on Sustainable Business Strategies. In it, we are challenged to think about entrepreneurship through the lens of social enterprise. The cases and frameworks we studied renewed my hope that businesses will pave the path to a cleaner planet and healthier, better lives for its denizens. Who knows? I might end up starting one.

Looking back over your MBA experience, what is the one thing you’d do differently and why? Time management! I feel like I’m always running behind, which sometimes results in giving less attention to projects or meetings than they deserve.

What is the biggest myth about your school? I’m not sure we have a robust mythology to choose from, but perhaps that we’re all tech nerds. While some of my classmates are recovering engineers (who express a suspicious fascination with space travel), most of us are happy to support the commercial side of innovation.

What did you love most about your business school’s town? While I’ll always love Atlanta as my hometown, it has changed dramatically even over the past 10 years. My life at Scheller has drawn me into many of the areas at the forefront of that transition, so I have greatly enjoyed coming back and re-encountering that familiar and strange place. Plus, there’s the food.

What surprised you the most about business school? Myself, in a lot of ways. When I was interviewing, I remember being asked about my weaknesses. As a devout introvert, I was apprehensive about the social demands of business school — cold-calling made me nauseous, networking felt insurmountable, and constant group work ran counter to the quiet, solitary thinking I did best. Through a combination of systematic preparation, leadership, and the support of my peers, I have grown in ways I could not have imagined when sitting across from my interviewer. As I write this, I am returning to Atlanta from this year’s ClimateCAP conference, where I spent two days meeting hundreds of strangers who share my passion and hope for sustainable business.

Which MBA classmate do you most admire? Jon Spearman. He is possibly the classmate who has given the most time to the program, volunteering for mentorship and ambassador roles, being pulled into marketing and leadership campaigns, and maintaining the most academically challenging concentration Scheller offers. Despite these demands, he greets all of us with kindness, humor, and generosity, and he works incredibly hard to make sure we connect and grow together.

What are the top two items on your professional bucket list?  I’d like to be an integral part of transforming one of our most carbon- or packaging-intensive industries, and I would like to serve as an expert witness before Congress.

What made Cadence such an invaluable addition to the Class of 2024?

“Cadence is a rising star, and it was a joy to have her in class! She’s smart, a natural leader, and a “big-thinker” who gets things done. Her peers voted her group’s startup idea as the best in our Business Sustainability course, which is a very impressive feat. I can’t wait to see what she will accomplish and build next.”

Dr. Andre Calmon
Assistant Professor

DON’T MISS: MBAS TO WATCH: CLASS OF 2024