Meet USC Marshall’s MBA Class Of 2026

P&Q: What types of programming – through classroom instruction, extracurriculars, and treks – does your school offer to expose students to country-specific and global business practices? What have students told you were the most educational and fun aspects of these activities?

(Response from Scott Abrams, Academic Director, Full-Time MBA program)

Abrams: “USC Marshall is proud to offer GSBA 580: The Global Context of Business, also known as PRIME, a capstone course that is taught at the end of the first year of the Full-Time MBA program. Launched in 1997, PRIME was the first course of its kind at any business school in that it required all students to take part in an international experience. PRIME set the standard for immersive, experiential learning that others have since tried to emulate. This required course has continually evolved to remain at the forefront of global business education, providing our students with unparalleled exposure to country-specific and global business practices. Numerous other programs at Marshall have launched their own versions of PRIME, including the MBA.PM (Part-Time Program), Executive MBA, Undergraduate, and the specialized MS programs.

Last year, our Full-Time MBA students traveled to one of six locations: Hong Kong, Tokyo, Singapore, Seoul, Bangkok, and Ho Chi Minh City. The PRIME course and experience consist of three main components:

* Pre-Trip Class Sessions: These sessions offer an intensive study of the destination country’s history, economy, regulatory environment, institutions, resources, social structures, and culture. Students gain a thorough understanding of how these elements influence business practices, industry structures, and opportunities.

* Group Projects: Students tackle real-world business challenges faced by firms in the target country. This project encourages the application of core concepts from their studies, culminating in comprehensive analyses and presentations to client companies or industry professionals.

* The International Field Study Trip: The highlight of PRIME, where students engage in direct observation and experiential learning. They interact with leaders of local firms, visiting the client companies and other local firms and immerse themselves in cultural activities, solidifying their understanding through first-hand experience.

Students consistently regard PRIME as the pinnacle of their two-year MBA experience. The international field study trip is often highlighted as the most educational and enjoyable aspect, offering hands-on learning, invaluable business insights, and rich cultural immersion. This blend of academic preparation, practical application, and real-world exposure is what makes PRIME exceptional.

USC Marshall’s commitment to innovation ensures that PRIME remains relevant and impactful. In response to the evolving educational landscape, this year we are rolling out PRIME sections aligned with specific industries and/or functions:

• Seoul and Hong Kong: Global Media and Entertainment Industry Dynamics
• London: Extraordinary Experiences: Technology, Immersion, and Consumption
• Frankfurt and Berlin: Global Capital Markets
• Tokyo: Marketing and Product Development
• Tokyo: Macroeconomic Environment and Business
• Singapore: Adaptive Solution Building with AI
• Singapore and Bangkok: Macroeconomic Environment and Growth

This pioneering spirit underscores our dedication to providing transformative learning experiences that prepare students for success in the global business arena. PRIME demonstrates our mission to cultivate globally-minded leaders equipped to navigate and thrive in an ever-changing business world.”

P&Q: What are the most exciting new courses that your school is offering to MBAs this school year? What makes them so unique and valuable?

(Response from Scott Abrams, Academic Director, Full-Time MBA program)

Abrams: “Our rollout of GSBA 508: Foundations of Business Success, what we’re colloquially calling the MBA Career Launchpad, is designed to equip our MBA students with the foundational knowledge and skills necessary to tackle their job search and help them to embark are their chosen career pathway. This course not only provides essential professional knowledge, but also emphasizes the importance of professional networking, featuring interactions with Marshall alumni who are leaders in their fields.

In addition to the Launchpad, USC Marshall is thrilled to have recently introduced another groundbreaking course: Sustainability, Business, and the Future of Capitalism, co-taught by Dean Geoffrey Garrett and Professor Paul Adler. This course is designed to tackle one of the most pressing issues of our time: the relationship between business and the natural environment. It addresses the urgent challenges of environmental sustainability and the profound impact these challenges have on the business world.

This course explores how businesses are affected by and can respond to the depletion of natural resources, social movements, government regulation, and financial market pressures. It examines how firms can innovate in operations, technologies, product design, marketing, and non-market activities to develop more sustainable business practices. By engaging with these topics, students gain a nuanced understanding of the economic, social, political, and regulatory forces reshaping business conduct and strategy.

What makes this course particularly unique and valuable is its focus on preparing students to lead in the context of these grand challenges. The course will feature a variety of perspectives from guest lecturers and industry experts, offering students a comprehensive view of how businesses can both contribute to and mitigate environmental issues. It also sparks critical debates on whether the current form of capitalism is sufficient to address these sustainability challenges or if a new system is needed to better govern our economic and natural resources.

This innovative course ensures that USC Marshall graduates are not only prepared to tackle traditional business challenges, but are also equipped to lead efforts in sustainability, making meaningful contributions to both their industries and society at large.

By continuously evolving our curriculum to include such forward-looking courses, USC Marshall ensures that our graduates are prepared to succeed in their careers and drive significant, positive change in the world.”

P&Q: Who are two new professors who’ve joined your faculty in the past year? What do they teach and how will they be difference-makers in your MBA program?

(Response from Greys Sošić, Senior Vice Dean of Faculty and Academic Affairs)

Sošić: “Marshall is dedicated to providing our students with the most cutting-edge knowledge and skills to succeed in their careers, and we’re always seeking new and innovative faculty members who can help us do that. We’ve hired many new faculty members this year whose expertise we’re excited to incorporate into the MBA curriculum, so it’s hard to choose just two. But we’ll focus here on Prof. Ike Silver and Prof. Bowen Lou.

Prof. Ike Silver is joining Marshall in Fall 2024 as an Assistant Professor of Marketing. Prior to coming to Marshall, Prof. Silver served as an Assistant Professor at Kellogg. He received his PhD in marketing and psychology from The Wharton School and his BA in cognitive science from Yale University. He studies moral judgment and decision-making. Specifically, his research examines how organizations and individuals communicate their moral values, take sides on hot-button issues, condemn and punish transgressions, and share information about contentious subjects.

Prof. Silver has extensive expertise in teaching marketing strategy and received the Sydney J. Levy Teaching Award while teaching at Kellogg. This award is given to a faculty member at Kellogg whose MBA course is among the highest rated in instructor quality, course quality, and course difficulty across the business school, per student evaluations.

As social responsibility becomes increasingly important for marketing practice, Prof. Silver can help our students become business leaders who are in tune with current societal needs and engage with the ESG demands of today’s companies.

Dr. Bowen Lou is joining Marshall in Fall 2024 as an Assistant Professor of Data Sciences and Operations. Prof. Lou’s research focuses on the economics of artificial intelligence (AI), innovation and entrepreneurship, and on the future of work. He collaborates with leading analytics companies to track technology, labor, and innovation trends, working on new waves of digitization and technological innovation across various industry sectors.

Prof. Lou has extensive teaching experience in business analytics and information systems, and his teaching philosophy is to make fundamental academic concepts and methodologies related to emerging technologies accessible to everyone in this digital age. Prof. Lou values accountability, fairness, inclusion, and transparency in teaching the role of digital technologies in shaping business and society.

In a world where AI is becoming omnipresent, and digital innovation reaches into all facets of business, Prof. Lou can contribute powerfully to better preparing our MBA students to positively impact the business world by introducing them to the newest set of skills emerging in the market.”

P&Q: What types of support does your career center and alumni provide to MBA students? How have these services and relationship made your graduates more competitive in the marketplace?

(Responses from Janet Horan, Vice Dean, Finance & Administration and Chief Financial Officer; Interim Director of Graduate Career Services and Camillia Lee, Assistant Dean and Director, Graduate Admissions)

Horan: “At USC Marshall Graduate Career Services, our goal is to facilitate the interaction among employers and recruiters, our employer relations team, our career strategist team and our graduate students seeking internships and full-time opportunities. Graduate Career Services at USC Marshall provides extensive expertise, knowledge, and skill development to prepare students to succeed on the job from day one. We provide state-of-the-art resources and a very experienced team of career professionals to help guide each student through personalized career exploration.

Our mission is to equip USC Marshall graduate candidates with the skills, knowledge, and resources that inspire confidence to achieve their post-graduation career objectives. Our employer relationship managers take a holistic approach to account management, partnering with companies every step of the way to build and strengthen relationships with our corporate partners. We build long-term relationships with employers to connect them with the talent needed to meet the challenges of today’s marketplace.

USC Marshall Graduate Career Services offers a student-centric, holistic approach to advising, coaching, and guiding our students toward optimal employment opportunities, and continues to support our alumni with lifelong career support. We offer a dedicated career strategist team, each member possessing many years of experience in business and career coaching and applying that knowledge to support our students through each building block of the career search process, from developing powerful resumes, to developing effective stories that answer challenging questions, to negotiating the best offer possible.

In addition, Graduate Career Services also employs several dedicated career strategists who focus primarily on supporting our international students attending USC on a student visa; these individuals are charged with staying abreast of the laws, rules and requirements for employment in the United States, and coaching and advising our international through the nuances of finding US employment. In addition, all our students have the support of a team of current second year MBA students who are selected and trained for the role of peer coach.”

Lee: “The Graduate Admissions office has also created an Alumni Ambassador program, which enlists the support of enthusiastic alumni who are interested in engagement with prospective and admitted students.  Their roles will include: interacting with students at virtual and in person events; serving on panels at outreach activities, and providing industry and market insight.”

MBA Student	Hometown	Undergraduate Business School	Last Employer
Kendrick Asril Lee	Singapore	University of Notre Dame	Asril Estates LLC
Jay C. Chung	Seoul, South Korea	University of Pennsylvania	SparkLabs
Elizabeth Grady	Greensboro, NC	University of North Carolina	USC (Football Recruiting)
Shannon Jordan	Chicago, IL	Harvard University	USC Keck School of Medicine (Student)
Manideep Kanagala	Guntur, India	Jawaharlal Nehru Technological University	Imperium
Jon C. May	Duluth, GA	Florida A&M University	Wieden + Kennedy
Monica Moorjani	Dublin, CA	University of California, Davis	DPP Tech
Marie O’Grady	Honolulu, HI	Whitman College	Blue Planet Foundation
Hannah Rhodes	Los Angeles, CA	Seattle University	Clinical Management Consultants
Bennett Royce	Solana Beach, CA	Chapman University	U.S. Navy
Zheng (Janell) Wang	Chongqing, China	Sichuan International Studies University	Bytedance

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