Anusha Rahman

University of North Carolina, Kenan-Flagler Business School

“Mission-driven healthcare leader bridging research and strategy to improve care delivery and patient outcomes.”

Hometown: Reston, Virginia

Fun fact about yourself: I once burned myself on a cop’s motorcycle in Quebec City

Undergraduate School and Degree: Tulane University, double major in Neuroscience and Psychology

Where was the last place you worked before enrolling in business school? Research Coordinator at Boston University

Where did you intern during the summer of 2025? The Chartis Group in New York City

Where will you be working after graduation? The Chartis Group, Senior Advisor II

Community Work and Leadership Roles in Business School:

Honors:

• Consortium Fellow
• Vetter Dean’s Fellow
• Forté Fellow

Leadership Roles:

• Executive Vice President of the Healthcare Club
• VP of Career Labs and Case Prep for the Consulting Club
• Executive Vice President of the Consortium
• Co-Chair of Engagement for the Vetter Dean’s Fellows
• Consultant with the Business Communications Center
• Graduate TA for Undergrad Business Communications
• Admissions Counselor with UNC MBA Admissions

Which academic or extracurricular achievement are you most proud of during business school? Keeping high engagement and attendance throughout the Consulting Club Career Labs in the fall semester. Seeing familiar faces asking many questions meant that we had created a safe space to learn and grow, which was our main goal for the Career Labs.

What achievement are you most proud of in your professional career? Working with adolescents in the Emergency Department in Providence, Rhode Island, I am most proud of opening the door for many teens to be able to talk with their parents about their mental health and stressors.

Why did you choose this business school? I want to create systemic change in the healthcare industry, making it more accessible for patients to get the care they need. To do that, I need to understand how the healthcare industry is built – and my MBA at UNC Kenan-Flager has created the foundation for me start creating sustainable change after graduation.

Who was your favorite MBA professor? Vinayak Deshpande. He has incredible knowledge about healthcare operations, and he’s happy to answer all of our detailed and specific questions. His class is very interactive and engaging, and he brings so much humor to his lectures.

What was your favorite course as an MBA? Strategic Value Creation for the Life Sciences. Through guest speakers every class to thought-provoking in-class discussions, we learned about what truly makes a successful healthcare and life sciences company that focuses on innovation, sustainability, and patients.

What was your favorite MBA event or tradition at your business school? Songfest is an experience where the legacies compete in choreographed performance. It’s my favorite event of the year, and it reflects UNC Kenan-Flagler’s non-competitive and fun nature, where we take risks and have fun, knowing that there’s no judgment, but only support.

Looking back over your MBA experience, what is the one thing you’d do differently and why? I would take more finance classes; it’s something I’m not as comfortable with.

What was the most impactful case study you had in business school and what was the biggest lesson you learned from it?

Through my Design and Delivery of Healthcare class: The Virginia Mason Medical Center case showed me that strategy fails without aligned incentives. The Owens & Minor partnership proved that redesigning systems and incentives, not just technology, drives lasting improvements in healthcare delivery. I want to create this type of sustainable and innovative change in healthcare.

What did you love most about your business school’s town? There’s so much hiking and nature around Chapel Hill. I fell in love with nature trails and North Carolina natural beauty.

What business leader do you admire most? The leader I admire most is Rose Marcario, former Patagonia CEO, who embedded environmental activism and stakeholder responsibility into corporate strategy, proving companies can prioritize purpose and societal impact while still achieving strong growth

What is one way that your business school has integrated AI into your programming? What insights did you gain from using AI? We have been encouraged to use AI in our research and presentations, which is critical for me to practice before going into the real world. From group presentations to individual essays, our professors encourage us to test out how to use AI to expand our thinking and go deeper.

Which MBA classmate do you most admire? Ellie June. She brings grit, resilience, and humor to everything she does. She’s the older sister I never had, and I know I can lean on her whenever I need to do so.

What are the top two items on your professional bucket list?

• Be an Adjunct Professor for a year
• Speak at a TedX conference on how to create systemic change.

What made Anusha such an invaluable addition to the Class of 2026?

“Anusha’s care takes the form of belief in her peers to change the world and of the action to manifest those things in the world. She is a person who remembers details, always follows up, gives honest feedback, and continually cheers on her classmates. She empowers the people around her to be better and to improve the systems around us.

When I was struggling in interviews, she spent hours with me sharpening my pitch and helping me uncover the skills that set me apart. She gave detailed, constructive feedback and became personally invested in my job search, always texting me before and after interviews. She feels such joy watching her classmates reach their goals, which is what makes her so invaluable. When we say that business can change the world, we are thinking of people like Anusha.”

Ellie June
MBA Class of 2026
UNC Kenan-Flagler Business School

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