Change doesn’t have to be in leaps and bounds. Smaller steps toward career advancement can provide the space to prove yourself. To take your pulse. Lauren Kalette, MBA 15, started her Evening & Weekend MBA studies with the dream of moving from graphic design at Shutterfly into a marketing position—and she is moving toward that MBA ROI.
“I started talking with the CMO and other director-level people in Marketing about my plans and the courses I was taking,” says Lauren. “That’s something I wouldn’t have done before. My Haas professors and classmates boosted my confidence in my ability to relate with colleagues on that senior level.”
“It’s exciting to be identifying and using data points that will help Shutterfly make informed decisions.”
Those conversations led to Lauren being assigned her first a marketing research project on the job. “It’s exciting,“ she says, “to be identifying and using data points that will help Shutterfly make informed decisions.”
A part-time mba course load heavy on marketing electives—Strategic Brand Management, Marketing Research, and Designing & Marketing New Products—prepared her for that project with new insights and an expanded skill set. Haas@Work gave her the opportunity to use her new skills and to be part of a consulting team on a real-world marketing project for Blackhawk Technology related to customer retention.
Lauren is also using her business strategy and leadership skills in her new role of Design Manager. “I’m definitely a hands-on manager. Classes like Negotiations and Power & Politics taught me about the importance of managing your interactions with people, understanding the trade-offs, and seeing the other person’s perspective.”
Lauren continues to expand her own perspectives, and her career prospects. Treks with the Design Innovation & Strategy and Marketing clubs took her inside companies like Frog Design and Eventbrite. She’s also exploring the field of design and innovation consulting. For now, she taking her career forward one step at a time, eager to see what is around the next corner.
Last year 42 percent of grads from our Evening & Weekend Berkeley MBA Program advanced in their careers, and 42 percent successfully made career changes. (You can read about a career switch in Desirae Early's story of a move to management consulting.)
We invite you to explore these and more reasons to choose Berkeley-Haas.
