DeGroote MBAs Clean House in Case Competitions
In February 2016, nobody could defeat an MBA team from the DeGroote School of Business. Students representing the Canadian business school won two different case competitions.
A team of DeGroote MBA students won the East Meets West Leadership Case Competition in Calgary on February 11-13. The competition — which is run by Haskayne’s Canadian Centre for Advanced Leadership in Business and Ivey Business School’s Ian O. Ihnatowycz Institute for Leadership — challenges students to balance the fiscal needs of businesses with ethical considerations and social demands of effective leadership practices. The competition is only in its second year.
DeGroote’s team was comprised of Jackie Day, Ryan Downey, Justin Medakiewicz, and Nick Vityuk. They were coached by Professor Milena Head. The team competed against nine of Canada’s most competitive MBA programs, such as the Sobey School of Business, the Beedie School of Business, the Alberta School of Business, Haskayne School of Business, Asper School of Business, Peter B. Gustavson School of Business and Ivey School of Business.
Head said that, “the senior industry leaders on the judging panel praised the DeGroote team for their originality, insightful identification of the core issues, completeness of their implementation plan as well as their passionate and charismatic presentation style.”
On February 24th, DeGroote scored yet another first-place win at Rotman’s annual Healthcare Strategy Case Competition. Students Tamara Harduwar, Sarrah Lal, Yusra Munawar, and Yuki Wu competed against 25 other teams of MBA and medical students to develop a Canadian product launch strategy to increase health care professional buy-in for a new cardiac device designed by Abbott Laboratories, a multinational American healthcare company operating in over 150 countries.
“I was able to take away a sense of pride in knowing that I could step into a field I didn’t know much about and provide analysis that ended up being valuable to the company,” Harduwar said. “I was also very happy to be able to interact with other MBA schools and learn from their unique perspectives on the issue presented.”
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Max Pulcini
Max Pulcini is a Philadelphia-based writer and reporter. He has an affinity for Philly sports teams, Super Smash Bros. and cured meats and cheeses. Max has written for Philadelphia-based publications such as Spirit News, Philadelphia City Paper, and Billy Penn, as well as national news outlets like The Daily Beast.
