This week, UCLA Anderson Dean Judy Olian joined the 2015 Riordan Program’s College to Career class for a special fireside chat interview, followed by a brief question and answer session. The program targets first-generation college students from across the country who are first in their families to attend college and interested in preparing for internships and careers in management.
Enrique Loyola, a second-year student at Wake Forest University and an alumnus of Anderson’s Riordan Scholars (high school) program, served as Olian’s interviewer, his questions demonstrating a deep knowledge of both the dean’s career and the myriad issues faced by the leader of a globally-respected management school. He opened the session by inquiring about Olian’s career path and how she found herself dean of UCLA Anderson.
Sticking to the highlights of her career path, Olian discussed her time as an undergraduate student in Israel where she worked in the office of then-Prime Minister Golda Meir. “It was a very interesting job, I loved the excitement, the multi-tasking, working with people,” she said. “I always remember what turned me on. I like stress and interfacing with people and this is what I do today. The dean went on to say that she never really looked at her career through a prism of gender and that she doesn’t believe people respond to her in those terms. “I just try to perform and perform well and exceed expectations,” Olian said, and then added, “We have an obligation to advance the goals of women. It’s been 51 years since the Civil Rights act of 1964. Women are getting 54% of college degrees, but we’re still behind, as are underrepresented minorities. We must focus on providing a voice and a structure that supports them.” She noted that Anderson had created a childcare program for its professional MBA programs, to create more opportunities for women with small children.
Learning from failure is also a key component of success. “We all fail, have you not failed,” Olian asked. “The question is, ‘How are you going to react to failure?’ If you don’t swing for the fences, you’ll never know if you have it in you to take on a leadership role. But sometimes when you swing for the fences you won’t hit a home run, you’ll strike out. The best part of failure is learning what you can do to avoid (the same failure) in the future and build on it.”
The dean cited “content, globalization and digitization” as areas where she foresees the greatest coming changes in management education. When asked about the most important qualities of leadership, Olian said, “The most important thing is to be a continuous learner. I feel lucky to be in this temple of evolving knowledge. Any day of the week I can take in a lecture from a leader in their respective industry.
“If you stop learning in your 20s, you’re going to become a fossil,” Olian said, “If you don’t remain curious, you will become irrelevant very quickly.”
After discussing some best practices for applying to business school (“Give us references who can provide objective feedback in your performance.”), Olian was asked how she measures her own performance.
“Have I raised the school to greater heights?” she wondered. “Do we have better faculty, better programs and better students? Are we more innovative, more globally renowned? Have we lifted the school? That’s the fundamental measure.”
In an intensive one-week study to prepare students for internships and careers, College to Career students participate in various workshops, lectures, and activities to build on career skills training, career and academic exploration and networking skills. This year the program received a grant from the Rosalinde and Arthur Gilbert Foundation due to its unique place in helping underrepresented students in the college pipeline, as few programs exist that provide guidance to managing their career paths and early graduate school awareness. The Grant will fund a virtual mentoring program as each student will be paired with a Riordan Alumni Mentor.
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