UCLA Anderson School of Management Blog

How Green Can You Go? Five Inspiring Sustainability Initiatives at UCLA

Left to right: Umbrellas with solar-powered charging stations at UCLA Anderson; UCLA’s co-generation power plant; Bruin Bike Share

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Along with the S.A.F.E. Collection Center for household hazardous waste, solar panels atop Ackerman Student Union, the UCLA Bike Shop and bike fix-it stands and air pumps stationed around campus, UCLA is dotted with numerous other green features. Anderson alumna Nurit Katz (’08), UCLA’s chief sustainability officer and executive officer of facilities management, shared these five cool campus interventions you might not know about:

1) The Marion Anderson Courtyard at UCLA Anderson is the perfect place to break for lunch and power down — and power up, as it happens. In 2015, Jason Hsu (Ph.D. ’04), assistant adjunct professor of finance and an Anderson alumnus, generously donated a ZON Powersol umbrella that provides shade as well as three weather-proofed solar-powered USB ports to charge up to three mobile devices at a time as quickly as a wall outlet, day or night. UCLA Anderson immediately purchased three more with help from donations to the Anderson Fund from students and alumni, and has added more since. UCLA was the first UC campus to use the ZON umbrellas. It’s just one of the ways Anderson is thinking in the Next.

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The Purpose Economy

UCLA Anderson students and staff collaborated to produce Impact Week. Back row, left to right: Impact@Anderson program manager Kelly Chung, Karthik Patange (’18), Qingqing Wu (’18), Katie Donovan (’18), Impact@Anderson director Bhavna Sivanand (’14); front row, left to right: Janna Stucky (’19), Elizabeth Heredia (’19), Jessica Lin (’18), Molly Tarrant (’19)

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By Carolyn Gray Anderson

Impact@Anderson and the award-winning UCLA Anderson Net Impact chapter presented Anderson’s 2018 Impact Week in April. Under the theme Purpose + Profit, invited thought leaders and company founders shared stories about mission-driven careers, businesses and projects that fulfill unmet needs in sectors from entertainment to real estate.

Impact Week attracted members of the greater UCLA and Los Angeles communities to engage with Anderson students, alumni, faculty and staff in interactive panels and workshops tackling topics that included impact investing, affordable housing, blockchain technology and finding purpose in traditional workplaces.

The week kicked off with a keynote address by Cara Chacon, VP of social and environmental responsibility at outdoor clothing retailer Patagonia. The privately held company is on its way to a 100 percent climate-neutral goal by nurturing a squeaky-clean supply chain that accounts for everything from healthy soil for regenerative organic agriculture to fair wages for a healthy community (and therapeutic surfing breaks for Ventura-based staff). “A responsible business model works,” said Chacon. The proof? Patagonia recently reached $1 billion in revenue.

L.A.’s Best Resource for Mobility Management Could Be Its Recent MBA Graduates

During Impact Week (April 9–13, 2018), whose theme is Purpose + Profit, UCLA Anderson is highlighting stories of mission-driven careers, companies and projects that fulfill unmet needs in sectors from entertainment to real estate. On April 16, Anderson presents the annual Energy Innovation Conference, which focuses on companies striving for energy resiliency through new technologies, robust policy and inventive business models.

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By Carolyn Gray Anderson

UCLA Anderson Inspirational 100 alumnus Gil Penalosa (’84) believes in government’s ability and authority to build and maintain urban infrastructures that can enhance a city’s livability. But he also believes that, in most cities, the efforts and policies are mismanaged. Take public transportation and traffic congestion mitigation. “No private-sector company is going to solve the mobility problem,” Penalosa says. “Not one city in the world solves the problem through the private sector — public transit has to be run by governments. But the public sector should do more steering and less rowing. You can outsource the rowing.”

Founder and chair of the board of the Toronto-based nonprofit 8 80 Cities and chair of the board of World Urban Parks, Penalosa works internationally as a consultant and strategic advisor to both public and private institutions looking to create vibrant urban systems. Penalosa has one catch phrase he considers the real key to making cities livable: healthy mobility. When people can safely navigate their communities on foot, bicycle or wheelchair, he says, a chain reaction of mental and physical health benefits follows. This raises the quality of life for every citizen, including the most vulnerable — the very young, the very old and the very poor.

Lynda Resnick Pursued a Second Career in Service to Others

Spirited, trim and energetic, Lynda Resnick could give the impression that success has come easily to her.

But in a keynote address to UCLA Anderson’s 6th annual Velocity Women’s Leadership Summit, Resnick, co-owner and vice-chair of the Wonderful Company, demonstrated the resilience that has made her a powerful force in California agriculture and philanthropy.

Together with her husband Stewart, Resnick co-owns the $4 billion Wonderful Company, whose brands include FIJI Water, POM Wonderful, Teleflora and Halo mandarins. Lynda Resnick is in charge of the Los Angeles-based company’s global marketing and product development.

UCLA Anderson’s Safety Team Earns Service Awards

The emergency preparedness team at UCLA Anderson School of Management (EPTA) was recognized with Distinguished Service Awards for its commitment to emergency preparedness.

Assistant Vice Chancellor Colin Dimock from UCLA’s Office of Environment, Health & Safety presented the award on behalf of Chancellor Gene Block, Administrative Vice Chancellor Michael Beck and Emergency Management Director Art Kirkland.

Anderson’s team was established in 2001 and is made up of 85 staff and faculty members who have annual opportunities to train in American Red Cross and Community Emergency Response Team classes. The safety team is responsible for building safety and evacuation drills for UCLA Anderson’s six structures.

The EPTA also received awards from the City of Los Angeles, presented by Chief Deputy of Public Safety Gregory Martayan on behalf of Councilmember Paul Koretz. The team’s community spirit was recognized for making the campus and the city a safer place in which to work and learn.

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EPTA members with more than five years of safety service and training certification by the American Red Cross and Community Emergency Response Team received Distinguished Service Awards: Tammy Baca-Montanez, Jennifer Banzon, Francesca Baugh, Joseph Boroumand, Paul Brandano, Linda Campbell, Laurie Carr, Theresa Cisneros, Leanna Cortez, Hannah Cowherd, Jonathan Daillak, Arturo Esparza, Mary Fleshood, Jose Garza, Dave George, Patty Gonzalez Johnson, Gordon Hill, Atsuro Kagawa, Rashida Kamal, Bonny Kim, Howard Kim, Dina Lee, George Lee, Julie Lindner, Manuel Macias, Armando Magana, Courtney Mannino, Jennifer McMillen, Claudia Olivares, Itze Ornelas, Delores Rhaburn, Donna Robinson, Cynthia Rueda, Gabriel Ruiz, Ruben Silva, Laurie Summers, Mark Taylor, Howard Titzel, Sara Tucker, Robert Villaverde, Carol Wang and Shi Zhang. The Distinguished Leadership Award was given to Kimberly Eremic.

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In Latin America, Ambassador Noah Mamet Promotes UCLA’s Strides in Entrepreneurship, Education and Sustainability

By Carolyn Gray Anderson

As U.S. Ambassador to Argentina under President Barack Obama, Noah Mamet (bolstered a positive bilateral relationship in the areas of entrepreneurship, education, clean energy and global climate change, repeatedly looking to his home state — and to UCLA in particular — as an exemplar of progress in all these areas.

Ambassador Mamet recently took part in a conversation with Argentine native Adjunct Associate Professor Andres Terech (Ph.D. ’04), the event sponsored by UCLA Anderson’s Center for Global Management, and drilled down on the economic and trade challenges facing Latin American countries, including a U.S. aversion to problem of inflation in places like Argentina. Mamet said it’s the biggest challenge for managers doing business there today, as local salaries sometimes need to increase as much as 42 percent from one day to the next. One impediment is Argentina’s slowness to invest in infrastructure. “When the cost of energy goes up, it’s hard to control inflation,” he said.

A third of Argentina’s GDP is held outside the country, suggesting a mistrust of domestic reinvestment, which may deter outside investors, too. Mamet said a one-time tax amnesty that invited Argentines to declare their overseas assets revealed $130 billion in investments that the government wants to attract back to the country. “Bank information sharing was a game changer,” said Mamet. “It was the most successful tax amnesty in history.”Mamet believes tech will boost the economy and encourage international trade. Among perhaps six Latin American unicorns, four came straight out of Buenos Aires, said Mamet, making Argentina a contender for world markets.

Exclusive: Under Armour Founder/CEO Kevin Plank Talks Leadership

Kevin Plank, founder and CEO of Under Armour, recently traveled to Los Angeles and the UCLA campus where UCLA Anderson presented him with the 2017 John Wooden Global Leadership Award. After the event, held in Pauley Pavilion, Plank sat down with the UCLA Anderson Blog team to talk about leadership, Under Armour, and his role models. (This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.)

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Q: In terms of your leadership style, what was the transition like, in going from entrepreneur and head of a small start-up to manager of a global company?

Number one, I feel like Under Armor is entering Chapter Three of our business. Chapter One was grandma’s basement — just fighting to survive — and Chapter Two was (when) we moved the company to Baltimore, (where) we tried to build a global company, and really worked on being a global brand. Chapter Three moves us to where we are a corporation and you lose the agility that you have as a small company, particularly a small company led by an entrepreneur.

As a small company, I’d see, or we’d smell, problems and I’d be able to have myself or my executive team jump on something and spend time on it. We could work 23 hours in a day, get it fixed and move on. Now the company is just bigger. It doesn’t mean you lose a sense of urgency, but you lose the ability to make as quick of an impact as you’d like. It just takes time, because the only way to get anything done, is by leaning on what I brag so often about, our team, and it has to be that way. I like to say that good leaders have good ideas, great leaders have great ideas and make others think of their own.

How do we position people with the right ideas, but also empower them to actually be able to make a change and create difference? We are a corporation with an entrepreneurial basis, foundation and culture. Hopefully, we can be the best of those two things, because I think every big company is trying to get small, and every small company is trying to get big. I just want to be a great company. 

Q: How would you describe your leadership style but also, if we were to ask your employees, how would they describe your leadership style? 

You’ve got to be careful, because sometimes your whisper can be a roar in an organization. But asked how they would define me, hopefully they’d say I was empowering. I’m not just saying, ‘Don’t worry, we’ll sit here and figure it out together.’ What you’re truly saying is that I’m just going to define for you what I think success is. And then — if that means meeting in Los Angeles on a Wednesday — I’m not going to tell you how to get there. Whether it’s a train, a plane an automobile or whatever you choose to do, you just have to be there at this time. And that’s the difference between running a larger organization verses a smaller organization.

Leading with Values: Dr. Va Lecia Adams Kellum’s Journey to Tackle Homelessness in Los Angeles

By Sana Rahim (FEMBA ’19)

Dr. Va Lecia Adams Kellum realized when she was a dance teacher for young girls that she had a passion for teaching and helping others. Later, as a Ph.D. student at Stanford University, Kellum examined the factors that create stress in ethnic minority youth, such as poverty, academic underachievement and family dynamics. This work inspired her to launch a career in service of others.

Now president and chief executive officer of St. Joseph Center (SJC) in Venice, Kellum joined UCLA Anderson to talk about her professional journey to SJC as well as her key leadership tenets. SJC’s mission is to provide working poor families with the inner resources and tools to become productive, stable and self-supporting members of the community. Last year, the center prepared more than 25,000 hot meals and permanently housed 304 people.

Retail: Survival of the Fittest

By DJ Busch

Retail as we know it is going through a dramatic shift, and the negative narrative is loud as ever. Consumer behavior is changing, retailers are trying desperately to compete and owners of retail real estate are working to ensure their properties are positioned for the future. But not all the news is bad. Some landlords should be positioned not just to survive, but to do quite well.

In the public market, mall REITs have been trading at large discounts to the underlying value of their assets for quite some time. This investor skepticism has spilled over to open-air shopping centers (strip centers), which are now also trading at discounts. While mall REITs own 80 percent of mall value in the U.S., these signals from the public market can have important, and often overlooked, implications for private market players. It’s no secret that the U.S. is over-retailed, and we have a substantial amount more square feet per capita than any other country.

How One UCLA Anderson Alumna Endeavored to Build Hispanic Leadership

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National Hispanic Heritage Month runs from September 15 through October 15. UCLA Anderson, in conjunction with the Anderson Latino Management Association and the UCLA campus, recognizes the significant contributions to society among our Latino and Hispanic students, alumni, staff and faculty. Visit Latino@Anderson to enjoy their stories.

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By Elise Anderson

It started as the Latino Management Students Association at UCLA — a group of about a dozen 1985 MBA graduates of what was then the UCLA Graduate School of Management. They would casually meet “and hang out between classes during the day,” according to Maggie Peña (’85). It was the unofficial, informal way to meet other Latino MBAs.

It wasn’t until a few years after graduation that Peña, the first Latina manager at Paramount Studios, and Henry Hernandez (’85), who was working at a large defense company, noticed something similar in their respective work environments. “There were no people of color at our companies except for those cleaning the offices,” Peña says.

Origins and Outreach

In search of a remedy, Peña and Hernandez reconnected with a number of original LMSA members, hoping to gather some collective thoughts. At the first meeting, only four MBAs attended, including Chris Arranaga (’85), Richard Rey (’85), Peña and Hernandez. “Clearly, we needed to get more people involved, so we reached out to other Latino MBAs in the local area, then nationally, to gather greater strength,” Peña explains.

With a campaign to reach out (mostly by telephone, mail and fax) to other business schools and “anyone willing to share graduate information or databases,” interest in the organization began to take shape. Peña gives credit to Paramount, which allowed her to make copies of material for mailings, and to a number of women who helped to launch the organization, including Jeannine Jaramillo, a USC and Harvard graduate, and Jaramillo’s friend Elizabeth Muñoz from USC.