alumni – Page 6 – Ciocca Center for Business, Ethics, and Society Blog

October 2, 2020

Brittany Alkes ’15 Shares Sales Industry Insights

Nick Bettenhauser ’24, George Caldwell ’24, and Cole DiGregorio ’24 are current freshmen who are not wasting time. The three Sales Group chairs are making the most of our virtual semester by connecting with alumni, getting advice, and creating opportunities. Just one month into the fall semester and the group invited Brittany Alkes ’15, client development consultant for Thomson Reuters, to speak to the Sales Club on Thursday, October 1.

Brittany Alkes ’15 shared valuable advice, including:

Branding: start now! Create a LinkedIn account and start connecting with Alumni
Be Active: when on LinkedIn, be active and post articles that will gravitate towards your clientele
Personalize, Listen, Read, Share: share things that represent you, your company, and the beliefs of both
Holy Cross: work on skills like selling yourself and branding before you graduate
Alumni: add every alum you meet on LinkedIn

Stay tuned for more events! Make sure you are on the mailing list by registering for a student business club.

September 30, 2020

Real Estate Club Hosts Panel and Networking Event

On Tuesday, September 22nd over 40 students attended the annual 2020 Real Estate Panel and Networking Reception. This year, unlike in years past, the event was held virtually on Zoom with many more alumni panelists involved. The event started with an overview of the real estate market in the United States today by Cameron Lawson ’17 (Fun Fact: Cameron started the RE club on campus!). He explained that the US housing market was worth over $34 trillion dollars. He also went on to explain that the US real estate market can be broken down into 5 sectors: offices, industrial, multi-family, retail, and hospitality. He also talked about the many career opportunities that are involved in real estate for those who were interested. Cameron’s overview helped paint a clear picture for students to know how the real estate industry has an effect on every aspect of American society.

The panelist section of the webinar included:

Colin Blair ‘00 of Cushman & Wakefield
Cassandra Clark ’02 of JP Morgan
Paul Formichelli ’96 of JLL
Bill Garey ‘12 of Taurus Investment Holdings
Cameron Lawson ’17 of National Development
Rob Rossi ’16 of Taconic Capital Advisors
Robert Valenti ‘11 of Kosmont
James Whelan ’00 of JP Morgan

Each panelist gave a brief informative presentation of how they ended up in their respective line of work which helped students understand the many different paths you can take to end up in the Real Estate industry. While all of the panelists are now currently in the Real Estate industry, almost all of them did not expect that they would end up working in real estate while at Holy Cross. The panelists also gave students advice on the best ways to enter into the Real Estate sector coming out of college, including using the feature on Handshake (Enter Link) for those applying for internships.

There are loads of upcoming events and meetings, so consider joining a student business club!

Learn more about student business clubs.

June 8, 2020

Ciocca Center Announces Virtual Summer Opportunities

The Ciocca Center for Business, Ethics, and Society has been an important partner in helping students to stay ahead of the consequences caused by the pandemic. There have been many unexpected twists and turns leaving students unsure of Certificate Program progress, summer internship plans and what to expect this fall when classes resume. The Ciocca Center has partnered with various Holy Cross offices to try to mitigate some of these new realities with additional funding and new opportunities.

Read on to see what’s happening and get involved! Continue reading “Ciocca Center Announces Virtual Summer Opportunities”

May 11, 2020

Holy Cross Graduates Students with Certificates in Business, Entrepreneurship and Finance

The Ciocca Center for Business, Ethics, and Society at the College of the Holy Cross works with nearly one in six students, or about 500, to provide technical skills and hands-on experiences to complement the liberal arts education. Students from all majors, including Chemistry and Economics, to English and Studio Art, are encouraged to get involved as early as freshman year because you can major in anything and succeed in business.

A recent study of the working Holy Cross alumni database found that three out of four work in business roles, making it particularly useful for students to study business. With three Certificate Programs to choose from students can focus their experience on different industries, including 1) Certificate in Business Fundamentals, 2) Certificate in Entrepreneurship and 3) Certificate in Finance and Banking.

This year, due to COVID-19, many seniors experienced the Business Ethics & Principled Leadership workshop through a virtual session. We appreciate their commitment to completing the program and flexibility as the Center quickly transferred the material to a digital platform.

Today, the Ciocca Center is proud to award 68 Certificates from the three programs. See a list of students below. Continue reading “Holy Cross Graduates Students with Certificates in Business, Entrepreneurship and Finance”

May 5, 2020

Student Investment Fund Presents Nationally

When you can’t take your annual trip to NYC you take advantage of the option to invite more alumni to your virtual presentation. This is exactly what the Holy Cross Student Investment Fund did on Monday, May 3, 2020.

Prof. David Chu, director of certificate programs, and Cassie Gevry, associate director of the Ciocca Center for Business, Ethics, and Society at Holy Cross, opened the webinar with a warm welcome. Maggie Burd ’20, Jack McConville ’20 and Jack Boyd ’21 then took center stage to speak with over twenty alumni based in Boston, NYC, Chicago, and the San Francisco bay area. They started out with the timeline of events and competitions they participated in over the year, shared the resources they have received through generous alumni donations, discussed how they plan to grow and diversify the student club, as well as thanked the founders – Andrew Smith ’19 and Sean Manning ’19. Closing the webinar, Prof. Chu moderated alumni questions for the students to answer.

We are excited to work with the next line up of HCSIF executives: Jack Boyd ’21, Liam Busconi ’21, LJ Foley ’21 and Hayden Ivatts ’21. Many thanks to our graduating seniors, we hope you will return as alumni to share your experiences and help current students explore the finance industry.

May 1, 2020

Annual Mock Super Day Held Virtually

Connecting via Zoom during COVID-19 has become the new normal for Holy Cross students and this year the the annual Mock Super Day was a virtual event held on April 29th by the Finance Club through the Ciocca Center for Business, Ethics, and Society at the College of the Holy Cross. Club chairs Allie Silge ’20 and Piotr Pogorzelski ’20, worked with Pam Ahearn, director of employer engagement in the Center for Career Development, to organize seven alumni and 11 students to participate in the event. Ahearn hosted the event and mapped out the evening to have each student interview with each alumni via breakout rooms.

Special thanks to our alumni interviewers for sharing their time, knowledge and advice — Brendan Grady ’89 of KeyBanc, Sydney Latour ’17 of J.P. Morgan, Ted Lynch ’84 of Bank of America, Jay Mackie ’19 of Barclays, Matt McCrann ’94 of Citi Bank, Pat O’Reilly ’16 of UBS and Dan Vucovich ’18 of Barclays.

We have enjoyed working with our graduating Finance Club chairs over the year – Piotr Pogorzelski’20 is an Incoming Investment Banking Analyst at Barclays Investment Bank and Allie Silge ’20 is an Incoming GTP Analyst at UBS. Best of luck on the next chapter! We hope you will share your story and success with current students as alumni have with you. Congratulations!

April 29, 2020

Students Win Business Ethics Competition

The International Business Ethics Case Competition, IBECC, was founded by Tom White ’69 over 23 years ago. Students from the College of the Holy Cross have competed since 2011, typically with a first round on campus with the winning team sent to compete internationally. Unfortunately, like so many other events in 2020, IBECC was moved to a virtual format and the Holy Cross teams opted not to move forward.

Two students, Katelyn Cody ’22 and Robin Lu ’22, worked with Prof. Karen Teitel and decided to participate as individuals in the optional Moral Compass Competition. Students were mixed up with students across schools, a good way to know other people. Katelyn Cody ’22 team (Bagel Running) won and Robin Lu ’22 team (Pot and Glove) was one of two runners up.

Continue reading “Students Win Business Ethics Competition”

November 22, 2019

Insightful Interview with Ted Lynch 84

Interested in finance? Take a listen to an interview by Leif Johnson ’21 withTed Lynch ’84. Leif first met Ted, Managing Director at Bank of America, during the annual spring Corporate Finance & Banking Workshop in Boston. Ted has been a great mentor for many students, including Leif, and he is eager to share new opportunities with Holy Cross students.

“Holy Cross will teach you to think critically and persuasively, no matter your major.” – Ted Lynch ’84

Leif Johnson ’21 and Ted Lynch ’84 at a Holy Cross event.

Continue reading “Insightful Interview with Ted Lynch 84”

October 15, 2019

Alumna Spotlight: Seton McFarland ’16

Seton McFarland ’16, second from right, on an alumni panel at UBS.

Alumna: Seton McFarland ’16
Major: Accounting
Profession: Analyst, UBS

Who/What inspired you to enter the business world? Both of my parents worked in business, so I definitely gravitated to what I was familiar with coming out of college. Within the business world, I chose to enter into the financial services industry because it complemented my strong interest in economics. Continue reading “Alumna Spotlight: Seton McFarland ’16”

September 26, 2019

Ciocca Center Intern Shares Path to Finance

Leif Johnson ’21, Economics Major
Fall 2019 Ciocca Center Intern

Coming into freshman year at Holy Cross I played lacrosse, and only lacrosse. That is who I was my entire life. I am very thankful for the lessons in teamwork and leadership along with the life long friends I made being that these are things I will have forever. I was never in any extracurriculars being that I truly thought all I would do is go to college, play lacrosse, and graduate with a job waiting for me. However, at the beginning of my sophomore year that all changed when I sat down and thought about all the things I wanted to explore on campus and beyond. Continue reading “Ciocca Center Intern Shares Path to Finance”