Category Archives: Alumni Spotlights

Alumni Spotlight: John Ward, Class of 1988 – Accenture Managing Director

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Alumni Spotlight: John Ward, Class of 1988 – Accenture Managing Director

JohnWardJohn Ward, BHP ’88, is a Managing Director at Accenture .  His current role is Commercial Director for one of Accenture’s largest accounts and the Lead for other Commercial Directors in Accenture’s Communications, Media & Technology business unit in North America. John has been with Accenture for 15 years and, although he has had multiple opportunities to take other roles outside of Accenture, one of the primary reasons he has stayed is because of the company culture. Accenture is a BHP corporate partner and has several upcoming opportunities for BHP students. Applications for summer internships are due by October 8 and the Accenture Leadership Series application will open early next semester.

Take me through your career path leading up to working at Accenture.

When I graduated from UT, I knew I didn’t want to be an accountant or auditor, but I knew that two years at an accounting firm would help me understand accounting as the language of business, so I accepted a position with Arthur Andersen. I spent two years at Arthur Andersen in Dallas. Arthur Andersen met all of my expectations and I still have relationships that I formed there.  I knew I wanted to go to a top-tier grad school, so eight months after marrying my college girlfriend we loaded up the moving truck and relocated to Philadelphia to attend the Wharton School of Business.

After Wharton, my wife and I wanted to move back to Texas, so I took a job in Finance and Corporate Development at American Airlines in Dallas.  After four years of the airline business, I learned that it was a very difficult business for management to influence. I decided I wanted to be in a role where I could have more control and influence over the business, so I moved to a CFO role for a couple of different start-ups, one of which was a private equity investment fund. When a head hunter called about a role as the Portfolio Manager of Andersen Consulting’s venture capital fund, I couldn’t say no. In a lot of ways it was like going home because Arthur Andersen/Andersen Consulting, which eventually became Accenture, employed the same kind of people, so it was really easy for me to go back there.

I have been here for 15 years. I started as a portfolio manager, but after we went public in 2001, it was in 2002 that our shareholder came to us and told us we needed to sell the venture portfolio, which I was tasked with.  After selling the portfolio, I had to make a decision as to whether to leave Accenture and stay in the investment world or remain at Accenture. I chose to stay because of the great corporate culture at Accenture.

After coming into Accenture, how did your role evolve?

After I sold the venture portfolio, the CFO asked me to stick around and said he would figure out something for me to do. The first thing he had me do was figure out how to manage compensation and benefits around the globe. I chartered Accenture’s first global compensation and benefits committee. I worked with HR to form a comp and benefits committee chaired by the COO at the time. We built processes around compensation and benefits for all 52 countries we were in. In that role, I met leaders in our business around the world and learned the business. It was a great introduction to Accenture as a whole.

The next big move was to move closer to clients, so I moved to the client I am on now, taking on more responsibility within that account over time. Three years ago, I was asked to lead the other commercial directors in our business unit, Communications, Media and Technology, for other clients.

You moved from working in industry to start-up to private equity. Do you feel your breadth of experience prepared you well for the management role you are in now.

As Commercial Director, I am the COO of Accenture’s relationship with one of its largest clients. In that role, I manage a finance team, a legal team, an HR team, a sales operations team and a business operations team. All of my experience with HR, legal, accounting, finance, strategy, etc. prepared me for this role.

What have you enjoyed the most and what is most challenging?

I enjoy the client interaction and helping my client achieve its objectives.  I actually get energy from meeting with my clients.    The most challenging part of the COO role is that I am often handed the most difficult problems that require tough client discussions, so that’s tricky, but I enjoy it. Those client bumps in the road are the biggest challenges and the most rewarding. My client’s problems become my problems and sometimes those discussions can get pretty challenging. When you deal with a large client, they expect big things and sometimes those are difficult discussions. My job is to remain unconditionally constructive and continue to find constructive outcomes. It helps to put yourself in your client’s shoes and understand the position they are coming from.

What do you enjoy most about working for Accenture?

The people and the corporate culture. We have incredible ethics. We hire good people and we treat them well. Not every company has the strong culture we have. We don’t mess around in the way we conduct ourselves. We have six core values which are: stewardship, best people, client value creation, one global network, respect for individual and integrity. These core values truly represents who we are. I see it day in and day out and people who don’t adhere to those values don’t last very long.

How did you feel BHP prepared you for the MBA curriculum at Wharton and what did you gain from earning your MBA?

I was fully prepared, so much so that I was asked to be a teaching assistant for two classes, which was great because it helped me pay for some of my grad school. I felt fully qualified to be there and BHP was really the ramp-up for that.

If a current BHP student is considering getting an MBA in the future, I recommend that they put it on the back burner for a while.  An MBA isn’t something I would rush.  Most importantly, you should have significant work experience before going to get your MBA. The benefits of getting an MBA are really more around the people you meet and using the curriculum to take it all to the next level. Much of the Business Honors Program is effectively a mini-MBA. .  Take your BHP degree as far as you can in your career without getting the MBA, then go get it when you need something more or different. Don’t go get it straight out of BHP.  Coming out of BHP, I wouldn’t do the MBA unless it is from a top-tier program. I knew I didn’t want to be an accountant, I wanted to be something different, so I felt I needed to go get my MBA.

Once you head down the MBA path, one piece of advice I wish I had received is not to place out of classes. You will most likely have the opportunity to place out of “core” classes in an MBA program and I would argue against that. If you place out of some of those core classes, you lose the opportunity to develop those relationships with your classmates.

What advice do you have for BHP graduates who are just starting their careers?

Choose an employer where you respect the people and the product or service. I call it the “take home to dinner” test. Find a culture of people you are comfortable with. Not just were they are nice or successful, but are they people you really want to associate with and take home to dinner with your family. Find a challenging industry/role where you can add value, grow your skills and use what you learned in BHP. Don’t be afraid to take risks. It is important to stay somewhere for a couple of years at least, but be open to trying new roles that aren’t in your comfort zone and stretch yourself. Also, establish a reputation of always doing a good job and being excellent at what you do. At the same time, keep some work life balance and maintain activities and interests outside of the company.

Alumni Spotlight: Shirelle Noble, Class of 2009 – rewardStyle

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Shirelle NobleShirelle Noble, BHP ’09, joined Bain & Company after graduating from BHP. After spending a few years working as a consultant, she felt it was time to make a move and found a great opportunity to do just that with rewardStyle. She is currently leading business development and partnership efforts for rewardStyle.

How would you describe what rewardStyle does?

rewardStyle connects digital style publishers and global retailers to provide marketing solutions across the web and social media.  At our core, we help fashion bloggers earn commissions from the products they promote on their blogs by providing them with tools and education. We connect the bloggers to our retail partners, who pay for the organic promotion and distribution of their products to the bloggers’ audiences. We do this by managing a technology platform which sales and other key metrics. Our tracking and platform allows us to report back to both the bloggers and retailers on performance. In short, rewardStyle is basically how fashion bloggers are able to make money from linking to products.

We didn’t invent affiliate marketing, but we were the first to make it accessible for fashion bloggers and influencers across the web. We are the market leader in our space. It is a very niche space, but also a profitable one. We work with all the major retailers in Europe and the U.S. and we are also expanding to Asia. We were also the first to launch shoppable Instagram through our product called LIKEtoKNOW.it, which has been a game changer in social media. Since Instagram doesn’t let anyone use links within their feeds, the LIKEtoKNOW.it solution allows consumers to find out what their favorite bloggers are wearing on Instagram by registering for the email service.

Tell me about your roles in sales and business development.

I was brought on board at the end of 2013 to run the team that cultivates relationships with our publishers. My role was largely focused on scaling the team and establishing strategies to keep up with our rapid growth. Our company has grown very rapidly- I was the 48th employee and now we are over 110 employees. We continue to scale to meet the growing demands of both our retail and publishing clients. At the end of last year, I transitioned into business development because of my background in strategy consulting. I was given a project to assess our European business, so I lived in London for three months to identify the growth opportunities and create the strategy plan fro 2015.

Tell me more about what you were doing for that project.

The crux of the problem was to understand the opportunity size for our European business and how to capture it in 2015. At the time, the European business was lagging the U.S., so I looked into all the individual markets to understand why.  Each European country is so different from one another, so we stopped treating the markets equally and started to think about each individual market’s revenue potential. The change of mindset has been very successful.

What work experience has been most rewarding for you so far?

The European strategy project has been most rewarding to me. When I was at Bain, I wasn’t able to see the results of my work in the real world. The European project is a great example of applying the consulting approach, but also leading the implementation. Six months later, I’m excited to see how my work is directly impacting the company.

What is your favorite part of your job?

Implementing the solutions I create and being in a fast-paced industry that is growing rapidly. We like to joke that all of our problems are “good problems to have” because they are all related to growth. A major plus of this role has been the opportunity to wear different hats and raise my hand to work on projects that interest me. Working internationally is something I love and rewardStyle has given me many opportunities to pursue that passion. I grew up in Indonesia and went to high school in Jakarta before coming to UT. Being part of the team that figures out the strategy for these new markets is something that really gets me excited and makes me want to work hard for the company.

rewardStyle has experienced rapid growth during the time you have been there. What kind of unique opportunities and challenges has that presented?

From the tech side, it is the ability to keep up with the growth of our products and data. One of the most interesting problems we are facing today is around email. Because the core product of LIKEtoKNOW.it is an email service, we are sending more than a million emails a day. It’s challenging to keep up with the volume and provide the best consumer experience.

What’s on the horizon for rewardStyle and how does that tie into the work you are doing?

International expansion is a major focus for the company, and I am leading the establishment of our first office in China. We are also continuing to grow our core services and LIKEtoKNOW.it, which is approaching one million registered users.

What experiences and skills did you gain at Bain as a consultant that have made you successful at rewardStyle?

The ability to critically think about a problem and determine the information I need to make an informed decision. I gained the ability to present a compelling recommendation to my team and build confidence in the solutions and plans I create. We are a young company, but it is a very supportive environment. One of the benefits of being in the social media/tech space is that innovators are young.

What advice would you give your college self?

Take advanced accounting, don’t avoid it! I was a BHP/Finance major and I didn’t take it because I was worried about ruining my GPA, but I wish I had gotten more of those hard skills. I also would have learned to code, even just some basic stuff. If I were a freshman, I would be looking at how I could gain some coding experience, whether in school or through a summer program. Being able to maintain a website and know some database architecture is helpful. I am trying to learn more now.

I also want to say how thankful I am for my BHP education. So many of the friends and support groups I have today are from fellow BHP-ers. Networking is really about finding a great friend group, staying in touch with them, and growing together throughout your career.

Where do you see yourself if 5 years?

I have no idea. It is hard to say! I will still be in the tech space and hopefully at a company that is growing quickly!

Alumni Spotlight: Samantha Darnell, Class of 2013

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Samantha DarnellSamantha Darnell, BHP ’13, is an eCommerce Inventory Analyst for H-E-B Grocery. Samantha triple majored in BHP, Supply Chain Management, and Spanish Literature. She has used her supply chain management knowledge in her role to guide vendors, work with various teams and analyze inventory. H-E-B is currently recruiting students for 2016 summer internships. Internship postings can be found on the H-E-B website until September 25. BHP will also be hosting a coffee chat with Samantha on September 8. Register for that event here.

 

What specific projects are you working on as an inventory analyst?

I’m currently working on the eCommerce project which is looking at different ways customers could order product online, potentially as alternatives to the traditional trip to the grocery store. On the supply chain side, I’m helping to design the systems and processes that could support this project. It’s exciting to get in on a project on the ground floor and create processes I might use in the future. The grocery retail industry is changing quickly so we never have a boring day.

Previously, I managed inventory and forecasts for several categories including cosmetics, skin and sun care, and chips, cookies, and crackers. We rotated regularly so inventory analysts could be exposed to different types of products. Inventory analysts work closely with the buying team, that is responsible for meeting with the suppliers and determining which items we will sell. Analysts then ensure that those items stay stocked.

How does your role support the company as a whole?

Supply chain and inventory analysts’ goal is to have the right products at the right place at the right time. In doing this, we are continually trying to maximize our in stock levels at our stores and minimize our inventory, which keeps our operating costs low. In addition to in-stock levels, we also plan for promotions and special events as well as new and discontinued item transitions.

Has working in supply chain been what you expected or different?

One of the first things I learned about supply chain in the real world was how much our modern supply chain relies on technology. In school, there is a distinction between Supply Chain and MIS majors, but realistically that distinction is much less clear. As supply chains continue to become more and more complicated, supply chain professionals are going to have to rely more on technology and become comfortable learning, and potentially helping to design, new systems.

What are the unique challenges of working in inventory for the grocery industry?

The first challenge is customer expectation, myself included. If I walk into a grocery store, I want every item on my list to be in stock, and I get frustrated if it isn’t. Customers expect consistently high in stock levels. Perishable products provide additional challenges;  we must forecast as accurately as possible for products with shorter lives. H-E-B tries to not keep a lot of excess inventory, especially on perishable products. If there is an ice storm in the Northeast and our orders are delayed, our supply chain has to be nimble and flexible in our planning to account for these unforeseen delays.

When you go grocery shopping now, are you looking at everything in the store through a different lens, knowing what has gone into getting the products on the shelves?

Definitely. My trips to H-E-B are about twice as long as they were before I started working for H-E-B. I like to look at the categories that I am managing to see how the shelves look, and to see if we are in stock or if there is anything out of stock that is a surprise to me. Sometimes I write down products that are out of stock that I didn’t think would be. Even though I know how hard it is to get products to the shelves, I still get frustrated when I can’t buy something I am looking for.

You completed an internship with H-E-B while you were in school. What about that experience led you to accept a full-time position with the company?

As an intern, even though it was only a ten-week program, I had a crash course in the H-E-B supply chain practices. H-E-B has a large supply chain organization with many different facets. As a student, I didn’t understand how complicated a retail supply chain was until I experienced it through my internship. I had such a positive experience, because it is an incredibly supportive culture. H-E-B really does have an “open door policy” even though the partners and leaders are very busy. As an intern, I had exposure to any partner or leader that I wanted to interact with, and that experience was invaluable.

I also felt that my work and recommendations were respected and that the leaders paid attention to the work I did even though I was just an intern. Several of the recommendations that I made were actually implemented. This has continued in my work there. I have been able to move around and work on different projects. The fact that I am able to have this experience with the ecommerce team is pretty awesome.

What do you love most about your job and about working for H-E-B?

There are so many opportunities with this company, and my leaders have always made it very clear that they are invested in my long term career goals as well as my personal goals. It is also great to work for a company that is so well respected in the community. When I tell people I work for H-E-B, most people say, “I love H-E-B! That is the best grocery store.” H-E-B does so much for the community, and it is nice to be part of such a positive work environment. Partners work hard, but work-life balance is also very important to the company. I have always felt that from the top-down it is expected that partners should maintain a good work-life balance.

 

Alumni Spotlight: Wes Brown, Class of 2011

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Alumni Spotlight: Wes Brown, Class of 2011

Wes Brown

Wes Brown graduated from UT in 2011 with degrees in Business Honors and Chemistry. Since graduating, he has been pursuing an MD from Harvard Medical School, as well as a Master in Public Policy from the John F. Kennedy School of Government and a Master of Philosophy in Public Health from the University of Cambridge. Needless to say, he has been quite busy.

 

 

You are completing two master’s degrees along with your MD. Why did you decide to take on the master’s programs at the same time?

I came across the masters in public policy option during med school. Because I went straight through from undergrad to med school, I thought it would be practical to try something else. We got a month of health policy training during our first year, but I felt I didn’t know enough about how the health care system worked and thought it would be useful to explore that world further. Learning about the options available within the policy sphere would be a nice supplement to my future in health care. I started taking classes in the Kennedy School and was exposed to work in behavioral economics. I was challenged by my professors to explore the public health applications of behavioral economics, which led me to the master’s program in England that integrated public health, philosophy, and the behavioral sciences. The subsequent interest in public health has really been an extension of my pursuit of the public policy degree.

Harvard is good about supporting students who want to pursue interests outside the box, including experiences abroad. I’ve learned a lot about the policy world in the past year, which has supplemented the business training I received at UT and current medical training. It’s been fascinating to see how different these worlds are and how they interact.

I recently completed the Zuckerman Fellowship in Harvard’s Center for Public Leadership. The program fully funds 16 students from across the country who are pursuing an MBA, MD, or law degree and are interested in pursuing a master’s in public health, public policy, or graduate education at Harvard. It has been a remarkable experience. They’ve had great programming that has brought me together with other professionals from across the country who have a variety of interests, but all want to tackle some of the most difficult problems facing the public sector. I’m very lucky to have been able to do it.

What similarities and differences were there in applying to your master’s programs and to medical school at Harvard?

They are very different, which is probably why many don’t combine them.  Both programs want well-rounded people who are truly motivated to make meaningful change in the world. You have to have a working vision around the change you want to see. The medical school has a more regimented, formulaic way of applying to it. The masters programs are a departure from the more formulaic application you experience in med school.

The most challenging part of the med school application process was the interviews. I didn’t know what to expect. Fortunately, my interviews at Harvard were very personable since the interviewers were genuinely interested in learning more about me. They were interested in how well I could talk about what I had done and why I was interested in medicine. They weren’t just looking for the “right” answers to questions.

How did being a BHP and chemistry major prepare you for graduate and medical school?

In terms of coursework, I fell in love with operations management. The BHP curriculum allowed me to explore OM, and I’ve used it in the healthcare research I’ve done. I’ve been excited by its potential applications to areas that may not be directly related to business like health care. It was also incredibly beneficial to have exposure to my fellow classmates and the conversations we had in class. Just being in that atmosphere—small classes where the professors knew us in addition to intellectual engagement in challenging discussions—was very useful. That environment gave me the confidence to engage with future challenges that I’ve faced in med school.

I really enjoyed both majors and seeing how they were similar and different. It was useful for me to learn how the science and business worlds approached problems differently. Often in the public sector, these two groups talk past each other, and it was useful to learn more about why that is. I had a very broad education at UT, and I knew this was something UT could offer over other schools. During med school interviews, it played a positive role because those practicing medicine often don’t have a business background. I think the interviewers found my business knowledge refreshing since they tend to have applicants who are just science majors.

Even with your busy schedule, you have still managed to find time to be involved. Tell me about the leadership roles you have taken on at Harvard and the experiences you have gained from those roles.

Coming out of the closet during my first year of med school allowed me to get involved in the Harvard Medical School LGBT organization’s leadership. Medicine is a traditionally conservative field, so there were plenty of opportunities to work with the staff to see how we could better support patients, physicians, and students who identified as LGBT within that realm. I learned a lot about myself and the system, and how difficult it was to change something in a timely manner. In one project, we worked with the administration to give applicants an opportunity to express any hardships in an application essay. There wasn’t a place to do this initially. Now applicants can demonstrate that they are LGBT and describe what they have overcome to get to where they are. The change has increased the number of accepted LGBT applicants to 10-15 people from 3-4 in my year.

I also got involved in the LGBTQ Policy Journal at HKS as the health policy editor, which gave me practical skills in the editing/publishing process. Additionally, I was elected to the medical school’s Center for Primary Care Student Leadership Committee, which promoted primary care opportunities to students and staff at Harvard. My experiences in this role and recognition of the increasing need for primary care heightened my interests in primary care and health policy in general.

What are your tips for people juggling challenging academics and busy schedules like so many of our students?

Do what you love. It is so important to go after what you’re passionate about. This will serve you better in the medical field (or the application process) than simply trying to do as many things as possible. Don’t be afraid to go off the common path and create your own towards whatever goal you have. Don’t be afraid to reach out to people who are doing things you’re interested in. I have a mentor who was a couple years ahead of me in BHP who went to HMS. She’s been mentoring me for the past eight years and has been so important in helping me navigate graduate school and tough classes.

What is your ultimate career goal once you have completed your schooling and residency?

I’m choosing between internal medicine (primary care) and emergency medicine. Both are generalist in-nature, and I like that because of the problem-solving skills required. My ideal career also incorporates health policy research in an academic medical center and involvement in healthcare politics in Washington. I see my future being a mix of research, education, management, and clinic. There are plenty of career paths in medicine that allow for this flexibility. I’ll graduate in 2017 and plan to complete residency by 2020.

What public health challenges are you most passionate about?

The future of primary care. We have the Affordable Care Act and increased access to healthcare, but if we don’t have enough providers in places to deliver that care, then we have a problem. It’s a serious supply-demand mismatch. I’m not sure what the answer is, but I believe any solution should treat primary care as the centerpiece and foundation of the health care system.

I’m also passionate about medical education and how it’s going to evolve over time. I’ve had my eye on Dell Medical School for a while, because I’m interested to see what innovative ideas they come up with. Beyond medical school, I’m interested in how we’re going to fund more residency spots in the future. We need to figure out from a policy standpoint how to bolster these numbers.

I couldn’t see myself doing anything but medicine, and I want others who are interested to know that it’s a great field to go into because it’s very exciting, rapidly changing, multidisciplinary, and tremendously satisfying as a career.

Alumni Spotlight: Tera Highbarger Hogan, Class of 2004

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Alumni Spotlight: Tera Highbarger Hogan, Class of 2004

TeraTera Highbarger Hogan, BHP 2004, is the incoming chair of the BHP Advisory Board. Tera is currently a Staffing/Recruiting Manager for Google, based out of their Austin office. Before joining Google, Tera was a management consultant at Accenture for many years and worked for Novotus, both in the area of program management.

Why did you decide to get involved through serving on the BHP Advisory Board and do you have any goals for your time as chair of the advisory board?

I really enjoyed my time in BHP and valued the programs that BHP offered. As an alum I want to be a part of making sure our great base of alumni is doing what it can to support the program. During my term, I will look for ways that alumni can provide more support and help to the program and how we can raise the profile of the program nationally. I would love to see more out-of-state applicants and more diversity of in-state applicants.

You had many roles at Accenture and stayed there for eight years. What did you most enjoy about working for Accenture and how did you develop professionally during that time?

What I enjoyed most about my time at Accenture was getting to see a variety of types of work and clients. I was exposed to a breadth and depth of businesses early on in my career. I was also fortunate to have a lot of client relationships at senior levels, especially considering how early I was in my career. Each project was different than the one before. I had to come in and learn a new area, identify what the clients’ needs were and be able to deliver on those. Throughout my experience at Accenture, I built my client relationship and program management skills and ensured that the clients’ needs were met.

You spent the majority of your career in program management and then switched to recruiting. What prompted that change?

I loved my time at Accenture and wouldn’t change that for anything. It was a great place to start my career. I had been doing the same thing for a while though, and I was interested in other types of work and in being in a business, instead of just being a consultant for one. I was also looking to get off the road and spend more time in Austin. I decided to take a job with Novotus, a recruiting firm where I was still leveraging the program management and client relationship management skills I had built.

I have always been most interested in the people side of business. When I was working for Accenture, I enjoyed career development with my staff and recruiting activities, so I was drawn in by these parallels and the opportunity to spend more focus on people.

What are the challenges of recruiting and staffing for a company the size of Google?

The volume, scale and complexity of Google is a challenge in everything we do. Google is looking to hire the best of the best for each and every role. There is such a variety of things at which people excel and for which they could be a good fit. Matching people with their perfect dream job, not just the next job, is our goal.

My teams are focused on passive candidates – people who haven’t applied, but that we have gone out and found because they are the best in their field. We get in touch with them and get to know them, to find out what they are interested in pursuing. We find out what they are passionate about and what their goals are to see if we can make that happen for them at Google.

Google has long been considered one of the best and most fun places to work. How do you sell your recruits on working there and what do you enjoy about working there?

We sell our recruits more on the work they will be doing. The fun is certainly a piece of it, but what they are most interested in is working on cool, challenging projects and how they can really change the world by what they will be working on. It is a fun, laid back environment to work in with free meals on campus, scooters – all those fun things. We work hard, but we also have fun.

As a recruiter, what advice do you have for students interviewing for jobs and internships?

Do your homework on the company and be yourself during the interview. They are assessing if you are a good fit for the job as much as you are assessing if it is a job you would want. You will be doing this job 40 hours a week, at least, so you want something that is a good fit and that you will enjoy. Also, don’t stress so much, it will all work out!! It’s easy to get wrapped up in thinking this is what you will be doing forever, but that isn’t the case, and really you’re looking for the best starting point for you (which won’t be the same as everyone else).

How did BHP prepare you for the work you have been doing?

The small classes and project focus of BHP prepare you for the real world because that’s how the real world is structured. You have to work with others to solve problems. There are also many times when you will have to work with people you don’t have authority over and in school you practice that when working with peers on group projects.

What are some of your best memories from your time at UT?

Making new and lifelong friends, and spending time with those friends. Also having a flexible daily schedule, which you don’t get when you start working. I have been in a book club with some of my BHP friends who live in different cities, and even different continents, for over 10 years now. The BHP friends you make are always going to be people who understand things you are facing in your career and will be there to provide great advice and guidance, because they are probably walking down a similar career path to you, even if it is in a different industry.