SUNY Oswego - Alumni Association - December E-Newsletter

December 2010 • Vol 6 No 9

MBA Candidate Helps His Team to a National Title

For the second consecutive year, a SUNY Oswego MBA student returned from Beta Alpha Psi’s international Project Run With It business consulting competition as a member of a winning team.

Michael Kurdyla M '11 stands with Richard Skolnik, left, and Florence Kirk, right

Michael Kurdyla M ’11 teamed this summer with three students from other business schools to produce a winning project for the not-for-profit Community Health Awareness Council of Mountain View, Calif.

Oswego’s chapter of Beta Alpha Psi received a prize of $1,000. So did the chapters of Kurdyla’s teammates’ schools: the University of South Florida, Utah State University and Western Washington University.

Last year, SUNY Oswego’s Brittany Vetter ’11 also helped a team win in the Project Run With It competition, which is sponsored by Moss Adams, a CPA and business consulting firm.

Kurdyla said the whirlwind trip in August to the competition in San Jose proved to him that he could work in an intense team atmosphere to produce a real-world consulting presentation.

“Being able to meet a tough deadline was a great thing to take away from the competition,” he said. Working early mornings and late nights around a full day of community service, the team produced a 10-minute PowerPoint presentation.

When the 60 competitors from business schools around the nation, as well as Australia and New Zealand, arrived at the event, they didn’t know who their teammates would be or which of three San Jose-area not-for-profit organizations they’d be asked to help. Kurdyla’s client turned out to be Community Health Awareness Council, which needed website reconstruction, advice on improving fundraising and other help.

The project produced business advice for the not-for-profit council, such as keeping a database of the many graduate students, so the organization can contact them for advice, service and donations after they graduate.

— Jeff Rea ’71

PHOTO CAPTION:
Michael Kurdyla M ’11, center, displays his team’s plaque for winning the international Project Run With It competition for members of Beta Alpha Psi, an honor society for finance information students. With him are Florence Kirk, adviser of Beta Alpha Psi’s Oswego chapter and professor of accounting, and School of Business Dean Richard Skolnik.

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Who doesn’t want to save the world? Michael Kite ’02 does that for a living through World Wildlife Fund.

As marketing specialist for one of the world’s leading conservation organizations, Kite and his team of three work to raise more than $5 million each year. The majority of that money comes from licensing partnerships and promotions with the likes of Barnes & Noble, Gap, Hewlett-Packard, Dial and Coinstar.

Retail partnerships help WWF spread its message to the general public and raise funds for its conservation work around the globe. For example, Bank of America contributes $100 for every special Visa account opened and Nabisco is supporting WWF’s “Year of the Tiger” initiative with special packaging and a $100,000 donation. The new CVS Green Bag Tag program rewards reusable bag-toting customers, and generates five cents for WWF for each tag sold.

All support WWF’s mission of protecting the future of nature, down to the finest details, Kite said.

“We like to see that the product is made from recycled material and is recyclable itself, and somehow ties into our mission,” Kite said. The Green Bag Tag, for instance, is made from a corn-based material and features a 100 percent recycled silicone lanyard.

As a broadcasting major at Oswego, Kite got involved with WRVO-FM and WNYO-FM.

“I think it gave me a lot more confidence in talking to people,” he said. It was an important part of his early career in broadcast sales and remains an important piece in the message he “sells” today.

“The best part of my job is seeing a product in the store with the WWF logo after months of working with a company to launch it,” said Kite, who joined the organization in 2006. “It’s rewarding to give people a fun, unique way to protect our planet.”

— Shane M. Liebler