Utkarsh Gupta, President of UConn Graduate Consulting Club

Friday, January 31, 2020 2:00-3:00 p.m., BUSN 106

Utkarsh worked in Mu Sigma (Bengaluru) as a business analyst before moving to the Middle East to start his own food tech company. There, he secured funding from Omani partners and ran the company for more than two years before it was acquired by another company. He was also elected as the President of NEDU, an India based micro-financing firm, where he added value by digitizing processes across the domains.

Currently, he is a first-year MBA student at the University of Connecticut, School of Business, and is the President of the UConn Graduate Consulting (UGC) club and leads a team of 50 students in Hartford and Stamford campuses. UGC is a student-run club providing pro-bono consulting services to small and medium businesses in Hartford. He is also working as a graduate assistant in the Connecticut Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation (CCEI), where he works with startups in UConn to help them solve business-related challenges.

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Wei Wang, Assistant Director - Group Benefit Strategy

Friday, February 28, 2020 2:00-3:00 p.m., BUSN 106

Wei first came to the US to pursue her Ph.D. degree in Materials Science. Her Ph. D. research was focused on fluid dynamics modeling and crystal growth theories. After graduation, she joined Applied Materials in the Semiconductor industry as a Process Engineer, working on one of the key semiconductor processes, EPI, in cell phone/computer chips manufacturing. In three years, she was promoted two times and became a Senior Principle Engineer. Despite the early success, Wei started to feel the need for more challenges, and found herself longing for more understanding into the business side of the world. As a result, she quit her job, and joined the UConn MBA program. While in the program, she interned with the Small Commercial Product Management team at The Hartford Insurance Company. She liked the product management role, which aligned with her interest and skill sets, and liked the insurance industry and the company culture. As a result, she joined The Hartford full time as the Assistant Director of Group Benefit Strategy after graduating from the MBA program. She hopes she can utilize her analytical skills and business knowledge to develop insurance products that better suit the needs of small business owners.

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Shirley Tarabochia, Pathway Operations Manager, Amazon

Friday, March 8, 2019 1:00-2:00 p.m., BUSN 106

Shirley holds a Bachelor of Industrial Engineering from Pontificia Universidad Catolica del Peru and a Master of Business Administration from the University of Connecticut , her concentrations were Business Analytics and Finance Analysis and Investment, while she was on the MBA program she helped several entrepreneurs to improve their processes providing them guidance as a consultant. She has worked in Kimberly Clark Peru as a Process Engineer before joining Scharff-FedEx Peru as the Chief of Engineering and Process Improvement Department, where she was responsible for the successful implementation of Lean/ Six Sigma methodologies. With more than 10 years of work experience, Shirley has Process Improvement and Project Management expertise. Shirley joined Amazon in 2016 as a Pathway Operations Manager Intern. In 2017 she took a full time job offer in Amazon as a Pathway Operations Manager, she was part of a leadership program, where she went through different operations roles until 2019 when she became a Senior Operations Manager, leading a team of more than 2,000 employees. Shirley lives in Hartford, Connecticut with her family and looks forward to the future with curiosity and an open mind. Be positive, be thankful, and keep learning is Shirley’s mentality.

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Tijana Grujic, Senior Manager, Value Management at Cigna

Tijana holds a PhD in Economics, MSc in Quantitative Finance and a Bachelors degree in Banking and Finance from the Faculty of Economics at the University of Belgrade, Serbia. After 7 years of experience in M&A Consulting, Tijana moved to the United States and completed her MBA at UConn with Beta, Gamma, and Sigma honors. Upon graduation, Tijana joined the Financial Leadership Program (FDP) with Cigna and has been taking diversified roles during the last 4 years. She currently works as a Senior Manager in Value Management.

During her career in Serbia, Tijana held strong connections with academia and completed numerous researches and publications. She held a notable position as a Board Member with the Central Depository and Clearing House of the Republic of Serbia, and was also a Consultant with the Treasury department of the Ministry of Finance. Aside from her professional development, Tijana is a very passionate traveler and has visited 42 countries.