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Alumni Spotlight Business Management Global Supply Chain
Global supply chain graduate Parker Teshima works to ensure that shelves stay stocked when natural disasters strike.
Rebecca McCarron Greenhalgh is no stranger to smart wordsmithing, so it was unusual when she was suddenly speechless during an important Zoom meeting.
It was a business proposition that would change the life of Stewart R. Walkenhorst. A colleague was closing up shop and asked if Walkenhorst would be interested in taking over some outstanding retail orders.
Tracey Evelyn Haslam, a 2001 BYU Marriott management grad, was shocked when she took her four children to visit the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, DC.
Bryn Sieverts was always fascinated with the concept of business. As a young boy, he set up a popsicle stand on a street corner in his neighborhood to earn some extra cash.
In 2010, Joe Bodily discovered a passion for global supply chain management at the BYU Marriott School of Business.
Jeff Brownlow was recruiting at BYU when BYU recruited him.
If there were a poster child for the importance of developing relationships—real relationships—throughout your career, Amy Sawaya Hunter would be it.
Almost everything is a learning curve when you’re starting a business, and Sandy Whitaker, a 2003 business management alum, acknowledges that there can be plenty of bumps and detours along the way. But as she and her husband, Tim, a physical therapist, worked to realize their long-term goal of opening a physical therapy practice, Whitaker found that navigating the curve was easier because of knowledge and skills she had gathered along the way—from her formal education, her past jobs, and even her hobbies.
When Stephen H. Russell reflects on his life, he is struck by the way seemingly small decisions and ordinary situations have blossomed into extraordinary opportunities. “None of this was part of a strategic plan,” he says, “and I feel grateful when I see all the times Heavenly Father has blessed me.”
Global supply chain management alumna McKenzi Gebhard believes that she wouldn't be where she is today if not for the BYU Marriott School of Business.

Born and raised in Honolulu, Thomas Y.K. Fong has long loved learning about the earth’s natural processes. He originally planned to earn a bachelor’s degree in geology at BYU and then pursue graduate studies in oceanography. But during one midwinter geology field trip to St. George, Utah, a sandstorm blew through the group’s campsite, prompting Fong to reconsider whether his studies had brought him too close to nature for comfort. “Halfway through that cold, sand-blown night, I’m thinking, ‘Is this really what I want to do for the rest of my life?’” Fong recalls.
In 1968 more than 150 students graduated from BYU Marriott with degrees in business management. Kristi Taylor Lawrence was one of the few women in that graduating class.
Alfred Gantner, cofounder of Partners Group and an MBA alum, shared his insights on a balanced life as the featured speaker at convocation on 28 April.
Just before heading to the University of Iowa to join the university’s swim team, John Fellows discovered a copy of the Book of Mormon on a bookshelf in his parents’ home in Boise, Idaho. He packed it in his bags, and before long he called the missionaries wanting to know more. The combination of his baptism into The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and a swimming-prohibitive injury led him to transfer to BYU, where he joined the Army ROTC and discovered what would become his lifelong career.
Never give up. That's a lesson that Allison Oberle learned early as a student at BYU Marriott that she has relied on often since graduating in global supply chain management.

Almost every May, between four hundred and seven hundred people, attend a Norwegian Constitution Day celebration at the International Peace Gardens in Salt Lake City and enjoy traditional Norwegian lefse flatbread and Solo orange soda. For more than a decade, the chair of the event’s committee has been 1995 business management grad Steve Affleck, who doesn’t have even a bit of Norwegian ancestry.
BYU Marriott alumna Melinda Malmgren's love for business can be traced back to her fifth-grade days when she participated in a class activity called "Store."

For Scott and Carmen Moscrip, global supply chain students at BYU Marriott aren't just future employees and leaders, but building blocks to a better world.
Hearing a mix of languages was commonplace for Everet Bluth, who grew up speaking both Spanish and English on his family’s farm in a Latter-day Saint settlement in northern Mexico. Life at home, Bluth says, “evolved around family, church, work on the farm, school, and sports.” He says he had a typical childhood—except that he started driving farm equipment when he was eight.
Brian Hanks has a job title you may have never heard before: dental transition specialist. Hanks works with dental professionals looking to buy a practice and helps them find financial stability. “Dentists are small-business owners,” he says. “The marketplace is becoming more competitive, and more and more dentists are realizing that they need to be business owners first and dentists second—or at least have those two positions tied in their minds.”
Living without a washing machine and other conveniences was hardly what Kim Kimball Fale had in mind after graduating from BYU. She had earned a bachelor’s in business education in 1977 and a master’s in business education with an emphasis in organizational behavior in 1979. But when her husband, Tevita, suggested they move to his native Tonga for a few years, Fale agreed.
From an early age, it was clear that Brian J. Baldus was destined for the world of business. In fact, he started his first company as a nine-year-old. Now as a professor and an academic researcher, Baldus strives to make a positive impact on the business community on campus and around the area.
Melissa Nielsen's degree in Global Supply Chain Management has allowed her to skip the learning curve, and start making a difference immediately at her first job post graduation.