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You could say that Gerald “Jerry” Petersen earned his master’s degree in marketing from BYU because he loved to sing.
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.
Tyler Hardy was one day away from finishing his mission in Veracruz, Mexico, when he got an unexpected phone call. His older brother, Greg, had been seriously injured in a work accident.
When marketing alumna Marinne Pearson was earning her MBA and working part-time, she was also working to rebrand a new company.
After retiring from a long career in sales for startup software companies, Greg Zippi knew exactly what he wanted to do next—teach.
Thanks to his education from BYU Marriott and the example of his father, marketing alum Carlos Valles lives his passion for business working at The Hershey Company.
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.”
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.
Not many people can say that they helped build a company from the ground up within a year of graduating from college. However, BYU Marriott marketing alumna Luisa Chil can.
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.
BYU Marriott marketing alum Orrin Hancock knows a thing or two about setting goals and following through to reach professional and personal summits.
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.
For BYU Marriott marketing alum Andrew Hancock, the opportunity to film a motorcycling trip through Baja, California, led to co-owning a motorcycle apparel company.
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.
Michelle Rhodes had been a widow for about eighteen months when she joined a Facebook group for Latter-day Saint widows and widowers that several people had suggested she join.
Between selling a business and starting a career at LinkedIn, BYU Marriott marketing alum Chase Evans has been busy since he graduated in 2018.
Quick transitions between life events have always been part of Merle Allen’s unofficial strategy for most of his life. At BYU’s 1954 graduation dance, the marketing grad, senior class president, and former varsity football player proposed to his sweetheart, Carol Beckstrand. After the MC announced the happy news, Allen says they then rushed to Beckstrand’s parents’ home to “tell her folks so we’d get to them before somebody else did.”
Hanging on a wall in Karen Ranson Peterson’s home is a quote commonly attributed to William Shakespeare: “Expectation is the root of all heartache.” Peterson has largely avoided such heartache because she’s frequently adjusted her life expectations as a result of several crucial experiences, which have led her to where she is today.
BYU Marriott alumni and former marketing professor Scott Smith was honored during Homecoming Week at Brigham Young University with the prestigious Alumni Achievement Award presented from the BYU Marriott School of Business.