MBA Hooding Ceremony Address · May 20, 2012 · California State University, Northridge
An Education or an Ordination?
In 2012, I was selected to give the student address at CSUN's MBA Hooding Ceremony. A colleague and friend — Victoria Branch — helped me shape the speech. She has since passed, and I've kept it all these years, both because of what the moment meant to me and because her words are part of it.
Victoria Branch
Who helped shape these words
Even though I was already working as a manager when I started the CSUN MBA program, I often found myself holding back in meetings — even when I really wanted to speak up and share my ideas, insights and opinions.
Maybe it was because I was usually the youngest — or the newest — in most of these groups, but I'd find myself thinking, “Who am I to voice a different point of view if the others — my supervisors, after all — seem to be pretty much in agreement?”
Yet sometimes if I'd take someone aside after the meeting and tell them what I'd been thinking — one to one — the response would be, “What a great idea! I wish you'd shared that with everyone.”
But I didn't or couldn't. I had plenty of ideas, but I seemed to believe that I lacked the authority to voice them. It was as if I were waiting to be somehow officially “anointed” or “invested” before I could be so bold, before I could be certain that my contributions would be regarded as appropriate or worthy of serious consideration.
And then I entered this program, in which — as you all know — we did public speaking in every single class. I don't remember a single class in which we did not present Harvard cases, industry analyses, and in-class projects.
But it wasn't really public speaking that I was learning. Rather, through the process of participating in these exercises, I developed a sense of confidence in my own critical thinking skills, my powers of reasoning, and my ability to make recommendations — strongly, effectively and convincingly.
I began to notice, when I was sitting in meetings with even the most senior of professionals at work, that I was feeling increasingly at home. It was as if — on some level — a part of me knew that I now possessed the knowledge and experience that qualified me not only to voice and support my own views, but also to openly challenge ideas that were unsound. For the first time in my life, I was experiencing the pleasure of making recommendations and observing how my contributions were proving meaningful, insightful, impactful.
In other words, this program didn't teach me how to make a pretty PowerPoint presentation. (I already knew how to do that when I came here.) What it did do was lead me out of my own self-imposed set of limitations.
Even more than that, this program invested me with my own authority. So, with MBA degree in hand, I consider myself not only well educated but also — in a very special way — officially “ordained” as a leader.
Which is to say, what we've earned here at CSUN isn't just our master's degrees. We've earned our voices — and the right to be bold in expressing the ideas that ring true for us.
Speaking of boldness, I'd like to end these remarks with a quote on this topic from the German poet and dramatist Goethe.
“Boldness has genius, power, and magic in it. Begin it now.”
There! (a sprinkling of holy water or fairy dust over self and fellow graduates) Now, we're all ordained!