International Study Trip

Photo of Matthew
Often, I believe sports fans are too critical on their respective teams without truly understanding the logistics behind managing them. Which is why it was awesome to gain insight towards the challenges, struggles, and excitement of being part of managing such a major league sports team from  Assistant General Manager (GM) Don Fishman of the Washington Capitals. 

SAF students from the Spring 2020 International Study Trip virtually met with alumni and dignitaries mostly from New York City. Although the course focused on NYC, SAF students were still able to expand their reach to meet with other alumni and dignitaries spanning from Hong Kong to California. I ended up virtually meeting with Kelvin Tran from NYC who offered me educational and informative knowledge that I will use to help grow my career.

Thursday, August 6, 2020

Logistics Team NYC 2020

Hello Fellow Students!

We are the logistics team reporting from our virtual International Study Trip course classroom. Our team, consisting of Cedric, Dawson, Matthew, and Michael, has been working extremely hard to make sure the organization of our virtual trip goes smoothly and seamlessly.

Hello Everyone!

Coming to you from our virtual International Study Trip course classroom, we are the Corporate Relations Team: Owen, Roseline, Jack and Kaif. Today we will be sharing our insight into a behind the scenes experience for the International Study opportunity to NYC.

After meeting Minghao Ji, from Bain & Company, at the UWMCC competition, I asked him if he would like to be a speaker at our class during a virtual coffee chat. Not only did he agree, but he also brought a private equity partner, Andrew Edwards, and a Waterloo alumnus, Cameron Capel, to help maximize our learning experience. This opportunity became a truly amazing interview.

We proactively responded to the COVID-19 crisis by pivoting and seeking global opportunities, which was a huge success with so many organizations from diverse industries agreeing to meet with our International Study group.

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I had the opportunity to lead our meeting with John Nicola, the Founder, Chairman & CEO of Nicola Wealth. With a background like no other, I found his insights, as well as the delivery of those insights to be extremely unique. With conviction, John spoke about some of the fundamental principles he abides by as he continues to grow his business.

Due to complications arising from the COVID-19 pandemic, the plan for the winter 2020 International Study Course shifted several times. I was a member of the meals and culture team, and our team was responsible for creating a presentation for the class to learn more about our original destination, Singapore. This included its history, cultural diversity, government structure, etiquette, laws, and points of interest. This allowed all our classmates to be knowledgeable about what they were to expect from the trip, and how they should be interacting with the speakers in our meetings.