The Lally Global Forum was created by Lally graduate students to provide opportunities to learn from international classmates. At the first session, students presented their experiences in Beijing, Shanghai, Rome, and Pakistan.
Attendees and presenters included students from the International Scholars Program (ISP) at Lally's Hartford, CT campus, who spent the past semester studying in Rome and Shanghai. After a greeting from Dean Gautschi, Ana Flores MS/ISP ‘10 and Aldo Fonseca MS/ISP ’10 presented a summary of the ISP group’s activities in Italy and China, including insights into each culture’s business style and etiquette, differences in decisionmaking, and other customs important for professionals to understand when doing business internationally. Flores noted: “We started the ISP program as students who are interested in international business and because we want to obtain international exposure. RPI’s Hartford campus is mostly composed of working professionals who are not internationals. We came to the Troy campus to continue our learning by being part of Troy’s international business culture.” Graduate students on Lally’s Troy campus represent more than 18 different countries of origin, and international students make up approximately 50% of MBA classes.
Following the ISP presentation, Fulbright Scholar Atif Abdul Majeed MBA ’10 presented his research about developing incubator efforts in Pakistan.
The meeting concluded with a celebratory pizza lunch at Bacchus in downtown Troy.
The Lally Global Forum organizers are Atif Abdul Majeed MBA ’10 and Jason Doran MBA ’11. For information on upcoming meetings, contact Jason Doran at doranj2@rpi.edu