Description of the video:

My husband was on LinkedIn. And he said, "Did you see the note from Kelley on LinkedIn? Some of the internships that had been scheduled and accepted and planned have fallen through."

So it seemed like it was a perfect opportunity for me to one, to get a talented person that could help our business grow and adapt to this changing post-COVID world. And two, yeah, I think there was some sense of wanting to give back, or at least to stay connected to the university.

Once I graduated, I've always been very open to helping interns or helping first year students, second year students, when they have questions, they reach out to me. Some of the value and key insights that Aki brought was just the different way we do marketing. So for example, he is very analytical. He looked at our data, he identified opportunities.

And so I reached out and said, "You know, I'm at a company. It's Rare Beauty Brands and I need some help. And is there anybody that would be willing to help?" We have Sudiptaa and she is on one of our other brands that we're working. Then Tyler got all his Patchology, and then Xenia, who supports both Patchology and Plant Apothecary. I hope they know how valuable they are and how wonderful they are.

One of the things that stood out about Riece is how she would yell at me. And she wouldn't just say something just to make me feel good, you know, or just to appease me. It was like, if she knew that this was the right answer, or if this was, what I was doing didn't make sense or wasn't helpful, she was really direct about it. And that's what I need because you get in your own head sometimes and you need another set of eyes and somebody who's honest, who's going to really pick apart some of the weaknesses.

This internship experience between me, my startup and the Kelley MBAs has met, but exceeded expectation. I knew I was getting good quality, right? I knew I was getting very capable people, very scrappy people, very fun people, people willing to collaborate, people willing to cooperate. I knew I was going to get that. I think I didn't understand how desperately I needed that.

Description of the video:

Tyler Ray, Full-Time MBA student: I found out the news about my internship being canceled towards the end of April. And I was pretty stunned.

Ruben Figueroa, Full-Time MBA student: When I was looking at the news and how everything was going up with the pandemic and myself still looking for an internship, seeing my classmates already with their locked internships, I did get a little bit nervous.

Akihiro Kohiyama, Full-Time MBA student: As an international student, everything was already very challenging. But then the pandemic broke out. It became even harder.

Tyler: When you had spent basically your whole year working really hard to get an internship and finding out that it no longer was what you were expecting, I knew that I wanted to still find something. I couldn't give up.

When I came across a rare beauty opportunity, it really was up my alley as far as what I wanted to do post-MBA. Working with Tara [Tara Morill, General Manager and Brand Director, Rare Beauty Brands, Kelley alum] has been great because she's been more of a coach than almost like a boss. She had been through the CMA [Consumer Marketing Academy] just like I had. She knew Jonlee.

Ruben: I am entering this summer in Firmatek. The CEO Lauren Elmore, she's a Kelley alum. She opened the doors for me to go work with them, understanding the whole situation that is going on.

Akihiro: I was very excited when I found out I would be interning with Discoverlist. Susana is a consumer marketing expert. She always follows up with me, making sure that I have any questions. I'm definitely learning from her.

Ruben: There are no barriers between us, the students, and the alums from Kelley. It's like an inherent connection that we make.

Tyler: Anybody who is a Kelley, I knew that they would be very friendly and absolutely willing to help. That's a consistent thread throughout and I just saw it through the whole recruiting process of my first year.

Akihiro: I feel like everything is coming to fruition now. We will eventually become alumni as well. But since we are getting a lot from the current alumni, we are getting the motivation to give back eventually as alumni.

Ruben: So I've been check-marking all of my goals so far. I achieved my goal of working with an American company, and that's thoroughly thanks to the university and especially the Kelley alums and Kelley network that we have, which is vast. Everywhere you look, you can find someone from Kelley.