Summer 2017

Features

A Smith MBA team tackles the trebuchet challenge, an exercise in operating a replica of a siege engine used in the Middle Ages.

Building Resilience

In February 2017, Smith launched a new initiative aimed at fostering high-performance team and resiliency skills for Queen’s MBA students. Developed in conjunction with Reticle Ventures Canada, a group of retired Canadian Special Operations Forces leaders, the Smith-Reticle Resiliency Challenge pushed students to test their problem-solving, communication, and collaboration skills.

Growing Impact

The Centre for Social Impact has come a long way since its debut 13 years ago. Since then, thousands of students have made positive contributions to their communities and to the wider world by participating in its programs.

seStart-Ups Snapshot

Three new ventures launched by Smith School of Business alumni are profiled. Many others are showcased in our Start-Ups section. This is also where entrepreneurs can profile their new ventures by submitting a form describing their company. Their submissions will appear online and also be considered for inclusion in a future print edition of the magazine.

Next-Gen Start-Ups

New ventures launched by students and recent grads get funding through Smith’s new venture initiatives and business plan competitions.

Profiles

Comrade Pazderka

For an astonishing 43 years, Bohumir (Bo) Pazderka has been a professor of economics at Smith School of Business. His courtly manner, dry wit, intellectual curiosity and depth of knowledge of economics have impressed generations of students, as well as his faculty and staff colleagues. Few knew that their teacher and colleague had been a former Marxist-trained economist, Czech Army veteran, convicted-in-absentia defector-turned-refugee in a previous life.

The Kindness of Strangers

If not for the actions of four Canadian public sector officials, Salman Mufti, EMBA’97, would not be where he is today. The Associate Dean and Executive Director of Queen's Executive Education believes compassion led these strangers to take a chance on a young aspiring immigrant. After 38 years of achievement and public service of his own, it seems that Salman was a good bet after all.

First Impressions

PhD candidate Tashfeen Hussain, MSc’12, arrived in Canada in 2011 from his homeland of Bangladesh to pursue his postgraduate studies at Smith School of Business. Here he recalls a few of his first impressions of his new home.

From One Kingston to Another

Smith MIS Professor Yolande Chan, born and raised in Kingston, Jamaica, has called its Ontario namesake home for 26 years. Educated at MIT and at Oxford as a Rhodes Scholar, Yolande had her pick of countries that would have welcomed her as an immigrant. Canada and Smith School of Business have been the beneficiaries of this accomplished professor’s decision to settle here.

Paying it Forward

Dunstan Peter, EMBA’15, left Sri Lanka as a teen and moved to Canada, where he has built a group of successful businesses. It’s no coincidence that many members of his workforce are fellow newcomers.

Taking Root

A special section profiling alumni and faculty who have brought their talents to Canada, enriching their new country and communities in the process.

Flight to Freedom

Afghanistan in the 1990s was no place to raise three daughters, concluded the parents of Mariam, BCom’07, Humaira, BCom’09, and Trina Ghiacy, BCom’13. Abeda, an architect, and her husband, Jelani, a civil engineer, left behind extended family and successful careers when they spirited their daughters out of war-torn Afghanistan. An eventual safe landing in Canada opened up wide avenues of opportunity that the Ghiacy sisters have embraced fully.

Different Paths – Same Destination

Ivayla Dingilova and Ivana Corovic, both BCom’09, hit it off right away when they met in the line-up for a Commerce Frosh Week staple, the Buddy Cruise of the Thousand Islands. That chance encounter would lead to a strong friendship, initially as novice first-years, later as friends and housemates, and still today, as successful professionals in Toronto.