Friday, September 20, 2013

STUDENT FEATURE: Ethan White, MBA '14

rutgers business school student blog student feature

Ethan White

Marketing & Global Business

VP of Education, Toastmasters


Ethan White is a second-year MBA Candidate in the full-time program, with concentrations in Marketing and Global Business.  He is also a talk show radio host, professional sports announcer, and stand-up comedian (wait, what?).  



What’s your deal?
What’s my deal? So abrasive. I did my undergrad in international business at the University of Miami (The U!) and graduated in 2009. I had no idea what I wanted to do, so I did what anyone would do when faced with such a decision, I ran away. I spent two years teaching English in Korea and the better part of another year traveling the world. Both are experiences I would never trade for anything, despite potentially putting me at a disadvantage in terms of career experience. Living in Korea where education is emphasized like I had never seen inspired me to come back to school and finish my formal education before really starting my career.

Where do you see yourself in 15 years? Why?
Nope. Skip. You cannot make me consider this.

What is your favorite thing about being an RBS student?
The best thing about being an RBS student is the opportunities afforded to me here. During my undergrad in Miami I didn’t take advantage of the full complement of opportunities for students so I am making amends for that now. I am the VP of Education for Toastmasters which has allowed me to spread my love of public speaking to my fellow classmates who may enjoy it less. Last year we held a competition aimed at improving presentation skills regardless of the actual speech content and I felt it was a big success. In addition, through a series of coincidences I can’t even entirely recount, I co-created and currently co-host Rutgers Newark’s only sports talk radio program. It’s become a
Ethan interviewing Mayor of Newark, Cory Booker
passion and has led to me announcing baseball games for a professional baseball team (all right the Newark Bears, but still) as well as the chance to sit down and interview Cory Booker, which was an incredible experience. I anticipated business school being very boring and straightforward, but it has wildly exceeded those expectations.

What do you do for fun?
So in addition to the sports radio show, my first passion is stand up comedy. While an MBA and stand up don’t seem to have much in common on the surface, both have been monumental in helping the other. I started doing comedy in Miami back in 2007 and I had no idea what I wanted to do with it. I just knew I liked getting on stage and making people laugh. I had no idea how much it would help me in terms of classroom presentations. At my internship this summer, I saw how important handling an audience comfortably could be. On the comedy side, my self-promotion has improved greatly via tools I’ve learned in my marketing classes. I should be famous any day now.

How did you land your summer internship?
I give all the credit to OCM. I was struggling to find an internship and they had sent out a resume book to LifeCell that included my resume. Both LifeCell and OCM contacted me and told me that they wanted to interview me and I got to the internship. I had been applying to all sorts of jobs, but I got one I didn’t even apply for.

What would you do differently if you could repeat your first semester all over again?
Just trust OCM. Seriously. You don’t have to love them, but they know what they’re doing and all the harassment is for your own benefit. Take advantage of the corporate presentations and any connections OCM can provide and get to work early. Having to scramble for an internship in April is a hassle you don’t want.

Check out Ethan’s radio, The Extra Point, every Tuesday and Thursday at 4pm. Stay up to date by following at www.facebook.com/WRNUSports or on Twitter @TheExtraPointRU

Like to laugh? Follow @EthanComedy on twitter or www.facebook.com/EthanWhiteComedy for jokes and upcoming shows and watch videos at www.funnyordie.com/ethanwhite

No comments:

Post a Comment