Daniel Bresette
Commencement Speech
May 23, 2008
Robert H. Smith School of Business
Thank you, Dean Frank.
Good afternoon, Smith MBA class of 2008! Congratulations!
And welcome to friends and family with us here to celebrate today. No doubt business school would be
impossible without the support of you all.
Thank you for the opportunity to speak today, for a particularly auspicious event.
I’ll be honest—I wasn’t sure why it should be me to speak during our graduation ceremony. I’m not the
perfect student. I didn’t earn a 4.0 grade point average. I’m not terribly entrepreneurial. I’m not a
savvy technologist. I’m not even originally from Maryland. Yet, despite these shortcomings, I still felt
I had something to say about my time here at Smith and what today is ultimately all about.
I’ve realized at this late date that the real value in a Smith MBA is in you, my classmates. Lately, I’ve
reflected on all that we’ve done since August 2006. Cases, cases, and cases. Readings, readings, and
readings. True, we’ve learned big and important lessons from our courses. Our professors have put
much effort into our instruction and our administrators have given our curriculum much consideration.
We know the particulars of the breakfast cereal industry. We remember why Jack Welch is a saint
worshiped by executives everywhere. We could go on all day about Wal-Mart’s supply chain expertise.
We can manipulate cash flow statements in spreadsheets.
Truth is, though, none of us has retained every lesson from every case or lecture.
But no matter how much I learned (or have since forgotten) from lectures, slides, and cases, I’ve
learned many, many times more from you, my classmates. Group work and, in particular, teamwork
has been the real source of value for me since Orientation. Even when I think about a subject that I
didn’t like, I’m reminded of a team experience that taught me something important.
I suspect most of you would agree—learning from each other has been the keystone of the Smith MBA
experience. And no matter the specifics—whether here, Baltimore, Shady Grove, or Washington, as
full-time, part-time, or executive students—our teamwork defines our MBA skills and abilities. We’re a
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collaborative and cooperative lot, and we’ve given ourselves, fostered and encouraged of course by our
terrific faculty and dedicated administrators, a unique place to learn.
Aren’t we all better from the chance to be students together? Can’t we all recall times when we have
learned from each other what seemed obtuse during class?
I figured out beta calculations thanks to Rob, Jared, Ramona, and Brett. I understand convertible
bonds thanks to Jorge, Mindy, and Berber. During my consulting project, I learned more about market
analysis from Ramin, Tomo, Valerio, and Billy than from any Harvard case. I value team chemistry
more today because of Eric and Ray. Ganesh, Eduardo, Scott, Volkan, Kenyan—we organized and
pulled off an ambitious and successful consulting business development Forum. A few weeks ago, my
capstone MBA experience was being teammates with Ike, Sam, and Liubov, competing in an enriching
and rewarding business case competition at the University of Wisconsin. I could go on and on and on. I
had diverse teams, too, including students from part-time programs, international exchanges, and
other graduate schools here at Maryland.
And even those with whom I wasn’t able to work as teammates, I still took many benefits and takeaways from watching the presentations that resulted from all of your teamwork.
This begs a question: “Seriously, didn’t I ever do anything by myself?” Yeah, I guess. I mean, I did
some good work. But I always did better on teams, with any number of combinations of you.
Yes, I think that the purpose underlying our soon-to-be-minted Smith MBA diplomas has been to gain
knowledge from each other.
So, that’s it. I’ve figured it out. The big idea of our MBA program has been group work.
So, then, why did we pay tuition to come here? For the privilege of huddling over Excel tables? For
the fun of arduously editing 10-page papers line by line? For the chance to argue about slide
formatting? This is really quite a racket.
Sure, it often felt hopeless: stuck in 2311D, time ticking away, an analysis coming together a few
hours before it was due. But would any of us really trade our team learning for anything?
Of course, while such memories are great, it’s not so great that our time together, at least formally as
an MBA class, is over. If I’m lucky, I’ll continue to learn from my colleagues on the job. But it will be
difficult to recreate the unique atmosphere and environment that we have all enjoyed while at Smith.
Now that we’ve nearly graduated, we’ll be re-entering the business world as educated MBAs. As Smith
alumni of the full-time, part-time, and executive programs, we’ll be very good at what we do. We’ll
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succeed individually, I’m positive. And we’ll also succeed as a larger, post-graduation, geographically
disparate group. One might say, as Smith alumni, we’ll continue on as one big team.
In closing, thank you for being my classmates. Thank you most of all for teaching me what I needed to
learn in business school. Thank you for making me a Smith MBA.
Thank you and good luck.
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