A group of 14 students is officially one step closer to earning their Executive MBA. Carey Business School inducted its inaugural cohort with a convocation ceremony earlier this month.
This year's cohort is made up of students from six states and the District of Columbia. Their professional backgrounds range from aerospace to healthcare to fashion entrepreneurship. Carey’s Executive MBA is designed to help these senior leaders enhance their strategic decision-making and solidify their analytical and financial skills.
We asked three students what brought them to the program and what they plan to take away from the experience.
Tiffany Johnson-Sager
- Title: Director: Business Relations and Director: Information Systems and Technology Incident Command Operations
- Employer: University of Maryland Medical System
- Hometown: Baltimore, MD
What made you interested in pursuing an Executive MBA?
Pursuing my EMBA is the next phase in my career and personal growth. Growing up, my family didn’t always have a lot of resources, which gave me an early appreciation for opportunity and how it can impact your life. That perspective has shaped my ambition, driven my desire to keep learning, and influenced the kind of leader I want to become. Receiving my EMBA will not only open doors for me, but also put me in a position to create opportunities for others and coach the next generation of leaders.
I want my children to look up to me the same way I looked up to my father: with pride. Pursuing my EMBA is another step in that journey. I want to keep challenging myself, broaden my thinking, and become a more strategic leader.
What are you most looking forward to in Carey’s EMBA program?
Even early in the application process, the staff at Carey was extremely attentive and answered all my questions. I felt they were as invested as I was, which is why I selected Carey.
Most of my career has been in healthcare IT. Being surrounded by leaders from different industries and backgrounds will challenge how I think and push me to become a better leader.
I’m also incredibly excited to be part of Carey’s inaugural EMBA cohort. There is something special about being part of the first group and molding an experience that future cohorts will build on.
I’m excited to be a student again so I can ask questions, be tested, and see what I’m capable of at this stage of my life and career.
What makes you a unique addition to the cohort?
Working in healthcare IT, I have learned the importance of building relationships and collaborating across different departments. I contribute IT leadership, healthcare experience, relationship-building, and complex problem-solving. My favorite part of my job is bringing groups together to tackle complex situations and figuring out how to move forward as a larger team.
I have learned the importance of hard work, listening, and creating opportunities for myself when they aren’t necessarily handed to me. I understand what it means to work for something you really want, which will shape how I show up for my cohort. I am excited to share what I’ve learned and am willing to listen to and learn from everyone around me.
What are you most interested in learning during your time in the EMBA?
My goal is to become a more strategic leader. I love solving problems, guiding a team through complex situations, and making things happen. However, I want to keep developing my ability to step back, see the bigger picture, and think beyond the immediate problem.
I’m particularly interested in strengthening my business and financial knowledge and becoming more confident making strategic decisions with the information that is provided. I want to enhance my understanding of how all the pieces of a business connect so I can lead at a broader level.
Rashad Staton
- Title: Executive Director
- Employer: Community Law in Action
- Home: Baltimore, MD
What made you interested in pursuing an Executive MBA?
I have reached a new stage in my leadership journey. Much of what I have learned about leadership, organizational management, fundraising, strategy, and community engagement has come through experience. Often times, I was placed in situations where there was no blueprint and I had to figure things out along the way.
As I have grown into executive leadership, I have become increasingly interested in understanding the business and financial principles behind the decisions I am already being asked to make. I want to pair my experience and practical knowledge with a rigorous business education.
More importantly, I see the EMBA as preparation for leading at a larger scale. Baltimore will always be central to who I am and why I lead, but I do not want the impact of my work to stop at the city limits. I want to build the knowledge, relationships, and executive capacity to operate nationally, develop scalable solutions, and connect communities like Baltimore to larger networks of capital, innovation, partnerships, and opportunity.
I do not see the EMBA as a departure from the work I have been doing; it feels like an evolution of it.
What are you most looking forward to in Carey’s EMBA program?
I am most looking forward to being intellectually challenged by people whose professional experiences and perspectives may be different from my own, while discovering how much we may have in common as leaders.
My career has primarily been rooted in nonprofit, education, civic engagement, and community spaces, while my classmates may come from other sectors. Although our professional backgrounds may differ, I believe many of us have navigated similar questions around leading people, managing uncertainty, making difficult decisions, building trust, and creating meaningful impact. I am excited to learn from how others have approached those challenges and to contribute my own perspective to those conversations.
Ultimately, I am eager to become part of a learning environment where everyone becomes a catalyst for someone else’s growth. I believe the collective experience can propel all of us to take what we learn and create impact well beyond the classroom.
What makes you a unique addition to the cohort?
I often describe myself as a self-proclaimed “Catalyst of Change.” I am intentional about how I invest my time, relationships, ideas, and resources because I believe leadership is not simply about what you accomplish individually; it is about what becomes possible because you were willing to invest in something or someone else. I see Carey’s EMBA as another catalyst in that journey. The curriculum, faculty, and my classmates will challenge how I think, expand how I see problems and opportunities, and push all of us to become more thoughtful, strategic, and effective leaders.
I have also found myself in positions where I was often the first, whether creating the first Youth Engagement Specialist role at Baltimore City Public Schools or stepping into executive leadership at a relatively young age. I do not take being first lightly. I see those opportunities as both personal responsibilities and opportunities to widen the pathway for others who come behind me.
What are you most interested in learning during your time in the EMBA?
I am most interested in strengthening my financial and strategic decision-making as an executive. I have learned how to build programs, organizations, partnerships, and teams, but I want to become much more fluent in the financial language behind those decisions.
I want to better understand how to evaluate an organization’s financial health, assess opportunities and risk, build sustainable revenue models, allocate capital, and make decisions that balance mission with long-term organizational sustainability.
I am also interested in learning how to think beyond the local scale. I have spent much of my career asking how we can create meaningful change for a young person, a neighborhood, or a community. I now want to become equally skilled at asking how we take something that works and develop the strategy, infrastructure, partnerships, and resources necessary to scale it across communities and, where appropriate, nationally.
Ultimately, I want to be a bridge: someone who can bring national ideas, resources, capital, relationships, and opportunities back to Baltimore and other communities that can benefit from them, while also helping the rest of the country understand the innovation, talent, and leadership that exists in communities like mine.
Brianna Wendt
- Title: Portfolio Development
- Employer: Boeing Ventures
- Home: Alexandria, VA
What made you interested in pursuing an Executive MBA?
I'm at a pivotal point in my career where I could lean into the technical or move towards strategy and leadership. I've chosen to pursue the latter, and the EMBA will help me bridge the gap between my engineering background and where I want to go.
The executive format appealed to me because it aligned with my years of experience and would allow me to learn from an amazing cohort.
What are you most looking forward to in Carey’s EMBA program?
I'm excited about the diversity of the cohort. Coming from corporate aerospace, I'm really looking forward to benefiting from the experiences of classmates with backgrounds in medicine, politics, government, and education!
What makes you a unique addition to the cohort?
In my day job, I help startups and small businesses find opportunities within my large corporation. I have a unique perspective on what it takes to get those contracts and be successful when in business with a large original equipment manufacturer.
What are you most interested in learning during your time in the EMBA?
I'm looking forward to learning the skills to communicate and present information like an executive. Working in engineering has led me to develop a very specific communication style. I want to be better able to convey my strategy and goals in my presentations.