Anthony Ambrose, a junior majoring in business administration at the Gabelli School of Business, spent his break trying to see how many times he could get rejected.

As part of a Gabelli School of Business course called Innovation and Resilience, taught by Julita Haber, Ph.D., Ambrose visited numerous places around his hometown of Moorestown, New Jersey, with the goal of hearing the word “no” at least 10 times.

Could a local pretzel shop make him 500 pretzels in 10 minutes? No. Could he use a leaf blower inside a friend’s living room? No. He even asked an employee at Target if he could display clothes as a living mannequin. Also, no, but with a giggle.

“That was very uncomfortable for me. I even shed a tear when I asked for it because I felt I would be rejected. But before the Target employee rejected me, she smiled and giggled because I had that ounce of hope,” he said.

“I’ve never done anything like it before. It was pretty crazy.”

As part of her course, Haber required students to reach out to friends, family members, and strangers and make 21 bold requests that would result in at least ten rejections.

Because 7 in 10 new businesses will fail within three years, she said, entrepreneurs need to be accustomed to hearing the word “no”.

“Students sometimes have a hard time giving or getting feedback. They avoid a lot of confrontation, and they perceive the word no as negative. We need to strengthen them to be more capable to take no,” said Haber, an associate clinical professor.

“That is the foundation for entrepreneurship.”

Saying ‘No’ as Well as Hearing It

In a separate exercise, Haber pitched business ideas to students to get them used to the idea of saying “no” as well as hearing it.

“Students can have a really hard time both giving and receiving feedback. They’re very kind, and they avoid a lot of confrontation, so they perceive ‘no’ as a negative thing,” said Haber, who credited Gabelli School assistant professor Sophia Town, Ph.D., for the idea.

The exercises are part of an emphasis on learning five “discovery skills” described in The Innovator’s DNA: Mastering the Five Skills of Disruptive Innovators  (Harvard Business School, 2011), which students read for class. Those skills include associating, questioning, observing, networking, and experimenting.

Sometimes ‘No’ Is Really ‘Not Now’

For Ambrose, the exercise was illuminating. Occasionally, the “no’” he was looking for never came, such as when he went to a local Wawa and asked if he could have a free cup of coffee instead of paying $1.89. The clerk told him to go ahead and take it. And when he asked if he could intern over the summer at a local real estate brokerage, the answer was more like “not now” than “no.”

“The woman at the brokerage took my email, and she said she would keep me in mind if any internship came up elsewhere at any other company,” he said.

“I thought that was pretty cool. Just because you get rejected doesn’t mean that you’re totally cut off from something; it could open up more doors down the road.”

From August 18 to 26, the students visited Buenos Aires, Argentina, as part of a monthlong onboarding process that emphasized camaraderie, academic excellence, and helping the less fortunate.

Julita Haber, Ph.D., a clinical assistant professor of communications and media management and director of the full-time MBA program, said this year’s trip, which followed three weeks of orientation both on campus and remotely, expanded upon previous years’ trips, when students did consulting work for local nonprofit organizations. This year, they also brought goods with them to donate to charities and devoted a full day to community service, helping to refurbish a shelter for homeless children.

Serving Local Charities

The three nonprofit groups they worked with were Mensajeros de la Paz, which runs residential homes and daycare centers for underserved children and the elderly; Pilares, which works alongside the families living in precarious settlements in Buenos Aires; and Educar y Crecer, which designs, implements, and evaluates high quality educational programs for children living in vulnerable situations.

“This year, we enriched their involvement and touched on their emotional connection with these populations,” she said, noting that after interviewing the heads of the NGOs about issues such as human resources and marketing, students then presented their findings in person at the NGO’s headquarters.

“Emotionally, students felt a lot more compelled to tap into a social innovation space and do things that open up their ability to give back, which I think is important for MBAs.”

Argentina isn’t the only place the students are traveling; in March, MBA students will travel to London to work with for-profit companies. Both trips are part of a program that emphasizes a global outlook, personalized leadership development, collaboration, rigorous curriculum, and business with purpose.

Forming Tight Bonds

Kostapanos Miliaresis, a member of the class who created to a spreadsheet to track the unassembled bicycles, sheets, towels, rain gear, and other items that the cohort brought with them to donate, said the trip resonated a great deal with him. The mission of Ethelon, the company he co-founded seven years ago in Athens, Greece, is to connect companies with volunteer opportunities. He decided to get his MBA to explore new opportunities, and Fordham’s designation as a Changemaker Campus convinced him to move to New York City. The trip was a great bonding experience, he said.

“We have all these get-to-know kind of gatherings, but when you spend all this time together, you really get a better sense of who someone is,” he said.

Hermann Rinnen, a native of Dusseldorf, Germany, said the trip exceeded his expectations. A 2013 graduate of Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University, Rinnen said he enrolled in the MBA program to strengthen his accounting and finance skills. He was part of a team that addressed human resource management at Mensajeros de la Paz, a project that enabled him to share insights he’s gleaned as co-owner of a family-owned logistics company, Rinnen GmbH & Co.

He said he considers the group’s donations and the service work to be even more important than the consulting projects.

“With the consulting project, we also benefitted from it, not just the organization. We were able to grow and apply knowledge and insight. But doing the community service opened my eyes to how important community work is and how important it is to pay attention to people,” he said.

“I think it was a really great experience to have one day of this kind of community work, I could have done it two or three more days.”

Haber said the trip, which was the third of its kind, has proven to be an excellent bonding experience. This year, the group was treated to a reception at the home of new Fordham Trustee Dario Wertheim, GABELLI ’91. Wertheim also earned an MBA at the business school, and is currently the director of Grupo Werthein, a firm whose portfolio includes mass consumption, energy, insurance, agribusiness, real estate, and technology.

“By having our students travel together, we are actually creating cohesive cohorts,” Haber said.

“That cohesiveness is something that distinguishes us from other, larger MBA programs.”

That was the message of Business with Purpose, a panel discussion held Wednesday, Feb. 13, at Fordham’s Lincoln Center campus.

“Everyone says we need to maximize shareholder value, and that apparently means today. But that’s an ephemeral goal. If you actually thought about the longer-term shareholder value, you have to take into account the environment,” said Paul Johnson, senior advisor at financial services consultant Harbor Peak, LLC, and adjunct professor at the Gabelli School of Business.

“These are shadow liabilities that are unrecognized from an accounting perspective, but they are going to come home to roost.”

Johnson was joined by the Gabelli School’s David Gautschi, Ph.D., the Joseph Keating, S.J., Professor of Marketing; Michael Pirson, Ph.D., associate professor of management systems; and Julita Haber, Ph.D., clinical assistant professor of communications and media management.

The discussion, which was moderated by Sertan Kabadayi, Ph.D., professor of marketing and chair of the marketing area at Gabelli School of Business, was sponsored by the graduate student club Fordham Net Impact.

A Critique of Short Term Thinking

Johnson said the term “long-term” needs to be reintroduced into discussions involving business.

Facebook exemplifies how not to do things, he said, as it puts too much emphasis on growth at any cost, without any consideration for users’ concerns about data collection, privacy, and disinformation.

“You no longer have any customer that would take a bullet for the business. The U.S. is looking at whether or not [Facebook] should be regulated, and no user is going to stand up and say ‘Hold on a second, this is really precious to me,’” he said.

Gautschi, who is also dean emeritus of the Gabelli graduate school, noted that the business world got a black eye in 2007 when the financial markets took a nose dive. This was not new though; in 2001, companies such as Enron, Parmalot, and Global Crossing were found to be operating in unethical, and in some cases, criminal ways.

“The fundamental purpose of business is to generate value and to distribute it. One of the problems that we have is we have a lot of things that are of value. Unfortunately, they’re of negative value, Gautschi said, as he detailed nearly a century of shady behavior in the business community.

“They’re called negative externalities, and they have just been ignored. They need to be brought into the calculus of decision makers within business.”

We Need Problem Solvers

Pirson said it doesn’t help that Americans subscribe to the belief that says we need someone like Elon Musk or Steve Jobs to save us.

“We need a lot of problem solvers, and whether they’re leaders or not doesn’t really matter to me,” he said.

“We’re all on this planet, we all need to problem solve wherever we are. It just matters what kind of problems we want to solve.”

Panelists diverged on how to address short-sightedness. Pirson noted that psychological research shows that humans are innately terrible when it comes to predicting the future.

“It’s easier to actually focus on the current problems and solve them, and see what develops. Nobody predicted the internet. Nobody predicted that Trump was going to win,” he said.

“So, I don’t know if we’re going to do ourselves service by saying we’re going to be long-term problem solvers of some sort. Maybe those long-term problems won’t even exist because we won’t exist.”

Gautschi, who spoke at length about the ways that California utility Pacific Gas and Electric failed to adequately plan for challenges such as climate change, pushed back.

“I will not disagree that beings are limited in their abilities to think long term, but damnit we’ve got to start doing this,” he said.

“The trick for business people, in particular, is to figure out how to adapt.”

To Minimize Blind Spots, Embrace Diversity

One way to adapt? Embrace diversity, said Johnson. If you gather together the broadest possible group of people to give you input, you minimize the number of blind spots you’ll have. Then, you need to create psychological safety where anyone can propose even the craziest ideas without fear of retribution, he said.

“You give me a group of diverse people, average capabilities, and I will crush any group of experts on the planet in any topic, as long as we have some sort of domain expertise,” he said.

Whereas Gautschi, Johnson, and Pirson addressed business from an institutional perspective, Haber, who was the first person to teach a class where students can ride bikes, said it’s important to consider the individual as well. Three-quarters of Americans’ health problems can be traced back to stress, she said. We spend 50 percent of our time in front of a screen, and the average person touches their smartphone 2,600 times a day.

“I see it with my students. What a difference over the years. I give them a five-minute break, and nobody talks,” said Haber, who had all the attendees stand up and stretch with her.

“Loneliness is the new smoking. We’re afraid to say it. ‘Oh my god, I’m not a loser, I can’t admit it.’ This is something that happens, but it happens undercover.”

That was one of the two virtual reality exercises that the 2018 cohort of the Executive MBA (EMBA) program at the Gabelli School of Business in Westchester found themselves wrestling with in a course led by professor Julita Haber, Ph.D. 

The experience was created through a head-mounted device that simulated the fear of heights. The software and equipment was provided by Lyron Bentovim, president and CEO of the Glimpse Group, a virtual and augmented reality (VR/AR) company.

Haber, a clinical assistant professor in the leading people and organizations department, believes the emotional immersive exercise can help students understand the skills and characteristics that are key to building and leading high-performing teams.

“The topic of team dynamics and technology go very well together,” she said. “I wanted to create activities that would evoke emotions and enhance their communication skills to reach a goal.”

It’s a team exercise that’s relevant to students’ work in the program, which thrusts them into leadership situations.

“In general, most of the students in the program have developed an expertise in a specific area, but they want to have more of a bird’s-eye view of an organization to formulate and implement strategies as leaders,” said Francis Petit, associate dean for global initiatives and partnerships at the Gabelli School.

Though EMBA student Ryan Grillo was able to climb the computer-generated skyscraper and walk across the beam successfully, his responsibility to his team didn’t end when he completed the task, he said.

“We were all trying to help the students who were afraid of heights eliminate some of their fears,” said Grillo,  who works as a general manager at a company that manufactures elevators and other related products. “I’d say, ‘Walk straight or walk towards my voice. You can do it.’ Some people were able to walk over or at least take baby steps.”

In the second VR/AR exercise, one student from each team was selected to deactivate a bomb. The student received directions from five other team members.

“Our team trusted each other more than I had anticipated,” said Stephanie Miano, GABELLI ’18, a sales manager at an international based luxury brand. “When it came down to the wire, we communicated effectively and did our best to work together.”

“Each exercise provided me with a different framework for my thought process in how to approach a situation,” added William J. Allan, GABELLI ’18, a financial professional at a global business and tech consultancy. “It [showed]me the importance of delegation and teamwork in time-sensitive situations.”

Haber said VR/AR experiences can challenge misconceptions about team work, including the myth that people don’t need to like each other to work well.

“When people like each other, it often helps to achieve a high quality of creative and innovative results,” she said, adding that effective teamwork is crucial to team success. “Well-designed team processes that are coupled with an individual’s ability to influence others can increase a team’s sense of control over the deliverables.”

The course, which focuses on developing professional relationships, is designated as fitness integrated learning (FIL). In the class, students “spin” or ride stationary bikes while Haber, Ph.D., a clinical assistant professor in the leading people and organizations department at the Gabelli School of Business, teaches research concepts, theories, and methodological techniques in impression management. 

According to Haber, this is the first FIL course to be offered on an American college campus.

“It’s an innovative way of teaching,” said Haber, who launched the course this fall at the McGinley Fitness Center. “There are health risks from a sedentary lifestyle. Through fitness, I found that students were naturally engaged.”

Over a seven-year span, Haber experimented with various versions of FIL at two other universities before piloting FIL courses at Fordham.

Based on an exploratory study with 700 students, she learned that incorporating physical education into an existing college-level business course curriculum can be beneficial to students. The study, which Haber co-authored with Gabelli School colleague Genevieve Elizabeth O’Connor, Ph.D., and Nina Sarkar, of Queensborough Community College, was published in 2016 in the Journal of Applied Business and Economics.

“Studies have shown that exercise has a tremendous impact on our well-being, but it also has an effect on cognitive thinking,” said Haber.

Unconventional Classroom

Donna Rapaccioli, Ph.D., dean of the Gabelli School, said the new course is enriching the academic experience for the school’s students.

“It means a great deal to me when faculty members go out of their way to come up with a fresh case study, an unconventional classroom activity, or a truly original lesson on a time-honored topic—and I believe our students appreciate it, too,” she said.

Drawing her research for the study from more than 16 different courses she taught over the years, Haber developed three modes of physical activities in FIL. The methods include: Simultaneous, which involves students doing a physical activity, like spinning, while learning the course material; Intervals, which involves doing a physical activity in between lectures; and embedded, which involves teaching new concepts via body movement.

No matter the approach, the curriculum is a top priority, Haber said.

“Students learn not just how to do research, but how to understand research studies from a very rigorous perspective, and be comfortable with consuming that type of literature so that they can open a research journal and continue to grow.”

Students were surprised to learn that some tactics for influencing perceptions were not only applicable in their personal lives, but also in their relationships in the workplace.

“The class is challenging me in ways that go beyond the classroom,” said Gabelli junior Christopher Dollesin. “I am not just learning about professional relationships or getting in a few hours to cycle. It has also encouraged me to integrate what I’m learning in my daily life.”

An Exchange of Ideas

Over the course of the class, students are assigned different leadership roles. During the first five minutes of class, a student “stretch leader” leads the classes through a series of stretches. Then, another team leader leads a warm-up on the bikes and reviews the previous class material.

Haber delivers her lecture content in between spinning intervals that are led by a student motivator/DJ, who also selects the music for the session.

“We get a chance to take charge of our experiences and participate in a really unique way,” said Dollesin, who was recently a student motivator/DJ. “I find that I’m way more attentive because I have an outlet for all my energy.”

The class has also helped Gabelli senior Meaghan Courtney, an accounting major, to build trust in the FIL classroom.

“I think that when you’re sitting in a lecture, information can go in one ear and out of the other,” she said. “But in this class, we learn from each other’s experiences. That’s very important in a class about management, where a lot focuses on your relationship with other people. Each week, I feel like we get closer and closer.”

Amanda Vopat, a member of Fordham’s Social Innovation Collaboratory, said the class’s structure and emphasis on teamwork are among its many strengths.

“So many classes in college are focused on passive learning, where the professor is talking at you and you take notes,” she said.

“But this class is collaborative and focused on engaging with the people around you. The class is not professor Haber’s class. It’s really an exchange of ideas among all of us.”

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