Evidence of Learning Assessment #1 

Student: ​Maansi Chodavarapu 

Name of Person Interviewed:​ Mr. B 

Profession:​ Vice President of Data Acquisition 

Date of Interview:​ Monday, November 5, 2018 

Time:​ 3:30 p.m. 

Analysis: 

Interviewing the Vice President of a company with branches all over the world 

seemed next to impossible for me - newbie ISM student with questionable voicemail 

skills. However, I had the privilege of interviewing an executive professional in my 

chosen career with the help of Mr. Pirtle, hence proving the power of personal 

connections. During Business Symposium, Mr. Pirtle met Mr. B - the Vice President of 

Data Acquisition - and struck a friendly conversation. Mr. Pirtle then gave me Mr. B’s 

contact information in hopes that I could interview him, and so I did. 

Mr. B conducted a phone interview with me, while picking up his children from 

elementary school. When he conveyed this to me, I was shocked because my other 

professionals conducted my interviews in the office, which made even the setting very 

formal. But the background noise of the engine humming and his kids talking set an 

informal tone to the interview. 

Initially, I started with a question that I asked every other professional: “What is 

your background in Finance and how did you get started in the field?” Since Mr. B 
holds a very high position in his company, I frankly was expecting him to say that he 

got a Finance or Business Administration degree from a reputable college, then joined 

as an Investment Analyst, and worked his way up the ranks. However, I learned that 

Mr. B actually pursued his degree in Criminology from Purdue and sought to join the 

Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI).  

While hunting for a job, he was hired by Beckett Media - a sports memorabilia 

company - as part of the Sports Analytics team. His degree in Criminology proved his 

attention to detail, which made him an ideal addition to the analytics team. This very 

quality and his persistence helped him rise up the ranks and become a Stock Market 

Director. When Beckett Media decided to start a sister company, Mr. B was promoted 

to the Vice President of this firm. 

As the Vice President of Data Acquisitions, Mr. B is in charge of a portfolio that 

he and his team must build through company acquisitions. In fact, he was able to 

increase the value of his portfolio by half a million dollars in this year alone. The 

professionals that I interviewed before, worked with clients wishing to invest or sell an 

asset. But Mr. B gave me a new perspective on mergers and acquisitions as he seeks to 

buy a company. I learned that, in addition to communicating with his different teams, 

he needs to interact with potential sellers and convince them to let him buy their 

company, which requires a completely different skill set. A successful person in his 

position must be able to effectively delegate the work and talk with confidence. 

Working with Mr. B would give me exposure to different financial teams that he works 

alongside, which would allow me to explore within the fields and truly decide which 
part of Finance I wish to pursue. In addition, his experience in each part of the job 

hierarchy would give me a potential layout of the progression of my own career. More 

personally, the confidence with which Mr. B presents himself with is inspiring and I 

would love to adopt a similar level of confidence in myself.  

Although being a Vice President comes with its perks, the position caused Mr. B 

to deal with new types of issues. As an Analyst, Mr. B dealt with work-related issues 

only. But as a Vice President, he must deal with employee-related issues as well. In 

particular, he was confronted with a problem that stemmed from cultural differences 

between two of his teams. The project required the Indian team to use the New Zealand 

team’s and requested to do so by asking “please give me the numbers”. The New 

Zealand team refused to do so since it sounded almost demanding. However, Mr. B had 

to explain to the two teams that culturally, the Indian team meant “please show me the 

numbers” instead of “please give”. He explained to me that this experience revealed 

the need for understanding different cultures, in order to effectively communicate 

between his two teams. This cultural dissonance was very common to me, given that I 

grew up with tension between my native culture and American culture, causing me to 

automatically adopt a peacemaker-like stance between the polar opposite cultures.   

I think that the most important thing that I learned from this interview was that 

Mr. B’s career actually changed his personality. Finance requires an extreme amount 

of attention to detail, which he developed through his degree in Criminology. His job 

also taught him discipline, in terms of work ethic and deadlines. However, this 

discipline bled into his personal life, forcing him to learn when to let loose and be 
more lenient with his children. This information was new to me, as my other 

interviewers claimed that their jobs had no impact on their personality at home. His 

revelation caused me to really think about how school impacted my own personality. I 

believe that the mixture of academics and extracurriculars that my peers and I deal 

with, also require an extreme amount of discipline. In addition, my interest in art 

shaped me into a detail-oriented person, which made me even more interested in Mr. 

B as a mentor because the personality that his job demands is similar to my own 

personality.  

Although Mr. B taught me a lot about his career, challenges he faces, and how 

the job changed his career, this experience posed a serious question in my mind which 

symbolizes the crossroads of my ISM journey. My topic of study for this year is 

Investment Banking, which deals with helping clients buy or sell an asset/company - a 

process called Merger and Acquisition. However, Mr. B introduced me to the 

Corporate Finance aspect of Merger and Acquisition: buying companies to increase the 

value of your firm’s portfolio. While Investment Banking is client-oriented, Corporate 

Finance is more profit-oriented as you act as the client buying an asset. In my previous 

interviews, I noticed that I loved Investment Banking except for the fact that I would be 

acting like a realtor for companies. Instead, Corporate Finance uses the same process 

as in Investment Banking, but you do not act like a realtor. Corporate Finance also 

interestingly includes an aspect of strategy as you must analyze which set of companies 

would ensure the best returns for your portfolio. So going into my future, I am posed 
with the decision that could potentially take me down two different pathways: do I 

want to build my own portfolio or help others build theirs?