#GNW2016 Student Profile: Rodrigo Parra, FGV
Rodrigo Parra, an FGV EMBA student, has worked in corporate finance for most of his career. Parra decided to pursue his MBA in part to further his understanding of organizational issues, and said his experience during Global Network Week has helped him learn how to navigate national business issues at a local level.
How did you decide to enroll in this Global Network Week?
I’ve been working with multinational companies for a long time in my career. Now, I’m getting my MBA and I’m trying to expand my knowledge, open my mind, and research new things like environmental issues. The Global Network is a bridge between networking, business, and specifically those environmental issues we’re seeing here in Quito. This course fits well with what I want from my career, and it’s a chance to collaborate on those issues now and to see how well we can all work together.
What has stood out for you during this course and your research with your team on the ground?
This experience has been awesome. The challenge has been tough. We’ve been able to network, meet incredible people from around the world, and see how local issues are very complicated, but important. We’ve also been able to attend Habitat III sessions and meet with leaders from around the world looking at and living these issue every day. I think it’s provided important experience for me that I will be able to take with me for the rest of my career.
How do you apply those international skills to a project like Choco Andino?
If you look at a problem and approach it as a way of trying to bring some help to the table, that’s a good start. You have a community and you have private companies. You’re balancing how to navigate those two, and that’s exactly what I need in my professional life. You have to connect the dots and create a common agenda. If you don’t have a common agenda amongst all of the stakeholders, then nothing is going to happen in a good way. You need to put everyone equally in the same agenda where the community gets the benefits and the government can find ways to impact the region.
