Berkeley Haas - Haas MBA Commencement Ceremony 2022

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(“Pomp and Circumstance”)

(“Pomp and Circumstance” continues)

(crowd chattering)

  • [Ann] Yeah, I mean, they’re down there.

  • [Students In Crowd] We love you!

(crowd cheering)

(crowd chanting)

  • Ladies and gentlemen, distinguished guests,

family and friends of the graduates,

and members of the graduating class of 2022,

(graduates cheering)

on behalf of our esteemed faculty and staff,

I welcome you

to the Berkeley Haas MBA Commencement Ceremony.

(crowd cheering)

I’m Ann Harrison, Dean of the Haas School.

It is my duty and great pleasure

to officiate at today’s ceremony.

How truly wonderful it is to be here

for our first MBA in-person graduation

at the Greek Theatre, since 2019.

(crowd cheering)

Graduates, we congratulate you

on your remarkable achievement.

And what an achievement it is.

You have earned your MBA from one of the top programs

in the entire world.

(crowd cheering)

Congratulations to each and every one of you.

Together, we have lived through a time like no other.

We have seen that the world is more fragile

than we could have imagined.

Almost no one is left untouched by loss.

For your class, the sense of loss was all too real.

Just as the fall semester 2020 was coming to a close,

we learned about the tragic death

of your classmate, Nadeem Faruki.

As we remember Nadeem, now with a moment of silence,

I ask you all to reflect on Nadeem’s words.

“Let us laugh, cry, and think

“of how to make the world better.”

(baby crying)

Thank you.

I look at all of you and I see so much hope for the future.

In coming to Haas, you asked yourselves, what do I believe?

You were already on your way

to making your mark in the world,

but you sensed you could do more.

So you came to Haas.

And suddenly your world was upended.

The global pandemic disrupted your MBA experience

and it disrupted everything else.

You faced isolation, uncertainty,

the added complexities of living through COVID.

For months on end, you were unable to see family or friends.

For our student parents in our programs,

you added homeschooling to your already long, long list.

But through everything, the closures and the upheaval,

and finally, the sheer joy of reopening.

You showed a grit and a resilience that was unparalleled.

You showed courage and conscience.

Simply put, you showed leadership.

Viktor Frankl, the great neurologist, philosopher,

and Holocaust survivor is often quoted as saying

“Between stimulus and response, there is space.

“In that space is our power to choose our response.

“In our response lies our growth and our freedom.”

If you ever wondered how you would respond

when faced with seemingly insurmountable challenges,

you have your answer.

You are, and will continue to be, an inspiration to us all.

Because of who you are, your fierce intelligence,

and your deep understanding

of the forces that drive business, you are powerful.

Power is not always how many people report to you

or whether you have the CEO’s ear

or even whether you are the CEO.

Power is the ability to make a difference one day at a time.

The careers that will take you far and wide

will create a world of new opportunities, new homes,

and new jobs for so many and not just for yourselves.

Entire communities will depend on all of you

to create a sustainable and inclusive world.

You will be on the cutting edge of decentralized finance.

You will reimagine our built environment

and the future of cities.

Retirees will depend on your skills

and responsible business practices

to see them through their old age.

And you will face choices.

My deepest hope is that the values that we share at Haas

will continue to guide you.

You know them as our Four Defining Leadership Principles.

The first one, question the status quo.

We champion bold ideas.

It is one of the hallmarks of Haas.

Confidence without attitude.

We do the work. We know our material.

But we always start from a place of respect.

If the pandemic has taught us anything,

it is that change is the one constant in our lives.

We will all continue to be students always.

And finally, my favorite of the Four Defining Principles,

beyond yourself.

We shape our world by leading ethically and responsibly.

You will be stewards of something larger than yourselves.

As you leave Haas, I ask you to keep the principles with you

as a touchstone, your true north.

Take a moment right now, look in front and behind you.

You are surrounded by some of the smartest,

the boldest and the coolest people you will meet

anywhere in the world.

(crowd cheering)

Stay connected to each other, help each other succeed.

That is among the greatest gifts of your degree.

Beyond your own class, today, you will be joining a network

of nearly 42,000 fellow Haas alumni around the world.

Take advantage of this network, your network.

When you reach your new destination,

look up your fellow alumni and plug into that network,

lean on it, contribute to it.

It will get stronger as a result.

Higher Haas.

Remember all the talent in the Greek Theatre today,

then multiply it all over the world.

And when you can give back to Haas, stay connected to Haas.

You will always have a family here.

And speaking of family, and before we proceed,

I want to offer special thanks to a group of individuals

here today who have gone beyond themselves,

who have worked so hard to make today possible

for our soon-to-be graduates.

That is all the parents, the spouses, the partners,

(crowd cheering)

the family, and the friends of the graduating students.

Without your help and support today would not be possible.

Let’s do another round of applause for this wonderful.

(crowd cheering)

One of the great traditions at the Haas School

is the selection of our commencement speaker.

Each year–

(crowd cheering)

Each year, we call upon an individual

of uncommon distinction to address

the MBA graduating classes,

someone who embodies a commitment to excellence

and a distinguished record of achievement.

Someone who personifies our defining leadership principles.

I am honored today to introduce

your 2022 commencement speaker Jagdeep Singh.

(crowd cheering) Wait, not yet.

Jagdeep is a founder, an entrepreneur,

and a telecommunications and energy visionary.

He’s also a graduate of the Evening and Weekend MBA Program,

class of 1990.

(crowd cheering)

In 2010, Jagdeep Singh co-founded QuantumScape,

a company on a mission to transform energy storage

and support a zero carbon future.

Electrical vehicles today account for only about 4%

of the world’s cars.

So how will car manufacturers transition

to fully electric fleets?

Almost certainly with the help of QuantumScape

and the new battery technology it is developing

for safer and more economical alternatives

to lithium ion batteries.

QuantumScape is just one of Jagdeep’s many successes.

What data displays on your screen

in just fractions of a second,

thank Jagdeep and the integrated photon circuitry

developed by Infinera Corporation.

Jagdeep led Infinera from founding to IPO.

Before Infinera, there was Lightera Networks

and OnFiber and AirSoft,

all hugely successful companies founded by Jagdeep.

Jagdeep also leads Deep Valley Labs,

the venture laboratory and incubator that he started.

It is focused on founding, validating, and spinning out

high-impact technology companies.

Jagdeep earned his undergraduate degree in computer science

from the University of Maryland,

and his Masters in computer science from Stanford,

and his MBA from Berkeley Haas.

Please join me in welcoming Berkeley Haas alum,

Jagdeep Singh.

(crowd cheering)

  • Thank you all.

Thank you, Dean Harrison, for that kind introduction.

It’s great to be back at Haas.

Great to be back at Berkeley after many years.

I have a few prepared remarks,

and I’ll try to keep things relatively brief.

So let me start.

So first of all, Dean Harrison,

distinguished members of the faculty, staff,

family, friends, and most of all, graduating class of 2022,

(crowd cheering)

it’s an honor to address you today.

So you’ve spent two years working late on finance problems,

management strategy cases, accounting homework,

organizational behavior readings,

many other things that you have to do,

and you’re now, or will soon be holders of a Haas MBA.

You might be asking yourself what’s next?

I know I was when I was in your shoes, about 30 years ago,

graduating with an MBA from Haas,

which of course had only just been renamed Haas.

At the time, I was a poor graduate student

living on student loans,

and to conserve cash and avoid falling deeper into debt,

I would often buy a pack of hot dogs and a bag of buns,

and to make them last a week, I’d live on one hot dog a day.

As I walked from the room I rented

in a house on the Northeast side of campus

to class at Barrows Hall,

yep, class was at Barrows Hall back then,

I would treat myself on Mondays to a 50 cent hash brown

from the McDonald’s on University in Shattuck.

I remember thinking nothing tasted so good.

On the plus side,

I did lose a lot of body fat during that time.

And I came out leaner, if not meaner.

Luckily we live in a great country,

and even someone who starts out as poor as I was,

can with some hard work and a bit of luck,

achieve their dreams.

My dream, since my early days as an undergraduate,

was to start a company.

I had seen an issue of Time Magazine

with Steve Jobs on the cover,

and that had inspired me to want to be an entrepreneur.

After graduating with a degree in computer science,

I moved west to work at Hewlett Packard,

considered by many to be

the original Silicon Valley startup.

I remember coming here,

seeing startups like Sun Microsystems and Silicon Graphics

go public and thinking I was too late,

that all the startup opportunities had already been taken.

Luckily I was wrong.

Kind of like Lord Kelvin, who in 1900

is said to have addressed the British Association

for the Advancement of Science by saying

“There’s nothing new to be discovered in physics now.

“All that remains is more and more precise measurement.”

Of course, that was the same year

Max Planck introduced his Quantum Theory of Energy,

revolutionizing physics forever.

So when it comes to the question of what’s next for you,

I can’t answer that for you.

Each of you will forge your own path,

your own unique path, through the world.

What I can do, however, is share a few key thoughts,

summarizing what I’ve learned about entrepreneurship

in my 30 years of starting companies in Silicon Valley,

in hopes that you might find some of these useful

as you work to make the biggest impact

you are capable of making.

While my comments will be framed

from the lens of entrepreneurship,

luckily it turns out that at least I believe

many of these principles turn out to be applicable

to almost every walk of life from working at a big company

to even one’s personal life.

With that as background, here are my five basic thoughts.

Number one, pick a big problem.

The starting point is the realization

that you can’t make a big impact

if you’re playing in a small space.

You have to pick big unsolved problems.

Picking the right problem, in my view,

is the hardest part of making an impact.

The problem has to be simultaneously important,

IE, if you solve it, somebody should care,

and have an actual chance of being solvable,

‘cause if you don’t solve it, nobody’s gonna care.

When Einstein chose to work in the Theory of Relativity,

he picked a problem that if solved,

would upend 300 years of Newtonian physics.

The fact that he was then actually able to solve it,

is of course what made him immortal in the world of physics.

Of course, picking a big problem doesn’t automatically mean

you succeed at solving it,

but it’s far more fun to fail at something big,

than succeed at something small.

The most fulfilling, most memorable projects to me,

have been the ones that look mind-blowingly disruptive

when first proposed,

yet paradoxically, look inevitable,

when viewed through the lens of hindsight.

Building a startup electric car company

in one of the most expensive parts of the country

with a powertrain made of consumer great laptop batteries

is an example of something that sounds ridiculous

at first glance, but then seems inevitable,

now that the electric car revolution is upon us.

Here’s the good news,

the world right now has lots of huge unsolved problems,

from political polarization to climate change,

from artificial general intelligence to augmented humanity,

from disease to inequality.

So you have lots of big problems to choose from.

Pick one that you have a passion for,

that you can’t help and wanna spend all your time,

day and night on, even if others think it’s too idealistic,

too big or too unsolvable.

You’re Berkeley MBAs now.

You don’t need to settle.

Which brings me to my next point, be contrarian and right.

When it comes to picking problems,

the best advice ever got was this, be contrarian and right.

Picking problems is a bit like picking a stock.

If you pick one that everyone likes,

then that belief is already priced in.

And even if you’re right, there’s limited upside.

And of course, if you’re wrong, then you’re wrong.

And there’s definitely a downside.

So the trick is to pick something contrarian,

something few people think can work, but to be right.

Many of the most disruptive contributions

made to our society were made by people

pursuing ideas that were considered impractical at best,

or downright ridiculous by many.

The first step is to pick an idea that’s contrarian.

A contrarian approach can be one that’s never been tried,

or has been tried, but has failed.

If everyone agrees your idea is a great one,

it’s, by definition, not contrarian.

So, ironically you need some naysayers

to validate your idea.

The second step, once you pick a contrarian idea,

is to maximize the chances of being right,

and actually being able to pull it off.

Doing this requires doing an intense level of homework

on the idea.

Learn everything there is to know about the idea.

Why previous approaches failed,

who are the best people in the space are,

and be brutally honest with yourself

about the merits of the idea.

Don’t let anyone else tell you it will never work,

but don’t convince yourself it will work

without having the confidence that comes

from truly having done a deep dive

and profoundly understanding the problem and your solution.

If you can do both these things,

you have a good chance of being contrarian and right.

I’ve been lucky to have had a chance to work

on more than one such problem.

In fact, in many ways, my entrepreneurial career

has been a series of contrarian bets.

Luckily they’ve generally turned out okay.

So this approach has worked for me.

Number three, build a world class team.

So here’s the thing.

There aren’t a lot of big problems

that you can solve on your own,

and few storms you can weather alone.

You need a team with world class talent

in all the key areas your specific project requires,

who bring knowledge and capabilities you don’t have,

and who can work together with you

to help scale the mountain.

So what’s a world class team?

It’s not just people you like hanging out with.

They need to have a few key qualities.

IQ and deep domain expertise is, of course, table stakes.

But what you really need is people who have

a deep rooted commitment to the mission,

a commitment which allows them not to be swayed or spooked

when the inevitable issues come up.

No startup is a straight shot.

Just like no attempt on a challenging peak

will be without setbacks,

whether it’s weather or avalanches or crevices.

But here’s the good news,

when you choose a really big, hard problem,

it gets easier to attract the world class team

because the best people wanna work on the biggest

and hardest and most impactful problems.

And with a team like this, you just might pull it off.

In this sense, it can actually be easier

to solve the really big and hard problems.

Yet another reason to go big.

Number four, take the initiative and just try.

Some of you might follow basketball.

Actually, any Warriors fans in the house here?

(crowd cheering)

All right, all right.

I think we can agree that Steph Curry

is one of the best shooters in the history of basketball,

but even Steph Curry can have bad shooting nights.

But what makes someone like him truly great,

is even when he’s not shooting well on a given night,

he has the confidence to still be taking shots,

more shots on goal,

which of course increases the number of shots in goal.

As an entrepreneur, you have to do,

not just sit on the sidelines.

I learned a long time ago with my first startup

that our system actually rewards taking the initiative

even more than it does being right.

When you take the initiative

and start making progress towards a vision,

you can inspire others,

and even if your full vision isn’t realized,

you can create value in the process.

And the more attempts you make,

the more right you will ultimately be.

Studies on contemporary geniuses have found

that one of the defining characteristics

of people considered by their peers to be geniuses

is that they have a lot more good ideas

than the non-geniuses.

But it turns out they also have a lot more bad ideas.

They just have more ideas, period.

It’s not that they’re always right.

Rather they take chances and are wrong a lot of the time.

But in the process, they may generate a few ideas

that are profound

or build something mind-blowingly disruptive yet inevitable.

And that brings me to my fifth and final thought.

When you take on big problems and big, hairy,

audacious goals, when you’re being contrarian,

when you jump in and try, you will make mistakes.

Own those mistakes, learn from them,

and try never to make the same mistake twice.

If you live your life with this principle,

you’ll get better and better at what you do.

And before you know it,

you’ll be playing the game at a higher level

than you ever thought possible.

With these few words, I wish you all the success

life has to offer as you pursue your own big,

hairy audacious goals,

goals I believe your time at Haas has prepared you well for.

Best of luck, Haas of 2022.

I look forward to truly great things,

big ideas, and contrarian solutions from you.

This is your time and your place. Thank you.

(crowd cheering)

  • Thank you so much, Jagdeep, for those thoughtful insights.

We really appreciate you sharing your story

with the class of 2022.

Jagdeep Singh is the quintessential Berkeley leader.

At the very forefront of innovation,

he is creating a sustainable and inclusive future

for all of us.

Now let us turn to our Evening and Weekend MBA Students.

(crowd cheering)

You persevered through the pandemic.

Even though personal and professional lives

were turned upside down, you kept going.

While you were here at Haas, 32% of you were promoted,

41% of you changed jobs,

13% of you said I do to your partners,

and 30 babies were born.

(crowd cheering)

Did I say you were inspiring?

Every year, we honor one student from your class

with the outstanding academic achievement award.

This honor goes to the student

completing his or her graduate studies

with the highest GPA in the class.

This year’s award winner is Laura Jacobson.

(crowd cheering)

Laura graduates with an impressive 3.982 GPA.

(crowd gasping)

After graduation, she will be continuing to expand her role

at GMO, the value driven investment firm

co-founded by Jeremy Grantham,

where her focus is on managing endowments, pensions,

and other large investor relationships across North America.

Congratulations, Laura.

(crowd applauding)

We also recognize the academic achievement

of the top 10% of full-time MBA,

of top 10% of MBA graduates as measured by GPA.

The honors, the names of our honors graduates

are listed in the commencement booklet.

At this time, I would ask our students to stand

as we celebrate their achievement.

Will you please stand if you are in the top 10%

of the Evening Weekend Program?

(crowd cheering)

I now have the pleasure of recognizing the winners

of a set of awards that are very dear

to every Haasy’s heart,

the class of 2022 Defining Leadership Principle Awards

and of the Berkeley Leader Award.

The winners were nominated and selected by classmates,

staff, and faculty.

As I announced the recipients of these awards,

will they please stand?

If you could, if you could please hold your applause

until I’ve read all the names.

(crowd chuckling)

The first one, question the status quo,

goes to Eleanor Bolai.

(crowd cheering)

Confidence without attitude goes to Jack DeHurra.

(crowd cheering)

Student always goes to Steve Odel.

(crowd cheering)

And beyond yourself goes to Nana Lei.

(crowd cheering)

And the Berkeley leader awards go to Nana Lei

and Francis Ho.

(crowd cheering)

Your classmates and all of us thank you

for your exemplary contributions to our community.

Thank you so much.

And now we can give them a round of applause.

(crowd cheering)

Now we will hear from a graduating student

who was selected by her classmates to represent

the Evening and Weekend MBA class of 2022, Paulina Lee.

(crowd cheering)

While managing the demands

of a sales and marketing director role

at Procter and Gamble,

Paulina brought her energy and commitment to Haas,

immediately joining student government,

first as a social cohort rep,

and then as the EVP of marketing,

and on the executive board

of the Evening Weekend Student Association.

In the classroom, she was a graduate student instructor

for the class Becoming Superhuman.

Around campus, she carved out time to serve

as the executive producer and host

of the “Here at Haas” podcast

and the special blockchain series, “Around the Block.”

Despite all of that, Paulina continued to find the time

to tutor K through five reading partners.

Pauline is a storyteller, an innovator,

and I would say a force of nature.

She is all Haas.

Ladies and gentlemen, the Evening Weekend

Berkeley MBA program speaker, Paulina Lee.

(crowd cheering)

  • [People In Audience] Woo woo!

  • Woo! Let me get situated here.

All right. It’s intimidating being up here.

600 freshly minted, or about to be minted MBAs,

not including some with double masters, PhDs,

doctorates, JDs, all you overachievers you.

The amount of wisdom and intelligence

in this theater alone is astounding.

To my EWs, here we are.

Three years later, 1,095 days, we did it Haasies.

(crowd cheering)

And a lot has happened in the world in those three years.

Wars, new world leaders, wildfires,

a pandemic that never seems to end, but here we are.

We’ve also seen a lot in three years, new careers, houses,

home cities, new beginnings, with new little humans,

fur babies, partners,

and friends who may often feel more like family,

no offense to our families.

We’ve also said, had to say goodbye to many things,

previous work identities, old habits, old ways of thinking.

We are here today with some of our favorite people

who are just as relieved and excited

that we made it to graduation.

We may also feel the absences

of those who could not be here.

There are the ones back home,

perhaps watching us on live stream.

Let’s give them all a little wave.

They are the ones who are a part of our past,

that we’ve had to let go of in order to move forward.

And finally, there are the spaces left

by those who left this life for good.

And though we may have said goodbye,

we hold them deep in our minds and in our hearts.

Each and every one of these changes, additions,

and subtraction has been pivotal

in shaping who we are today.

We have all gone through immense change and growth.

We have all faced ourselves in the mirror

and examined our identities in order to find ourselves anew.

When we all showed up at WE Launch,

I’d bet we all had a little bit of imposter syndrome.

Heck, I sell toilet paper for a living,

though I’m not sure if that’s a step up or step down

from how I started, selling toothpaste.

What Haas has afforded us is the opportunity

to redefine ourselves,

to explore the edges of our comfort zone.

And that’s why as we end this chapter and start a new pass

to our own definitions of success,

we are faced with so many different emotions,

joy, anxiety, relief, excitement,

to move on to the next thing, get on with it.

But perhaps we shouldn’t, at least not right away.

Which brings me to my first theme,

because it wouldn’t be a proper commencement speech

without some themes, right?

This one is about pausing.

We have sprinted through life for the last three years.

We should not, we cannot continue at this pace.

We spent the last three years,

ruthlessly prioritizing and surviving.

We gave up weeknights.

We gave up weekends.

So we now have an acute understanding

of the breadths and depths of our own human capacity.

So the first ask is to pause, really pause,

and see the space that school used to take up

and protect it.

Now that you have become the person you are today,

reevaluate, sit down with yourself,

and honestly seek to understand who you have become.

Upon graduating we often feel we are tasked

with saving the world.

“The world is your oyster,” they say.

But please, you first.

It will take work to intentionally leave space

for you to pause, but it will provide clarity for you,

not just on what’s next,

but also truly understanding your purpose, your values.

Haas lecturer Lucas Miller,

during our first class this spring said,

“keep creating meaning, happiness is fleeting.”

This brings us today’s second theme, live with intention.

Each day you decide with intention

what you do, how you spend your time and energy,

how you choose to move through this world.

One step at a time.

One of my favorite quotes from professor Drew Isaacs

is “there’s no such thing as people

“who have great time management,

“just people who have a clear system of priorities.

“And more often than not,

“you will have to say no more than you say yes.”

What I have loved about Haas is that is not just a place

for cutthroat capitalist competition.

Instead, you discover peers

who constantly lift each other up.

You discover faculty that aim not just to help you

get that next promotion, but prepare you to be a leader.

Leaders with responsibility.

Leaders who must understand their own impact on their team,

on their community, on their planet.

We have heard from those that we lead

how Haas helped us become more confident, more flexible,

and pushed us to redefine how we think of success.

We cannot claim ignorance anymore, my friends.

We do have a duty, a duty to be our best selves

and to put that best part of ourselves forward,

to lead, not just with our brains,

but our gut and our heart,

most importantly, our heart.

My time up here is coming to a close.

I’ve asked you to pause and then live with intention.

So finally we must remember to savor.

Savoring is all about being present,

soaking in each and every moment before it is gone

in the blink of an eye.

So I’d like to close today with a brief meditation.

Please join me in closing your eyes,

take a deep breath in,

hold it and a deep breath out.

Savor.

I want you to remember today.

Remember this defining moment.

Can you feel the tickle of a breeze in your hair?

Perhaps the sun upon your face?

Savor.

Can you feel the weight of B school lift off your shoulders?

(graduates laughing)

Sounds like it.

Savor the big moments and the small ones.

Savor.

And when you’re ready, please open your eyes.

Remember to pause.

Remember to live each day with intent.

Remember to savor.

Thank you.

(crowd cheering)

  • Thank you so much Paulina.

And now to our teaching awards.

Each year, our students in each of our programs

select the winners

of our Cheit Awards for Excellence In Teaching.

This year’s Cheit award for Graduate Student Instructor

goes to Kimberlyn George.

Kimmie is a candidate in our Haas PhD program

and GSI for financial reporting.

Congratulations, Kimmie. Where’s Kimmie?

(crowd applauding)

Now for our faculty Cheit Awards.

The Weekend MBA students selected

as their Cheit Award winner,

economics, professor Ricardo Perez-Truglia

for his macroeconomics course.

Ricardo was not able to join us today.

The Cheit Award for the Evening MBA Program

goes to professor Max Auffhammer.

Max? (crowd applauding)

Max taught data and decisions.

Congratulations, Ricardo and Max.

Let’s give Max and Ricardo and Kimmie

a big round of applause.

(crowd applauding)

We will now recognize the Evening and Weekend Program

candidates for the degree Master of Business Administration.

Assisting me will be Jamie Breen,

Assistant Dean for MBA programs.

Jamie will be joined by Mark Gorenflo,

the Executive Director

of the Evening and Weekend MBA Program.

(crowd applauding)

  • [Jamie] Kalyen Bahmidi.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Sugan Bahl.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Barack Bachia.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Sarada Wira Singe.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Alex Nibyaski.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Christian Mattison.

(crowd applauding)

  • [Jamie] Ankath Turalla.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Teng Chu.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Fiene Shreedar.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Jacklyn Wong.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Alexander Carney.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Jose Alvarez-Recendez.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Britt Osmond.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Gall Levy.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Katelyn Mullen.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Anjalee Chatwanee.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] David Diaz.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Edward Wong.

(crowd applauding)

  • [Jamie] Shrea Rijiashthre Regananthem.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Shilpe Madrana-Paga.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Jimmy Lee.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Shilpa Warlacar.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Jodie Shulin-Ya.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Person In Audience] Go Julie!

  • [Mark] Allen Wong.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Cindy Hun.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Sudir Chira.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Pascal Sucar.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Mark Yabivitski.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Nathan Hannah.

(crowd applauding)

  • [Mark] Actar Masuud.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Wayne Beng.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Connor Cunningham.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Rudalah Singapali.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Anika Sinege.

(crowd applauding)

  • [Jamie] Umar Badawarge.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Rupile Rutis-Sweetah.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Peter Gallagher.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Kimberly Lamb.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Katie Todd.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Jacklyn Schindler.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Antonia Berhardt.

(crowd cheering)

  • [People In Audience] Antonia!

  • [Mark] Priya Baddagge.

(crowd applauding)

  • [Jamie] Teyjas Merotee.

(crowd applauding)

  • [Mark] Nick Gurwee.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Janna Keyrom-Mudannah.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Connie Wong.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Terrance Singh.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Christine John.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Thao Tong.

(crowd applauding)

  • [Mark] David Yang.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Bo Lynn.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Farbaad Seyda.

(crowd applauding)

  • [Jamie] Senchen Hu.

(crowd applauding)

  • [Mark] Keyton Konkardee.

(crowd applauding)

  • [Jamie] Grant Heffernen.

(crowd applauding)

  • [Mark] Austin Rosso.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Wayne Taylor.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Blane Tahani.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Robert John Lee.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Okshay Molluck.

  • [Jamie] Paige Stephens.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Sudarson Kondusumar.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Leaning Lynn.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Maria Fernanda-Uraina.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Ryan Kimurra.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Samuel Gould.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Geogria Wright Simmons.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Person In Audience] Go Georgia!

  • [Mark] Paul Engelhart.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Kelsey Eastman.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] John Eastman.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Adam Eppenstein.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Trevor Ryan.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Person In Audience] Yeah Trevor!

  • [Jamie] Araben Mamadanna.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Vishal Dessi.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Ian Leatherby.

(crowd applauding)

  • [Mark] Connor Wilks.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Andrew Notone.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Carrie Goodson.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Nicholas Ranchuck.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Will Scott.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Jared Wright.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Usha Rasul.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Ariana Calderone.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Nichole Vasquez.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Tanya Sutstheyvaag.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Nuhammand Waldemarian.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Johanna Hyde.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Lauren Teng.

(crowd applauding)

  • [Jamie] Vivian Lynn.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Buscaan Bale.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Jaree Risbe.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Jesse Mathers.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Claire Willy.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Erick Sesanno.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Michelle Saychow.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Connor Handy.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Othack Lavian.

(crowd cheering)

(person in audience shouting)

  • [Mark] John Xiong.

(crowd applauding)

  • [Jamie] Sia McWilliams Ellingson.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Vina Dharma-Decade.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Shiva Samusanterum.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Atusa Sedehe.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Hayan Wu.

(crowd cheering)

(crowd laughing)

  • [Mark] Danya Ude.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Maggie Lao.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Sonya Huong.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Burt Harrow.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Palavi Masce.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Kathy Shaw.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Wong Yao.

(crowd applauding)

  • [Jamie] Shemlee Envee.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Chris Bennett.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Brad Sadderwipe.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Minaj Ravi.

  • [Jamie] Nick Clarke.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Misaki Yamagucci.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] David Wellington Holm.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Alexander Christian Innocent.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] LiPeng Charles Teng.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Lennon Pinto.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Gaotem Shollingar.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Ron Bee.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Casey Peng.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Fukon Peng.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Sancana Ryanon Veniceturwara.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Ellen Wong.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Yang Xiang.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Meng Nee.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Ryan Yapeton.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Nicholas Raddich.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Matt Showholm.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Vivik Doshi.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Sean Uwi.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Projuma Desali.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Kishori Sakar.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Gokul Chrishnaan.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Rohad Turanella.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Melody Maasis.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Frank Murdock.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Cannack Murdock.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Patricia Korrula.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Casey Hayano.

  • [Jamie] Gabriela Banks.

(crowd cheering)

(person in audience shouting)

  • [Mark] Katie Blevins.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Person In Audience] Yeah Katie!

  • [Jamie] Norah Fritz.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Chelsea Boyle.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Amna Kahn.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Francesca Delaney.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Nicholas Houchen.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Christopher Leyton.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Darren Lim.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] A.J. Sharmaa.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Eric Pow.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Daryush Sarafzeyde.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] See Lee.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Surica Anatarmaan.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Dinesh Prissant-Stryhari.

(crowd applauding)

  • [Mark] Subaash Segareddi.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Hellen Hatch.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Tim Jing.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] We-Wey Shultaya.

  • [Mark] Joty Ballaggi.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Mairu Kusseine.

  • [Mark] Anita Xavier.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Stephen Feng.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Catherine Zayack.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Ranjeek J. Paul.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Ranaa Gidwanne.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Sean Chatturgene.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Vincent Yea.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Jogaas Pingle.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Travis Kauser.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Charles Thum.

  • [Mark] Andrew Lu.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Ryan Morningstar.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Addichia Kistu-Sumeti.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Kevin Chang.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Person In Audience] Kevin!

  • [Mark] Jason Matthew Cumadoy.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Timothy Chen.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Finley Harkum.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Melissa Jeng.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Minh Ku.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Nichola Penyek.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Ying Li.

(person in audience shouting)

  • [Jamie] Faruhn Chicabucola.

(crowd applauding)

  • [Mark] Kaguun Dee.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Kai Hu.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Christa Metteromedla.

(crowd applauding)

  • [Jamie] Seth Chun-Wy Yu.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Dogakahn Toka.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Michael Curry.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Way Xiu.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Stanley Lamb.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Isaiah Dureesa.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] John Toman.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Andrew Elliot.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Lauren Macklat.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Anthony Ma.

(crowd applauding)

  • [Jamie] Joseph Young III.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Raul Sahu.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] McDad Fulgee.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Gopee Sinduraisahn.

(crowd applauding)

  • [Jamie] Niguasan DuSuaran.

  • [Mark] Purna Samanta.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Alyssa Zachariah.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Gigen Sindulang.

(crowd applauding)

  • [Jamie] Menge Wu.

  • [Mark] Olayna Daruviancu.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Snaia Salomke.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Adriana Manuela-Huseche.

(woman laughing) (crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Shre Kular.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Chinme Guiaquad.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Brandon Himan.

  • [Person In Audience] Yay!

  • [Mark] Abdula Amunkeel.

(crowd applauding)

  • [Jamie] Hari Mani.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Greg Eckert.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Andrew Saleen.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Michael Speeler.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Max Rausch.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Francisco Gonzales.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Daniel Zong.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Charles Barlow.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Joshua Minnicks.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Gaida Zaron.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Gunner Asen.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] William Oldfather.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Patrick Arrownene Jr.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Anthony Riva Dinera.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Federico Torre.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Kaushik Daas.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Laura Jacobsen.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Eleanor Bolai.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Jack Omar DeHurra.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Steve Odell.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Nana Lei.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Mark] Francis Ho.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] And Paulina Lee.

(crowd cheering)

(crowd cheering)

(audience members shouting)

  • [Person In Audience] Yo yo yo!

  • [Person In Audience] Yo yo yo.

(person in audience shouting)

  • [Paulina] All right.

  • So let us now turn to our full-time MBA students.

(crowd cheering)

Your full-time Berkeley MBA program is one of the finest

and most selective MBA programs in the world.

Yours is a story of accomplishment

against some of the strongest headwinds ever.

From the beginning, you stood out

as one of the most diverse classes ever at Haas.

(crowd applauding)

39% of you are women.

(crowd cheering)

8% of you are veterans.

(crowd cheering)

10% of you were the first in your families

to attend college.

(crowd cheering)

And a full 50% of you are U.S. minorities.

(crowd cheering)

During your two years here,

you took on high profile leadership roles,

in addition to rigorous coursework.

Every year, we honor one student from your class

with the Outstanding Academic Achievement Award.

This honor goes to the student

completing his or her graduate studies

with the highest grade point average in the class.

This year’s award winner is John Christopher Thompson.

(crowd cheering)

John graduates with an impressive GPA of 3.983.

(crowd cheering)

In August, he will start with software company, ServiceNow,

in its business strategy group.

Congratulations, John.

(crowd applauding)

At this time, we also recognize our Full-Time MBA students

who performed in the top 10% of their class.

The graduation with honors program

celebrates their achievement and underscores the importance

of academic excellence at Haas.

The names of our honors graduates are listed

in the commencement booklet.

At this time, I would ask those students to stand

as we celebrate their achievement.

Please stand.

(crowd cheering)

Now we recognize the winners of the Full-Time MBA

Defining Leadership Principal Awards.

The Full-Time MBA students nominated classmates

who have made outstanding contributions

to the MBA experience and who best embody

our defining leadership principles.

As I announce the recipients, will they please stand.

Again, I ask our guests to hold your applause

until I’ve read all the names.

The first one goes to,

for Question The Status Quo, Aleeza Gaysik.

(crowd cheering)

And I met her father, David, wherever you are.

She’s amazing.

Okay, Confidence Without Attitude

goes to Casey Donochek-Donight.

(crowd cheering)

Student Always goes to Matti de la Calla.

(crowd cheering)

And Beyond Yourself goes to Kevin Hu.

(crowd cheering)

Thank you all for your exemplary contributions

to our school.

You may now be seated.

(crowd cheering)

Now we will hear

from our Full-Time MBA student speaker, Kokei Otosi.

(crowd cheering)

Kokei was selected by her fellow students

to address her class.

Kokei is a Bay Area native turned New Yorker,

who is the proud daughter of Nigerian immigrants.

(crowd cheering)

While at Haas, she focused on sustainable innovation

and interned at Alante Capital,

a venture capital firm that invests in technologies,

enabling sustainable apparel, production, and retail.

She also served as a graduate student instructor

for Leadership Communications

and Storytelling for Leadership.

She calls coaching her peers for story salon,

a beloved Haas tradition, the highlight of her time at Haas.

(crowd cheering)

Prior to Haas, Kokei worked in roles driving social change

through urban design in public private partnerships.

Most recently, she managed a portfolio

of climate adaption infrastructure projects

at Van Alen Institute,

including a mission critical work stream

of a 200 million bond program in Miami.

Kokei is a serial hobbyist whose current obsessions include

Crack of Dawn Spin Class and perfecting a roast chicken.

(crowd chuckling)

She received her undergraduate degree

from New York University.

Kokei will be joining IBM as a senior consultant in August.

Ladies and gentlemen,

the Full-Time MBA program speaker, Kokei Otosi.

(crowd cheering)

  • What are you all doing here?

We can’t come back.

This means we can’t come back guys. What a miscalculation.

I can’t believe you’re all here.

(sighs) Before I begin, I would like to say thank you.

I often find myself deep in thought,

and I’m often reflecting about the fact

that everything that happens to us is a result

of a series of choices.

There is so much about our existence

that is completely out of our control,

but I suppose at times like this, at significant moments,

I like to think back on the seemingly insignificant moments

that led to me getting to a particular place.

Not only my own choices, but the choices of other people.

My time at Haas has been incredibly formative.

And despite the pandemic,

I consider it to be one of the best decisions I ever made.

And I wanna say thank you to you,

my fellow Full-Time MBA-ers,

because had you not made that choice to come to Haas,

for whatever reason you made that choice,

whenever you made that choice,

my experience would’ve been totally different.

I sincerely thank you all

for the time that we spent together.

So thank you so much. I love you guys.

(crowd cheering)

So my speech will not be about the pandemic.

However, that while I said that my MBA experience

was what it was despite the pandemic,

it of course was what it was because of the pandemic.

One of my earliest memories at Haas

was Leadership Communication,

a class we took from 6:00 to 9:00 PM once a week on Zoom,

early in our tenure at Haas.

During that time of global chaos,

the sun could not set fast enough.

It would race to set in the evenings,

and I would watch on Zoom

as all the Zoom rooms in front of me went completely dark

and everyone shuffled awkwardly to turn on desk lamps.

Immediately, I would become exhausted.

And then on a break,

I would hear one of my fellow classmates mention

that he was thinking about how he was gonna spend

the rest of his day.

His day, because it was 3:00 AM where he was.

Do you remember that?

A third of you all did that?

You delivered marketing presentations, micro exams,

lead com speeches in the middle of the night from Africa,

Europe, South America, Asia.

You guys are incredible.

You fought to be here with us and we’re so grateful.

(crowd cheering)

We have not forgotten.

Another one of my earliest MBA memories

was attending the memorial service

for our dear classmate, Nadeem,

one of the very first Haas classmates I met over Zoom,

as I was quarantining with my family.

The shock and the grief that we experienced

so early on in our Haas experience was palpable,

even though so many of us

were watching the ceremony on Zoom.

Nadeem, we can’t believe you’re not here with us

celebrating today, but we haven’t forgotten you.

We miss you.

It is impossible to reconcile the idea

that strangely, as the pandemic was closing in,

I found myself cushioned by two years of an MBA program.

While wars were being waged against mask mandates,

as the National Guard was being deployed

to sanitized community centers,

as families were clapping from their windows at night,

as protestors painted murals in the streets,

as coffins piled up outside nursing homes,

I was invited to spend two years thinking about myself.

What a baffling gift.

For some of us, the choice to accept that gift

was particularly complicated by that cacophony of events,

and yet here we are.

The MBA is obviously not like other grad school programs,

as my friends in med school like to remind me.

Yes, I did return from Mexico

a day before my corporate finance final.

Why do you ask?

(crowd cheering)

I’ve heard consistently from classmates

that the greatest gift of the MBA

is the freedom to experiment,

the freedom to try new things,

be it pushing themselves to take internships

in completely new sectors, or even riding a bike.

(crowd cheering)

Most of us came from careers

that held efficiency in high esteem,

and thus, a lot of us didn’t have the flexibility

to take certain types of risk,

or even to ask ourselves what we really cared about.

A few weeks ago, I asked a first year student

what she hoped to do post MBA,

and I watched her crumble as she confessed

that she didn’t know,

as if I was going to report her to admissions.

Isn’t it so nice to know the truth?

You know what I said to her?

Who cares? Enjoy yourself.

What I know now is that the MBA is a sandbox.

When you leave, you may still not know what you want to do,

but for two years, we have the opportunity to try

and fail and learn and try.

We may never get freedom like that again,

which is why I may not leave.

I don’t know. I haven’t decided yet.

But if I do leave,

these are the things that I’ll take with me.

I’ll share with you a couple of things I’ve learned.

The first one I learned in Startup Sales,

a class preparing founders and aspiring sales professionals

for effective business development.

I promise this is relevant to you.

Our professor spends a lot of time consulting with founders

about how to do sales,

given that people say bad things about sales people,

but the success of the company

really does depend on their performance.

He says that when it comes to assessing the effectiveness

of a sales team, only one metric matters.

Can you guess?

Leads generated? Revenue?

The one metric that matters is learnings over time.

How much you’re learning over a given period.

What a Berkeley hippie answer,

the most important things that you’re learning.

Well, I buy it.

The objective of the sales team

should be to maximize learning

through intentional experimentation

and intentional reflection so that the team can build

a sustainable and proven strategy.

When you find what works, hold onto it.

When you find what doesn’t, get rid of it,

I’ll tell you why I buy it,

and I think it’s applicable to all of us,

and you probably have experienced this in your own lives.

Experimentation is the key to growth.

Professor Sharif Karmally said it this way,

“We’re always in one of three zones,

“the stretch zone, the comfort zone or the danger zone.

“The stretch zone is the only zone that you grow in.

“If we are not trying new things, we’re not growing.”

May we, my beloved classmates and friends,

remain curious enough about ourselves

to take risks with intentionality,

enabling a life of endless growth.

The second valuable takeaway that I’ve gleaned from my MBA

is no matter how smart or accomplished someone is,

they’re probably pretty weird.

(crowd laughing)

Another way of saying that is the MBA has pushed us

to believe that people are storied and complex.

We realize that we cannot guess who a person is

or what they believe simply by how they present.

I hope with all my heart that we don’t forget that,

that we don’t forget how pleasantly surprised

we’ve been by each other.

Here’s why I think that’s important to remember.

Odds are that the people

that you’re sitting next to right now

will be pretty powerful someday.

We will be responsible for other people.

Not only are direct reports,

but those directly or indirectly impacted

by the companies we work for, or even run.

It may be tempting for us as business leaders

to become singularly focused on profit.

But we simply cannot.

You might be surprised to learn

that the most salient argument I’ve ever heard

in favor of corporate social responsibility

came from our corporate finance class.

Our professor reminded us that Milton Friedman’s argument,

that shareholder maximization is the same

as stakeholder maximization comes with conditions,

conditions that are unequivocally unmet

in our present society.

As we re-enter the real world,

I hope we can remember to view other people

with openness and curiosity

that will enable empathy and compassion,

that motivates us to fight for what is good.

I hope we can translate this awareness

of the complexity of others into resolve,

to steward our positions of power,

to contribute to an equitable and thriving society.

Even when it requires sacrifice.

May we commit ourselves to relentless curiosity

about the other, so that we’ll be motivated

by empathy and compassion, regardless of our position.

We have endless choices.

Some of which are overtly bad,

but many of which are probably just fine.

May these values guide whatever it is that we choose to do.

To our friends and family, you all look very cute.

I beg you to hold us accountable.

People think MBAs are pretty insufferable.

But you may have heard that we at Haas

like to question the status quo.

Please remind us to keep growing

and to continue being compassionate.

Stay hungry, stay curious.

Happy birthday, Kathryn. Go Bears!

(crowd cheering)

  • Thank you so much, Kokei.

And now the Cheit Awards for Excellence In Teaching.

The Cheit Award for the Graduate Student Instructor

in the Full-Time MBA Program goes to Griffin Grail-Bingham.

(crowd cheering)

Griffin,

Griffin was GSI for Introduction to Operations Management.

The faculty member selected by the Full-Time MBA Students

for the Cheit Award is Associate Professor, Ned Augenblick.

(crowd cheering)

Ned taught the Strategic Leadership Course.

Please join me in congratulating Griffin and Ned.

(crowd cheering)

We now recognize the full-time program candidates

for the degree, Master of Business Administration.

Assisting me today will be

Jamie Breen, Assistant Dean for MBA programs,

Jenn Bridge, Executive Director

for the Full-Time MBA Program Office,

and Cheit Award winner, Ned Augenblick

will join in the presentation of the scrolls.

  • [Jamie] Kaylin Todd.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Stu Fram.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Olivia Wastinis.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Charlotte Harris.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Rachel Prinsky Pommerance.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Emily Pearl Shapiro.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Jake Becker.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Brooke Monroe.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Laina Horbath.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Erick Edelstein.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] David Mancy.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] David Parkinson.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Marco Chesario.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Lily San.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Julia Benjamin.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Alyssa Zu.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Kathryn Wilcox.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Rachel Steinbaugh.

(crowd applauding)

  • [Jamie] Tess Crasney.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Sam Ballor.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] George DeNeveres-Molanovich.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Clara Con Pume.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Preston Swan.

(crowd applauding)

  • [Jenn] Thomas Fantis.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Irene Vig.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Rachel Sclar.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Christina Shu.

(crowd applauding)

  • [Jenn] David Rossis.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] London Swift.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Phu-Zha Bhag.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Rosa Wong.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Thonvee Lao.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Jason Friedman.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Jeremy Smith.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Taylor Fulton.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Christina Dunbar.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Jordan Bennett.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Casey Smith.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Jacklyn Burnbaugh.

(crowd applauding)

  • [Jenn] Alejandra Vergara.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Charles Lehman.

(crowd cheering)

(person in audience shouting)

  • [Jenn] Alex Stragden.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Naveh Algareesi.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Eliza Springer.

Delia Springer.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Facundo Albayari.

(crowd applauding)

  • [Jenn] Thomas Jimenez.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Thomas Campos.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Ignacio Binami.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Martin Pavez.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Ryan Gebow.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Hannah Grants.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Simone Cept.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Carlin Dasey.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Andre Heller.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Lisa Cheng.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Sevida Carshey.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Yog-Min Kim.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Jung-Ho Lee.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Ryan Chin.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Marcus Branford.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Jacob Macintosh.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Saben Ray.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Kevin Son.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Michael Fergarsi.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Andrew Johnson.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Kathryn Vaye.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Loki-Lani Hunt.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Leila Beyonce Samini.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Daniel Machlot.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Stephen Domingo.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Allan Churchill.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Juan Carlos Nunez.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Anton Diavola.

(crowd cheering)

(person in audience shouting)

  • [Jenn] Kevin Xiang.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Candace Key.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Kevin Brushir.

(crowd applauding)

  • [Jamie] Steven Snotgrass.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Michael de la Guardia.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Drew Schneider.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Gabe Manyon.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Bora Gunner.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Alma Skahim-Sharif.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Cyrus Aga.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Daniel Pluth.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Alex Surgian.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Peter Wren.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Thebob Anon.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Sandib Shaw.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Person In Audience] Yeah, Sandib!

  • [Jamie] Idija Ravi.

(crowd cheering)

(person in audience shouting)

  • [Jenn] Matt Schneider.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Austin Lavin.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Michael Halkias.

(crowd applauding)

  • [Jamie] Bradley Friedman.

(crowd applauding)

  • [Jenn] Leslie Chen.

(crowd applauding)

  • [Jamie] Robert Gasman.

(crowd applauding)

  • [Jenn] Landon Sarichi.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Harrison Shaw.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Allison Fu.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Christina Lee.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Person In Audience] You go girl!

  • [Jenn] Sharin Kumar.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Sofia Meloni.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Amanda Wenell.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Carolyn Aker.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Kelly Chu.

  • [Person In Audience] Go Kelly!

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Blake Johnson.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Will Bayer.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Shiva Patel.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Masu Panaker.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Jared Greg.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Rita Wiley.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Lydia Simoto-Johnson.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Michael Kim.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Lucas Coalio.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Stefan Pung.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Divya Bija-Purapu.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Vivian Fung.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Jimmy Yang.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Josh Andres.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Chris Hester.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Emma Levy.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Anisha Brikash.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Anna Pan.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] El Wisnicki.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Christopher Brian Quadu.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Tori Orlando Maize.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Lucas Sayfu.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Donzelle Legatt II.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Anchoworle Ajule.

(crowd cheering)

Give it to me again.

Aiachobewa Ahjule.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Brooke Carter.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Somerle Tohamalo-Abai.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Dina Yarin.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Nicole Jones.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Conusole Ibana.

(crowd cheering)

Coinsola Ibanu.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Johnathan Antos.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Alabi Rumi.

(crowd cheering)

(people in audience shouting)

  • [Jenn] Dennis Yee.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Mina Matsumodo.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Ryan Littlefield.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Emily Morrison.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Jared Lyn.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Cindy Liu.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Jessica Puong.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Moon Kim.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Dominic Jonsore.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Aga Gukole.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Sean Mendell.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Ismael Aparke.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Sora Nayak.

(crowd applauding)

  • [Jamie] Jonas Linde.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Alejandra Aruay-Lao.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Bryan Locasio.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Yoko Masuta.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Nicolas Breadschneider.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Jeff Diamond.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Morgan Somaitus.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Graham Hayden.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Emily Ore and Greg Lupin.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Roy Hajar.

(crowd applauding)

  • [Jamie] Chase Thompson.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Helen Huyon.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Camilla Rico.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Alex Hamilton.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Nori Terasima.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Juan Pedro Pera.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Luis Felipe Gonzales.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Fernando Moreno.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Frederico Cueva.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Felipe Cordas-Chadwick.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Ignacio Solis.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Person In Audience] Ignacio!

  • [Jenn] Seroja Burachian.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Samuel Jazzo.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Tai Wu.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Lucas Barth.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Amashak Saroth.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Danielle Dylan.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Hiroki Cotagoa.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Kane Urayama.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Christine Wang.

(crowd applauding)

  • [Jamie] Ja-Ling Ju.

(crowd applauding)

  • [Jenn] Juan Yu.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Cora Yuwen.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Joseph Arone.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Drew Ruiz.

(crowd applauding)

  • [Jenn] Enrique Terasuk.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Graham Smith.

(crowd applauding)

  • [Jenn] Douglass Wise.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] John Tolton.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Jake Mervas.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Dylan Corderro.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] John Dio.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Kathryn Law.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Hugh Harsono.

(horn blowing)

  • [Jamie] Sunyell Solen.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Priyanka Entraya.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Nada Bizofti.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Sareen Kayradi.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] May-Ha Data.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Person In Audience] That’s my roommate!

  • [Jenn] Marcello Ferera.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Jose Phillip.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Alexandra Buskeva.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Grace Britain.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] David Sambrano.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Julia Renaldi.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Enrique Povadano.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] John Akino.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Patrick Yang.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Tessa Duhl.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Kendall Steskovich.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Zachary Bills.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Nate Nasen.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Ukil Phannis.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Ian McClain.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Vincent Chang.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Julie Mijong-Kane.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Paul Cho.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Ronik Singh.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Sachi Haula.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Suchen Grotokrelu.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Sean Aurora.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Janki Patel.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Alex Wong.

(crowd applauding)

  • [Jenn] Spender Ponce.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Auby Roy.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Roy Shu. Ray Shu.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Anthony Fasulo.

(crowd cheering)

(people in audience shouting)

  • [Jenn] Mo Dubove.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Son-Wen Chen.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Joseph Scammerhorn.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Pete Bobsy.

(crowd applauding)

  • [Jenn] Do you want all of it?

David Damari Golden.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Owen Lyons.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Shane Wilkinson.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Nasarel Reyes.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Victoria Wilbur.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Stephanie Winklowski.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Roy Perrier.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Brandon Ayler.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Kayla Leila Resavi.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] James Doden.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Mikinda Zastry.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Nick Halgason.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Ian Emery.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Romit Sen.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Mena Ayer.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Ja-Wen Lee.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Jane Lu.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Kate Hung.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Yushen Chang.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Billy Andika.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Sharon See.

(crowd applauding)

  • [Jamie] Eileen Lu.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Protek Sahai.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Sharia Kalsee.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Shawshank Antharon.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Andrew Zelman.

(crowd applauding)

  • [Jenn] Monica Parock.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Abishak Gupta.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Jonathan Wong.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Erick Halley.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Justin Rodgers.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Doug Pan.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Sarah Ramen.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Suon Tung.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Winston Guan.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Ann Tran.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Loata Soshinu.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Chrystal Ang.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Jessica Bronell.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Sevita Calyon Cular.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Griffin Grail-Bingham.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Taylor Budenseck.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Andrea Barrios.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Kyle Dowds.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Kaylon Castillo.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Christine Yee.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Sully Sullivan.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Avery Hairston.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Alex Trembeda.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Spence Parro.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Bailey Dom.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Angela Lewis.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Arianna Spillotus.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Julie Warshaw.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Chelsea Mason.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Carson Goldman.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Lucas Quello.

(crowd applauding)

  • [Jamie] Chris Wang.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Kokei Otosi.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] John Thompson.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Aleeza Gaysik.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] Casey Donochek-Donight.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jenn] Mattil de la Calla.

(crowd cheering)

  • [Jamie] And Kevin Hu.

(crowd cheering)

  • At this time will all the candidates for the degree,

Berkeley Master of Business Administration,

from both the Full-Time

and the Evening and Weekend programs, please rise.

(crowd cheering)

(horn honking)

By virtue of the authority vested in me

by the president of the University of California

and the chancellor of UC Berkeley,

(person in audience shouting)

I grant you the degree, Master of Business Administration.

You may now switch your tassels to the left.

(crowd cheering)

(crowd applauding)

If you haven’t already done so,

please switch your tassels to the left.

Please, please be seated.

All of the graduates here have commenced a new,

lifelong relationship with the Haas School and Berkeley.

You are now alumni.

Before I–

(crowd cheering)

Before I bring the ceremony to a close,

I want to invite you all to join us

for the commencement reception in the Haas Courtyard.

We are full of pride at your achievements today,

and we eagerly anticipate your great accomplishments

in the future.

Congratulations.

And this commencement ceremony is now concluded.

(crowd cheering)

(“Celebration” by Eumir Deodato and Kool & The Gang)