Five Booth Students Join the Siebel Scholars Class of 2022

Brian Carlson

By the time Detroit native Brian Carlson entered Booth in 2020, he had already attained an MS in chemistry from the University of Michigan and had worked as a biochemist at a biotech startup in Kentucky.

“Coming as I did from a nontraditional pre-MBA background, I had a lot to learn about the business world,” he says.

He adds that Booth’s flexible curriculum has allowed him to create a schedule that combines both the fundamentals of business and the kind of advanced analytics he was already practicing as a biochemist.

Carlson says that Booth’s student body is “by far my biggest resource. My classmates have helped me get up to speed on everything from course work to recruiting. I have made many lifelong friends here.”

Carlson, who will be joining Bain & Company after graduation as a management consultant, says he is honored to be a Siebel Scholar. “There are so many outstanding Siebel Scholars,” he says. “I can’t wait to get to know them better.”

Ryan Hoerger

Prior to enrolling at Booth, California native Ryan Hoerger worked in the Silicon Valley office of Cornerstone Research, an economic consulting firm doing quantitative analyses relating to corporate litigation and regulatory matters.

Hoerger credits Booth—and in particular Kevin M. Murphy, the George J. Stigler Distinguished Service Professor of Economics, and Ozan Candogan, associate professor of operations management—with showing him how to attack complex problems with data.

“Professor Murphy’s Turbo Microeconomics class and Professor Candogan’s Operations Management class gave us so many real-world examples to help us think more clearly about economic theory and operations and logistics,” he says.

He recently completed a summer internship at Nike, where he “had flashbacks to Professor Candogan’s class” while listening in on discussions relating to navigating supply-chain disruptions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.

He adds that past Booth Siebel Scholars have already contacted him and that he looks forward to being part of “this hyper-accomplished group of people.”

Hardik Parikh

For Hardik Parikh, who grew up in Mumbai, India, and has degrees in physics and computer science from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, being involved with Booth’s Graduate Business Council was an eye-opening experience.

“I moderated a panel for the council called Life as a Generation X Immigrant in the United States. It was humbling to hear about the challenges and hurdles people have passed through in order to keep their American dream alive,” he says.

Parikh, who plans to work in the investment management field, says two classes in particular have been standouts for him—professor George M. Constantinides’ Financial Instruments class and professor Anil K. Kashyap’s Advanced Macroeconomics class.

He says Professor Constantinides, the Leo Melamed Professor of Finance, “helped unravel my naivete and taught me to think about options through the pure, first-principle lens of economics” while Professor Kashyap, the Stevens Distinguished Service Professor of Economics and Finance, “radically changed my understanding of climate change and social equality.”

Parikh says he is looking forward to meeting Thomas Siebel. “I cannot count the number of all-nighters I spent at the Siebel Center at the University of Illinois,” he says. “I need to thank him for being an integral part of both my undergraduate and graduate education.”

Srividvatha Sridhar

“Not a day goes by where I am not amazed by my classmates,” says Srividvatha Sridhar, who grew up in India and New Jersey and has a degree in chemical engineering from Rice University. “They come from diverse backgrounds like the military, education, and big tech but are humble and willing to help anyone they can. I learn from them every day.”

She is similarly impressed by Booth’s faculty. “Everyone is so accessible,” she says. “It’s not unusual to run into award-winning professors in the hallway or to chat informally with them over lunch or coffee. It makes a big difference.”

Sridhar’s ultimate goal is to be an entrepreneur in the e-commerce field. She recently completed a summer internship at Amazon. “I was part of the returns operations team, and one of the things I got out of it was a sense of how big tech e-commerce functions. It made me realize that strategy and operations are my main areas of interest.”

She adds that several past Siebel Scholars have already reached out to her and she looks forward to “expanding my network and seeking their advice, particularly in relation to the startup world.”

Kira Tebbe

For Kira Tebbe, who grew up in the Chicago suburb of Elmhurst and previously worked for an educational travel company in Boston, finding out that she likes accounting has been a transformative experience.

“I thought it was going to be dry and boring, but I was shocked by how much I enjoyed it,” she says. “Accounting allows you to tell a story from an otherwise passive set of information.”

She began with the Financial Accounting class, taught by Joao Granja, associate professor of accounting and the Jane and Basil Vasiliou Faculty Scholar. She followed it up with the Financial Statement Analysis class, taught by John Hand, a visiting professor of accounting from the UNC Kenan-Flagler Business School. Professor Hand’s class, she says, “was my toughest class so far. I struggled with the acronyms and accounting-specific terms but I loved how the class incorporated managerial motivations and external context into an analysis.”

Tebbe adds, “My journey with accounting and finance has taught me how the subject has more depth than I previously thought and how my own biases, if left unchecked, may hinder my intellectual exploration.”

Tebbe, who plans to work in the field of nonprofit administration, looks forward to meeting her fellow Siebel Scholars—both past and current—and hopes that “being a part of such a diverse group will give me the ability to learn about many different industries.”