Winning Hosts

PROVO, Utah – Jan 20, 2017 – Deloitte Consulting’s fourth annual Supply Chain Challenge pulled together some of the country’s elite global supply chain MBA students for a competitive two-day series of proposals and presentations held at the Marriott School of Management.

And while hosting the competition was honor enough, BYU’s team also clinched the first place title and a $5,000 prize.

“This was such an incredible experience,” says Susannah Hertz, a BYU MBA student from Salt Lake City who has already accepted an internship to work for Deloitte this summer. “Deloitte has been great to us. We’re so excited.”

Hertz was joined by teammates Kyle Burton from Riverton, Utah; James Pao from Taipei, Taiwan; and Matt Phillips from Midvale, Utah.

“They did an outstanding job of thinking through the issues of the case, summarizing them, and explaining visually and verbally how they would solve the problem,” says Mark Quinn, Deloitte Consulting director and a member of BYU’s Global Supply Chain Advisory Board. “They did a great job supporting that solution under some pretty tough questioning.”

Georgia Tech came in second place and Penn State finished third, winning $3,000 and $2,000, respectively. Ohio State, Tennessee, USC, and Wisconsin also competed. All the participants were congratulated for their great work and knowledge of trending topics in the field with the Deloitte team telling participants to be expecting the company to be in touch with career opportunities.

“This competition gives us an opportunity to see some of the top talent at the institutions where we recruit,” Quinn says. “Where we’ve found outstanding talent, we’ve gone back to those schools to improve our brand, to support our practice, and better serve our clients.”

Deloitte has a longstanding relationship with the Marriott School, which led to the company asking BYU to host this year’s competition.

“It’s an honor to be selected as the site for this case competition,” says Tom Foster, marketing and global supply chain department chair. “It only involves the very best programs, so being asked to host is a signal from Deloitte that they value our global supply chain program.”

The Marriott School is located at Brigham Young University, the largest privately owned, church-sponsored university in the United States. The school has nationally recognized programs in accounting, business management, entrepreneurship, finance, information systems and public management. The school’s mission is to prepare men and women of faith, character and professional ability for positions of leadership throughout the world. Approximately 3,300 students are enrolled in the Marriott School’s graduate and undergraduate programs.