GRAND RAPIDS — A team of Grand Valley State University students made history by winning a recent international business competition.
The team was the first from the United States to win the Schlesinger Global Family Enterprise Case Competition held at the University of Vermont. The students consisted of Abbie Hoffman, Alina Ledewig, Teddy Rounds, and Justin Quinn.
“Congratulations to Abby, Alina, Teddy, and Justin for representing the Seedman College of Business and GVSU,” Diana Lawson, dean of the Seedman College of Business, said in a statement. “We are very proud of them and their significant accomplishments.”
The team was led by Ana Gonzalez, Seedman's student advisor and director of the Family Business Institute, and Chandresh Vaid, assistant professor of business administration.
The four-day competition requires teams to act as consultants and analyze family-run businesses from a variety of backgrounds and histories. Students will submit their findings and recommendations in her 20-minute presentation. The judges will score the decision-making and strategy process.
“It can be any business that students judge in a competition,” Gonzalez says. “A 35-year-old company or a 120-year-old company, or a family-run company that has been in his fourth generation with very large stakes and diversification.The interesting thing about family businesses is that they come in all shapes and sizes. .”
The team will have eight months to review the first case. After the first round, the team conducted two additional rounds where he reviewed and strategized for four hours before creating a presentation for a panel that included academics, consultants, family business executives and employees. I will consider it.
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Since the first event in 2013, more than 800 participants from 66 universities in 37 countries have participated in the Schlesinger Global Family Enterprise Case Competition.
“I grew up in a family business, which gave me a deeper understanding of business in general,” says Hoffman. “Being able to look at each case more holistically helped me understand all aspects involved in a family business.”
This was GVSU's 10th anniversary of participating in the competition.
— Contact reporter Mitchell Boatman at mboatman@hollandsentinel.com.
