New Club Helps MBA Students Hone Leadership Skills
During the pandemic, MBA students Benjamin Bedosky and Kaleb Kille invested their time reading books on leadership to develop their professional skills. Inspired by many great reads through the summer, they began the fall semester taking their work one step further, and started a new student organization in the School of Business.
The Professional Development Club aims to leverage activities beyond the classroom to help students develop core leadership competencies and grow as business professionals. Bedosky and Kille feel they have grown through their readings and can maximize those learnings if more students collaborate through this initiative.
As part of the club, they are also planning to bring a diverse group of leaders from various industries to campus to offer advice on how students can demonstrate leadership early in their careers.
The first speaker, Robert Fashano, founder and chairman, Alliance Advisory Group, is scheduled to speak via Zoom at 5:15 p.m. on Thursday, Sept. 24. His talk will cover the importance of soft skills required to practice leadership; the characteristics associated with being an effective leader; the importance of leadership; and his definition of leadership. The talk will also feature a question-and-answer session.
Fashano has served as a general agent for Guardian since 1979.
In the industry, Fashano has taught Chartered Life Underwriter (CLU®) and served as an AMTC moderator. He is the past president of the Buffalo Chapter of the American Society of Insurance Professionals and the Western New York chapter of the General Agents and Managers Association (GAMA).
He has spoken to industry and non-industry groups across the country and has spoken internationally in 11 countries on leadership and coaching.
Within Guardian, he has served on the Field Advisory Board and as chairman in 1997 and 1998. He was active in the formation of the Guardian Leadership Institute and is a certified facilitator for John Maxwell Company leadership programs. He is also a member of The Executive Circle, a 20-member international mentoring group of John Maxwell. He is a certified executive coach from the Center of Executive Coaching.
Fashano is the creator of The Lead One coaching program, designed for mid-level leaders and small business owners in developing critical leadership skills for developing their leaders. He is the co-author of “The Power of Coaching,” and is the author of his new, soon-to-be released book, “Lessons from the Porch.”