This is the first part of an interview with Dan Walmer. Dan graduated from UHD with his MBA in Leadership in 2017. He has been a Corporate Fellow in the Process Improvement and Project Management Concentration since 2021.  Dan has worked at MD Anderson Cancer Center (Business Manager), Baylor College of Medicine (Associate Dept. Administrator), and recently accepted an executive role as a Division Administrator at Thomas Jefferson University / Jefferson Health in Center City, Philadelphia.  In his spare time Dan loves hiking with his wife, running marathons (48 at last count), and watching his four children take on life with enthusiasm!

 

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.


Marilyn: Hello Dan, thanks so much for being here. To start, would you please share a little bit about yourself, where you’re from, and what led you to Houston?

Dan: I was born and raised in central Pennsylvania, and I went to college in the Chicago suburbs. A college summer internship with Star of Hope Mission led me to Houston. Star of Hope runs homeless shelters and provides family social services.

I spent about 15 years working in nonprofit youth and family social services, before I transitioned to healthcare about 12 years ago. I got to a place where I was burning out on social work and not making enough to support my family, so I wanted to switch to something that had more future and more financial support [for me], but I’m still wired to be doing something that impacts people’s lives.

Healthcare was a natural fit. But I had no road to get in, no business training. I could not get people to respect professionally what I had done for a living for 15 years.

Marilyn: What helped you pivot?

Dan: It was about that time that UHD was just getting their MBA program up and running. And for me I didn’t have to have an undergrad background in business, [so] I did the leveling courses. The price was right, the flexibility was right, the fact that it was so diverse and geared to professionals in the job market, nights [and] hybrid— it was just a perfect fit for me. UHD’s MBA program was a real launching pad and game changer for me.

Marilyn: That’s an amazing story. 

Dan: It was a really tough pivot. The only jobs I could really find in healthcare were jobs like volunteer coordinators or fundraisers, and I just fortunately stumbled into a position in volunteer services at MD Anderson, I didn’t understand how privileged I was to get a job at MD Anderson—I didn’t know enough about it to know it was the #1-rated cancer hospital in the world. It was just one of dozens jobs I applied for.

And then within a couple weeks of finishing my MBA, I was able to get a promotion as a clinical business manager. I had all the connections and networking I needed, just literally had to have that – a lot of the jobs I was trying to transition to said that I had to have either an undergrad or grad degree in business, and I could literally not even apply for jobs until I had a business degree.

At MD Anderson, I got a lot of great experience supervising people, and knew everyone in the clinics, and I just needed that business stamp to take the next step.

Marilyn: I think that really speaks to the value of an MBA, and a UHD MBA, especially for someone with a non-business background. Let’s discuss your UHD experience now. Which concentration did you choose, and why were you drawn to it?

Dan: I chose leadership, [and] it was a no brainer of a decision for me. I was new to business, and I didn’t know if I would be a finance or HR guy, but I knew that leadership was going to be important for me to get where I wanted to get. Leadership seemed like it was the most practical to me. There’s no path to the executive role I wanted to be in that didn’t require strengthening my overall leadership.

Marilyn: That’s interesting, because since then you’ve come back to UHD as a Corporate Fellow for Project Management and Process Improvement (PMPI).

Dan: Now I will say, PMPI did not exist when I was there, but it would be a close second for me if I were choosing again. I can’t think of anyone at any level I’ve interviewed in middle management or above where I didn’t see a Project Management background as a huge asset, a huge strength. Pulling together all the different pieces of a complex project and moving it forward financially, time phrase wise, deliverables, managing your team, crafting the vision and mission and end goal of a project, almost a microcosm of an executive. It’s very valuable.

Marilyn: With the UHD MBA experience, was there a particular highlight or something that you enjoyed or are really proud of?

Dan: I think there are two things. What I enjoyed most about the program was that it was [20] hours of general from every concentration, and 16 hours of focus on your concentration. And I think what that did for my experience it forced me to really find a team of people with whom we worked together well, and we journeyed through the program together.

MBA programs are so focused on projects and team exercises—because that’s how the world works—it was incredibly valuable for me to get a team.

By 8-10 hours into the program, I had a group of five of us. One was finance, one was HR, two of us were in leadership, and one was a supply chain person. And we registered for every course together, if we were allowed to choose our team, we chose our team. We pushed and pulled, and we all brought something different to the table. And I felt like our graduation was a group project. I think that’s what I’m most proud of.

Marilyn: You pulled each other through.

Dan: Yes, absolutely. And another thing I really liked about the program was the Corporate Fellow aspect. Having someone in the classroom that was less about theory and principles and theoretical things, and more, “This is what it’s like in the day to day.” I’m still very much in touch with two Corporate Fellows who took me under their wing and really mentored me.

I knew when I finished the program, if there was any way to be a Corporate Fellow, I knew I wanted to be one. I finally found a professor who didn’t have another Corporate Fellow. I’ve done six classes now over three summers with him. It’s one of my favorite things I do for sure.