Bryant University’s Global Foundations of Organizations and Business (GFOB) course offers first-year students more than an introduction to the core concepts that govern corporations around the world – it gives them a chance to put the concepts into action. A key element of the University’s award-winning first-year Gateway program and a required course for every student in both the College of Business and the College of Arts and Sciences, GFOB empowers them to begin working toward a better future.
"Ultimately, our goal is to get our students ready for the real world. A class like GFOB prepares them for when they leave here and for the rest of their lives,” notes GFOB Curriculum Coordinator Mark Vozella, a lecturer in the Management department. “They develop so many skills: the ability to work in groups, the ability to communicate and present effectively, the ability to develop innovative solutions to complex problems. Ultimately, they develop the realization that the world is bigger than they knew.”
"I think you get the heart of Bryant in GFOB. You’re learning about business but you’re also learning about so many other things,” says Literary and Cultural Studies student Kayla Batalha ’22. “There’s a lot more facets to it than you’d normally think of as part of a business course."
Range of ideas
A wide-reaching primer on the basic concepts of business operation, GFOB introduces students to fundamental tools and ideas – from management basics to SWOT analyses and finance – they’ll use going forward and helps them figure out how they work together. The course's faculty, many of whom bring real-world experience to the classroom, help them understand how these disparate pieces fit. “GFOB helps you realize how many little, important things there are to every industry and how impactful that can be to our lives,” says Jenna Knight ’22, who is considering going into marketing or management. “That’s really cool.”
“It might not be immediately obvious how a sugar crisis in Cuba might affect the United States, but there are so many ways that different countries intertwine with one another.”
Kirstyn Sperry ’19, who is about to begin her professional career as a Staff One Auditor at EY, remembers her GFOB course as a formative element of her Bryant education. It "changes your thinking. It helps you become a bit more business-oriented,” she notes. “You aren’t really aware of everything that goes into a business or a product, all of the effort and complicated logistics that go into making it real and putting it in your hands.”
The students also explore how business is done around the world through case studies and by closely examining multinational companies like Starbucks and H&M. “It gives you a different perspective,” says Knight. “It might not be immediately obvious how a sugar crisis in Cuba might affect the United States, but there are so many ways that different countries intertwine with one another.”
“A huge component of the class is understanding how diverse and different the world is and what that means,” says Batalha. “I think that’s an important lesson for anyone going out into the world, just being aware of how different cultures interact and shape one another.”
“Our project is uniquely our own and reflects who we are. I’m really glad we were able to bring that in to the classroom.”
Big plans
A semester-long project allows students to apply their developing knowledge and perspective to global issues. Working in teams, they select an important problem that affects daily life in another country, then develop an original, viable business idea that helps address that problem. That means considering everything from cultural issues to cost analyses to marketing and creating a comprehensive business plan that covers it all.
The students receive guidance from the course's faculty to ensure their ideas are feasible but are otherwise able to choose their path. “I like that GFOB is a business course where you can really use the creative part of your brain,” says Batalha, who worked with her group to address the maternal death rate in Tanzania. “Our project is uniquely our own and reflects who we are. I’m really glad we were able to bring that in to the classroom.”
Their plans are tested in the Global Pitch (G-Pitch) competition, where the teams share their ideas and are evaluated on feasibility, creativity, and presentation. The contest culminates with a final round judged by industry professionals; winners receive a monetary prize.
Savanna Templeton ’21, Vice President of Events for Bryant’s chapter of the Collegiate Entrepreneurs’ Organization, led the team of students that organized the final round of this year’s competition, sponsored by Liberty Mutual. “The competitive aspect of GFOB and the G-Pitch competition really gives students a push to work harder and achieve more,” says Templeton, who took GFOB last year. “It can be intimidating for the students to present in front of hundreds of people, but they walk away with so much experience and so much satisfaction in a job well done. You feel like you can do anything afterward."
