Great First Year for the Spaniards at Fuqua

As an international, I always asked international MBA students about their recruiting experiences. If you are an international, I would encourage you to do the same when researching business schools. Meet and talk with as many students from your country as you can. Not only did they have to face the same challenges that you will have to face, but also you will relate better to their stories and experiences.

Today I want to share with you the recruiting experience of my Spanish classmates. There are 5 students from Spain in the class of 2015, including myself. There also was an exchange student from Spain during the two Spring terms.

Vivian Zeldis

Ladies first! Vivian is the only woman representing Spain in Fuqua, and she is awesome. She was born in Barcelona, although she has lived in many countries. Among other leadership roles, Vivian is the European Club Co-President.

Before the MBA, Vivian worked at Inditex -owners of Zara, Pull&Bear, Massimo Dutti among others- and several other companies. She has a lot of experience both in fashion and in marketing.

Vivian will spend the summer in San Francisco doing her internship at The Boston Consulting Group.

What is something that Vivian likes about Fuqua? “One of the things I was looking forward to the most was being in an international and diverse environment. 47% of my classmates are international, and I love it!”

During the Global Week party

You can visit her LinkedIn profile here.

Enrique Plaza

Born and raised in Madrid, the “other Enrique” is like Wikipedia: ask him any question, he has all the answers. He knows the weight and height of any famous player to the exact pound or inch. Impressive. He is also cabinet member of several clubs.

Before coming to Fuqua Enrique worked at companies such as HP and Telefónica -the fifth biggest telco company in the world.

Enrique will spend the summer in Seattle doing his internship at Microsoft.

Why did Enrique decided to come to Fuqua? “After talking to a number of people, one realizes that there are a lot of similarities between b-schools. It is the small differences what make a school the right fit for you.  Fuqua is the right fit for me for the kind of people that the Fuqua culture attracts: nice, diverse and team players.  At the end of the day, you spend a lot of time with your classmates and they are key in supporting your learning process.  You should make sure that you like them and that you would enjoy spending time with them outside school.  I have been lucky to work in a team where we created strong relationships that I am sure will last for a long time.  Here is a picture of a team dinner.  As you can see, it couldn’t be more diverse!”.

You can visit his LinkedIn profile here.

Adán Hervás

Born in Granda, a city recognized as one of the best places to have tapas in Spain.

Before Fuqua, Adán worked in the North and South of Italy at Sacyr, one of the biggest construction companies.

Adán will spend the summer in New York doing his internship at Bank of America Merrill Lynch.

What was the best experience for Adan? “For me the best thing of my first year here has been the Team Fuqua culture!”

Team building activity during Orientation

You can visit his LinkedIn profile here.

Alberto Bielsa

Alberto is from Zaragoza, a beautiful city in the Northeastern part of Spain.

Before the MBA, Alberto worked at Libelium, an Spanish tech company. He will spend the summer in San Francisco doing his internship at Genentech.

Why did Alberto decided to come to Fuqua? “I came to Duke to switch career into Healthcare, and I did it! I didn’t know that an MBA was so hard tough, but dreams come true.”

Spending the summer in San Francisco for his internship

You can visit his LinkedIn profile here.

Enrique Toubes

Most of you already know me. I was born in San Fernando, in the most southern state of Spain. I have been very active in Fuqua during my first year, and plan to be even busier next year.

Before Fuqua, I worked in Austria at inet-logistics -a software company- and in Spain at Bip -a boutique consulting firm.

I will spend the summer in Atlanta at Deloitte in its technology practice.

One of the best experiences at Fuqua is being able to talk with some of the best companies in the world. They are on campus quite often, giving you multiple opportunities to network and learn more about them.

Visiting BCG’s office in Atlanta

You can check my LinkedIn profile here.