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Tom Patton ’86 Returns to the Hill to Teach Entrepreneurship Course

 

Headshot of alum in a grey suit

Tom Patton graduated from Holy Cross in 1986 studying economics and accounting while playing on the football team.  Following HC,  he attended law school at Georgetown.  “After five great years of practice as a litigator at a D.C. law firm, I leapt naively into a general counsel job at an orthopedic device company in Memphis, TN” shares Patton. ” Five years after that, as the company was circling the drain, I was asked to be the Chief Executive Officer (CEO, a.k.a., the Boss.)  Our team fixed the company and sold it, and just like that, I became a medical products “turn-around” specialist, meaning, I was the person to jump in and run companies when things were really bad.  I did that three more times.  In between CEO jobs, I worked with private equity firms that invest in healthcare companies.  I also started a healthcare diagnostics company with two doctors as partners.  We sold that start-up after six years of hard work to a multinational medical products company.”   He goes on to add that he learned constantly which included good and bad decisions, good and bad hires, and good and bad investments. “Over time that accumulation of hard-earned experiences turned into what people my age call wisdom,” Patton closes.

Over the years as an alum, Patton supported the Ciocca Center programs by co-teaching during various business workshops such as the Executive Leadership Workshop and most recently Business Ethics & Principled Leadership.  This fall he will be returning to campus in a new capacity as an adjunct professor to teach Entrepreneurship.  Through this class, its readings, interactions, and experiences, “I hope to relay some of that wisdom and give you the chance to learn some of the entrepreneurial stuff I wish I knew before I was handed my Holy Cross degree” shares Patton. Students can expect to come away from this course with:

  • an understanding of the component parts of a successful entrepreneurial enterprise.
  • a new vocabulary and a new lens to see, understand, and critically analyze business techniques and entrepreneurial opportunities that surround you every day.
  • entrepreneurial confidence to apply sometime in your career if or when those entrepreneurial opportunities arise.
  • the tools to follow a rigorous process to maximize the likelihood that your entrepreneurial venture is successful.
  • honed your writing, communication, and interpersonal skills.
  • understanding that all business endeavors, whether for-, or not-for-profit, can be consistent with a purpose-driven life and the mission of being men and women for and with others.
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This is Summer Business Program : Part 2

Here’s the latest post from guest blogger Frank DeLeo!  Enjoy!

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With the conclusion to week two of the SBP, new challenges awaited me at the beginning of week three. The amount of valuable information kept flowing, causing me to fill page after page of legal pad with important notes. After another phenomenal week in the program, I could only hope that week three would top the prior two weeks to kick my adrenaline up another notch.

Before I got there, a lot of work needed to be accomplished on the team project over the weekend. Our team meeting was on Sunday, so Saturday I spent most of the day continuing research and gaining as much knowledge about Home Depot and their customers as possible. On Sunday, I spent the morning and afternoon in Hopkinton, MA by the pool with my best friends from Holy Cross. We had a tiny celebration because, conveniently, it was my two year anniversary with my girlfriend. It was nice to get off campus and have solid food due to my meal scavenging tactics and lack luster cooking ability. The event was a just the change of pace I needed to recharge my batteries to press on with the program after still being burnt out from the academic rigor of the past semester.

From my relaxing afternoon by the pool, I was dropped off in Milford, MA at my executives home (Al Correia ’78). There we had a nice meal and accomplished a ton of work: the planning of our project, the structure of our project, and the determination of the remaining steps needed to create our presentation. At the meeting, we disclosed all of the information we had obtained from our excursion to Home Depot the past week. We discussed our interactions with customers and our questioning with sales associates as well as what we saw in the ceiling and walling isles. Ultimately, we came to a consensus on customer types, and the particular needs/wants of each group. From there, steps were laid out and responsibilities divvied up in order to proceed through our plan of attack.

The first half of week three has brought new and intriguing topics to the forefront. Personal finance and the management of the Holy Cross endowment definitely sparked my interest. Because I am a very future oriented thinker, personal finance really struck an emotional cord within me. I consider this trait to be a double-edged sword. It is a benefit because I always plan ahead, and am constantly thinking about how I am going to support my family in the years to come. On the other hand, I tend not to live in the present, which causes me to miss out on some of the worry free fun college has to offer. I by no means don’t enjoy the college experience, I just tend to worry about the future more than the average person, which is reasonable considering the current economic climate. Regardless, the session with Professor Anderton on Tuesday taught me about bond and stock mutual funds, compound interest, and general investing strategies just to name a few.

On Wednesday, Tim Jerry ’00 taught us about how Holy Cross invests its endowment. This is a behind the scenes topic that never came to mind. It was definitely much different than personal finance, especially when it came to investment strategy. When dealing with an institutional endowment the standard deviation and return rates played a huge factor. Generally, when creating such a portfolio, the investments need to be more conservative. On the other hand, in personal finance you can take more risks in hope for a higher return. We ultimately created our own endowment portfolio and learned about hedge funds, real assets, fixed income, and equities.

Week three is flying by. Every day is a new opportunity to learn, and the information that is being presented has great practical use now and in the future. I cannot believe there is only 10 days left before I pack up and head back to CT for the summer. I’m making the best of each session, and can only hope that I continue to soak up all of the business knowledge that I’m being exposed to.

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Thank you, Frank! It seems like the teams have some stiff competition this year.  Can’t wait to hear more!

As always, don’t forget to “Like” us on FACEBOOK and look for our WIB, SBP and ELW groups on LinkedIN!

Kaithlyn

Kaithlyn Kayer
Associate Director, Entrepreneurial Studies

David Chu
Director, Entrepreneurial Studies & Pre-business Advisor
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Finance Boot Camp – The Beginning

The COES & Prebusiness office has been hard at work all summer and this past month preparing the first ever FINANCE BOOT CAMP.  This highly competitive program is stirring up interest all over campus.  Here’s a quick overview:

  • 4-day immersion in the framework and careers of Wall Street.
  • Interview prep simulating the fast paced, intense environment of a Super Day.
  • Networking opportunity with HC alum working on Wall Street.

We have interviewed 78 extremely qualified candidates for 30 coveted spots.

This program, like all other COES programs, brings successful alumni back to campus to help better prepare HC students for jobs in business, specifically finance in this case.  It’s bound to be an intense and exhausting week and we’ll be blogging each day, so watch for updates.

As always, don’t forget to “Like” us on FACEBOOK and look for our WIB, SBP and ELW groups on LinkedIN!

Kaithlyn

Kaithlyn Kayer
Associate Director, Entrepreneurial Studies

David Chu
Director, Entrepreneurial Studies & Pre-business Advisor
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Summer Business Program: Week 2 part 1

Our guest blogger, Quinn, is back with more from SBP.  I’ve asked her to share a brief bio this week as well.  ENJOY!

Quinn Korzeniecki is a senior English major with a Pre-Business concentration. She is editor-in-chief of The Advocate, a progressive online publication at Holy Cross, and works as an assistant in the Vice President and Dean of Academic Affairs Office. As a participant in the Summer Business Program, she hopes to learn more about marketing and advertising aspects of business. Quinn aspires to enter into publishing either in the editorial, marketing, or advertising departments.

On Friday, we learned about something for which my dad would be very proud of me if I could only accomplish it: personal finance, investments, and mutual funds. Professor Anderton taught us all about the similarities and differences between stocks and bonds. He stressed the importance of setting up a financial plan to control spending after graduation. Also, we discussed how profitable long-term investments can be especially if we start at our young age. Because of this workshop, I plan on saving the first significant amount of spare cash that I earn, investing it in stocks, and praying that in 50 years it will amount to 5 million dollars like it did for Susan Smith in the example. Hey, a girl can dream.

Along the same lines of personal finance, Professor Chu lead Monday’s workshop on accounting. We learned more about the individual shareholder’s piece of profit from stocks in the company. In the afternoon we learned about the terminology needed to understand the business world in general: one of the most interesting things I learned was that companies are obliged to report risk factors to the Security Exchange Commission. Therefore, when we had to list the cons of investing in the insulin pump company Insulet we realized that a natural disaster like the tornadoes that recently tore through Massachusetts could demolish the company’s only storage warehouse. Yet, sometimes the future benefits outweigh the present risks, and my group ultimately decided that we would invest in Insulet.

Monday night we enjoyed a banquet-style dinner and discussion with Peter Mondani, VP of Human Resources for General Electric, who taught us about business models, personal branding, and careers. We learned that it is best to “influence without authority” by changing the opinions and viewpoints of others although you’re not in an authority position. Exude confidence but admit to making mistakes and learn from them. Also, apparently we women get red necks during interviews when we get nervous. I guess I’m “investing” in a scarf for my quickly approaching job interviews!

Tuesday afternoon focused on the job/internship search and networking. I found this particularly helpful since I’m entering my senior year and feel helpless in planning for the real world. I learned the best way to reach out to alumni and maintain informal and beneficial relationships. All in all, I’ve learned how to balance my personal finances, invest in stocks and bonds, and plan for attaining my first full-time job.

Wednesday we learn about what it means to work in finance: don’t let the English major fool you, I also enjoy math!

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Keep an eye out for Quinn’s posts throughout the month!

Kaithlyn

Kaithlyn Kayer
Associate Director, Entrepreneurial Studies

David Chu
Director, Entrepreneurial Studies & Pre-business Advisor