Experience

Education: BA Law & Society, American University, USA; graduated in 2015

Pre-MBA industry: Financial Services/Investment Banking

Pre-MBA role: Vice President, Goldman Sachs

Clubs: Out in Business Club

About me: A New Yorker through-and-through, Julia spent her entire life in New York City before moving to Washington, DC to study Law & Society at American University. Prior to LBS, she worked at Goldman Sachs as a vice president, focused on operations, risk management and compliance. While at Goldman Sachs, Julia was very involved in the firm’s LGBTQ+ Network, collaborating with employees globally to deliver several initiatives to increase the visibility of LGBTQ+ individuals at the firm and elevate the conversation on LGBTQ+ inclusion.

Julia came to LBS to further develop her global mind-set, and learn about other cultures, experiences and identities, to help with her post-MBA goal of entering the diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) field and someday hopefully becoming a chief diversity officer. Outside of class, Julia is a junior member of the Out in Business Club’s Executive Committee, and is actively involved in many LGBTQ+ organisations and speaking engagements, primarily focused on the importance of pronouns and increasing space for all LGBTQ+ identities in professional environments. She’s hoping to get back into working with children, and was a football coach for four-to five-year-olds for many years. Julia is a Reaching Out MBA (ROMBA) scholar recipient.

Three topics I can be approached about: LGBTQ+ inclusion at LBS; women in finance and business; DEI (diversity, equity and inclusion) work

Email address: jhamilton.mba2023@london.edu

Experience

From modest beginnings in Jakarta to an Executive MBA at London Business School, Laidlaw scholar Asih Wulansari says she now hopes to become the role model she never had.

I grew up in the East of Jakarta, where you still see traditional cycle rickshaws and vegetable cart sellers on the streets. My parents worked for the Indonesian government on modest incomes. They did their best to provide for me and my younger brother; we didn’t go to fancy restaurants, but we always had a home-cooked meal on the table.

I owe my success to having supportive role models as parents who taught me to be both creative and driven. At school, I used to make simple handicrafts like bookmarks and letter stationery that I’d then sell to my classmates for pocket money.

My mother has such a strong work ethic and is hugely inspiring. She always told me to push for anything I wanted and not rely on anyone for my own success. That’s why I’ve always worked hard and not taken anything for granted.

To relieve the financial stress on my parents, I worked hard to be accepted to the University of Indonesia, a heavily subsidised government university where only one in 200 people got accepted onto my degree. It’s ranked first in Indonesia by the QS World Universities Ranking 2019 and I studied Communications there. I was Vice President for the University Senate and the Head of Events, where I was responsible for getting sponsorships from various companies.

I’ve come a long way since then. In my current role, as Associate Vice President, Business Marketing at Mashreq Bank, the oldest bank in the UAE, I handle multi-segment marketing for the retail banking group. It’s a big responsibility and has been quite a journey. I moved from Jakarta to Dubai in 2007, jumping from advertising to in-house marketing consultancy to banking. In two years, I’ve grown from a one-person team to managing seven people and tripling my portfolio. I now head up multi-segment product marketing.

Moving to Dubai was exciting, but I had no friends or connections and had to rebuild my life from scratch. It’s tough being an ambitious woman in business in the UAE, particularly if you’re from a minority ethnic group. But I don’t avoid a challenge. I left OgilvyOne, my first job in Dubai, for a job at a local Dubai advertising agency where there was an opportunity to expand my business development skills. One of my clients there was Emirates NBD, the largest banking group in the UAE at the time. After working for them on a project, they asked me to be seconded to them on a full-time basis. That was the start of my career in banking. At Emirates NBD, I had lots of opportunity to move from segment to segment. During my last year there, I was tasked with managing their biggest segment: cards and digital banking.

Then came an opportunity at Mashreq Bank. I’ve been there since 2017 and it’s been a real rollercoaster ride – in a positive way. When I arrived, I was handling cards and payments and personal loans. By 2018, I was handling personal banking as well, which then expanded to Islamic, SME and digital banking. I’ve repurposed my marketing role from support function to key sales driver for the bank’s various products. Mashreq has also given me exposure to management and strategy, as the bank accelerates its digital transformation. I was chosen to be part of a young leader programme, part of a select group of just 2% of all company staff. 

I know I’ll be able to access bigger roles, especially with the skills, knowledge and network gained from my time at London Business School. And that’s down to being selected as one of the first Laidlaw scholars – such an honour.I’d actually applied and been accepted to the School’s Executive MBA programme in 2018 but had to pull out because of financial constraints. The admissions team kept in touch and in 2019, they suggested I look into the Laidlaw Women’s Leadership Fund, set up through a partnership between London Business School and the Laidlaw Foundation.

The Laidlaw Foundation’s vision – to address the gender balance at senior management level and empower ambitious women regardless of their backgrounds – is so inspiring. I share this vision in addressing the global imbalance of women leaders. But I believe that the effort starts with me. By equipping myself with London Business School’s first-class education, I can set myself apart and start bridging the gender gap. As I move upwards, I’ll be able to introduce programmes that will improve the chances of enabling many more capable women to better themselves.

Only a modest 0.02% of the Indonesian population of 270 million are currently studying abroad. As a Laidlaw scholar at a leading international business school, I hope I’ll inspire more Indonesians to venture out and make their mark in the global market. 

I wasn’t sure what to expect at the start of the EMBA in Dubai, but the whole experience has been so rich and stimulating. The cohort is really mixed, and comprises people from such different sectors, industries and countries. I’ve really bonded with my multicultural study group, who have shifted my perspectives completely.

I can already see how the EMBA will help me unlock my full potential. I’ll use the knowledge, skills and network from LBS to hopefully become one of the first few female Chief Marketing Officers in the UAE. Women are under-represented in management roles in banking and I’d like to change that by inspiring women with backgrounds like mine. In the longer term, I’d like to get involved with coaching and mentoring in the Emirates, and also, one day, back in Southeast Asia.

The Laidlaw Foundation and its global footprint could help me improve living conditions for women and children in developing countries. I’m currently supporting non-profit movements in Indonesia to improve children’s education in rural areas, but the Laidlaw Foundation’s influence will help me take this further. One day, I’d like to return to where I grew up and share my experiences with young women there. I want to inspire them to have bigger ambitions and rise up beyond traditional expectations.

Learn more about the Laidlaw Women’s Leadership Fund.

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Experience

Growing up in France with Senegalese and Beninese heritage and spending part of his formative years in India, Norway and South Africa, Axel Tagnon’s (MFA2022) interest in global business and commitment to promoting racial equality was sparked early on. Here, he reflects on the experiences that led him to choose LBS, his work with the Black in Business Club, and what promoting racial diversity in business means to him.

I was born in Paris and my primary education was spent at a private Catholic school. The pupils were mainly French, and it wasn’t a very diverse environment. From the age of 10, due to my parents’ work, we moved a lot, to various countries around the world. This meant that I experienced more diverse environments and met classmates from a variety of backgrounds, cultures and nationalities. Having been immersed in such a variety of cultures and environments truly made me appreciate the meaning and the value of diversity – and it’s shaped the person I am today. When I was at an American school in Chennai, India, I improved my English a great deal, and I also spent some time in Norway and South Africa, before returning to France to study for my Science Baccalaureate.

When I was around 16 years old, I attended The African Leadership Academy’s Global Scholar’s Programme. I thought it would be a good experience to reconnect with my African roots. I visit Senegal every Christmas but had never lived in Africa and my experience of it was very different from children that grew up there, so it was really enriching to be involved in the Academy. After some leadership classes, which focused on theory, we were put into small groups and paired with business owners in Soweto. My group was assigned to a woman who was launching a jewellery brand; she had the craft skills and passion for making jewellery but needed some help on the business side. Although we were all 15 and 16 years old and didn’t have the experience of running a business, with the help of mentors we were able to work with her on developing international shipping strategies.

I first came to London to pursue my business ambitions by studying for an undergraduate degree at UCL in Statistics, Economics, and Finance. When I was researching business schools, I always thought I would want to study at one of the top business schools in France. Having grown up in France, much of my family associated some of these schools with a level of excellence that could perhaps only be compared to going to Harvard in the US. To them it was inconceivable to turn an offer down from those schools. But when I received my offers from those schools, I took a step back to think, and I realised that the French system wasn’t going to offer the kind of culturally diverse environment that I need to thrive; one that embraces tough conversations instead of sweeping them under the rug.

Deciding on the MFA at LBS has meant that I’ve had the opportunity to talk about what it’s like being a Black person in business in 2021 and to work with the LBS Black in Business (BiB) club – the first of its kind in Europe. I was fortunate enough to take part in an interview with Tabria Lenard (MBA2021) who co-founded the club, for an LBS website feature as part of Black History Month, and we discussed all these subjects and more.

The BiB Scholarship completely differentiates LBS from other schools. The School valued me for what I could bring, beyond my academic achievements; they saw that I could have an impact on the community. I think that also made me believe in the positive impact that I could make too. Before coming to LBS, I found it difficult to talk openly about the struggles of being a Black person in business and some of the challenges I faced growing up in a predominantly white environment as a Black person.

Even before I studied at LBS, I wanted to set up a social enterprise to help create more opportunities for Black students. I gained a lot of knowledge and opportunity through the 10,000 Black Interns programme last year, which enabled me to secure an internship at Castlelake: a global private investment firm. It’s a UK programme that aims to provide 2,000 internships to Black students every year, for five years. I was also conscious of the lack of Black people represented in postgraduate business studies and wanted to change that. I’m working on setting up a mentoring programme to connect current students at LBS and other top business schools with prospective applicants of Black heritage, to support them in their applications.

As Vice President of careers in the Black in Business Club, I’m working with Ayoyinka Johnston (MBA2022), the Senior Vice President for careers, to develop partnerships with some of the corporations and companies that the Black students at LBS want to work for and help them with the careers they want to pursue. One of BiB Club’s biggest initiatives this year has been creating a Black CV book, which features talented Black individuals. Companies often say they don’t know where to find Black or diverse talent, so we created the book to help companies find the right people. So far, we’ve sent the book out to companies such as JP Morgan and Bain & Company.

When I came to LBS, I thought I would work in investment banking positions for a few years before transitioning to an investing position. However, LBS has given me the tools and the network to enter the buy-side straight out of school. Over the summer I’ll be interning at Bain Capital, working in the private credit sector, which I'm really keen to explore.

I’m really looking forward to some of the practical components of the MFA, like London Business Challenge Week. It’s a project where teams of five or six people work on a live business case for a London-based company. You get the type of exposure you might not get on a purely academic business course.

The main highlight of the MFA so far is the network this programme gives you. I think the main difference of the MFA cohort is that everybody is here with the same goal. People might think that it is competitive, and in many ways, it is, but people are here to support each other; it truly is a community.

Learn more about our MFA programme