Winning Advantage

Shreyas Gavit, MBA ’20, put his business skills and knowledge to work as a member of an innovative cross-university team that took first place in the national Salesforce Career Journey with Deloitte, a case study competition in which college students were tasked with helping a fictional online retailer meet recruiting and hiring challenges posed by the pandemic.

“Our solution used the Salesforce platform to build out a new recruiting app that optimizes the candidate and hiring manager experience,” he explains. “We used the latest features from the Winter ’21 release, which allowed us to make a solution using features that had not been implemented in the market.”

As Gavit and his teammates, Nicole Alkhazov from Drexel University and YaoYao Cai from Northeastern University, moved to the final round of the competition they incorporated feedback from the Deloitte leaders who served as judges.

“We improved the virtual onboarding process by adding a community page with a personalized homepage, career guidance plan, inclusion opportunities, diversity learning and increased work-from-home engagement,” says Gavit.

Gavit and his team rose to the top in an intense two-part virtual competition. In the first part, more than 1,100 students from 300 institutions across the country participated in a three-month immersive learning program. Students who completed the three Salesforce “superbadges” known as the “Admin SuperSet” were then eligible to participate in the case competition.

“The Salesforce ecosystem is a huge world of opportunities. Instead of being intimidated by the extent of it, I embraced it and figured out my own path,” Gavit says. “From not knowing what Salesforce is, to completing the admin superset, Ranger status, and building a functioning solution, this journey pushed me out of my comfort zone in the best way.”

Gavit also credits his OU MBA in helping him succeed.

“The skills I gained during my MBA program helped me with storytelling and selling the product to the judges with a beautiful demo video, which is what impressed the judges the most,” he says. “This experience was so valuable because of the amazing people I met, from my teammates to my adviser to multiple professionals at Deloitte and Salesforce.”

Originally from India, Gavit considers himself a global citizen. After earning his bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering from Florida Institute of Technology, he followed his passion for cars to Michigan where he has worked at FCA on contract since 2016.

“My coworkers who were part of the MBA program at OU had great things to say about it,” he says. “More importantly, the program allowed me the flexibility to complete my MBA while working full time.”

Pursuing his MBA meant he could expand his education while exploring an interest in business strategy. While at Oakland, Gavit also discovered a passion for product management and marketing.

“I loved Professor Janell Townsend's marketing and Professor Yan Ling's strategy classes the most,” he says. “In fact, I pursued electives in marketing because I enjoyed the topic so much because of Janell.”

His OU MBA experiences are influencing his career plans.

“I'm looking to move on from engineering and be more involved in digital product management, preferably in the tech industry or at a marketing agency because it would give me a chance to be closer to the customer and utilize my strengths of problem-solving, creativity and cross-functional collaboration in the best possible way,” he adds.

Complementing his professional interests, Gavit’s involvement includes the Adcraft Detroit Diversity, Equity and Inclusion committee and the sponsorship committee for Adcon Detroit, a conference from Southeast Michigan marketing and advertising students. He also participated in OU’s Ballroom and Latin Dance Club since his first semester, where he won three ribbons in competitions across the Midwest and gained a community of friends, including his girlfriend, fellow OU graduate Megan Carson, CAS ‘18.

“I could not have done anything without her constant support,” he says. From expanding his network and skills to influencing his personal life, he says “attending OU has been a great decision.”

 Learn more about Gavit and his work at shreyasgavit.com.