Cal State San Bernardino Students Help UPS Explore New Markets

“It’s a real confidence-builder when they go in and nail the recommendations, make a good presentation and get good feedback from the client. It’s a proving ground,”Entrepreneurship and management students at California State University, San Bernardino have gained real-world experience through a series of consulting projects conducted for global logistics provider UPS.

The first 10-week project asked the question, “What products would people living in China and Southeast Asia buy from U.S. sources?”

Local UPS executives were so impressed with the results they forwarded the completed study to the company’s corporate headquarters and signed on for follow-on consulting projects conducted by students in Professor Bill Donohoo’s Management 515 business consulting class.

“It’s a real confidence-builder when they go in and nail the recommendations, make a good presentation and get good feedback from the client. It’s a proving ground,”   says Dr. Mike Stull, Director of CSUSB’s Inland Empire Center for Entrepreneurship, which oversees the program.

The relationship is a win-win for both UPS and the university, said Noel Massie, UPS CEO and vice president for Central California. “We learn and they learn,” he said. “We get intellectual capital by way of exposure to young people and current trends. That’s big; that really helps us.”