Two FEMBAs Make One Anderson Their Goal

Tiffany Lin’s (’24) decision to enroll in UCLA Anderson’s Fully Employed MBA (FEMBA) program was rooted in both the professional and the personal. At the time, she was a solution engineer at Salesforce, and her future ambitions had her considering expanding her role into product management or product marketing. “I saw within these roles that a lot of folks had MBAs,” says Lin, who recently completed her term as FEMBA Council president. “From a more personal perspective, I wanted to work on growing my confidence and being a better problem-solver.”

Lin chose UCLA Anderson because she knew she wanted to continue her career in tech. And after meeting FEMBA Assistant Dean of Admissions Dylan Stafford and talking to a number of student “FEMBAssadors,” she fell in love with the community. Add in the chance to participate in global immersion courses, and she was sold on Anderson. “I also talked to a few people on the FEMBA Council, and that piqued my interest before I joined. But it was really the people I met that made the choice easy for me.”

Clay Moore (’25), who has succeeded Lin as FEMBA Council president, had already earned one master’s degree when he decided an MBA was in order. Until then, his entire career with companies such as AT&T and boutique consultancy Headstorm had been technical, working with data science and machine learning. He needed to round out his skill set, especially by adding finance and accounting experience. “From that point, I realized that Anderson, being a West Coast school, was the one that checked all the boxes for me,” Moore says. “I did a bunch of tours of other schools, talked with admissions people, but only applied to Anderson.” He says the expertise of the Anderson faculty was a main draw, as was the quality of the curriculum, where he could take courses to further his career in tech while exploring opportunities to pivot to entertainment or healthcare. “I don’t think I could have gone to another school that would have given me such a full view of what I’m looking to accomplish while in the program,” Moore says.

Lin and Moore talked about their participation in the FEMBA Council and handing off the baton.

What made each of you decide to become active in student government while earning your MBAs?

Clay Moore: I was really active at Southern Methodist University in student government, and I knew that I wanted to make a similar impact during my FEMBA experience. Even though I’m fully employed, I wanted to make sure I was still participating in other ways in order to network. I knew I really wanted to give back and start making an imprint on the program that would last for years after I was gone. I started with the Student Affairs Committee, then served as VP. As president, Tiffany made a great imprint on the FEMBA Council, and I want to continue her legacy. There are organizations I’m a part of, like the FEMBAssadors and the Video Game Business Association, but really, the FEMBA Council is my home.

Tiffany Lin: A lot of my reasons are similar to Clay’s. I joined the council my first year as a career service representative, helping folks reach their career goals. That’s something I’m very passionate about. The next year, I became VP of that committee, doing more at scale. Then in my final year, I became president, and my reasons were twofold. First, it was an opportunity to give back, and FEMBA Council was the best way to make an impact on a program that at this point has about 700 students. The second reason was that while I dabbled in leadership roles as an undergraduate and in the workplace, this felt like a safe place to work on my leadership skills, to see what worked for me, while running a group of 80 folks who had different levels of commitment and different motivations.

Incoming FEMBA Council president Clay Moore volunteered at a Valentine’s Day event with students and alumni

Tiffany, when you look back at your term as president, what makes you proud?

TL: I’ll cheat and talk about two initiatives. My presidency started with the One Anderson initiative. When I enrolled in 2021, the degree programs were pretty separate. There were clubs that brought members of the different programs together, but no effort to really connect folks across programs. Luckily, I was good friends with Anderson Student Association president Juhie Rathor (’24) from our undergraduate days at UC Davis. We got acquainted with the co-presidents of the EMBA Council, and we shared knowledge across our programs that was never really shared before. We made an effort to stage more cross-program initiatives.

The second thing is something I wanted to focus on from within the council, which was more cross-functional collaboration. In FEMBA Council, we have 10 different VPs that all run different events and have different priorities. Last year, we made an effort to really focus on having a board retreat, getting everyone together early, starting to plan events and have weekly meetings to make sure, for example, marketing is aware of what’s going on with social media, or which VPs are aware of what Clay was doing with student affairs. I think we did a good job of setting the foundations there and making sure that we can touch on every single thing that gives students a better experience.

Clay, what are some of your goals for next year?

CM: A lot of my plans are an extension of what Tiffany has already set up. I see a lot of value in the cross-collaboration between the different committees. I’m also looking forward to creating greater transparency regarding what the council does. The council can range between 70 and 80 members, but the FEMBA student body is much larger than that. So, does the student body in general see what the council is doing, the events we put on, what we’re doing for academic and career programming, how we move the needle to make sure that everyone is making the most out of their three years’ experience here? How do we make sure that people are aware of our budget and how we use our resources so that everyone feels valued? We want to make sure we’re representing the entirety of the student body, not just the majority, and we have some things planned to make sure we accomplish that.

What did you learn from working with Tiffany during her presidency?

CM: I learned a lot about executive presence from Tiffany, how she handled herself in a lot of different situations, in front of a group or in front of the administration, how she interacts with different people. It’s all about stakeholder management; she did a great job of that. Also, Tiffany dealt with a lot of things involving timing and budget constraints but didn’t let those change outcomes or goals or the expectations of anything. She was very resourceful and made sure she understood what levers we can pull from the FEMBA Council side to make sure we still have very profitable — from an emotional standpoint — events. Also, kudos to Tiffany, who had a very galvanizing presence, because my VPs are ready to go and they’re very high-energy.

Tiffany, any advice for Clay?

TL: First, I really appreciate what you said, Clay.

In terms of advice I might have for you, I know you’re already killing it and doing a great job and your energy is amazing. It’s so important to keep up that energy, which I know you’ll do throughout your presidency. Things do change after spring quarter, when everyone is pumped and really excited. The reality is, the responsibility starts to creep in. So — and I know you’re doing this already — take advantage of that energy, and do the planning early so that when fall comes, everything is smooth sailing.

And the second piece of advice I could offer is to be bold. Every year, we kind of do 90% of the same things as the year before, but we come up with a few new ideas. With more support in terms of funding, I would encourage you to lead all your VPs to come up with ideas that maybe haven’t been tried before.

Clay, we’ll give you the last word. Anything to add?

CM: I want to double down on what was mentioned earlier, the idea of One Anderson. You’re joining the FEMBA program. That’s what you’re applying for. But there are plenty of other students in different programs. Anderson is full of Ph.D. students, MSBA students, MFE students, as well as the other MBA programs. There are a lot of people to experience. There are a lot of networking opportunities. You’re applying to the FEMBA program, but you’re really part of the Anderson community.