TMP 2002

Wow! Thanks to everyone for their amazing support on this edition of TMP 2002 Notes! Despite the very short notice, the response has been overwhelming. It is clear to me that if you every send out a request for urgent assistance to your classmates, the response will be overwhelming! That said, here we go.

Gopal Kasichainula made a move last year in April to Deere & Co. from his previous employer CNH Global as a division manager in IT. He is responsible for product delivery systems and is leading a project to integrate the engineering processes and systems of over 20 units within the Agricultural Equipment and Power Systems divisions. Gopal and wife Radhika welcomed daughter Uma Mihira in June 2003 and moved from the busy streets of Chicago to the laid back Quad Cities on the Iowa-Illinois border.

Dan Schipfer has moved to the Kansas City area where he is the managing director, oncology for the Cerner Corporation in Shawnee.

Marty Smith has been working for two years with Capital Point Financial as a financial planner/adviser. Give him a call if he can be of assistance with your personal financial needs.

Nishea V. Clark moved to New York City 18 months ago to begin working with NVC Consulting, a marketing, market research and strategy consulting firm, as a founding principal. Nishea also reports that she was married this August in St. Croix and would love to hear from any fellow 2002 TMPers who are also in the NYC area.

Tobi Klonecki remains as a technology practice leader at Hewitt Associates where she has worked for that last 10 years. Tobi, husband Tom (TMP 2005), and son Matthew welcomed their newest addition to the family, Daniel, who was born earlier this year.

Cindy Borski is the director of finance and operations for ExtendMed, where she has worked for the last 18 months.

After 11 years with Kraft, Cathryn Olchowy moved to Colorado in April where she is culinary director for the Sterling-Rice Group (Marketing Consulting) in
Boulder. In her role, Cathryn manages brand strategy work for food service and food manufacturer clients. She says it's a great job and fits perfectly with the culinary degree she earned prior to Kellogg.

Grace Chang has relocated to the Bay Area and is now working for Intuit in Silicon Valley as a senior manager of finance. Grace still has a home in Chicago and visit friends and family often but really enjoys the great weather, food and new friends in the Bay Area.

Tom Dahlin has been working as a buyer with Caterpillar, Inc for the past 18 months in Peoria, Ill.

Ken Mathieu is a director with FTI Consulting in Chicago where he investigates accounting fraud and has been involved in investigating some of the very high-profile cases we've all seen lately in the news.

Sabrina Karl and husband Brian Beutter recently moved to Madison, Wis., and purchased their first home very close to both the university and the downtown. Sabrina took a position as the director of fund development for SERRV International, a nonprofit organization that reduces global poverty by providing U.S. market access to artisans and small farmers in developing countries. Besides being VERY excited about SERRV and the position, Sabrina says she is "psyched about reducing my commute to a mere 12 minutes by bike or bus. Life is good!"

Fellow TMP 2002 graduates Mark Angelos and Jaideep Vivekanand have teamed to provide 2D Drafting and 3D Rendering outsourcing services to Chicago- and Los Angeles-area architects and builders. Headquartered in Chicago, with operations in India, Buildsoft Graphics Inc. is fulfilling a burgeoning demand for 24/7 drafting services at half the price of their U.S.-based competition.

Arthur Alvarez has recently taken a position with Rohde & Schwarz Inc. as a distribution account manager in Chicago. In even bigger news, Arthur was married to Sandra Lozano on Aug. 21, 2004.

Mike Margas, McDonald's Corp., was promoted to financial director, Asia, Pacific, Middle East and Africa division in October 2004.

Mayura Garg continues to serve as a product manager for the wireless infrastructure division of Symbol Technologies in Menlo Park, Calif. She is hosting her in-laws for an extended stay as they wait for news on their home in New Orleans.

Nicolle "Nicki" Hines continues to serve as the managing director, western region, for GCD Consultants in Chicago. She and husband Bill were able to enjoyed the summer with family in Nantucket, chasing their nephews (all under the age of four) up and down the beach! Nicki remains busy traveling across the country from L.A. to New York handling the retail real estate for clients Aeropostale, Coach, J. Jill and Tiffany & Co.

John Lee was married to Sandra Ferreira in June. The wedding occurred in France (near Paris) and they spent their honeymoon trekking around Peru. John remains a senior consultant with Ennis Knupp & Associates.

Eric Solberg moved from Chicago in June 2004 to start a business in electronic document management (IntegriDoc). Eric, wife Danielle and daughters Jenna (8), Samantha (5) and Erica (3) are all adapting well to new schools and friends!

Jason Seiden took the plunge and recently started his own consulting firm, Seiden & Associates. The firm specializes in executive team building and helping leadership teams develop a sustained ability to execute...without ongoing reliance of strategy and management consultants. Jason also found time (as he says "maybe when I should have been sleeping") to write a coming-of-age novel that he is looking to get published. Last year was equally busy for Jason as he and his wife welcomed their second daughter and simultaneously made the move out to the Chicago suburbs.

Bill Nurthen, wife Jennifer and daughter Lily welcomed the birth of their newest family member, Julia Rose, on Sept. 1. Bill continues to serve as treasurer for Inforte.

Jennifer Moss, husband Keith, and kids Ryan and Anna have relocated to Michigan. Jennifer works as operations controller for Federal Mogul in Southfield, Mich.

Sheila Hanley continues to work in the Emerging Markets PM Group of Lehman Brothers Asset Management, Chicago. Sheila reports that, "Life is still good" and that she is "enjoying the (stock market) rally while it lasts."

Marc Dietrich reports that he took a position with Morgan Stanley in their Institutional Equity Sales group (here in Chicago) in June.

Jim Newcomb recently moved to a new position within Boeing and now serves as the senior manager of corporate identity and sponsorship.

Shay and Nate (TMP 2004) Depies welcomed son Conrad Tyler Depies on May 21. Shay recently took an account director position with 141 Worldwide and Nate continues to serve as a category insight manager for Kraft Foods.

Jeff Wojcik continues to live in Chicago where he works as the director of financial planning and analysis for Cosi Inc.

Chris Cornett is a VP with Bank of America Leasing & Capital Group in West Palm Beach, Fla. Since moving back to Florida from Chicago where he attended Kellogg he says he is "finally back where I can put my Ocean Engineering Degree to work, i.e. fishing, boating, scuba diving, surfing, etc." Chris, wife Karen, and kids Chase and Chloe relocated with Bank of America in January and couldn't be happier. Chris invites and all of his classmates to give him a call if ever they are in south Florida.

Sumeet Kapoor's travels have included New York City, England, Scotland, Switzerland and India. Sumeet continues to work with Motorola as well as with his own company, Notes Inc. Despite his very busy schedule, Sumeet still managed to find time for a few "overs" of cricket this summer.

Bharat Kakar is with T-Mobile in Seattle and claims, "no significant life/work altering moments...yet." Having spent a significant amount of time at Kellogg with Bharat, I find that statement very hard to believe.

Jennifer Anderson is enjoying her new position as a brand manager for Miracle-Gro Plant Foods with The Scotts Miracle-Gro Company in Columbus, Ohio.

Wayne Brown, his wife Kristin and daughter Kaitlyn were blessed on Dec. 7, 2004 with their second daughter, Jessica Paige. Wayne is the financial analysis manager for CNA Insurance Companies in Chicago.

Arek Jaszcz and family have returned from a two-and-a-half-year stint with McKinsey & Co in his native Poland. Arek is now a senior consultant with ChapterHouse LLC, a healthcare strategy consulting firm in the Chicago-area and is looking forward to reconnecting with his Kellogg classmates.

Philip Lamonaca recently took a position with Robert Half Management Resources as a financial analyst consultant here in Chicago. More importantly, Philip, his wife and their daughter, welcomed twin boys Massimo and Alessandro to the family on Dec. 14, 2004.

Kristyn Dunn got the "entrepreneurial bug" while in brand management and decided to go into residential real estate brokerage. Kristyn has been a broker for the last three and a half years and specializes in consulting, sales and marketing of new construction or condo conversion for Coldwell Banker Hyde Park. There she leads a team of four agents that support her in the sales/marketing of new construction and condo conversions on the South Side of Chicago and recently launched a 70-unit new construction condo project in the North Kenwood/Bronzeville communities, adjacent to the lake. Kristyn is particularly proud of the significant number of Kelloggians she has as clients!

And this in from Milwaukee... Matt Coburn writes that he his wife Julietta are busy with their two-year-old daughter, Kendall, and newborn son, Robby. Matt works in fixed income for Robert W. Baird & Co. Inc. and recently completed a second term as president of the CFA Society of Milwaukee. He'll be joining fellow classmates Pete Syslack and Stephen Simsic in Park City, Utah in January for their annual ski visit with Eric Johnson (TMP 2001). Pete works for Wells Fargo in Menomonee Falls, Wis., and he and his wife Victoria are enjoying their 18-month-old daughter Annika. Stephen continues in his role as a vice president with U.S. Equities Realty in Chicago and vows to finally go skiing "off trail" this year in Utah.

Since completing TMP, Heather Foote Daas received a promotion to the department of radiology at Northwestern Memorial Hospital, where she led the successful turnaround of their reception, scheduling and transcription services. In 2003, Heather and husband Charlie purchased a beautiful condominium in Chicago overlooking Indian Boundary Park, where they have enjoyed restoring their vintage home. In 2004, Heather left Northwestern to take on an exciting new challenge with Accordis, part of the New York-based HMS Holdings Company, where she assumed the role of their manager of EMS services. In April of this year, Heather completed her tenure with Accordis and took the glorious Chicago summer off, visiting relatives in Michigan, western New York and taking in concerts with fellow alumni Sumeet Kapoor and Arek Jaszcz at the fabulous Millennium Park! Heather is also in her fourteenth year of singing with the St. Clement's Choir as it prepares for a tour of Ireland in 2006. Heather is currently seeking opportunities in the health care strategy arena and would love to touch base with her classmates!

Venkat R. Mullur took a position as senior banking consultant for IBM Business Consulting Services here in Chicago and wanted to share the following with his classmates: "My daughter Kamala started first grade this fall. She finally made the connection and asked me why I went to 'cereal school' when I don't even like the morning staple? After my lengthy explanation, covering, among other things, brand names, endowments, and corporate identities and philanthropy in the U.S., she asked if she could attend Kellogg when she grows up." Venkat, please note that I have notified the admissions office who believes it is "never too early" to begin recruiting talented people.

Shiva Kalisetty has taken a position as director of project management for Clarity Communication Systems and continues to live in Naperville, Ill., with his wife, Madhva, and son, Siddarth.

Lieutenant Commander Matt Lince of the U.S. Navy had a run in with Hurricane Katrina and has this to report: "I've got some news so I might as well pass it along since I've been getting a lot of ‘are you OK?’ emails from Kellogg friends. I've been working in Montgomery, Ala., as the executive officer of Navy Recruiting District Montgomery. We cover all of Navy recruiting for Mississippi, Alabama and the panhandle of Florida. But my wife and kids lived in Bay Saint. Louis, Miss. (I drove home every weekend). The day before Katrina hit, I drove down and picked them up and we evacuated to Atlanta and stayed with family. Our house in Mississippi was flooded with about four feet of swamp water and we had two large trees fall on the roof. The house is unlivable but standing. I don't know if we'll have to totally rebuild or just do a major remodeling. Everything from the waist down was lost and the house smells really bad with lots of mold. We've gotten a house on Maxwell AFB in Montgomery and the kids are going to school up here for the remainder of this year. Good news: we are alive and well (including the three cats, much to my disappointment) and we're moving in a positive direction; I have a job and a paycheck thanks to the Navy (most of my neighbors have neither); we had flood insurance (most of our neighbors did not); and we have a house to live in (again, most of my neighbors do not). We've owned the house in Mississippi for 13 years and we have many friends in the community that are still unaccounted for. Our church and the kid's school (which was attached to the church) were completely destroyed by the storm surge and they did not have flood insurance. We don't need anything but your prayers — many of my fellow Kellogg alums have contacted me and I thank you for thinking of us. Again, we're OK, but many from the area lost everything and have nothing to fall back on. Please give generously to charities helping locals from the Gulf Coast if you have the means to give."

Finally, and perhaps most importantly, Michael McLean continues with Pearson Education as he aggressively fights colon cancer. Michael's had some significant treatment successes in the previous months and is determined to beat this once and for all. Michael, please know that all our thoughts and prayers are with you.

Thanks again to all who contributed to this update; I couldn't do it without you. As always, drop me a line when you can and don't hesitate to contact me if I can be of service to you in any way. I wish you and your families all a very happy holiday season and a prosperous New Year.

Cheers,
Tiny