Leadership Spotlight

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"This is a chance to be cross-cultural, to have a complete functional experience," said Lodish. "We've become more sophisticated over time, but the idea is still the same, a capstone course, something of real value to both the students and the company for which they consult."

Over the 25 years, the students have consulted for just about every imaginable type of industry. To be sure, during the technology boom, many of those companies were tech firms trying to gain a foothold in the United States market. For the 2003-2004 group, the 10 clients ranged from a winery to a feminine hygiene products manufacturer to a billing outsourcing firm to the non-profit Mercomujer. Lodish said the criteria for the firms the Global Consulting Practicum picks to help out are not extensive.

"The first is that there is a reasonable, prima fascia reason for them to be successful in the United States market," said Lodish. "They have to have something leverageable. Management has to have the courage to do something different. And they have to have the resources to be able to implement what we suggest."

One of them might be as fortunate as Kitan, which Lodish pointed out as a Global Consulting Practicum success story. Kitan, an Israeli company, had a line of about 240 various products, but was exporting none of them, when it came to the practicum for advice 20 years ago.

"The students went through a winnowing process and came up with a detailed marketing plan for the company's 100-percent cotton flannel sheets," he said. "There were OSHA standards that prohibited U.S. companies from making them and the main competition was in Portugal and China. The designs in Portugal were not as good as Kitan's, and the ones from the Far East didn't have their quality.

"The student team did a step-by-step plan and the export manager followed it almost word for word," said Lodish. After about six years, he said, the export business was doing $10-15 million in sales. "They wouldn't have been around, it is fair to say, if our project wouldn't have happened."

Sometimes the students in the Global Consulting Practicum find themselves in a somewhat top-secret situation. Such was the case for Ellen Copaken, WG'05, a member of the team consulting for an Israeli company which makes feminine products.

"They have a product that is completely new in technology. That's about all I feel I can say," said Copaken.

Because of security concerns in Israel, the team from Wharton and its partner team from Tel Aviv University met in Paris to plan the strategy for the company to get its product into the North American market. There, she said, the main initial difficulty was to set figure out who was to do what and why.

"In an actual consulting firm, there would be a pre-established hierarchy. We had to decide our own roles and how we would choose who would lead what part of the project," she said. Once that was done, though, the teams became emboldened. "I think because it was more of an academic setting, we had more permission to challenge the client. We certainly did that. We challenged many of the assumptions. They came to us exploring one specific thing, but we said to explore four or five things and they were receptive."

Copaken's Wharton team was also unique because it was entirely female.

"For any project, that would be unusual for consulting and unusual for Wharton, since only 30 percent of the student body is female," she said. Yet, she said, she felt that served the client well. After all, it would be women who would be using the product. "We had professional interest in the project and personal interest in the project. The product itself, if it indeed works as described and planned—and they are doing more clinical trials—can make huge improvements for women's health. There is no other product like it on the market anywhere in the world."

Unfortunately for some firms that come to the Global Consulting Practicum for advice, there is indeed too much market competition for particular products. At that point, said Lodish, the advice is to not enter the U.S. market, which can be a disappointing answer to the client.