After a series of company reorganizations within the Software Technology Center in Bell Laboratories, a research and development arm of Lucent Technologies, Indira Kuruganti sat down with technical manager Michael Burns to discuss her career trajectory within the organization.

"One of the things that struck me is that she not only already had several advanced degrees but she was interested in continuing to expand and grow," says Burns.

"I'd been working in product development or research and development for most of my career. I wanted to get into a line management function but I knew I couldn't persuade anyone to take a chance on me if I didn't have a business background," says Kuruganti.

One of Burns' colleagues had recently gotten an executive MBA and transferred to the company's corporate strategy department. Having witnessed his colleague's success, Burns felt that sponsoring Kuruganti for an executive MBA program was a natural next step, both for her career and her contributions to Lucent. "Anything you can do to improve your skills and breadth of expertise is attractive to managers. We work in an internal consulting capacity at Lucent, and we're never exactly sure what the next problem domain is, so having the ability to move with these kinds of changes is critical. The Wharton MBA is something that will give that expertise to Indira."

Encouraged by Burns, Kuruganti started looking into executive MBA programs, and applied to several. When it came time to select a school, she consulted with her colleagues and it wasn't long before she settled on Wharton. "When you talk to senior managers in the tech industry, you realize Wharton has a reputation for producing people with great finance and general management skills," says Kuruganti.

Burns predicts that her Wharton degree will position Kuruganti for several different career options. "I expect she'll have a bigger-picture understanding of how everything fits together. She could go to one of Lucent's product units and become a product manager, or stay within the Software Technology Center in a business role, perhaps as a relationship manager working with various teams. I'll be very interested to see how I can help Indira move in new directions and take advantage of this opportunity."

At Wharton, Kuruganti has already begun to clarify some of her goals and apply her newfound knowledge. "For right now, I think my next step is to move into marketing or business strategy. Pursuing a business degree is suddenly opening doors for me — my affiliation with the program distinguishes me now. I have a new understanding of products and strategy and now I have a more credible background to go where I want to go."

Michael Burns
Technical Manager
Lucent Technologies

Indira Kuruganti, WG’05
Member of Technical Staff
Lucent Technologies