International Profit Associates and Harvard team up again

For the sixth consecutive year, International Profit Associates (IPA) Managing Director John Burgess traveled to the state of Massachusetts to engage the world’s most prestigious business school’s MBA program on the impact that small business has in America as it relates to the economy, job growth and overall stability of the American public.

Burgess, accompanied by Senior Business Analyst Geoffrey Gabor, was invited by the school to do the follow up presentation based on a case study performed by Harvard professors in 2001 regarding IPA’s successful business model. The 2001 case study takes a detailed look at the IPA organization and subsequent revenue growth. The study begins by taking the reader through two days in the life of an IPA Analyst and his client visits. Meanwhile, it clearly demonstrates the behind the scenes work at International Profit Associates headquarters in Buffalo Grove, Illinois focusing on business coordination, sales and marketing, survey services and management services.

When Harvard University originally teamed up with IPA in 2000, their goal was to expose their graduate level business students to a consulting company specializing in small to medium-size businesses. They believed International Profit Associates to be an excellent business model of successful consulting. With more than $200,000,000 in annual revenues, IPA is the 6th largest management consulting company in Chicago and the 61st largest consulting company in the world.

Harvard’s Business School students were surprised by the actual extent of aggregate exposure that IPA analysts and consultants received. They found that a wealth of knowledge has been gained from what and how business is done. The students and their professor, Dr. Nanda, PhD, were surprised to learn that a single analyst will dissect and evaluate hundreds of companies. They were equally amazed at the extensive and comprehensive nature of each analysis performed and the examination of the ownership’s leadership style, key personnel, financial operating statement and a myriad of other areas. Students also learned that an analyst will work with hundreds of businesses in cities throughout the United States and Canada.

Today, Harvard continues to utilize International Profit Associates as the model of a successful consulting company, but the focus has evolved well beyond modeling. Fifty percent of the time that IPA spent at Harvard was devoted to the students and professor peppering Burgess and Gabor with countless questions about the real business world. Every class demonstrated an enormous thirst for IPA’s analytic business experience. It is obvious, within the lecture halls of Harvard, that the students regard the IPA analyst’s education as extraordinary.

The initial breakfast session, with International Profit Associates and a group of the top 15 students hand picked by Dr. Nanda, was an open discussion regarding small business, its impact, needs, obligations, successes and failures. Most importantly, the discussion reviewed the overall impact of small business on America and American families. The highlight of the breakfast session consisted of Gabor’s problem costing directly correlating to behavioral issues. Each and every student was seen taking laborious notes related to these matters not normally associated with book learning, but rather associated with real experience.

Subsequently, Gabor and Burgess met with two individual sessions comprised of this year’s top graduating MBAs. Professor Nanda started each lecture by setting forth what IPA truly is, how it works and how each department is coordinated. The professor turned the class into a model of IPA. Both Burgess and Gabor repeatedly glanced at each other with a combination of pride and astonishment.

After the business modeling session was complete, International Profit Associates offered to share experiences and extrapolated problem resolutions in the grand theater. Students were free to ask questions in an open format.

"It felt a little like being rock stars with an audience of musicians, only we were the consulting world’s A-Team and they were Harvard’s best," said Gabor.

This yearly presentation teaches Harvard students the important role that small businesses play in society and provides them with an opportunity to gain insight into the real world of business. Students also learn that to create a successful business they need to develop a business plan, create a strategy to achieve it, manage its development and modify it over time to meet its ever changing needs.

Harvard Business School and International Profit Associates teaming up are worth taking note of. To put this into proper perspective, it is important to understand how difficult it is for a student to get into Harvard’s MBA program. Top ranked universities and colleges worldwide designate their best of each graduating class the prestigious title of valedictorian. One might think that a valedictorian would have fairly good odds of acceptance into Harvard’s MBA program, but the truth remains that it is improbable at best. Dr. Nanda states that the Harvard Business School accepts only approximately one in 50 of the valedictorians who apply. Harvard is arguably the most sought out graduate level business school in the world.

It is worth noting that Harvard invites only one consulting company that specializes in small to medium-size businesses to participate in a real world teaching process and it is an honor. The day ended when the professor brought Burgess and Gabor back to a private faculty dining room rich with patina and adjacent to a private library loaded with scores of books gold leafed and bound in leather.

"On a personal note, it was enlightening for me and Mr. Gabor to receive accolades from the MBAs and these students, knowing that these young people will soon become the core of the business world," said Burgess. "We both walked away feeling that we had contributed to the ongoing learning process and that we personally had an impact on their capability to become role models for American Business over the next 50 years. Very few people ever have the opportunity to impact individuals who at some point in time will become business leaders. We both had this opportunity and are grateful for that."