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Distance Learning MBA for Latin American Managers - Maria Claudia Renjifo '09

Maria Claudia Renjifo '09
Columbia
“The most important skill Thunderbird helps develop in students is a global mindset. It makes you culturally sensitive and helps you successfully communicate, negotiate and relate cross-culturally.”


María Claudia Renjifo ’09 wanted to follow in her aunt’s global footsteps – a Colombian with an electronics engineering degree who splits her time between Paris, Brussels, and Colombia, is married to a Dutchman, and who speaks Spanish, French, and English.

And while Renjifo did earn MS and BS electrical engineering degrees and has the same passion for global travel and cultures as her aunt, the 37-year-old has forged a path of her own.

“I had a lot of technical experience both as an engineer and as a project manager,” explains Renjifo, who has worked within the Bayer Corp. for more than a decade. “But to move up the corporate ladder, a business degree was the perfect complement to my technical background.”

The self-proclaimed number-crunching global traveler did more than just move up the ladder; she climbed it at breakneck speed. “I had three promotions in two years thanks to my Thunderbird/Tec de Monterrey joint degree.”

Halfway through the joint Thunderbird-Tecnológico de Monterrey distance learning MBA program, Renjifo was promoted from a project management position at Bayer S.A. in her home country of Colombia to a procurement manager position in Venezuela.

Then only a year later - and just before graduating from the Distance Learning Global MBA for Latin American Managers program, she was promoted to head of finance and sales administration. In 2010, she had the chance to take all of her newly honed business skills from Thunderbird and apply them to her current position as Head of Finance, Procurement and Sales Administration. She currently leads a team of 26.

“On the sales side, I am responsible for invoicing, collections and price reporting processes for master client data,” explains Renjifo. “In the finance area, I have responsibility for everything related to foreign exchange controls and all financial investment decisions. Then in procurement, I supervise the acquisition of all goods and services purchased by Bayer S.A. in Venezuela.”

Renjifo admits that, while she always loved finance, she just didn’t have the appropriate education to pursue a finance career. Until now. In her new role, she says she has the best of all worlds: finance, sales, and procurement responsibilities.

“I frequently interact with my Colombian, Mexican, and German counterparts,” she explains. “My business communication class at Thunderbird helped me redefine the way I made presentations and even wrote e-mails. And my international negotiation and bargaining class was extremely useful since procurement is all about negotiation.”

Renjifo was so impressed with the joint distance-learning program that, today, she serves as a facilitator for the program at one of the satellite sites in Miami, Fla., traveling to the United States every two weeks.

“This program format presented the perfect opportunity for me to keep my job while I got the degree I wanted,” she says.