McGinnis

Ross McGinnis '83, credits his University of Detroit MBA with giving him the strong foundation to succeed in challenging assignments overseas. Currently controller for the Global Service and Parts division at Chrysler LLC, McGinnis has served the company in the USA, Germany, Brazil and China.

"I had just begun my business career when I started the MBA program at U of D. The experience at U of D laid a good foundation for me to later excel in the international business arena, particularly the ethics classes," says McGinnis.

Father [Gerald] Cavanagh's classes provided me with a very solid grounding in business ethics.  I feel the awareness and commitment to ethics in the workplace that I learned back then helped me throughout my career.  Whether working here in the USA or overseas, I have had many opportunities to refer back to this educational foundation set for me and apply it in my day-to-day tasks and management of my responsibilities.  The MBA program really emphasized this and it's been beneficial to me.

"Twenty-five years ago, the University of Detroit was really a frontrunner in requiring ethics education and was one of the few universities around with this included in their curriculum. Today, with all the financial scandals, it's come to the forefront of our consciousness, and is now a standard course for most college students. U of D was already conscious about this a long time ago" he adds.

In Brazil, where he lived and worked for three years, McGinnis was controller for Chrysler do Brasil, charged with essentially setting up a new company to produce vehicles, as Chrysler re-established its brand after a 15-year absence.  He also lived and worked in China for three years as director and CFO for the Beijing Jeep Corporation, a collaboration between Chrysler and the Chinese government.

Both international assignments included moving his family. "Expatriate assignments are incredibly expensive endeavors for companies.  It's important to be successful and to have good global management skills. I believe the diversity of U of D and the curriculum gave me the management skills to operate any place in the world." 

In each location, he took as his guide a quotation from former United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan: "You never walk into a situation and believe that you know better than the natives. Listen and look around. Otherwise you can make some very serious mistakes."

McGinnis explains, "Many times in international business assignments, people go over representing their company and try to do things the way they are done in the USA. Things don't necessarily work exactly the same way around the world as they do here, but too often we assume we know everything, and that can lead to failure."

For each overseas assignment, McGinnis studied the language ("Portuguese was much easier than Mandarin," he notes), took an active interest in local customs, and traveled in the area. He brought his family with him on each assignment, and one of his daughters was born in Brazil.

Says McGinnis, "Any place we live, we take the opportunity to travel, to see the country, the people and the culture.  My wife and I looked at each opportunity as more than just a 'career move.'  We made our decisions to move to each country based on our ability to learn new things, grow as individuals, and also provide me with great career development."

While working in China, the McGinnis family traveled throughout Asia, including visits to Vietnam, Tibet, Thailand, Australia, Japan, and Singapore.  McGinnis says, "My overseas experiences both professionally and personally have proved to be a great blessing in my life and the lives of my wife and children.  We wouldn't trade any of those experiences.  They were times of great learning and growth for all of us.

"The local people that you work with have to know that you actually care about them and their country and have an interest in their culture and their society. If you show genuine interest, they can tell that you are sincere. If you don't, they won't give you 110 percent. Involving yourself in the local culture is much more rewarding on a professional and personal level than not." McGinnis still displays the Annan quotation in his office.

Not surprisingly, McGinnis is a big proponent of international experience for businesspeople and regularly mentors colleagues who are interested in or are working overseas for the company.  He tries to remain active in the international community trying to give back all that was given to him when he was once a "foreigner" in a different land.

McGinnis advises current business students to both follow their aspirations and prepare diligently for their careers. "You need to find out what your passion is and then find a way to pursue it. Be willing to take risks and step out of your comfort zone. And you need to be prepared to work in a global environment. Try to remember that different is not about right or wrong, it's just about different.  UDM, through the diversity on campus and the classes taught, will prepare you well.  Work hard to practice what is taught to you at UDM.

"All students need to think globally these days," states McGinnis. "When you complete your MBA, you need to have a global mindset."