With any new year, a fresh start brings resolutions and ideas for personal growth. Two members of the Nebraska Business community exemplify how College of Business students and faculty entered the new year ready to build upon their past experiences to make a difference in 2019.
 
Hunter Kelley’s summer experience continues to unfold new opportunities for the international business and management major. Last summer, he studied abroad in France while interning 25-30 hours a week at Geo Sentinel, which specializes in making smartwatches to track and store vitals by GPS to assist in caring for Alzheimer’s and dementia patients. Geo Sentinel invited the Lincoln, Nebraska, native to help represent them at the Consumer Electronics Show held January 8-11 in Las Vegas.
 
“My main project during the internship was helping them prepare for this world-renowned technology show that highlights new, cutting-edge products. I also helped review FCC guidelines to assist in getting their product classified as a health care device,” he said. “Getting invited by my boss to join them at CES to do further market research is a great opportunity to use what I learned both at Nebraska and in France in a real-world setting.”
 
Rob Simon, associate professor of practice in marketing, is known for hands-on experiences offered to students in classes he teaches. After years of teaching a Union Pacific consulting class, he will now also stretch the strengths of 24 business majors as they work together with Ameritas on projects designed to innovate and disrupt the insurance and financial services industry. The opportunity arose after Simon talked with Brent Korte, senior vice president and chief marketing officer of Ameritas Life Insurance Corp. who serves on the Department of Marketing advisory board, this fall.
 
“We will be working with an entrepreneurial hub within Ameritas as they explore new ways to connect with millennials and also how to shorten their sales funnel. They will interpret data, create solutions and sell their ideas to management. They will be challenged, but there is real value in learning from mistakes made along the way,” he said.
 
Nebraska Business wants to share how you are building on your experiences this year. Share your Start Something story at: https://business.unl.edu/startsomething. Published: January 8, 2019