The Winners of TGCC - The World's First Global, Virtual Case Comp For High Schoolers Ft. Tina Mai, Alexis Lindenfelser and Charlotte Quintanar
The Tiger Global Case Comp has thousands of high schoolers from all over the world competing for the experience and first prize of a PwC internship, mentorship from the President of Tiger Management and $1500USD.
This year, team USRA took first place with a polished, well-researched presentation.
We chat about the problems they solved, the skills they learned and what they think made the difference to help them win.
Resources and links
The Winners of TGCC - The World's First Global, Virtual Case Comp For High Schoolers Ft. Tina Mai, Alexis Lindenfelser and Charlotte Quintanar
The Tiger Global Case Comp has thousands of high schoolers from all over the world competing for the experience and first prize of a PwC internship, mentorship from the President of Tiger Management and $1500USD.
This year, team USRA took first place with a polished, well-researched presentation.
We chat about the problems they solved, the skills they learned and what they think made the difference to help them win.
Resources and links
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
slides, competition, learning, alexis, business, rubric, tina, case, global, students, soft skills, terms, team, stem, future, regional, charlotte, people, skill, interested
SPEAKERS
Podcast Host, Charlotte, Alex Cork, Tina, Alexis
Alex Cork 00:17
Hi, Alexis, Charlotte and Tina. Welcome to the top of the class podcast. It's awesome to have you all on the show at the same time, the winners of the latest TGCC, The Tiger Global Case Comp competition. And yeah, welcome to the top of the class podcast. Alexis, kick us off. Tell us a bit about yourself, and where abouts are you from?
Alexis 00:38
Hi, I'm Alexis. I'm from California, and I'm a junior. So I'm 16.
Alex Cork 00:45
16. Fantastic. And you're obviously one of the fantastic members of the team as well. We'll throw to Charlotte as well, Charlotte, give us a quick intro of yourself.
Charlotte 00:54
Hello, my name is Charlotte. I also live in Southern California. I'm 16 and was super happy to be a member of this amazing team.
Alex Cork 01:04
Awesome. And Tina?
Tina 01:06
Hey, I'm Tina. I'm also 16. And I go to the same school as Alexis in Charlotte. So we knew each other through that. And it was just great getting together to form a team for the competition.
Alex Cork 01:17
Yeah, so tell me about that. Tell me how you kind of come across the competition in the first place? And what made you want to compete in it? I mean, it's something that did you all have this existing interest in case comps or business? Or was it like something that just popped up on your newsfeed, you were like, Hey, we're kind of bored. Let's give it a go type of thing. Who could I throw to for that, Tina? Yeah.
Tina 01:37
So I actually came across the competition just through like a quick Google search. And I just like none of us really knew that much about case competitions before this, like none of us. Have you ever competed in one, none of us, like, even knew that much about the strategies involved. And we were all sort of interested in different things like I was more interested in sort of the technology and computer science side, Alexis is interested in chemistry, shallow is interested in biology. So we're kind of like all over the place, and sort of in terms of interests. And so for any students out there listening, it's not really about like the specialized knowledge you have to have in business or finance that kind of takes you to the other side. It's more about learning along the way. And also like the soft skills and so it's not that intimidating. If you want to get interested, if you want to get started in a competition like this. It's more about finding the right people finding the right team and then taking the jumps to just do it. Even though we none of us really knew that much about it.
Alex Cork 02:31
Yeah, yeah. Well, it's one of those things that I think case comes sometimes like, people have probably heard of the term before but don't really know what they're getting themselves in for. Was there ever a moment in this process from like, the start of forming a team through to like getting the rounds that you went through to get into the finals? These kinds of things? Where you were like, what are we doing here? Like, we all have interest in STEM by the sounds of things. And then like, all these numbers of, you know, financial records, and all these things were coming at you we like, I don't know really why we've entered this. But hey, it's seems to be a bit of fun. Let's keep going. Like, shall we do want to answer that one.
Charlotte 03:09
I would say that that happened quite often, specifically, the first days of the both the regional and the global rounds, you're given this big packet about, you know, the company that you're you're making this pitch for. So there's a lot of acronyms and big vocab terms that none of us were really familiar with prior to this. So it was a lot of learning as we went and looking things up and watching YouTube videos and learning as you go. And so like Tina mentioned, and how you said boys in STEM. But I'd say that the skills that we learned about, like research and taking on something new, were very applicable to almost any fields, regardless if it is business. So it was a lot of self learning.
Alex Cork 03:51
Yeah, absolutely. Now, Alexis, given that you're all stem background students, and Charlotte just mentioned the research side of things. But those two marry up type of thing, like the fact that you more stem focused, and the fact that you have to do a lot of research for the case, comm that skill set seemed to match up for you.
Alexis 04:10
Yeah, I think the skill set definitely matched up being able to look things up and process technical information quickly, which you have to do a lot in STEM subjects where you're learning things out of a textbook, or you're being very precise when you're coding, taking technical things. And learning it quickly. really helped us when we were going through the packet and taking on all this business, acronyms and information very suddenly. I remember when I first looked at the winners from last year the slides I was in shock that high school students had made those I was like, Oh my goodness, are these professionals? What is this? There's no way we can do this. And then by the end, it was like all of a sudden it looked like our slides were looked like theirs and we couldn't believe how much we've learned in such a short amount of time.
Alex Cork 04:55
Yeah, so give us the the timeframe. I actually know what you mean with those slides. I remember say those slides too. And I was like, Oh my gosh, these are super intense slides. And yeah, like you do learn an incredible amount in a short amount of time, particularly when you're you're focused as a team and you're working towards this goal and you've also got like other teams to kind of measure yourself off as well as you see in the rounds, etc. But for yourself, Taita in terms of the timeframe this all took place in what did that look like from like original, seeing the post on on Google, getting the team together, going through the Global's? And now where we are on the podcast, what has been the total timeframe there?
Tina 05:31
Yeah, so it's been sort of like a month, like in the process of getting from deciding the competition to actually finishing it and pitching it like the last round of pitching that felt just really surreal, because it was such a long process. And so I mean, like, when we first got started, we signed up early, and then we were all like, well, we don't really know what to do to prepare, because we really didn't know anything. And so by the time that the first regional case came out, we were kind of like, just in shock, like we've said before, about just how hard it really was like at first sight. And so the first week that was so much of it was just like staying up lay and like researching, like figuring this out, like learning from previous winners. So much of it was just like the one week that we had for the regional case went by so fast, because we just didn't know what we were doing. And then when we got to the Global's It was like, you don't get a week, you just get 72 hours. And so that was just even more of a crazy for us, because we all had school, we had like eight, nine hours at school every single day. And so we stay up so late, just like working at night, the last night, we actually pulled an all nighter and then didn't submit the slides until the last five minutes before they're due. So the time crunch was absolutely insane. But it was so much of it was like learning time management and organization and those like soft skills that kind of come up along the way of just like, in the professional world, we don't get time to do everything we don't get all the time we need in the world, it's a lot of it is just like prioritizing. And so that was actually a really good learning experience for us as well. But yeah, it was like long in terms of the overall life. But it was short in terms of, we only had a couple of hours to do it like in the last day, which was really just sitting down and like staying up all night with some tea and coffee and just like doing it.
Alex Cork 07:16
Yeah, yeah, well, that's a pretty crazy experience to be pulling an all nighter in a high school competition. I don't know of many competitions that require that amount of commitment or that amount of work. In terms of like, what was motivating you through that kind of period of time, where you're like, Oh, my gosh, this is so much work, you know, like, we've got no certainty of winning here, we all kind of come from a stem background, not to say that that's a bad thing. In this instance, obviously, we heard that it's a pretty good skill set, actually to have. But was there any kind of motivation from each other? Like, hey, we all want to do this? Because it's going to help out with our college applications? Or it's going to help out, you know, with potential career pathways. Was there any like why attached to you know, that people say we find your why type of thing was there any y attached to this that kind of kept you going through all those hours of work that you're putting in showered or 30 fit?
Charlotte 08:10
I would say there's probably two reasons why, like, specifically, I was so motivated. And one of those was because I saw how hard Alexis and Tina were working, I would see that little icon on the Google Doc at like 2am. And they were just typing away all of this analysis. So because I saw how much time and effort that they were putting in, it just made me want to, you know, keep keep working alongside them. And then the other aspect was, it got really interesting, like the stuff that we were learning although it was new, it was it was it was definitely new. But it was definitely was things that I think that we enjoyed and we had never known before, but just how companies actually work. And I feel like I now have a better understanding of business as a whole that I did not know before this competitions, I think just actually learning about these topics was part of the motivation.
Alex Cork 08:59
Well, it definitely throws you in the deep end as a team into like, not just the ins and outs of terminology and all the rest of it, but also the lifestyle of consultants because you know, pulling an all nighter to reach a deadline, these kinds of things like well, if you're a consultant like Goldman Sachs, or you know JP Morgan, or BlackRock or whatever, that's like pretty nuts standard thing to do, but not unusual thing to do to pull an all nighter for any of you did you have any kind of contacts in the professional world that you are able to kind of tap on the shoulder and be like, hey, we've ended this case calm, like, Can you give us some advice? Or was it mainly just YouTube channels and reading online? Like what were some of your resources that you were using to get yourself ready for this and let us offer to you for that.
Alexis 09:47
We mostly relied on the internet searching we looked a lot at the slides of last year's winners. We went to most of the webinars. We thought those are really helpful and they just really introduced us To the topics that exactly what we needed for the case, instead of just going through pages of Google documents, like not really sure what we needed to know. And reading through the case a few times helped us a lot as well. As for context, we eventually established some connections. We thought it was really helpful when we got to meet with our mentor from Crimson before the global round, they gave us some good advice we took with us to the Global's, and then we were also able to connect with some of last year's winners through Gen Z, which I think I'll pass to Tina, if she wants to talk about that.
Tina 10:32
Yeah, so we actually developed a lot of networks and connections throughout this whole process. And one of it was just with last year's winners, they founded their own consulting company called Gen Z consulting. And so I was part of that, and I got to chat to a lot of them and learn from sort of like other high schoolers who are in this field in general, which is really crazy, because you really wouldn't really imagine that there's going to be a huge network, or a huge pool of teenagers working on consulting. Yeah. And so it was kind of crazy getting exposed to this whole network and also connections outside of it. And through that, I was able to just learn a lot about what other people are doing and sort of reach out to more professional mentors out there after the competition. So throughout the competition, we sort of had like very limited networks. But afterwards, it really just opened a lot of doors for us in terms of reaching out to people and seeking mentorship and like that,
Alex Cork 11:21
I bet the LinkedIn was one of your tools to be using to connect with these people, right? Absolutely, yeah. LinkedIn for high schoolers is like a complete game changer. Actually, I was talking to a student recently, who is like, I got onto LinkedIn because of the podcast. And now I love LinkedIn. And I use it all the time, because it comes up a lot of the time on the show, as like a way for students to get out of their school bubble in a way and to really broaden their networks, you know, not just within their country, but across, you know, into Dubai as the last year's winners were from. So probably connecting with them there, which is awesome. Now let's go into the kind of training aspect of things and the preparation of the slides and all these types of things. Because Tina, you won the Best speaker as well, you want the best speaker, which is awesome. But I know that that part of it is like pretty tough, because it's under these time constraints. And it's a bit of a tricky thing to do to try and fit in all your kind of ideas and concepts into this timeframe that you're given. So can you take us through? Like how you planned all that? And what preparation you do? Like, how many times did you practice with those slides? To kind of nail this presentation tended to want to take us through that? Yeah, sure.
Tina 12:31
So in terms of the first time around in the regional round, we actually didn't really have a plan going into it. I mean, like, we were kind of just thrown in the deep end. Like we've said before, it's just, it was just like figuring out how to best organize them along the way, we didn't really know how much each thing was going to take us like the slides ended up taking us so long. And so afterwards, it was more about just like getting the final touches on the slide ready, because in the regional round, what happened was they actually looked at our slides before they decided who would actually present live. And so we spent so much time just like putting final touches on the slides. And then afterwards we we sort of did a lot of work on like actually speaking and presenting and also q&a prep, but not so much as we did the slides. And so when we went into the global round it was we knew a lot more about what we were getting ourselves into. And so it was a lot easier to sort of like time block everything and sort of figure out okay, how many hours are we allocating for this? And how many hours are we allocating for this? And so I guess, like, it really comes with the experience, and it really comes with sort of just doing it firsthand. You can't really have other people tell you like how long each thing is going to take because you haven't done it as a team yourself. And so pacing ourselves was definitely more figuring it out along the way.
Alex Cork 13:44
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Well, who was kind of the slide guru? Did you have anybody who was responsible for formatting and getting all the information out there?
Tina 13:53
Yeah, that was me. So I actually like I'm really passionate about like graphic design on the side. And so I had a lot of fun, maybe too much fun, putting like the actual aesthetic, like design formatting of the slides together and making a cohesive theme both like the regional dark mode and the global we changed like a color scheme a little. It was like if you ask me the likes lishala they're gonna be like, you spent way too much time on this, but I feel like it was a little bit worth it at the end just because it kind of gave us more of like a professional feel. And it was more fun. And also like I actually designed these little business cards for a team as well. And so it was just like the little design tips along the way really kind of carried us through on making the final presentation look more cohesive and like we put a lot of time and attention into it.
Podcast Host 14:39
Charlotte wasn't worth it. It
Charlotte 14:41
I think it was worth it. In the end. Tina definitely spent a lot of time on it. But the designs and the end ended up looking beautiful and advice I would give for students that are looking to make slide decks for this competition but also in the future would be to utilize figma. That's what we use, and it's a great platform to, it's sort of like Google Docs because you can all work at it at the same time. And so everyone can be collaborating. But it's a great way to organize slides to do some graphic design all in one place. So I'd recommend figma.
Alex Cork 15:16
Yeah, absolutely. Oh, good recommendation. But yeah, I actually am very on board with the design, lifting up a presentation to that professional standard. I often say to students, like if you get a logo and a website that has like some, you know, decent color schemes and interesting images, this type of thing, it can really lift your whole kind of performance in your user experience and everything. So I'm sure that was actually mentioned by the judges at all.
Tina 15:45
Yeah, we actually talked to Janine Manning, who Yes, we actually got to talk to her afterwards. And she's really amazing. But she kind of mentioned during our q&a session that having like the background, having the slides in the logo just made us like a lot more professional. And it just made it look like we were coming in knowing what we were doing. And having put in the attention to detail that gave us more of, I guess, a professional field. Yeah,
Alex Cork 16:07
awesome. Awesome. Now, Alexis, I'm going to throw you a bit of a controversial question, I guess. And I don't mean to stereotype here at all. But the skill set that you all talking about, you know, the attention to detail, the going to the webinars doing all these things, it often gets associated with girls, right? Who have this kind of more attention to detail breaking down like a chunky piece of information into small things, like I will, you know, when I was at school, and at university, I was always amazed by the the notes that girls would write and how they were like, highlighted perfectly, and everything was just so organized. And you know, you spoke about the time blocking as well, and how many hours we allocating here and here and here. Did you feel like it was an advantage to have an all girls team in this competition, because you did have to be so organized.
Alexis 16:58
I think having an all girls team was mostly beneficial because we had a really strong sisterhood. And we were able to connect and we all wanting to win together. So it's really easy for us to work together. As for the organization piece, I've definitely seen some very nice girls notes and not so organized voice notes. But I do feel like the organization piece, I don't think it really depends on who you are based on like, your gender your skill set, or like where you come from, I think you have to develop it no matter where you come from, like whether you're organizing, I understand the team last year organized in notion even though they were an all guys team, or in Google Docs, I think the organization time blocking comes no matter where you come from, like in order to get this far in a competition or stay on track and make sure you're not submitting like 30 seconds before is you have to do that no matter what. And I think anyone who wants to win the competition can pick that up.
Alex Cork 17:56
Yeah, well, it reminds me a little bit of that, kind of saying that, you know, under pressure, cold becomes diamond, right? Where it's like under the pressure of this particular competition, you start discovering new skill sets, you start discovering shortcuts that work, not shortcuts that end up diminishing the quality, but shortcuts that actually improve the quality of the work that you're doing. So for our story to yourself, Charlotte for this one, is there any particular thing that you found under pressure that your team really rose to the occasion?
Charlotte 18:29
I think we definitely rose to the occasion, obviously with time management in general as in, like blocking out time, but also the distinguishing of roles was beneficial in who was doing what so we could focus on different things. But then also, we would have times where we would come back together and go through like okay, what what progress have we made, who's made, what slides who's focused on what so I think that the fact that we could both be individual and making slides, but then also come and collaborate together was probably something we we did very strong, and that helped us, you know, move on and make some some beautiful slides.
Tina 19:07
Yeah, to add on to that a little, I really agree with the fact of just structuring our team and like pulling together what we're best at to like, create roles, I guess, because when you have a time crunch, not everyone is going to be able to obsess over every little detail. And so you really need to identify what you're best at what person is working on which part and then sort of grouping together at the end to sort of to decide if this is really the final product that we want to go for. But when it comes down to a team, it's really about optimizing your skill set and about which components can you puzzle together to make the best end product I guess, and that was something that was really helpful for us because down to the 72 hours or a lot less for us, actually since we had school, but there was no way that we each could have done the presentation ourselves and then sort of work together the whole time. And so it was figuring out which slides are we going to be best at doing and also which portions which roles are we going to each have That decided that we finally did the final product at the end and got everything done and submitted.
Alex Cork 20:05
Yeah, yeah. Which is? Yeah, no mean feat for sure. Now, I'd be interested in the actual global case round, because that's something that I'm sure people are interested in. By my reading, it was with our Bay robotics, which was a Tel Aviv based company that does like four day imaging radar type of thing. And so we're kind of over my head in terms of the tech side of things. But yeah, what did that look like? Like What Did you have to prepare for people who, you know, weren't on the competition? What did you have to do to kind of put forward your particular case for this particular global round?
Charlotte 20:38
So our Bay is a 40, image radar technology that focus on Robo taxis. So to start off, we also have limited knowledge on the technology. So it was more just learning about, you know, the technology as a whole the marketplace, why, or where's it projected to go, you know, what are some challenges this company is facing, we also figured out in context that the company was about to go public a week after we submitted the competition, so that that kind of affected the market, and some of our slides are for what we would suggest that they would do in the future. But overall, it was just more about reading about the company finding the case study and learning about that,
Alex Cork 21:19
right, Alexis? Is there anything in there that you know, surprised you about four D, Robo taxis, this type of thing,
Alexis 21:26
I was actually surprised that they planned for the robo taxis to be a solution for the environmental and co2 emission problem that currently comes from like gas powered cars. I knew Robo taxis was a thing in terms of convenience and ride hailing in just the future of like Uber and Lyft. And like the taxi industry, and I really didn't realize that it was also a solution for like the environment, and that they plan to make them electric vehicles or fuel cell vehicles that didn't pollute, and also to reduce the congestion, since not everyone's owning a car, like you're getting in the robo taxi, like you want a bus, but it's more personal and private, and it won't take as long. So I was just really amazed that it was also a solution for the climate problem.
Alex Cork 22:11
And in terms of what case, or what solutions you started to put forward as a team, because I know that you were looking for the Tel Aviv company to pitch to the US market. And there were some other interesting points that you had to present on. Like, how did you kind of brainstorm the solutions that you wanted to put forward? Like, how much of it is, I guess, like the theoretical type, you know, pie in the sky idea, versus like, how much of it is informed by the actual context and information that you're given? So Tina, referred to you for that, like, how important is it to balance those two things between the ideas and the actual information you've given? Yeah,
Tina 22:49
so I think this is actually something that not only applies to case competitions, but to projects and also like startup ventures in general. And I think it really comes down to knowing what your end product is going to be. And we definitely had our fun with ideation and creativity and innovation and being able to think futuristically, that was a big part of coming up with ideas for both the regional and the global round, it was more about like, how can we sort of be outside the box and coming up with our solutions, but we also had to make sure that we were more realistic, and that we supported it with financials, and that we supported it with data and research and market analysis. And that it's not just a crazy, like, oh, in the best world case scenario, this is what's going to happen kind of thing. I think in the business world, a lot of it is about balancing both having the creativity and the mindset, and also having the data and the financials to support it. Like even if you look on the rubric, there's kind of both there's like the creativity aspect of it. But then there's also the actual data financial side of it.
Alex Cork 23:50
Yes, actually, on the rubric. I remember in the last year's team, they pay very, very close attention to the rubric, what was being actually asked to them, what were they being judged on these kinds of things in order to win. So they basically reverse engineered in a way they saw the rubric. And then we're like, okay, let's make our slides based off of that pretty much. So it was that something that you thought about really closely? Like, what are we actually being judged on? Was that a part of your preparation at all? I'll throw to shout for that.
Charlotte 24:17
I think that that was definitely a part of what we based our slides on, if we definitely went back and checked, like, are we covering all the topics that they suggest that we cover? Are we going through every all the questions that they asked in the case study, but I know our team in particular looks for ways that we could go above and beyond and stand out between other teams that are also just following the rubric. And I think that one of the ways we did that was through our graphic design, and through our slides and color schemes and organization. And then the other way was just actual presentation. Speaking as smooth as we could be put virtual background so we all had like continuity and we looked professional. We were blazers and button down shirts, and we tried to look As best as we could, that would be a way that we went above and beyond just the rubric as well.
Alex Cork 25:05
That is some awesome tips. And this is why I'm saying like, guys just don't think about that I will not too many guys think about that level of attention to detail like, I certainly wouldn't. In any case, I'll just rock up in whatever jumper I had on at the time and kind of do the presentation. But that level of detail is awesome. And I think that really does show, you know, the professionalism and continuity that you mentioned there. Alexis, I saw you grabbing some papers off the off the shelf there. What were you hoping to add there?
Alexis 25:35
I was just pulling down the case. This is the global round case the RBA case, just to look at the rubric. And I really agree with Charlotte, we did follow the rubric especially at the end when we were going through our slides we're checking Okay, do we have this? Have we answered this aspect this question. And like Charlotte said, we did try to go above and beyond because we know everyone is making a similar solution going through the same rubric. And so the little detail parts we think really helped us in the end.
Alex Cork 26:03
There's no doubt about that. So yeah, let's talk about the future now. Because obviously like this can be a potentially powerful direction changing experience in that business sense. So for any of you kind of before and after the case camp, has it changed what you thought you wanted to do change kind of the degree that you will potentially aiming for college, I know you may not be thinking about that, because you're 16 at this time, but you know, I'm sure some of you are thinking, I'm definitely on the stem side of things. But now might be the stem slash business side of things potentially Taner offered to you for the status. Sure. So
Tina 26:41
I've personally always wanted to work at the interdisciplinary connection between stem of business, I knew that I was never going to be just a stem person or just a business person. And so having this competition, I mean, I've had some projects and experiences in the past where I was able to build my own products, where I was able to sort of think more about like the sort of venture side of things. But having this business competition also sort of added I guess, gave me a little more confidence to add to my toolkit of Business Administration, and also accounting and also the consulting side of things. And so I think, overall, it's just a really good experience, and a really good doorway to future possibilities. I mean, one of the prizes is an internship at PwC, which is crazy, but really exciting. And so that sort of gives just another opportunity for us, I think, to experience this in the real world, and to sort of looking look at like consulting in the world world. And being able to have this in connection to stem I think is really cool. Also, just like the global case, in general is in itself, a tech startup company. And so seeing that, like seeing the stem, and like tech and engineering in connection with the actual business side of things just really just solidified. I guess what I want to do my future.
Alex Cork 27:49
Right? Yeah, well, I love the term interdisciplinary because I feel like there's a lot of students who, you know, on LinkedIn who are kind of hustling, like they know their stuff. And they kind of level up by saying, I'm not just going to go in one direction, I'm going to go into the intersection of two different fields. And that's where I'm going to really specialize. So yeah, I've heard that more and more from my high school is these days, then it just be like, Oh, I want to be a doctor, or I want to be this. They're like, I'm gonna focus on the interdisciplinarity. You know, like, it's cool. It's cool. I'm all about it. Like, that's awesome. Charlotte, How about yourself?
Charlotte 28:25
Yes. So speaking of interdisciplinary, I also am interested in the connections between stem science like molecular biological engineering, and film with art, actually, the two that I'm trying to blend together. So this business thing was totally out of the two that I was focusing on. But after the competition, I realized how important these skills regardless of its business are in everything, like mentioned research from before, it was teamwork, to work with the team, it was communications among the team, when can we talk? When can we plan? It was time management with being at school. And also like, the q&a being asked questions, you know, you have to know your stuff. You have to you have to be prepared. So from the actual business perspective, and from the competition perspective, I think that it was really a good eye opener for me and for everyone else on just the skills you need to go into the future. Absolutely.
Alex Cork 29:25
And Alexis?
Alexis 29:27
Yeah, this was also kind of surprising for me, um, Tina texted me. She's like, 'Hey, you want to do this thing?' And I was like, 'sure', but I really enjoyed it. It was really interesting. And I ended up doing the financials, which was totally crazy. I could not believe that. But it really made me reconsider exactly what I wanted to do. I knew I wanted to go into chemistry or chemical engineering or something in the engineering field. But I want to end up in an industry not like a research position. And I think it's made me consider maybe like learning more about business, maybe a minor in business. administration or something along those lines to help anyone who's interested in science or another stem discipline to work at a company or start a company instead of researching or just working in the field?
Alex Cork 30:14
Well, yeah, you know, you all beautifully spoken. And I think that skill set in and of itself, right, the presentation slides, all these kinds of things really does, you know, it's a big part of business. It's a big part of communicating what your business is doing, or where it's going, where it's been these types of things. So, yeah, it's an interesting skill set you've developed and I'm really glad that it's kind of open all your eyes to different possibilities, potentially. But yeah, let's let's wrap it up with your final advice for students who are looking into case comps in general, understanding that, you know, as we discussed off, it's more of like a university thing. But there are like the TGC safe for future references, like a great competition for high school is like a really great feather in the cap type of thing. Is there any advice you would give to future students looking at case coms already our competition to take part in potentially Tina? Yeah, so
Tina 31:08
I would say I'm going to give them three main pieces of advice. And first is being ambitious and bold, and having the bravery to do it in the first place. I know a lot of people, I mean, like, for us, we were all sort of more stem people than we were business people. And so I think we were all a little intimidated by really how complicated a lot of this was. But that's, that sort of leads into like my second tip, which is just that you need to build the soft skills before you can look at the hard skills. And so for us, it was being able to carry over those soft skills from stem like having that public speaking, having that design, having those research, like experience like that really helped us in terms of learning along the way. And so a lot of hard skills, you can do what we did and learn along the way you can pick it up later in your career if you really need to, but it really sort of comes down to like building the solid skills in the process. And then my last piece of advice is just do it for the experience and do it for the learning experience, especially since we're also young. And for any like young people listening out there, you have so much time to care about like prizes or money or other stuff right now you really should just care about the experience and the network that you're building that sort of propels you into the career into your career in the future, I guess. And so those are sort of my main three tips for anyone who wants to do a business case competition for anyone who wants to do a case competition or business in general, I think those are some three things that really helped us as a team and as individuals.
Alex Cork 32:35
Awesome, awesome. And yourself, Charlotte?
Charlotte 32:39
I would say Tina, definitely just income that encompassed everything that I think could possibly be advice for people, I would say, submit to competitions. And I know for our team, we were not expecting to move on to the next round and Global's we were not expecting to win. So I would just say keep, keep submitting and keep looking for new things. Pick a team that you know, you'll work well with who you're friends with, or maybe you're not friends with them. But I would just I would just compete.
Alex Cork 33:09
Yeah, it's one of those things that I often say to students like, enter into competitions that you don't think you're going to win. And like that you've never really had I mean, I remember just chatting with another student in my last episode, he was like, I've done so many different competitions. But you learn things from different competitions, like you might do a competition, which has a completely different focus to the one you end up winning. But you learn something from that previous time competing, you might learn about time blocking, or you might learn about teamwork, you might learn about the soft skills of research. And then over time, those things add up to a winning performance in another competition, hopefully, fingers crossed as it did for you, obviously, which is awesome. And Alexis have his own advice for students.
Alexis 33:53
Yeah, just going off the I think just do it. Like I mean, sounds cliche, but you know, just getting into the competition, just there's nothing to lose in enrolling in a competition getting the file or the project or the rubric. And just working on the project, you're gonna learn a lot, no matter what the outcome is. And I think even if you're afraid or don't know about it, you should totally do it because it might turn out good. And there's no harm that can come of it. You learn either way, like you said, the soft skills that can be applied elsewhere. Maybe you'll win the next one, and I would just try it and there's nothing bad that can come out of it.
Alex Cork 34:30
Awesome. Awesome. Well, Alexis, Charlotte, Tina, it's been an absolute pleasure having you on the show. Thank you so much for sharing your wisdom and insight into winning the 2021 TGCC, I'll put links in the show notes to as many different things as I can, if you want to have your LinkedIn in there as well. Like if you want to connect with students through LinkedIn, send me your link for that. And I'll put that in the show notes too. And I think there might actually be a link to the slides somewhere potentially that we could share, right? So we can even throw those in there too and people can admire the well designed, well thought out slides that you all put together. But again, thank you so much for your time. And look forward to sharing this episode far and wide.
Podcast Host 35:15
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