Fiza Yousuf is a former master’s of management student at Manderson who recently transferred into the MBA program. She agreed to answer a few questions for us.
What led you to UA?
I’m from West Hollywood, California, but I’ve always loved the South and really wanted to go to a huge football school and get the full college experience. Once I visited Tuscaloosa, I just fell in love with this school. Walking into Bryant Denny, the president’s mansion, and just walking around the quad, I knew it was meant to be. It was the best decision I’ve ever made for myself. I never knew a place close to 1800 miles away could feel like my home away from home.
Why business? Why Manderson?
As a little girl, I’ve always had an entrepreneurial mind. My parents both started their own business in their early 20s and that always inspired me. I always looked up to them. I would accompany my dad on his international work trips and the business world just fascinated me. These times shaped my love of communicating with people and raised my curiosity and determination to learn more about the business world. When I took some AP Economics classes my senior year of high school, it really sealed the deal for me and showed how I loved business and I wanted to major in it. I graduated with my undergraduate degree at Alabama with two degrees: economics and finance.
I knew that this was not where I wanted to stop with my degree which made me want to go to graduate school. Alabama shaped me as a person and I’ve learned and grown as a person here so I knew this was the perfect place for me. It was the place that made me fall in love with business even more so I wanted to get my graduate degree at Manderson. I wanted to study management so I can create something of my own.
What does the future hold?
I want to reach my full potential. Some of passions include health and wellness and I’ve always wanted to create my own company. I wanted to get business a degree so I could gain all the knowledge I needed to create it on my own.
I wanted to gain all the insight, because I want to be unstoppable in the business world. It’s hard being a woman in business and education is so powerful that it can lead you to anything.
So I am now working towards my MBA. I want to have my own business in the health wellness space, and eventually take it global. The first place I want to target is Tuscaloosa. Health and wellness usually isn’t as accessible as it should be and I really want to implement that change. When I become a future entrepreneur, I want to represent the University of Alabama wherever I go. The University of Alabama is where legends are made and I want to be one of those legends.