Forté Fellow Spotlight: Alexa Roscoe

Alexa Roscoe

University of Massachusetts Amherst, Comparative Literature and Latin American Studies, 2007
London School of Economics and Political Science, MSc Human Rights, 2010
University of Oxford, Saïd Business School, 2015
Hometown: Marblehead, Massachusetts
Pre-MBA Work Experience: Private Sector Advisor, CARE International

How did Forté impact your interest in an MBA, your career goals, or your MBA application or student launch experience?

The Forté Foundation provided a huge range of resources that helped convince me that making investment in the MBA was worth it. Now that I’m here, I can’t believe I ever considered not coming.

Why did you decide to get an MBA? How do you hope the MBA will influence your career trajectory?

Prior to starting an MBA, I advised companies on how to maximize their social impact. I realized to do that in the best way possible, I needed to know as much about the inner workings of businesses as possible.

Even now, most businesses don’t realize how strongly linked their design, production and sourcing practices are to their overall social impact. I want to change that.

What advice do you have for women starting the MBA application process? What worked well for you versus what barriers/challenges did you face?

Don’t be put off by the reputation of MBA programmes. My classmates at Oxford, male and female, in addition to being some of the most accomplished people I’ve ever met, are collaborative, engaging and always ready to lend a hand.

Coming from the non-profit world, I expected a bit of surprise that I might be interested in doing an MBA from those with a more traditional business background. What I hadn’t expected, however, was surprise from people in the non-profit world.

There was definitely a sense that I was “letting down the team,” so to speak, by going into the business world. For me, this is exactly the type of prejudice that some in the non-profit sector have to overcome for NGOs to work more effectively.

So much of what I’ve learned can be applied in the not-for-profit space. I hope to help disseminate those lessons.