Shane Stender, IMC ‘12, found his career path due to his time in the IMC program. Currently, Shane serves as a managing partner of SilverBack Advertising in Seattle, Washington, because of his time in the IMC program which he started in 2010.
“During that course of time and the classes that I took, it really opened me up to wanting to be a lot more entrepreneurial and get involved in a much more boutique business than I was in at the time,” Stender said. “So after my graduation, I moved forward with becoming a partner in a boutique advertising agency, and it's really been a great career move the last seven years.”
Shane joined the IMC program in 2010 after completing his undergraduate degree at West Virginia University and graduated with his M.S. IMC in 2012. Once the mentorship program became available, Shane began committing his time to it to give back to students that are like him.
Stender has been a mentor four times in the program which matches alumni and current students, and he uses this as an opportunity to pay it forward. He uses his experience through the program and in the workforce to help his mentees make career transitions, connections and skills for them to find the success they’re looking for upon completing their masters degree. Stender also finds valuable lessons in the people he meets and their stories.
“They have different career paths than I've had. They're currently going through classes that may be a little different than ones that I had, and I'm always picking up some little piece of information that I then try to turn around and incorporate in and think about and how I'm hiring in employees at my at my company or the roles and responsibilities that I'm giving to my employees,” Stender said. “The things that I'm learning from them, I'm taking back and applying those to my own business to help be successful in what I'm doing. What these people are doing is providing me as much value as hopefully I'm providing to them.”
What these people are doing is providing me as much value as hopefully I'm providing to them. Shane Stender