Meet the Alumni Engagement Manager – Professional Networks

Laura Meadows, Alumni Engagement Manager for Professional Networks, offers an in-depth look at her role and the invaluable support she provides to MBA alumni in fostering connections and unlocking career opportunities.

Tell us a bit about yourself and your role in the team? 

I joined the Global Alumni Engagement and Rankings (GAER) team in February 2023 as the Global Alumni Engagement Manager – Professional Networks. I look after the sector-specific alumni networks and along with my team am responsible for growing the alumni network and organising a calendar of in-person events at The Shard and webinars that focus on industry-specific activities, offering alumni and current students a platform to connect based on their professional interests, expertise, and sectors. These networks are driven by our alumni volunteers and offer members valuable opportunities for continued learning, networking, and career development.

What does the Global Alumni Engagement Team do, how does it support our MBA alumni? 

The team support our MBA alumni by helping to foster our alumni connections and build a lifelong community that reinforces the core values at WBS. We want to connect with as many of our alumni and students as possible to help to cultivate meaningful and reciprocal relationships to help to leverage connections between our alumni, students and the business school. We have assisted some of our students to find MBA projects and have introduced recent graduates to established alumni for ad-hoc careers advice. The Alumni community will continue to support you throughout your career whether you graduated recently or quite a few years ago, it’s never too late to engage with the Global Alumni Engagement Team!

What might a prospective MBA candidate not know about Warwick Business School’s alumni offering? 

The main benefit of being part of the networks is the networking opportunities that it affords. We have six industry-specific networks; Women in Business, Finance, Technology, Strategy & Consulting, Public & 3^rd Sector and Sustainability, each looking at specific topics, themes and interests of the sectors filled with opportunities to hear from thought leaders and change makers from WBS and beyond.

As well as all of the benefits of being part of our networks, our MBA Alumni have access to two free of charge modules from current MBA programme and are invited to the annual MBA conference. 

Can you share your proudest moment as part of the team with us?

My proudest moment in this team so far has been our latest MBA conference. We launched our Sustainability Professional Network at the conference. It was the first MBA conference that our wider team had organised, and bringing together our Alumni to share their stories, network and continue their lifelong learning journey was a privilege to be part of. I enjoyed meeting new alumni and reconnecting with alumni who I see more regularly.