New York author, businesswoman Miki
Agrawal to share message of finding career calling
MURFREESBORO — Social entrepreneur and author Miki Agrawal
will visit MTSU Monday (March 23) to encourage students and the campus
community to do cool (stuff) and create their best lives by starting their own
businesses.
Named by Forbes magazine as one of
2013’s “Top 20 Millennials on a Mission,” Agrawal will speak from 6:30-7:30
p.m. Monday in the Student Union Ballroom. The event is free and open to the
public. For parking, a printable campus map can be found at http://tinyurl.com/MTSUParking14-15.
Agrawal’s appearance is part of
the second annual MTSU Nonprofit & Social Innovation Week. Last year’s
inaugural event featured a one-day summit that drew a cross-disciplinary mix of
almost 140 student participants, said Leigh Anne Clark, associate professor of
management in the Jennings A. Jones College of Business.
This year’s week of events
concludes Friday, March 27, with a half-day student summit featuring guest
presenters and a volunteer/internship fair, with both events held at the James
Union Building.
“We realized that a lot of
students were interested in doing something with purpose in their careers, and
this was throughout the colleges at the university,” Clark said of the genesis
of the event. “So we wanted to do an event with all students … and provide them
with skills, tools and networking opportunities to help them get into the
careers they wanted to get into or help them create their own opportunities.”
A New York City native, Agrawal is
author of the book “Do Cool Sh*t,” which shares insights from her journey of
leaving a traditional job that she hated to founding the popular farm-to-table
pizza restaurant, WILD (formerly known as SLICE), in New York as well as co-founding
female garment company THINX while also continuing to branch into other
socially conscious business efforts that spoke to her personal passions and
purpose. The book features a foreword by Tony Hsieh, the founder of online
retailer Zappos.
Clark said Agrawal’s book, which
at one point hit No. 1 on Amazon’s bestseller list, “had a lot of practical
business knowledge, written in a way that we thought would appeal to college
students,” so bringing her in as a speaker made sense. As a Millennial herself,
Agrawal relates to a younger generation of students who “want flexibility, and
what they do spend their time working on, they want it to matter,” Clark added.
In a guest column for the website
Inc.com, Agrawal explains how to find your passion and turn it into a career:
“So how did I go from being a miserable 100-hour-per-week investment banker who
was overworked and unfulfilled to a happy social entrepreneur and author? I
asked myself two questions: What am I really good at? What can I be
passionate about for a really long time?” …
“Once you can answer this, you
should be willing to fight through the crazy ups and downs and the years (yes,
years) of potential struggle in business and life. Because you'll be waking up
with a sense of purpose daily. When you find that sense of purpose, the pain of
the process all becomes worthwhile.”
In
addition to Agrawal’s visit, the week’s events include a Wednesday, March 25,
event where students can volunteer with the CEO Club assisting Greenhouse
Ministries.
The week concludes Friday, March
27, with the MTSU Nonprofit & Social Innovation Student Summit from 8:30
a.m. to 12:30 p.m. in the James Union Building.
Guest speakers will conduct
sessions on: funding; social innovation; career-focused volunteering; passion
to purpose; beyond ordinary marketing; cool people care; and new nonprofits.
As part of Friday’s activities, a
Nonprofit Volunteer/Internship Fair will be held from noon to 1:15 p.m. in the Tennessee Room of the James Union Building.
The sessions are free and open to
students, and while registration isn’t required, students are encouraged to
register at http://MTSUStudentSummit.eventzilla.net so that organizers have an idea of how many
students plan to attend.
The week of events is being hosted
by the Departments of Management and Marketing and Business Communication and
Entrepreneurship in the Jones College of Business and the Department of
Communication Studies and Organizational Communication in the College of
Liberal Arts.
Agrawal’s visit is made possible
with support from MTSU’s Distinguished Lecture Funds, Jones College of Business,
College of Liberal Arts and the
Jennings and Rebecca Jones Foundation.
For more information about the
lineup of events, contact Dr. Leigh Anne Clark at la.clark@mtsu.edu.
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