São Paulo Wharton GMC Recap
The best classroom is outside the classroom.
Indeed, The Wharton School’s São Paulo GMC (Global Modular Course) has this concept ingrained in its DNA.
The GMC combines Wharton Undergrads, MBAs, and Executive MBAs in a weeklong immersion into Brazil’s corporate and entrepreneurship ecosystem. It has easily been a highlight of my MBA journey so far. There is something beautiful about having a class where the youngest person just turned 20 and the oldest person just turned 50, while having lectures inside a manufacturing plant and learning while the bus is moving across the Brazilian countryside.
We met up with several Brazilian titans of industry, including BTG Pactual, Natura, Embraer, MAYA CAPITAL, Creditas, Itaú Unibanco, Rede D’Or, Magazine Luiza (Magalu), XP Investimentos, Ambev, CI&T, Dexco, Suzano and Raízen. What I found truly admirable was, despite different industries and business sizes, all Brazilian businessmen and women exemplified the same four characteristics time and time again:
1. The humbleness to keep learning , not only from other players in Brazil but also from other countries. Magalu CEO Frederico Trajano visited Silicon Valley and studied eCommerce players there as well as new entrants into the Brazilian ecommerce market before starting his digital transformation strategy. BTG Pactual CEO Roberto Salloui mentioned how, back in the old days, Banco Pactual had never executed a global asset management operation, so the Brazilians were eager to learn from their acquirer UBS in 2006. Former Director of Brazil’s Central Bank João Manoel de Mello mentioned how Brazilian economists went to India to learn from the government’s implementation of UPI so that they could learn best practices for Brazil’s own instant payments platform PIX.
2. Embracing youth in traditional industries. Itaú Unibanco CEO Milton Maluhy Filhoat was 44 when he assumed the position in 2020 and is leading a generational change as the large banks start to compete more aggressively with the intense Brazilian Fintechs. Brick-and-Mortar Magalu CEO Frederico Trajano was 40 when he assumed the position in 2016. Brazilian Brewery Ambev’s CEO Jean Jereissati and CFO Lucas Liro were also in their early 40s when they were appointed to their respective C-Suite roles.
As seen in Figure 1, the Brazilian trends contrast with the increasing US CEO age at hire for the US Fortune 500 and S&P 500 companies. As show in in Figure 2, I was only able to find data up to 2015 , which shows how Brazil was already on average producing younger CEOs than Mexico, India, US, and the Global Average of 55. Especially with the massive fintech and digitalization revolutions Brazil underwent the past 5 years, I am intrigued to see how the numbers look today in 2023. Interestingly, we learned that Itaú Unibanco has a mandatory retirement age of 62; I am not sure how many banks in other countries would pass this requirement.
Figure 1:
Figure 2:
3. The scrappiness to do so much with, at times, so little (Read more in “Difference in Investment Cultures”, link coming soon)
4. The grit to keep pushing forward within such a complicated and at times turbulent market. (Read more in “Sweat More in Peace = Bleed Less in War”)
Thank you fellow students, entrepreneurs, Brazil Wharton Alumni, and real world professors in all the Brazilian companies who hosted and presented to us. I have said this before and I will say it again: LATAM is the future, and Brazil is its fearless innovation leader that will help us get there.
Obrigado Brasil!
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