College business team makes a good case
An Okanagan College accounting team scored a third-place finish at a prestigious business competition.
The Queen’s University Intercollegiate Business Competition draws teams from Canada and beyond. Usually, OC sends teams to compete in Kingston, Ont., but this year the event was held online.
Kayla Berlinski and Zina Park earned the third-place finish. They were coached by Okanagan College professors Adrian Fontenla, Mary Ann Knoll and Josh Widmann.
In the competition, teams must come with solutions to a business case presented to them. The local competitors were prepared.
“Our coaches simulated a true competition day on three separate occasions where we were
given past ICBC cases to crack in the allotted time and present our solution,” said Park.
“The most stressful part about competing virtually was the possibility of a technical issue disrupting us on presentation day,” said Berlinski. “However, we were able to work out a lot of technical issues during our practice presentation days. Thankfully we did not run into any technical issues on competition day.”
“They (Park and Berlinski) improved each time and demonstrated their best performance during the final weekend,” said coach Widmann.
“Both are calm and collected public speakers which really impressed the judges.”
Two other OC teams made it to the finals Makayla Hawthorne and Nico Dirksen (the finance team), and Rachel Wehrmann and Matty-Lyn Fedorowich (the human resources team).
“Business case competitions provide our students with a chance to use their acquired knowledge and skills, polish them, and put them to the test against students from other institutions,” said William Gillett, dean of the Okanagan College School of Business.