Top MBA Programs Target Diversity for Real-Life Case Studies

You can also listen to our radio show at two pm Eastern Time on Bloomberg Radio or watch us on YouTube search Bloomberg Global News. You are listening to Bloomberg Business Week Carol Master along with Shinali Bassik here in our interactive broker studio. Let's get to a little bit more on COVID and the vaccine because top of mine Sali mentioned it earlier. We've got President Bush his push to begin offering third doses of Visor's vaccine, facing the

first of two crucial tests. Advisers to the FDA meeting today to talk about whether booster shots should be offered to most Americans. So the process moving forward today, we are expecting some type of vote expected later this afternoon. So let's see what's top of mind for Dr Ian LUs Bader, his clinical Professor Medicine at n y U Land Going. He joined us once again on the phone in New York City. Hey, Ian, good to have you back with us. How are you. I'm good, Happy Friday,

and welcome back Caros, Thank you, thank you. I got a needed break and it's good to be back. But I do feel like so many of the same stories that I left are still here, understandably, So how do you see the way forward when it comes to this pandemic? You and I UH and Tim and our team have been talking to you a lot. What's next here? So there's a big debate about the third dost or the or the booster dose for COVID, and you know who,

what and when is really the question. A lot of this data is based on Israel, where you know, they had a relationship with the fiser and they got their vaccines very early, really December in January. It's not earlier last year, so it's been almost a year. And what they are noting is really the effectiveness of the vaccine is dropping from about to about and that's both due to dropping antibody levels, which we know happens after a while, and also mutations, you know in the virus. This was

to the alpha variant. The delta variant actually has a different confirmation of the spike protein, and so based on a number of issues, including a much higher viral load of with delta, people are asymptomatic and often have very very high levels. So that's really what we're seeing, and concern about transfer. I mean, in other words, you're not getting sick, but you're now have ability to pass COVID around. Yes,

I think that's certainly one of the elements. So that's really what we're seeing in Israel, and really what we're seeing here is that the majority of people who've been vaccinated are not getting very sick at all. A small sent are and in Israel and here as well, the small percent of people who've been vaccinated. Actually in Israel

it's about half the hospitalized patients had two vaccines. They typically have heart disease or lung disease, diabetes, hypertension, they have a number of other issues, and so it is likely if we're going to do a booster, it should be in those susceptible groups. You know, we know that the third vaccine really does raise antibodies. The question is doesn't change anything? Will it really change hospitalization and death rates?

So that's really the question. And then the question also comes up, what about side effects or potential side effects months or years down the line. So what do you make of the meeting today of the FDA advisors and what will come out of it? How fast can we expect decisions to be made by the Biden administration and then guidance given to the bulk of the country. You know, candidly,

I think we need more data. We really should have been all along the way doing a variety of our own studies, both on the MR and A vaccines and patient populations, monoclonal antibodies, UM other drugs and other treatments, you know, for COVID, we we really should be a leader instead of relying on other data. My bet is that they are going to say it's absolutely reasonable for people the IMMO compromised people with underlying diseases, but I think they're going to wait on advising it for a

big group of people. First of all, we know a lot of people now really have very high endibody levels, you know, and what we don't know is we'll even higher antibody levels really make a significant difference. We before we subject people to the potential risk of a third vaccine, we really should know. Does a higher antibody level really

change an outcome? That's really the question. This is a really big week with so many people going back to school, So what are you expecting for the next buple of weeks. Does that mean that there may be a lot more cases? And does that um really start to change the calculus of how people think about this disease. You know, even though we're getting closer to what we used to think of her immunity is right vaccinations. Seventy Americans have had

at least one vaccine. There's a group of about fifty or sixty million people who you know, remain unvaccinated, although slowly that seeming to chip down. I think we are going to continue to see a rise in COVID cases really in the unvaccinated, and I think everyone ultimately is going to be exposed to delta. It's highly contagious, but I think most people who are vaccinated will have either minimal or no symptoms. They'll have a cost, they'll have a cold, and if they don't get tested, they may

never even really know. And I think eventually we will all build up antibodies to that, and unless there's a new mutation, I think we will sort of learn to live with delta, you know, one that group of fifty million people you know, wind up getting it. Now. Of course there will be some hospitalizations and deaths in the unvaccinated, but that at this point is a relatively small percent of the population. Well, and it is interesting. I thought

the point you made about a third dose. We don't necessarily know all the side effects of getting one, and that's just something to consider as they as they move forward. Certainly regulators, Um, Dr Lusbader, sit tight, We'll come back. Dr Ian los Bader, where you're talking with on this Friday's clinical professor of medicine over at n y U Landgoing Medical Center on the phone in New York City? Are you ready Shinale to get a third booster? I would like it as soon as possible, like him would

be like, I want it yesterday. UM. I do like that they're gathering more information because I think we're getting pieces from different parties, and you know, we know, right data is important to really understanding maybe what's to come. Definitely, what's the best move? Definitely, but people are back in full force. It definitely feels like it definitely feels it. Are you are listening to Bloomberg this week on this Friday, Carol Masser, Shinali Bassik, and we'll be back in just

a moment right here on Bloomberg Radio. Let's get right back to Dr Ian los Beta, clinical professor of Medicine at n y U Landgown, still with us on the phone in New York City. So Dr ls Beder, one thing that really caught my attention when you said, you know, we don't know the side effects of a third possible dose. I mean we are still learning in real time about these vaccines and about you know, the impact it has on our body. What are the concerns that kind of

an overdosing of a COVID vaccine could mean? So, you know, everything in life is a risk and a benefit ratio whatever decisions we make, and certainly being unprotected against COVID is not a smart thing to do, because we do know that about a third of patients have long COVID, so we do our best to protect the issue was raised about influenza absolutely. Flu shots, although not perfectly effective, certainly can be very helpful. You know, we're starting to

give that now, so that's important. We certainly know the two vaccines are really reduced of for COVID, certainly reduced the risk of death and hospitalization. We don't know that much about the third vaccine. We certainly know a small percentage of people who get the m R and A shots um can have other issues myocarditis, pericardius or neurologic issues. Yes, it is a very small number, and overall, the the benefit of the vaccine over overrides really the risks. But

people should know that these are not risk free vaccines. Importantly, side effects can occur. Importantly, Also, the vaccines are different and differences are emerging across them. How do you parse what's most important when it comes to the differences between the vaccines themselves. So at this point, um, it does little like the Maderna m R and A vaccines really

do give a little bit longer lasting protection. Part of that might be the time interval, right, So initially we were giving a three week interval between a fiser and four weeks with the Maderna. It does turn out that maybe that gap between the first two shots really can give you longer lasting protection. J and J initially did not have numbers quite as high, but over time it

does seem to help. And that also seems to be boosted if you give an MR and a vaccine several weeks or months after the the J and J. So it does look like for the majority of people, of healthy people, they are pretty well protected. I want to say, whither without approval At this point, people can go into you know, local pharmacies. I've got patients who get their vaccines. It really so there's no one preventing that. But it really has to be a recommendation B on the science

behind it. And I don't think we really know other than saying that vulnerable people elderly diabetes, I mean it was suppressed. They're the risk of getting delta and complications are much higher than your average person who's otherwise healthy, who's who has already had two vaccines. Kitty Gratfeld was on with me yesterday at Bloomberg and she she only actually talked about people she knows. You just walked into pharmacies and like, I need a shot. It was a

third shot, and they just did it. It happened to me in front of me the other day, did it, Yes, so we know it's happening. Well, go ahead, people if they want to get it, you know you can do it. And people who don't want vaccines, you know. Obviously we're not yet forcing people to do that in the United States. Um, but I think we should wait for more data. And I don't think there's an emergency at this point. If you're otherwise healthy, it is not a panic to get

a third booster at this time. Hey, real quickly thirty seconds here? You know, China can't seem to get a break. There is so where where there's tons of people, lots of vaccines have been given out. They contract data points like no other uh probably country. Their problems tell tell you what about this virus? And again just got about thirty seconds. Well, I'm not sure how effective the sign of VAC vaccine really is and they maybe having other mutations that they're not testing for. We need to do

a better job. In general. There are new nasal vaccines for COVID that are being worked on. There are a lot of different approaches that we really need to make efforts that may be equally or more effective for new mutations. The data out of China could be a new mutation or could just be a less effective vaccine. All right, good, great always Ian, thank you, thank you, thank you. Have a wonderful and safe weekend. Dr Ian las Bader, clinical Professor of Medicine at n y U Land, going on

the phone in New York City. The more I learned, the more I feel like I don't know, but he helps. He does help clarify a lot. Though. You're listening to Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Messer and Bloomberg Quick Takes Tim Stinovic on Bloomberg Radio. Well, you know we often reference something being a great business school case study. We to that a lot here on Bloomberg Business Week. Case studies now part of business school's efforts to improve diversity.

Let's get into it. It's all part of the coverage of Bloomberg Business Weeks annual survey and coverage of the world's top NBA program. So let's get into it with Bloomberg Business Week, getor Joe Weber here in our Interactive broker studio, and also with us Bloomberg News Higher Education Finance reporter Janet Lauren on the phone, in New York City case studies right at the heart of like getting an m b A. And yet yeah, well, and it is a topic that we think about it the magazine

a lot. I like in some of our our most noteworthy stories to to sort of our version case studies. And so I thought this was a really interesting story, um that Janet was able to contribute to the package. Because you go to business school, what do you what

do you learn? Yeah? That's to me. Yeah, well, the case studies really the DNA of that experience, right, and as you as we've all known for the past uh from all of our amazing reporting from the past year, it's like, all right, this is a lot of white and male stuff, right, so so let's shake up the case study, right, So Janale, what does that end up looking like? Oh? Well, what's so interesting? And I'm curious

to see what Janet found here. But to the point, there are a lot of you know, if you're going into retail, you will find more case studies where women have become the CEO turned things around. But when it comes to other more hardcore areas of finance where women have not really dominated yet, like quant finance, I mean even the class. It was like two women in most of my classes. So and very few case studies that involved women because the women have not risen to the

CEO level in those industries yet. So, Janet, how are they changing this? Well, it doesn't have to be the CEO to be a compelling character in a case study. For example, the one we mentioned in our story was rosal And Fox of John Dear, the tractor agriculture manufacturer UM. And she was the first black woman manager of a factory, and that was a compelling enough reason for Harvard to feature her as a case study. That's why that was interesting.

I think I always think about case studies as being these huge big blow ups or problems or or you know, it's usually involving the C suite and the CEO or something. But as you point out, there are some really great stories case studies and lessons to be learned by people UM.

Certainly diversity UH and diverse people maybe lower on UH you know, the career ladder, but they're still leaders and still facing challenges, and they're still dealing with with issues and problems, and it's you know, you can learn as much from somebody who may not be the CEO by listening to their experience. And if you read the case study of Rosalind Fox, you know you could hear about the isolation she you know, she experienced while living in a small town of in Wisconsin a six months people.

And she was recruited by John Dear and you know that was one of the things she was concerned about in going and taking the job. In another case studying we mentioned UM. Stanford, in addition to Harvard, has been doing a lot of outreach and just asking their alumni and asking faculty members to reach out and find other UM potential protagonists with diverse backgrounds. And Stanford featured you know, a woman who runs a car dealership, a black woman

who runs a car dealership in Dayton, Ohio. Um, and she's the second generation running that card dealership. And uh, you know that was an interesting case study for Stanford, you know, which bears mentioning. Stanford number one in our tanking of NBA UH NBA schools, UH programs. Um. Yeah, I here's my big question. So so interesting Stanford number one in networking, number one in compensation, such great things, but they're not among the top ten when it comes

to diversity. I don't want to be super tough on these business schools because I've got to say they're not doing horrible, all right, I mean they are top twenty. I've got to say, when I went to business school, I was more pleased with the diversity than I wasn't even in college. So Joel, how did I mean, how did you guys even think about how to approach diversity in these programs as you guys did this for the

first time. Well, the it's all driven by survey, right, and so it ends up being thousands and thousands and thousands of surveys, and that is our data point, right, like, whatever those responses are what we build that around recognizing that this was such an important thing that we wanted to actually help acknowledge in the schools are recognized that there's a challenge here, but they're also doing things about it. And that's what we effectively, you know, centered the survey

questions on UM. But you know what what that ties into, I think is also what this article of Janet's reflect which is that case study about John Dear didn't come from a professor, right when did you come from? Janet? It came from a student, and that students said I want to be reflected in these case studies. And she she spoke up and she suggested Rosalind Fox. Rosalind was not her manager, but she was someone who mentored her at John Deere and Low and behold she became a

case study. And Harvard is mandating and it's required first year NBA courses that every every course have a protagonist with a diverse background. So what I like about that she just shows this relationship that I think the business schools are really they're leaning into their own students, right, and they recognize that their own students can help them solve these problems, and that surfaces new material that they

wouldn't otherwise have been able to have. So I just thought that was a really really clever insight into what makes business schools also special, right, And like we we've gotten to so many of these business schools together, and it's like that network that is the network effect, right for all these people together, and you you talk about the problems and solutions and you create better leaders out of it, right, Exactly What's interesting We talked about brands

all the time and how customers are pushing brands and companies right to be were diverse or were sensitive to the environment. What's interesting, though, Janet is a student pushing this, you know, to get a more diverse case study. Yet in your story you point out that it might be unclear whether professors will embrace it equally. What did you

hear about that? So? Um so the professor that I spoke with at U C. L A. Had talked about how, you know, like a decade ago, you know, in a psychology course, he had brought in um diverse people in his in his discussions and case studies, and he said students were wondering, well, why why are you Why are you including this? It doesn't really feel relevant. And now a decade later, you know, students are really asking for it.

But the question is book, If you're a business school professor and you've been teaching a class for decades, you know you that add more work for you to change out your case studies. You know, it's a lot of work to find case studies to to you know, have to teach them, and they may not want to switch up their courses if you know you've got an oldie, but goody, you know who who's going to replace that?

And it takes effort on that time unto students keep answering these surveys that you're doing, Joel and saying this is what we want. You know, that's exactly right. And and it's also why we've continued to just champion this this ranking because like the students end up being the engine that drives it, they become alumni. The alumni also are a big part of who do takes part in these surveys. The more you do that, the more it

actually helps everything. Joe, Well, we're gonna have more offshoots of certainly the Business Week coverage in the magazine that's in weeks to come. Joe Weber, thank you so much. Have a great weekend. Editor Bloomberg Business Week. Here in our studio, Janet Laura and check her out at Janet Lauren on Twitter, Higher education finance reporter at Bloomberg News. You can find her story too at business week dot com. This is Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Masser and Bloomberg

Quick Takes. Tim Stinovic on Bloomberg Radio. Let's get in to it. Our check on the cryptocurrency world. We've got a company that is developing digital tools to merge the traditional capital markets and crypto assets here to tell us more and Jale and I've been talking behind the scenes. We have a million questions for Alec Flenberg you see of Nimbus. He's on the phone in New York City, Alex. UM, so great to have you here with Shinali and myself.

First of all, I've been reading about your company, and I'm going to be quite honest with you. UM, I'm a little confused, so tell me exactly what you guys do. So so good afternoon, ladies, and thank you so much for having me on the show. It's a real pleasure. UM. And I hope and I hope. Well, I think there's only a ten minute segment, so a million questions going to be pretty tough. Try to speak. Well, have you

back again, UM, So what do we do? We we are firmly fixed in providing solutions within the decentralized finance space. What does that really just mean in layman's terms, all of the things that we've been doing, uh, you know, in the centralized standard eyes general uh financial services space and the lending space. UM, in the traditional trading space, we're going to be looking to do exactly the same things and leveraging what the team's you know, multiple decades.

I would say at least every every single leader on this team has at least three decades in the UH centralized you know, standardized financial services space. So we're looking to bring that experience to the decentralized space. What does that mean. Yeah, So decentralized finance. One way, I try to explain it to people and tell me how you make the comparison. The centralized finance reminds me a lot of peer to peer lending, where there's a human being

on the other side somewhere. Um, how does this actually work? And how do you compare it to just peer to peer lending like we've seen the last several years, right, So so so peer to peer lending. So peer to peer lending is one component of the centralized finance, right and and that's also how we've we're starting, you know,

from the tools designs that we're implementing. So we're we're actually provided two main apps, right, One that's for lending and borrowing h with you know, through peer to peer UH and also the exchange of currency off exchange so that we don't have any fees associated with it. And also because we're not an exchange. We're doing it off exchange. Um, it's impossible to hack us, right, So, so there's a

great risk metrics there. But from a peer to peer perspective, uh, there's very little difference between what decentralized finances and peer to peer is providing versus what the last two decades of the lending clubs and and the prospers uh that they've done. Except they've done it off change and we're doing it on change. So why is it better? Why

is it better? So I'll tell you sees ultimately, Ultimately, ultimately, if we think about all of the decentralized activity that we've seen over the last twenty or so years, starting from you know, I mean you know mean no long we're having to call a broker in order to get an executioner to get a quote. Right. Uh, When when that deessentralization happened and we started being able to trade from our phones and our laptops without having to me that call. Remember, transparency uh was it was a big

part of that. But also primarily it was the spees I drove that if I don't if I don't have to use a broker, I can do the same things without those seas, and that's driving this industry as wend so magical lower fees per peer learning. But the reality too is there's a lot of risk involved. How do you get comfortable with lending and barrowing two people you don't know without actually insurance? By the way, like, where's

the oversight? Who? All? Right? Right? So I'm very happy he said that because Look, one of the thing, one of the reasons I keep harping on the fact that the leadership of this team has spent their lifetime, you know, I've spent twenty seven years in the in the you know, in the real standardized you know, centralized financial services. The reason I keep harping on that is because you're there is a tremendous amount of risk, inherent risk in doing

it on chain or off chain. Right. The reason why it's so important to pick products that are being developed by folks with our level of experience is that we're not looking to dethrone traditional finance, right, We're not looking There are no you know, to us, you know, the standardized, generalized, centralized banking sector. They're not the enemy. And let's let's be realistic, ladies, you know, just because we're calling it

a disruption. Just because we're calling it as an industry decentralization move doesn't mean that this traditional banking institutions and alternative assets institutions are not going into the space. They are going to go into the space very very heavily, and they bring with them a tremendous amount of experience and and liquidity. So we're actually providing that level of experience and oversight to the community as well. Alex just

quickly got about forty twonds left here. I mean, my understanding is you guys are moving towards a listing on on with American Stock Exchange. So is the plan or maybe is it ultimately that you end up being linked up, bought out by merged with one of the traditional financial Wall Street houses. And again just quickly so so I'll tell you, being a compliance officer for many years, there's no way that I could actually even speak to that. But I am going to tell you that you are

right that we are. We are moving very heavily uh to bring in a k y C n m L and get registered in the state or for for global purposes, all right, because we do feel that there's a good balance to actually do that but but yeah, that's that's certainly the direction of all right, we still have nine thousand questions to ask you, but we'll do that next time. Alex thinks so much. Alex Lemberg, CEO at Nimbus, on the phone in New York City. I'm a journal now,

but you let me drive. No, no, no, all right, please, I'll do the right I want to try question. This is the drive to the globe. Give thanks, We'll try us down on Bloomberg Radio. Let's get to it. We've just got about ten nine minutes left in today's trading session. We're hovering around our worst levels of the day. We are on track for a second down week when it comes to US equities. Let's get to it with Ryan Kelly, Senior VP portfolio manager at Hennessey Funds with us on

the phone in Raleigh, North Carolina. Among the funds he helps manage, the Hennessy Gas Utility Fund up about eleven year to date, putting it in the eighty second percentile among its peers. That's according to Bloomberg Data. Ryan, the energy story is certainly one that we've been watching this week. How are you and how do you see that? Group? Hi? Good, to be on again. Good to hear from you and

the group. Utility group has certainly been lagging this year last year as well, but that's usually the time when we think it starts to get a little bit more interesting. UM. This is a group that we like for many reasons. Uh. It has good dividend yields, it has a nice long term uh projection of earnings, it's pretty stable earnings. These are companies that we need no matter what. It's a

central part of the economy. UM. And yes, they have been sort of pushed to the side last year and this year, but this also makes it at this point much more compelling valuation. They're trading at about a three multiple discount to the SMP five. Generally they actually trade just slight premium to the SMP. But you know, there's been so much money going into all the other sectors of the market and too. You know, last year is

all about large cap it was about technology. Uh. This year, Uh, some of the sectors that really got hammered last year, such as financials and energy, they've come flying back this year. But you know, something like utilities, we think it is still a really good long term holding for long term investors, So how much are you rushing the safety now? You made this comment about how these are companies that will

do well no matter what. We've seen a few days of slight full pullbacks in SMP in the last week or so. Are you looking for safety now? Well? I think, UM, you know, we've seen a little pullback, we're still only about two and a half percent off the highs give or take. UM. This is such a resilient market. It's it's hard to to tell, you know, if we are going to have that next big correction that everybody talks about UM. And you know we've seen it again and

again for the last year. Ever, every time that there's a pullback, it takes on average five days to hit a new high UM. So UM, you know, things seem a little different maybe this time, but potentially not. No,

this is more of UM. I like to talk about utilities in this space a little bit more long term right now, in that we are entering there is a defensive side, which you mentioned, but we're entering really the first endings i'd say, of a very very long term transformative UM expansion for many of these companies UM driven by clean energy, driven by new technologies driven by electrification.

If we are going to get to a space a place where we have you know, say, um, many more electric vehicles on the on the road, and many more appliances being you know, you using electricity. I've seen studies that show that we're going to need an electrical grid which is two times bigger than it is right now, which means what good things for natural gas? It means it means good things for a few things we have in this fund. We have utilities in general, so it's

really good for electric utilities. This is a long term runway of growth and utilities in general, whether it's natural gas or electric. Um. These are the companies that when they invest in their infrastructure. This infrastructure a huge word right now. When Capex goes up, longer term earnings per share go up, but it causes growth rate and earnings per share when they have to spend more to reinvest in our infrastructure and to get bigger. Is there right?

One thing I do wonder though increasingly Snolly knows it. She covers it, She talks about it all the time about you know, e s G on Wall Street among institutional investors, you know, looking for kind of a greener way forward, greener it's a little vague I think right now, because there aren't really true standards out there when it comes to regulators and what it means. But I mean, do you see in the near future that you're gonna have to pivot more because institutional investors will demand it.

Investors will demand it that your investments reflect a cleaner way forward when it comes to the impact on the environment. Well, I mean, I think there's certainly that that that pressure that's happening already, and that that's not only from institutional investors and other investors, it's also from the companies themselves. UM, many utilities themselves. Uh. They are pushing for whether or not the government is or you know, politically we're moving

that way or not. They are pushing for net zero type emissions by twenty fifty duke energy down in my area, for instance. So that movement is happening, and that does mean a whole lot of investment for many decades to come.

I think personally, the way that we believe is that, um, it's going to be really hard to go to straight on full renewables, and natural gas is a very good complementary energy source to renewables, because you know, there are certain times when we have to have a large scale quickly turned on electricity generation, and natural gas is a very good way to do that. You know you own Berkshire as well. For me, Caroline, I love watching the Berkshire bets. What do you want? What do you want

Warren Buffett to be doing with all that extra money? Well, it's an interesting question. So, UM, the the way that this fund is run, it is a fund which is primarily invested in any company, most of companies that are natural gas distribution companies. Now Berkshire Hathaway obviously does not sound like one at all, Um, but they have a very large company within their structure called min American, which is a utility company and energy company. So that's why

it's in the fund. UM, and it happens to be, you know, market cap weighted funds, so it's UM one of the largest holdings in the stand. Well, good to get some time with you. This is certainly a topic we've been talking a lot about more generally when it comes to energy and just kind of watching several hotspots around the world when it comes to energy crunches. Ryan, Thank you so much. Ryan, Kelly, He's portfolio manager at Hennessy Funds on the from Raleigh. Thanks for listening to

Bloomberg Business Week. Download the podcast on iTunes, SoundCloud, or Bloomberg dot com, and you can also listen to our radio show at two pm Eastern on Bloomberg Radio or watch us on YouTube. Search to Bloomberg Global News