Following his recent successful completion of the Babcock Senior Leaders MBA programme, process engineering manager Juan Gerber says the learning opportunity has opened up new perspectives of the business world which he would never have otherwise been exposed to.
MBA enriches perspective of the business world
One of two South African candidates selected for the three-year programme, which is offered by the University of Strathclyde Glasgow’s Strathclyde Business School in Scotland, Juan has found real value in the opportunity afforded to him. Coming from an engineering background, he says the programme has broadened his understanding of business.
“Our cohort comprised Babcock employees only, from various disciplines and locations, including Marine, Land and Aviation, from the UK, Spain and Italy. Although the syllabus exposed us to other industries, many of the projects were still in the context of Babcock’s international operations, which provided a great opportunity to learn about the business and apply our learnings from the programme to real-world Babcock challenges.”
Regardless of the roles he may play at Babcock in the future, Juan is confident that the knowledge gained form the programme will help the business address current challenges and identify future growth strategies. This will be done through continuous development of capabilities and solutions offered to clients, ensuring that Babcock remains relevant in its various fields and fulfils its purpose of creating a safe and secure world, as it has done for the last 120 years of operation in Africa.
“I am honoured to have been selected for this programme and will forever be thankful to Babcock for providing me with this prestigious learning opportunity,” he says.
Having graduated with a BEng (Mechanical) from the University of Pretoria in 2008, Juan joined Babcock as a junior design engineer and has always found interest in fluid systems and heat transfer. He later joined the Process Engineering team and has over the years played a leading role in a number of Babcock’s flagship projects, including life extension studies, bespoke system upgrades and retrofits, and more recently emissions abatement projects.
In 2013, he registered as a professional engineer, before being promoted to his current role of process engineering manager in 2014. His discipline entails mainly thermal-fluid and combustion system design, analysis and troubleshooting.
