Stax Alumni Series: Amanda Tripp

When Amanda Linked In Social Network Tripp graduated from California State University, she moved to Chicago in search of a career that would be both intellectually challenging and stimulating. Luckily, Amanda’s brother-in-law had worked with Stax in the past and connected Amanda to the local office, creating an invaluable professional and personal experience. Working at Stax helped Amanda uncover her passion for healthcare and ultimately pursue a Masters of Public Health and now PhD from the Yale School of Public Health.

A Structured Approach to Different Industries

During her time at Stax, Amanda was introduced to a number of different industries ranging from financial services to agriculture. While each presented its own unique challenges, Amanda quickly learned a structured approached and process to her work that could be utilized across all sectors. Amanda also developed the ability to find innovative solutions that had an immediate impact and addressed the business needs of clients, regardless of sector.

With the skills she acquired and the opportunity to work on projects from various industries, Amanda developed a passion for healthcare and alternative financial services, guiding her to her current aim: meaningful work in healthcare public policy. And through her work at Stax, she developed deep insights to these industries with a great deal of overlapping, that would inform her graduate work and leading publication efforts.

Learn from a Mentor

By working at a more tight knit organization like Stax, Amanda was able to work directly with leaders at the firm, like Mark Bremer. Mark, who is President of Stax, guided Amanda during her tenure at Stax. She was impressed by his ability to analyze and understand issues before they even became evident noting that if work was like chess a board, “Mark saw ten moves ahead of you at all the times.”

Manage Projects and Think Creatively

Above all, consulting enhanced Amanda’s critical thinking skills. She is the first to admit that preparing a dissertation can be a lonely journey and daunting task. A typical first reaction is to be overwhelmed by the enormity of it all. However, prior pursuing her PhD Amanda was already used to structuring, guiding and completing a massive amount of research—granted with a full team—in only a few weeks and then defending the results to experts in the field (clients). Through working and learning at Stax, Amanda had a head start on industry knowledge and technical analytical skills, helping her circumvent, and in some cases speed by a lot of the typical roadblocks that many find when going for their PhD.