Caterpillar Young Professionals is aiming to give Bradley engineering and business students a semester’s worth of educational experience in a month by analyzing actual Caterpillar business cases with the fourth annual Caterpillar Case Competition.
Jason Garrett, associate dean of the Foster College of Business, helps students get involved in the competition.
Bradley students go through a very competitive application process in order to get accepted to participate in the competition, according to Garrett.
Those who get accepted in the program go through four training sessions that take place on Wednesdays in October. These sessions lead up to the competition Nov. 6 and 7. Students participate in something very similar to an all-nighter at the competition, Garrett said.
Each session has students tackling a different topic. Defining and measuring will be the topic Oct. 21, whereas analyzing, improving and controlling is the topic being covered Oct. 28. A panel discussion will take place Nov. 4 covering non-disclosure agreements and tips to help students in the competition.
Managers at Caterpillar submit applications over the summer for the cases to be looked at in the competition. At the official competition, students work with Caterpillar Young Professionals at the Caterpillar facility. Students don’t see anything on the case until the morning of Nov. 6, Garrett said. Students will present their findings Nov. 7 to Caterpillar executives in their boardroom.
Garrett stressed how important this opportunity is for Bradley students. He said the competition is a great resume builder and allows the students to act as leaders. Students learn to work with professionals and can apply the knowledge they have been learning in the classroom directly to the cases they are working on.
Senior industrial engineering major Conner Garrison is currently participating in this year’s case competition. He spoke about the challenges he’s faced throughout the competition and how it has been beneficial to his major.
“Working with professionals has been my biggest experience from the case competition thus far,” Garrison said. “It’s very important to get used to ‘talking the talk’ in the professional world. Understanding verbiage and diction is huge before I go out in my professional career. It puts me a step ahead of others fresh out of college.”
Garrison said he’s not particularly nervous about the big competition because he’s doing it for fun. However, he said anyone who is interested should give this competition a shot.
“Go out and challenge yourself,” Garrison said. “It’ll be something out of your comfort zone that you’ll remember the rest of your life. Also, you can talk about it in a job interview. It’s a challenge, but you build your network and it’s a good time.”
Garrett calls the Caterpillar Case Competition “one of the premier events for College of Business and College of Engineering.”
