Student Spotlight: Balancing Life as a Professional & a Student
How Allan Gulley (‘24) is using his MIIPS Online degree to elevate his skills while working a full-time job at a FinTech start-up.
By Hannah Brelsford
Currently, Allan Gulley leads a product team at a FinTech startup, Index Coop. Outside of work, he is an online Master of Integrated Innovation for Products & Services (MIIPS) student. While evaluating graduate education options, Allan considered an MBA, but wanted a more technical program. This led him to the MIIPS Online program.
Carnegie Mellon University was always on his radar as a rigorous school, and the interdisciplinary nature of the Integrated Innovation Institute sealed the deal on his interest in the program.
“There are not any other programs quite like this one.”
The Fast Facts: A Summary of Allan's Time in the MIIPS Online Program
Context Building in the Classroom 📖
- Translating classroom skills to the workplace
- Learning from all disciplines
- Master of Integrated Innovation for Products & Services Online Degree candidate
Industry Experience 📈
- Head of Product at Index Coop
- Experience in academic research and technical consulting
- Committed to innovation in his work
What’s Next 🧳
- Applying his knowledge to his day to day work
- Plans to visit every continent, the last remaining is Antarctica
Go Deeper
Context Building in the Classroom
Allan has learned a lot about product development in Carnegie Classroom, the iii’s online learning space, and he has been able to implement those skills into his work as the Head of Product at Index Coop. The user experience skills he acquired have been extremely valuable for context-building to communicate with other professionals. In the workplace, Allan notes that you always have to work with people from different academic backgrounds, and the iii classroom reflects that.
“The user research and user experience coursework has been helpful for context building so that when I do communicate with designers I have a better idea of what I am talking about. I can ask better questions.”
Through MIIPS, having the opportunity to learn aspects of other disciplines' languages strengthens the student's ability to ask better questions and deepen their understanding within their own area of study.
“I don’t know how else I would get to work with such a diverse group of people. That is a big pro and strength of the program.”
With classmates from all over the globe with the online program, it can be a challenge to find synchronous time to meet together. However, that challenge is also met with the opportunity to globally network and collaborate with individuals.
Throughout his entire career and education, Allan has been drawn to innovation, which is exactly what drew him to the iii. Through the various projects during the iii curriculum, Allan and his classmates had to look at different innovation methods and frameworks. This made them look at aspects of innovation from different lenses, to push them to learn more.
“Every class has had an element of innovation and how one goes about innovating.”
Working full-time and gaining a master’s degree can feel like you are working two full-time jobs, but for Allan, the flexibility of the online MIIPS program has been able to take some of that stress away. With this flexibility, he can continue working where he is based without having to uproot his life to get a quality education.
Industry Experience
Allan’s passion for blockchain technology and cryptocurrency has led him throughout his career, but as his job within a product role grew over the years, he saw an area of improvement within himself. Allan found the iii when he was looking for an opportunity to learn more about the product management space outside of his specialized corner with a technical background.
During and right after his undergraduate degree, Allan worked in an RFID Lab at Auburn University researching blockchain technology and strategy.
This eventually led him to be an independent consultant who provided advising for companies with blockchain and RFID technologies. These technologies help companies trace assets while making sure they are trustworthy and reliable. His expertise within these technologies helped companies implement solutions to the problems that they were facing.
Allan has enjoyed working in a startup environment. He has found that one of the best ways to learn is failure.
“You have to learn a lot on the fly. You make mistakes and you watch products flop the hard way.”
Within the startup space, Allan has spent the last three years building financial products at Index Coop, a FinTech startup looking to make decentralized financial products more accessible. The organization is currently focused on crypto-native assets, but has identified opportunities to work on broader asset classes in the future. In his current role, Allan is applying product management skills taught in the MIIPS course to further his impact within the field.
What’s Next
After graduation Allan seeks to push his learnings from MIIPS even further into his role at Index Coop. Further in the future, he can’t quite say exactly what his career looks like. It could be anything from applied research to venture capital work to continuing on in product roles within the cryptocurrency space, but whatever it may be he is excited for the future.
There is one guarantee in Allan’s future though and that is that he plans to step foot on every continent. With only one left, Antarctica, Allan is confident that he will accomplish this goal sooner than later.