John Wooden Global Leadership Awards

Allen Chen (UCLA-NUS EMBA ’22)

Professor and Chair, University of California, Irvine, School of Medicine

Academic health care is a team sport. Whether caring for sick cancer patients and providing them solace, researching new treatments or educating the next generation of young doctors, creating effective teams is what goes farthest in tackling those goals.

Coach Wooden’s legacy of promoting inclusiveness resonates with me. As an oncologist, I recognize that cancer is a disease that doesn’t affect everybody equally. Underserved communities suffer from disproportionately high incidence and mortality rates, and a distrust of medical institutions still exists.

Perhaps my proudest accomplishment is developing a cancer disparities registry focusing on how ethnicity, socioeconomic background, housing and insurance influence access and treatment. In 2021, I spearheaded the implementation of a “same-day access” clinic for cancer patients. Black, Latino and Asian patients were likelier to use the initiative and wait times for oncology visits were reduced from an average of 11 days to 3.

Data from this project was used to devise outreach programs to bridge many of the identified gaps and serve as the model for access improvement across our entire organization. I was also awarded a grant to develop a health equity curriculum that expands awareness of this issue in the workplace.

I try to see patients not just for their diseases, but as living, breathing individuals. Personalization of care is what I emphasize, and that means understanding that our patients are people with values, goals, loved ones, dreams. Ultimately, everybody on my team is on the same page — trying make the world a kinder, more compassionate place.

Samuel Fein (MBA ’23)

Associate, Transom Consulting Group

Every word you say as a coach matters.

Sports have played a big role in making me who I am. Since high school, I have had a passion for sports-based youth development, which led me to serve as a boys’ varsity basketball head coach for nearly a decade. Coaching has been the most transformational experience of my life.

When people talk about Coach Wooden, they talk about his devotion to his players, his attention to detail. And then they bring up his competitive success. Coach Wooden demonstrated that focusing on the players and the process were more important than the results.

Team sports require participants to be vulnerable and to act selflessly in the best interests of the team. Coaches have limitless opportunities to positively impact their players. Our responsibility is to inspire our players to act with empathy, courage and generosity on a team. By instilling these values, coaches can inspire their players’ experiences that lead to team success.

How does Coach Wooden’s philosophy influence my life and the evolution of my leadership style? I’ve always tried to make leadership decisions that enable me to contribute the most to the communities I serve. As a leader, both on the court and professionally, I have been fortunate to develop wonderful relationships with my colleagues and students. As I transition into my post-MBA life as a team-oriented consultant, I want to continue to serve those around me to the best of my ability.

Sonia Ly (EMBA ’23)

Administrator, Chatsworth Park Health Care Center

I work in skilled nursing, rehabilitation and convalescent care. And I think I was always destined to work in this industry.

Eight months into my current job, I had to figure out the best way to get information about COVID-19 protocols and regulation to my team — and to families because all visitation was restricted, like a curtain coming down. Family members were having trouble calling in to ask their questions. Everyone was looking to me for answers.

In Coach Wooden’s spirit of teamwork, I relied on my team members’ individual expertise and let them come back with ideas. I also tried to instill humility in my team so they felt free to admit what was or was not working, even if it was my idea. We made a decision to communicate with families the way they wanted: an old-fashioned phone call. It took a few weeks for the process to become streamlined, and the families began to trust us more. It was exhausting, but a call a day was rewarding for us, too. It’s the human touch.

On reflection, I identify with attributes like loyalty and cooperation that form the foundation of Coach Wooden’s Pyramid of Success. Now I aspire to refine my leadership by strengthening the second tier of my own pyramid — better self-control, steady alertness and greater initiative and intentness. I’ll never forget that night in March 2020 when I sat on my staircase, stunned to read that the federal government ordered nursing homes to restrict all visitation because of COVID-19. On the other side of that experience, I feel confident that in continuing to build my foundation I can lead my team to rise above new challenges that will ultimately enable us to keep our facility thriving.

Nick Sharma (FEMBA ’23)

Senior Operations Manager, Amazon

With the onset of the pandemic in 2020, I faced my greatest professional challenge yet. I was a department head at a luxury resort, tasked with letting every team member go. And at the end of an excruciating week, I too was asked to leave.

Each employee was like family to me, and the experience tested my faith in myself and my profession. Over the course of my unemployment, I reached out to my former staff, offering help with job resources, resumes, mock interviews and unemployment benefits. I was struck by the newfound sense of purpose in their success, as I managed to help many of them find new jobs.

Coach John Wooden’s example of loyalty and intention inspired me to pursue my MBA, improve my physical and mental health, and secure my dream job at Amazon, sparking a commitment to employ empathy in all facets of my life.

In 2021, I was given the opportunity to help my hometown when the disastrous delta variant hit India. Almost overnight, my childhood community was extinguished like a light. I lost five family members and two friends, along with countless neighbors and colleagues. So, from faraway L.A., I led a fundraising effort to secure $15,000 and I headed home to apply the funds directly via neighborhood support groups.

I would not have been able to affect as many lives as I have, even within my darkest moments, without the transformed leadership style I learned through John Wooden’s tenets. I’m eager to see where his principles take me as a humanitarian, father and executive.