Biography
Wendy Evans is the consummate cheerleader. “If anyone says, ‘I can’t commit to an MBA,’ I say, ‘Yes you can. If I can do it, you can do it!’” she says. She is not speaking facetiously. Evans was four decades deep into her highly successful career and a 59-year-old mother of two when she opted to follow a dream she had long put off: earning her MBA. “I was (and am) working a 60-hour-a-week job and traveled often for business,” she says. In spite of her heavy schedule and life commitments, she decided to go for it. Now a newly minted graduate of Barry University’s Master of Business Administration program, Evans has only one regret: she wishes she had earned her degree sooner. Glimpse at her impressive resume, and you’ll see why she waited.
In 1989, soon after earning her bachelor’s degree in Broadcast Communications and Government from Western Kentucky University, Evans became a law-enforcement officer in her hometown of Louisville. Within a decade, she had risen through the ranks to join the FBI as a special agent. “I loved the job,” she says, “but having kids later in life—and a husband in same field—led me to accept a private-sector job with Lockheed Martin in 2006.” She has remained with the company ever since, working first as a Global Security Operations Manager, and now as an Ethics and Compliance Officer, a role that frequently finds her speaking at conferences around the world. But for Evans, success with her Fortune 500 company did not negate her desire for growth. “Retirement isn’t part of my vocabulary,” she says. “I knew my final years at my current company—and the next steps afterward—would be more productive with an MBA.”
She began researching business schools and was immediately impressed by Barry University, which offered an MBA with a specialization in International Business as well as the flexibility of online courses and an accelerated year-long program. As a remote learner, Evans initially worried that she would feel disconnected; but those early jitters vanished thanks to the direct faculty mentorship she received. “I felt like I got to know every single professor,” she says. “I felt as ‘at home’ at Barry as if I were physically at the campus in Miami—yet I obtained my MBA at home in Orlando.”
Evans hasn’t wasted any time putting the skills and knowledge she gained at Barry to good use in her role with Lockheed Martin. “I can see now, having finished my MBA, how valuable this knowledge would have been earlier in my career,” she says. She hopes her story will uplift and encourage anyone with dreams of earning their advanced degree. “Many things in life tempt you to put education on the back burner as you get older,” she says. “But if I can do it, so can you.”