MSM Executive MBA – in the spotlight Razvan Mogos

Can you tell us a bit more about your background?
I have a master’s degree from the University of Construction in Bucharest, and I started my professional career in 1998 with The Bucharest Municipality Heating Company as a Project Manager.

My career at Marriott started in 2010, when I joined the JW Marriott Bucharest Grand Hotel as the Director of Engineering. There I won two prestigious awards: Marriott Best Energy Saving Programs Inside Kitchens within Europe, and the 1st place of Top Performing Companies for the most responsible company on environment protection in Romania.

Since 2017, I have been Director of Engineering at Amsterdam Marriott Hotel and on 1st of August 2021, I officially moved into my new position of Area Director of Engineering for Marriott Western Europe and Maghreb which is a big step moving forward in my career.

Already armed with a master’s degree and a bag full of working experience, you decided to pursue an Executive MBA. Can you tell us why you were keen on following an MBA?
After graduating from university, I undertook several courses to further develop my skills and to help me in better managing my job tasks.

I considered an MBA as the best education to further develop my managerial, leadership and communication skills, and to gain new knowledge on business related aspects. I would see myself learning from the most experienced professors, in a class with a very diverse range of students, representing different cultures, working for multinational companies and being experts in their fields.

Having more than 20 years of experience in engineering I was looking for an MBA to help me boosting and enhancing my career, and in April 2020 I had the chance to be admitted in the Executive MBA at MSM. 

It is clear that you had high expectations about an MBA program. Why did you choose the Executive MBA program at MSM?
After looking into some options of other famous MBA schools, mainly from The Netherlands and UK, I found out that MSM is the closest and most appropriate school to fulfill my expectations, as described earlier.

Two very important aspects on taking the decision to follow the Executive MBA at MSM were the high level of accreditation (AMBA, IACBE, ACBSP and NVAO), and the courses included in the program.

Before enrolling in the Executive MBA, I visited an MSM Open Day and had the chance to participate for half a day in one of the Executive MBA courses at the MSM campus, together with the students that were already in the program. This experience gave me the confidence to go for the Executive MBA at MSM.

You already mentioned that you will take up a new role within Marriott, as the Area Director of Engineering for Marriott Western Europe and Maghreb. Can you tell us a bit more about your responsibilities within this position?
As the Area Director of Engineering, Western Europe & Maghreb I provide functional engineering and facilities leadership. In addition, I will share my expertise regarding facilities management, sustainability, discipline technology platforms, capex planning/execution and energy conservation for all Marriott International hotel brands within Western Europe and Maghreb Area.

In this leadership role I will have the overall responsibility for managing and implementing the engineering strategy for the Western Europe and Maghreb Area. This includes defining and presenting opportunities for operational improvement, evaluating risks, providing effective solutions, and implementing systems and processes that leverage and support enterprise strategies to maximize guest satisfaction and engineering performance. 

It sounds like quite a responsible and tough position. Why did you choose to go for this position?
Choosing this position is part of my mindset. I always had in my mind that I need to exceed my limits! I never stopped on improving my performance and I will continue to do my best each day.

Since I have joined Marriott in 2010, I have been able to continuously develop myself, to grow within my area of responsibility in the hotels where I was working as Director of Engineering, but also helping other hotels from Europe in a Task Force or with new hotel openings.

Taking into consideration my expertise as one of the top performing Directors of Engineering within Marriott Europe, I felt that this is a logic step on moving forward in my career.

Marriott has a very strong culture that revolves around putting people first and being always a company focused on helping employees grow their careers.

Did the MSM Executive MBA help you in growing into this new role?
The Executive MBA helped me a lot! Basically, all courses that I have finished so far have prepared me for this great opportunity. Initially, I have been thinking that the Executive MBA will be an investment from which I will get the benefits throughout my career, and now became a school which already changed my life. 

And you finalized already many courses so far, right?
Yes, indeed, I have.

I have completed Digital Transformation, Global Supply Chain Management, Leadership & Organizational Behavior, Entrepreneurship, Global Corporate Strategy, Research Methods, Decision Making Tools, Economics for Managers, Marketing in Global Context and Change Management.

So, we can conclude that you use the lessons learned from the Executive MBA in your daily job and life?
Yes, the lessons learned from the modules I have finished so far have certainly been applied in my personal and professional activities. To give a quick example, the last two courses Leadership & Organizational Behavior provided by Dr. Stephanie Jones and Change Management by Prof. Dr. Geert Heling helped me to understand what my personal strengths and leadership capabilities are for my new position of Area Director of Engineering, Western Europe & Maghreb, and how I can be better prepared for facing the upcoming challenges within my organization.

As mentioned, you have already finalized a big part of the Executive MBA program. Can you share your experience in the program so far?
The Executive MBA at MSM is a part of my personal and professional life. The modules are up-to-date and extremely interesting, providing a lot of tools for managers and leaders to perform in their job. Apart from that, the professors are doing their best not only on delivering the courses but also on providing personal feedback and on supporting each student. Especially in this period, in which the Covid pandemic has changed our lives, the professors managed to create great and memorable teaching experiences.

We have the chance to work closely with our MSM facilitator Dolores McIntyre who is the glue between the students and professors. She has given us her full support whenever we faced challenges or unexpected situations. I met Dolores on my first day entering at MSM and I am looking forward to celebrating my graduation with her as well.

Another extremely important aspect of my EMBA at MSM, is the fact that I am part of a group of students, representing different professional backgrounds and working experiences, as well as different cultures. During the EMBA modules, we have been working closely together on preparing, analyzing, and delivering business cases in an extremely professional manner.

All modules were very well structured but extremely intensive, so we were facing situations in which we were required to work fast and efficient, but we always had the chance to do it in a fun and friendly way, which makes our EMBA group so special.

You obviously are getting the best out of your Executive MBA studies. As an experience expert, what advice would you like to give to future students?
To follow their dreams, and to continuously improve their knowledge by learning and by creating people networks within the school, to help on working and completing assignments and to get the most out of their learning experience. Communication with the other students, professors and MSM facilitators is crucial. As the MSM MBA students should always keep in mind that the modules are quite intensive and is very important to start working on the individual assignments right after finishing the modules instead of doing them close to the due dates.

We have one final question for you. You have just now moved into a new position. However, we would still be interested to know what you would wish for, in your future career?
To continue working hard, learning, and having the chance to take part of as many new experiences as possible in order to be able to continue growing in my career. Success is never ending!

About the MSM Executive MBA
With the MSM Executive MBA you can sharpen your business knowledge, develop your leadership and personal skills, broaden your horizon and challenge yourself to come out of your comfort zone. Through the modular set-up - 4 modules of 8 days per year - you can combine work and study. You will share your classroom with experienced professionals from diverse cultural and job backgrounds. Through the practice-oriented assignments you will get immediate results in the workplace.

Interested to join? The next intake will start on 8 October 2021 and the deadline for application is 1 October 2021.