Carol Simon, MM '03
Courtside Management: Not just jumping through hoops
It was nothing short of a slam dunk for Brandeis women's basketball coach Carol Simon to earn her master's in management from The Heller School. Her hoop dreams were matched only by her affinity for motivation and inspiration – two critical qualities of excellent managers and the impetus for attending The Heller School.
During the off-season Simon actively recruits high school athletes for Brandeis Women's basketball, drawing on her managerial know-how to create a winning team. Indeed, Simon's skill in attracting talented, smart young women to Brandeis has led her Division III team, known as the Judges, to two consecutive division championships, a rare achievement that has driven up attendance and pride.
Simon's acumen at marketing, selling, fundraising, building character, assessing chemistry between players, and pushing women to lead are attributes any mentor in a management role would envy. Simon's route to success has been echoed by others in the Brandeis athletic department who have followed the same path up the hill to obtain a Heller degree, including five current or former colleagues who earned management degrees from Heller.
Coming to Brandeis as a part-time assistant coach in 1987, Simon kept her day job in retail and spent evenings and weekends on the basketball court. As a three-sport athlete at Colby College, she had always wanted to coach college athletes. When the Brandeis Woman's Basketball head coach retired, Simon jumped at the chance to fill her shoes.
Looking ahead
Always a pragmatist, Simon was eager to obtain a management degree at Heller anticipating that "some day I may
decide to leave coaching, and knew I would need a master's degree for that next step." But now in her nineteenth season, it's unlikely she'll be abandoning the game anytime soon.
"Heller was a great experience for me. It was nice to be in an academic setting, with adults, pursuing intellectual goals. I learned so much about health policy from Sarita Bhalotra, PhD '99, and also appreciated my classes with Jim Callahan, PhD '68, and Bill Van Leuven. The knowledge has come in handy both personally and professionally in every aspect of my own job."
The Judges won their first ever Division III New England championship title in 2004, the season after Simon received her master's in management from Heller. Coincidence? Maybe not entirely.
"Coaching is similar to running a business—you have to do something together and you succeed not as a group of individuals but as a team with a single mission," says Simon, MM '03. "As a Division III school we can't offer athletic scholarships, so my job is to market the benefits of a Brandeis education when I'm recruiting athletes. And sometimes I have to make the difficult decision to cut a player." "I believe I am training women leaders," says Simon, and in that way she is indeed using her management skills, in the Heller style.