It seems as if the pace of life hasn’t slowed much for Olivia Goff (McIntire ’22) since she found herself collaborating with classmates in McIntire’s third-year Integrated Core curriculum. As an Associate at Harris Williams in Richmond, VA, she advises clients through mergers and acquisitions, building models, preparing analyses, and managing communication between deal teams and buyers. The high-stakes work requires precision and poise, both of which she credits to her McIntire training.
“The Integrated Core is incredibly beneficial in preparing for a role in investment banking,” Goff says. “In banking, you are never operating in a silo; transactions involve strategic considerations, marketing implications, and operational realities. The Integrated Core’s structure, which forces you to look at a business from every functional angle—finance, marketing, management, IT, and accounting—it perfectly mirrors the cross-functional nature of an M&A transaction.”
Ralph De Palma (McIntire ’22), a Valuation Analyst at Valuation Research Corporation, echoes that sense of connection between classroom and career. “Understanding an income statement or any kind of financial statement, it’s a lot like McIntire,” he insists. “Even some of the most complicated things in the CFA curriculum were covered in Advanced Investments.”
For De Palma, the lessons extended beyond technical mastery to emphasize communication and presentation, which in his particular career path was essential when he pivoted from sales and trading into valuation. The move required him to clearly articulate his skill set and motivations. “Being able to tell my story and tell people what does get me excited really went a long way,” he says.
Olivia Schmidt (McIntire ’22), an Investor at Stonecroft Management in New York, says the Comm School’s influence is visible in her analytical work and also in her mindset. “Some of the best investors are people who spend their entire career being curious about a wide range of topics,” she says. “I feel like the liberal arts focus at UVA and even at McIntire helped shape that curiosity in me.”
That interest drives her investment work across industries and areas. “On any given week, I’m learning about a new pipeline a biotech company is developing, touring a rocket factory in California, and then learning about AI models,” Schmidt says. “I love spending time with founders and investors, and I love learning. As an investor, I’m lucky that I get paid to learn.”
Advancing their professional lives via different fields, each graduate points back to McIntire as the foundation for their confidence, agility, and adaptability. As Goff puts it, “McIntire taught me two fundamental skills: how to work effectively in a team and how to communicate complex ideas clearly and concisely.”
Early Career Growth Through Self-Discovery and Adaptability
These three young alumni stand out for much more than being well-prepared for their first jobs after walking the Lawn. One notable insight they all cultivated is the ability to quickly discover what they wanted next. Within a few years of graduation, all three made pivotal career decisions shaped by honest self-assessment and an openness to change.
Goff felt that the earliest moments of her career hadn’t unfolded exactly as she had originally mapped it out. “My biggest piece of advice is to embrace the unexpected,” she says. “Most people I know, myself included, graduated with what felt like a very clear five-year plan. You quickly learn that a career path is rarely a straight line.”
That philosophy is also demonstrated in De Palma’s story, as his path took a turn he couldn’t have seen coming. After graduating with concentrations in Finance and Accounting, he began to work in sales and trading. He came to realize that its rapid decision-making tempo didn’t align with his deeper interests. “I considered myself a hardworking student and an overachiever,” he says. “I thought a challenging, fast-paced place would be right for me. I was overlooking that I’m deeply analytical and like to take my time with something.”
That self-awareness led him to valuation, a field where he could analyze rigorously and apply the technical expertise that drew him to business. “In valuation, it’s even more relevant,” he says of his McIntire coursework. “The things I learned from Professor Patrick Dennis in Advanced Investments are still coming up.”
Schmidt says career growth has meant recognizing the kind of work and environment that bring out her best. “I loved my time at Warburg,” she says of the private equity firm where she first worked after graduation, “but I learned I was drawn to earlier-stage investing and projects with small teams.”
Her current firm, Stonecroft Management, is a family office of three. Now in her second job, Schmidt emphasizes self-knowledge as the key that helped her find the best course of action in her professional development. “Take ownership over both your work and the way you show up every day,” she says. “As the most junior person, you’re often asked to do things that aren’t necessarily exciting. But it was a learning process to put effort into every task and then notice which kinds of work energize you most.”
Adaptability has become both a necessity and a philosophy for these alumni. De Palma admits that changing directions after only a year in his first job wasn’t easy, but authenticity mattered most. Goff agrees and advises current students to “be open to those detours.” She explains: “Your career is a marathon, not a sprint, and there is no single right way to build a fulfilling professional life.”
Commitment to the Commerce Community
All three alums remain active with the Commerce School through the McIntire Young Alumni Council, finding purpose in helping current students.
Goff calls her service “a fantastic way to stay engaged and connect with fellow alumni.” She often returns to Grounds to speak in classes, attend events, and mentor students. “Whether it’s helping with a resume, providing advice, or just being a resource,” she says, “staying involved is my way of showing gratitude to the community that shaped me.”
De Palma says the experience has strengthened his appreciation for McIntire’s network. “We were able to get our summer industry series back this year,” he says. “Engaging with students and alumni again has been really rewarding.”
Schmidt notes that the bond among McIntire graduates extends well beyond Grounds and is a unique feature of having been a Hoo. “I knew the network was special when I was in school,” she says, “but being out of school, I’ve realized how much UVA grads look out for each other. And people notice.”
