Alexandra
Phillips

What motivated you to pursue an MBA, and why did you choose Nottingham Business School?

The main reason I chose to do an MBA was to further my learning across broader business topics to help enrich and progress my career. Also, having not been to university after A Levels, it was a chance to gain a higher level qualification and experience a different type of learning.

Tell us about your career/work experience prior to joining the MBA.

After a couple of short-term jobs following A Levels, I began what has turned into my career at Boots aged 19, when I joined as a Category Assistant in one of the buying teams. I soon realised that I had a passion for the commercial world and progressed to a Junior Buyer position before leaving Boots to join a small online pharmacy business just out of start-up.

Over the next eight years I held a number of roles here including category management, product management, retail buying, pharmacy, NHS prescriptions and online doctor services, progressing to senior management level.

I rejoined Boots in 2020 and worked across a number of roles including supplier negotiation coaching and eCommerce. At the point of joining the MBA I had recently transitioned out of leading new and emerging channels for digital to heading up the eCommerce team for the beauty business unit.

Which aspects of the NBS MBA programme have you found most valuable, and why?

Have you taken part in any consulting projects, study trips, work placements or experiential learning opportunities? What did you gain from these?

Yes – two consultancy projects for the change management and strategic business proposal modules (the global consultancy project is upcoming). I gained a lot more from these modules than just the learning, as previously stated. Being given clients that I knew nothing about, both in very different market sectors and different business types, really pushed me outside my comfort zone of familiar profit-led retail business models in the health and beauty sector.

Being able to analyse a completely new operating model and market sector with the lens of the learning I’ve gained surprised me in how I was able to quickly understand the new context and what the implications were on the project, as well as revealing where my existing experience and knowledge can be applied in very different circumstances to add value.

How has the MBA contributed to your personal and/or professional growth?

Personally, this has been one of the most enriching and challenging things I have undertaken. Aside from the huge time commitment needed, academic research and writing is completely new to me, having never been to university before, so it’s been a steep learning curve. I have really surprised myself at some of the work I have produced, and even when I look back now at some of the module assignments, I can’t believe I have done that work and I am really proud of myself. It has given me the self-confidence to continue to push myself outside of my comfort zone and not just stick with the familiar.

Professionally, the learning I have gained on this course has been hugely beneficial, both in teaching me about new aspects I hadn’t been exposed to before, such as board and governance structures, but also in the areas that I do cross at work. The academic and theoretical underpinning of work I would do on a day-to-day basis has changed the way I approach certain tasks, and given my work more depth. The assignments I have done along the way have mainly been pieces that have had a strong correlation with current work projects, some of which I have progressed to implementation and/or shared with business colleagues to advance pieces of work.

What is your current role, and which skills or experiences from the NBS MBA do you use most in your work?

My current role, Head of Digital Retail Strategy, is a new role within the business and is all about finding and exploring new growth opportunities for Boots’ digital business. The learning I’ve gained on this course, and the work I’ve produced along the way, has really helped me get to grips with and scope this role, as it’s very much linked to some of the areas I have explored along the way, such as the emergence of social commerce and TikTok Shop, new innovations, and future strategy. Through it, I will be using skills and learning from many of the different modules across the course as I’m crossing over with new territories such as logistics, procurement and strategy, which I now feel more confident that I have some foundational knowledge in.

What has been your biggest career highlight or achievement?

How has the network you built at NBS influenced your career or professional opportunities?

What advice would you give to someone considering the MBA at Nottingham Business School?