Jocelyn Lederman '09
Jocelyn Lederman gladly credits the Department of Entrepreneurship and Emerging Enterprises (EEE) at the Martin J. Whitman School of Management with enabling her to see the possibilities of her potential.
My professors would say ‘can’t is not an option,’ pushing me to aim higher than I ever thought I could,” Lederman explains. As a double-major in entrepreneurship and emerging enterprises and supply chain management, with a minor in information management and technology, she took this philosophy to heart.
While at Whitman, she started participating in small business consulting engagements on the south side of Syracuse through the EEE department and SU’s Creativity, Innovation, Entrepreneurship learning community. Later, she participated in the Entrepreneurship Empowerment in South Africa program, spending six weeks during the summer between her junior and senior years consulting with small businesses owned by previously disadvantaged women in South Africa.
“My various experiences at SU and abroad changed my perspective on how the world works and how I view myself,” Lederman says. “I was able to realize that I loved strategy and business consulting and have been able to start a career doing what I love to do.”
Today, Lederman is an associate strategy consultant at CSC, a Fortune 150 company and one of the world’s largest, most respected providers of information technology services. There, she is the lead business analyst helping to create the health claims processing system for 9/11 first responders and survivors.
“My SU experience provided a foundation for me to enter post-college life as a young mind prepared to take on anything,” Lederman says. “I was able to translate this to my professional life by striving to deliver quality to my team and my manager, even when the answers aren’t clear.” When her colleagues at CSC discovered this quality, they offered her an extraordinary opportunity to join a high-profile team building out a business plan for a new corporate business unit.
As a Generation Orange alum, Lederman feels it’s important to stay connected to and support Syracuse. “Appreciating the impact SU has had on all of us is important,” she states. “The abroad programs, community engagements, and various clubs around campus—on top of the academics—have helped shape most of us. To see them continue to grow will only ensure that the next generation also has meaningful experiences at SU.”