NIU College of Business Alumni Award Winners – year 2020

On November 19, 2021, the NIU College of Business held its Alumni Awards Dinner. Hosted by Dean Balaji Rajagopalan, attendees included NIU President Freeman, 2020 and 2021 award winners, NIU College of Business alumni and friends, and NIU faculty and staff, all of whom gathered together in celebration of the college’s award winners for the years 2020 and 2021, respectively. Due to the covid-19 pandemic, this year’s event represents the first time award winners for the past two years were celebrated during one event. Also, due to the pandemic, some award winners were not able to attend in person.

Please see the writeups that follow to learn more about the journeys taken and accomplishments achieved by each of the amazing individuals who were honored. Our hearty congratulations to 2020 NIU College of Business Alumni award winners:

    • Distinguished Alumnus Wes Saber, 2014 MBA, Executive Vice President and CFO of HARIBO of America.
    • Honorary Alumna Jackie Sander, 2008 B.S. Public Health Administration, Executive Director and Partner of The Birches Assisted Living.
    • Outstanding Young Alumna Mary Vrancic, 2008 B.S. Marketing, 2018 MBA, Digital Marketing Director for McDonald’s U.S.A.
    • Innovation and Entrepreneurship award honoree Jack Molloy, 1994 B.S. Marketing, Executive Vice President of Sales for Motorola Solutions.
    • Social Impact award honoree Sarjoo Patel, M.D., 2003 B.S. Operations Management and Information Systems, CEO of Beam Healthcare and Flow Healthcare.
    • Student Engagement award honoree Robert H. Rothkopf, 1967 B.S. Management, 1973 M.S. Management, retired President and CEO of Semblix Corporation.

2020 Distinguished Alumnus

Wes Saber, 2014 MBA, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer of HARIBO of America

Saber has been an international leader in innovative management philosophy and business development for more than 22 years.

His expertise in developing global enterprises has led him to his current role as executive vice president and chief financial officer for HARIBO of America (HoA), the fastest growing confectionery company in the U.S.

As EVP and CFO for HoA, Saber has created a holistic approach for international operations between the company and its affiliates, ensuring the global reach of HARIBO is successful in the U.S. He spearheaded the development of the $242M investment to build HARIBO’s first-ever U.S. factory, projected to create more than 400 jobs in the first phase build-out. The factory will be in Pleasant Prairie, Wis., and upon completion it will be one of the largest confectionery plants in the U.S.

Prior to joining HARIBO, Saber had roles in 25 countries around the world, including Turkey, Egypt, Africa, United Arab Emirates and the U.S. His most recent role was with Mars, Inc. where he worked with the chocolate segment to develop the business in Europe, Russia and the U.S. He has also held leadership roles in Finance and Marketing with Pizza Hut and KPMG.

Saber holds his MBA from Northern Illinois University and has continued his learning with Harvard Business School and the Center for Creative Leadership. In addition to English, Saber is fluent in Arabic and speaks Turkish and French. He is an active Board Member of the Boys and Girls Club of Kenosha, Metropolitan Milwaukee Association of Commerce and the Kenosha Area Business Alliance. Saber is passionate about engaged, diverse environments and has a deep appreciation for collaboration, cultural learning and inclusion.

2020 Honorary Alumna

Jackie Sander, 2008 B.S. Public Health Administration, Executive Director and Partner of The Birches Assisted Living

Sander was pivotal in navigating the community through the extreme times of the pandemic quickly and efficiently for the health and safety of the residents, team members, and their families.

Sander is passionate about keeping up with various industry trends, advocating and applying best practices in senior living as an active LeadingAge Assisted Living cabinet member. She helps provide an atmosphere of growth and opportunity for all individuals regardless of age or ability and helps support and excel small businesses.

As past president of the NIU Executive Club, which partners with the College of Business, Sander, with a group of elite business alumni, relaunched the NIU Executive Club in 2019 to provide scholarship opportunities within the College of Business to exceptional students in business, and develop networking opportunities for our “best in class” alumni and future business leaders.

2020 Outstanding Young Alumna

Mary Vrancic, 2008 B.S. Marketing, 2018 MBA, Digital Marketing Director for McDonald’s U.S.A.

Vrancic began her career with McDonald’s through an Experiential Learning Center (ELC) project, an opportunity created for undergraduate students, during her time at Northern Illinois University. From there, she landed the first international internship for McDonald’s and partnered with the local marketing team on McHappy Day, 2008 Beijing Olympics and supported the launch of free restaurant WiFi.

After completing her internship, Vrancic joined the Global Technology team focusing on infrastructure and support. While in this role, she earned the McDonald’s Circle of Excellence Award for her leadership on an enterprise tech project with Microsoft. This award recognizes individuals across all McDonald’s markets responsible for implementing an idea that exhibits creativity, delivers better business results and makes the company demonstrably more efficient.

In 2012, Vrancic transitioned to the Global Technology Strategy team where she managed annual technology alignment, planning processes and oversaw technology portfolio management. She was instrumental in standing up the Ronald McDonald House Charity tech strategy to integrate RMHC into the McDonald’s customer experience. This led her to win the McDonald’s President’s Award in 2015, which is awarded to the top 1% of McDonald’s corporate employees globally for their purposeful collaboration, while inspiring other to deliver better results.

In 2016, Vrancic shifted to the world of Digital Marketing and was quickly recruited to join the U.S. Marketing team to lead customer data strategy and segmentation for paid and owned media activations. Vrancic developed and launched the first U.S. customer segmentation framework to integrate content strategies and communication channels. She also led the redesign of marketing processes to incorporate a more customer-centric approach to campaign planning. In 2019, she was responsible for establishing the first digital test and learn center of excellence, accelerating the application of first party customer data for cross-channel digital activation.

2020 Innovation and Entrepreneurship

Jack Molloy, 1994 B.S. Marketing, Executive Vice President of Sales for Motorola Solutions.

Molloy began his career at Motorola Inc. in 2003 as an area sales manager for government and public safety. A few years later, in 2006, he moved up to MSSI VP and director of sales. Since 2011, he has held multiple leadership positions of increasing responsibility in his career with Motorola Solutions. Most recently, he is the executive vice president of products and sales, Motorola Solutions.

Molloy is driving a modernization agenda for the company and in public safety. He leads Motorola’s global sales, system integration, and product development organizations. His teams are innovating to ensure its land mobile radio and video security platforms are an essential part of public safety and enterprise communications.

He has served on the boards of The Chicago Police Memorial Foundation and The Field Museum.

2020 Social Impact

Sarjoo Patel, M.D., 2003 B.S. Operations Management and Information Systems, CEO of Beam Healthcare and Flow Healthcare.

Patel is the person he is because of the mistakes he made and the support of those closest to him. Patel is passionate about simplifying life, the practice of healthy living, and improving outcomes in the field of medicine.

His experience as a clinician and bootstrapping entrepreneur has given him unique skills as a leader, collaborator, and strategist in running lean and socially responsible organizations. He hopes to continue utilizing his skills by working alongside organizations that advocate for the environment, help the homeless, and assist in alleviating extreme poverty.

After medical school, Sarjoo began his career as chief resident at Excela Health in 2010. He continued his career in health care at Stoughton Hospital where he was medical director and started the Hospitalist Program there. He quickly began advancing his career even more when he became founder and CEO of Beam Healthcare in 2014. At Beam Healthcare, he used technology to solve Iron Triangle of Healthcare and now leads a team of medical professionals in Madison, Wisconsin. In 2014, he also became CEO of Flow Healthcare, health- tech SaaS that streamlines the process of onboarding, managing and educating medical staff members.

Sarjoo currently serves as a board member of the Entrepreneurs’ Organization Wisconsin. Today, he is developing his non-profit branch of Beam Healthcare, called Beam-Up. Beam-Up is working to tackle social determinants of healthcare.

2020 Student Engagement

Robert H. Rothkopf, 1967 B.S. Management, 1973 M.S. Management, retired President and CEO of Semblix Corporation

Rothkopf has enjoyed a 52-year partnership with Northern Illinois University, which began in 1965 when he enrolled as a junior at NIU’s College of Business. He has returned each fall until 2019 to teach the Dean Scholars in Leadership Preparation.

This partnership is unique in the length of time and commitment from each party that has spanned five deans and several classroom appearances at the College of Business both as an instructor and speaker. He began his career in 1965 working full-time at the Chrysler Corporation at the Belvidere Assembly Plant while also attending Northern Illinois University.

In 1970 Rothkopf joined Camcar Textron, a cold heading company in Rockford. In the marketing department for the next 19 years, he worked his way up the ranks and became president of the company in 1986 and continued in that role until 1989. That same year, Rothkopf joined Elco Industries in Rockford as vice president of planning. Over the next 11 years he was also vice president of marketing and sales and became president of the Industrial Group of Elco in 1994 and served in that role until 2001.

In 2001 Rothkopf started his own consulting company, Rothkopf and Associates, where he consulted for many fastener and metalworking companies before joining Semblex Corporation as a full-time consultant in 2002. He then became president of Semblex in 2004.

Rothkopf has received many awards with the Northern Illinois University and the College of Business. His involvement with the College of Business includes 24 years of serving on the Board of Executive Advisors, delivering the commencement address, and providing scholarship support. In 2010, Rothkopf began his teaching career at NIU teaching Leadership and Leadership Preparation courses to the Dean’s Scholars at the College of Business at the DeKalb and Rockford campuses. He taught these classes for eight years until 2019. In 2017, the Alumni Association awarded Rothkopf the Outstanding College Alumni Award.

In his retirement, Rothkopf has resumed his career as a consultant specializing in business planning, sales strategies and sales training.

posted by M. De Jean, Director of Marketing, NIU College of Business

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