Aaron Sneed

For Aaron Sneed, it all started with helicopters. At Sikorsky Aircraft, the company known for building the Black Hawk and Marine One (the President’s helicopter), Aaron began his career as a design engineer. But that was just the beginning.

Aaron went on to work in the fields of mechanical engineering, medical devices, Lean manufacturing, exotic automobiles, laser machinery, and aerospace and defense. The list of business areas he has experience in is also long— project management, engineering, manufacturing, trade compliance, quality, and logistics. He jokes with friends that the only one he hasn’t worked in is human resources. “But that could happen at any time,” he quips. Aaron also holds a master’s in Project Management from BU’s Metropolitan College, which he completed online. So why does he need an MBA?

“I have a lot of real-world experience working in the business sector, but what I really want is a structured learning environment that will confirm my experience and help me understand some of the underlying principles,’ Aaron says. “I want to learn to be a better leader.”

One of the reasons Aaron chose Questrom’s Online MBA (OMBA) is the opportunity to share innovative ideas with other professionals from around the world without having to wait to meet in person in a weekly class. This is an aspect he liked about his online project management program at BU. “In an online program, if you have a light-bulb moment and you want to share that moment, you can do that instantaneously. If something comes up that coincides with that week’s readings, I can say, ‘Hey guys, what do you think about X, Y, Z?’ I can type something out and click send, and I’ll get a response right back, and that will create a waterfall of discussions.”

Aaron’s dream role in business would be chief visionary officer for a technology company. “I have a lot of grand visions for the future I would like to see implemented,” says Aaron, who looks up to innovative leaders like Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk, and Richard Branson. “I really admire those figures in terms of what they’ve been able to accomplish, and how they’ve been able to take their visions and leverage their companies’ resources to further humankind in terms of space exploration and re-inventing the way that commerce operates in the world.”

Another transformational leader Aaron seeks to emulate is Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. This led him to Morehouse College as an undergraduate and Boston University as a graduate student, both colleges where King studied. “I’m the first in my immediate family to obtain my master’s degree,” says Aaron. “My parents were fortunate enough to obtain their undergraduate degrees—my father is a minister and my mother’s a teacher—so they did what they could to put me in a great position. I’m taking it a step forward and getting another degree in homage to their hard work to get me to where I am today.”

“MY PARENTS WERE FORTUNATE ENOUGH TO OBTAIN THEIR UNDERGRADUATE DEGREES…I’M TAKING IT A STEP FORWARD AND GETTING ANOTHER DEGREE IN HOMAGE TO THEIR HARD WORK TO GET ME TO WHERE I AM TODAY.“

– Aaron Sneed