Sajib (SJ) Jafar

Ask SJ where he’s from and you’ll get a long answer. “Where I’m from is a tricky question,” he jokes. “I’m an Australian national, born in Bangladesh, based in the United States.”

SJ’s office is in the Washington, DC metro area at Marriott Corporate HQ where he supports the organization’s global design, architecture, and construction department as a finance business partner. This is where the design standards and specifications for all 30 global brands under Marriott International are conceptualized. SJ says it’s an innovation hub, where hundreds of designers, engineers, and architects are constantly collaborating, paving the way for the future of travel. His biggest challenge is thinking globally, across countries and cultures.

“I lead associates based in Washington DC, London, and Hong Kong. The challenge is to design finance policies & strategy and roll it out to thousands of hotels in hundreds of countries. Catering that to different continents can sometimes be challenging.”

SJ was certified as a Chartered Accountant in Australia and worked at KPMG Australia and CrossCountry Consulting in Virginia. Soon after he joined Marriott International in 2019, he decided he wanted to up his game. “I learned these valuable skills throughout my career in accounting and finance at KPMG, at CrossCountry, and I was thinking, how do I take it one step further?”

SJ took a few online courses at Cornell and Harvard Business School. None of the DC-area based MBA programs appealed to him. He planned to take more online courses but then he discovered Questrom’s Online MBA (OMBA). “I thought, why not do the courses curated by world-class faculty members, in Boston, a well-known hub of education in the world?”

SJ researched the Online MBA extensively, but it was the Wall Street Journal video, “Is Business School Worth It?” featuring Questrom students and faculty, that sealed the deal. “I realized, this is exactly what I need to pursue,” SJ says. Ironically, he later discovered that one of his friends was the video’s director and editor. “That really led me to think that this is meant to be,” he says. “And when I studied the BU curriculum, the way it was structured, it was just so dynamic. The ideas were designed for the future. Obviously, I put my application in right away. And I was probably one of the first applicants to accept the offer.”

One thing SJ has learned is that executive education is more than just attending trainings, completing self-paced courses, and reading books. “There’s a lot of content out there. You can basically learn about any topic. But what I’m really hoping to achieve from the Questrom program is not just learning the content. I’m looking forward to learning with other driven professionals and being engaged in a program with students from around the globe curated in a way that there are discussions from different countries and industries.”

SJ is really looking forward to being a part of the Questrom culture and giving back as much as he gets. “As someone who has lived on three continents, traveled to seventy plus cities, and consulted for ten plus companies, I do believe I have a lot to share in terms of what I’ve learned throughout my career.”

SJ loves to travel. He’s a man who has seen the world. One place he avoids is his comfort zone. “I feel like this program will challenge me, but at the same time, it will help me understand different perspectives,” he says. “It’s very easy to get stuck in your comfort zone. I really think the Questrom MBA will throw me out of my comfort zone, which I believe will bring out the best in me.”

“I learned these valuable skills throughout my career in accounting and finance at KPMG, at Crosscountry, and I was thinking, how do I take it one step further?”

– Sajib (SJ) Jafar