Blog #1

Hello all. My name is Evan Hammontree. I am a junior here at EMU, and I work for dining services in the Student Center so some you may recognize me from there. I am currently pursuing an Accounting degree. After changing my major three times in as many years, I finally settled on accounting after realizing how much I like to count money, whether it belongs to me or someone else. After graduating with my MSA I plan to pass the CPA exam and begin to establish my career. Once I have a few years of experience, I will return to school for an MBA degree. My ultimate goal is for my business card to say, "Evan C. Hammontree, C.F.O." The company name at the top of the card is yet unknown.

With aspirations like these, I am immediately drawn to the success stories of the world's most powerful people. So when our class discussion briefly covered Bill Gates, I decided to investigate his background and discover how he became the richest man in the world. It turns out, as one might guess, Gates is an extremely smart man. He scored a 1590 on his SAT, and has an approximate IQ of 170. Since I don't have that level of intelligence, I can only hope to use his business tactics to achieve success of my own. Bill has always been very blunt and outspoken, so board meetings with him are said to be tense, but his manner ensures that people put the utmost care and effort into their projects. Apparently, Bill knows what he wants and doesn't settle for anything less, which I think is great. If someone has a distinct vision as he does, it is important to do everything possible to produce that vision as accurately as possible.

Now it is important to remember that Microsoft wasn't created over night. Gates spent years working with computers and programming to gain the experience necessary to create such a company. I wonder what he could've accomplished had he put his efforts into a different field of study.(I like to imagine his parents as farmers and picture the agriculture revolutions that would've occurred in the last thirty years.) Bill's story is also a great reminder for everyone to jump on any opportunity that they feel passionate about. He had the chance to leave his conventional upbringing to pioneer a new technology. I'm not condoning dropping out of school, but I think it's important that we pay attention to the paths are available for us to take. That way, one of us may pioneer the next big thing.