54°F
weather icon Partly Cloudy

Las Vegas nonprofit offering UNLV scholarships, mentoring expands reach

A good business leader is honest, has integrity and is willing to be held accountable, according to the Las Vegas Business Academy.

The nonprofit is dedicated to business mentorship and supports graduate students at UNLV, offering them a full scholarship. Its students also receive direct mentorship on how to be a business leader beyond the balance sheets and boardrooms, said Rino Armeni, founder and CEO of the nonprofit.

“The best thing about the program is the complexity of the program,” said Armeni, who noted he’s worked in beverage marketing and procurement for firms such as Caesars Entertainment and Walt Disney World Resorts. “This is not about writing a check. This is about them experiencing true life lessons.”

Armeni and other board members have made such a name for the program that they’ve decided to expand. The nonprofit is launching a partnership with Global Celebrity Women Organization, a Chinese organization, to create a subsidiary of LVBA called the Las Vegas University of Business Etiquette.

An early agreement between the two groups shows the LVBA will create a monthlong program focused on business, social etiquette and mentorship for a class of about 20 to 30 women. Similar to the local program, classes will take students behind the scenes of different industries in Las Vegas.

“It’s an opportunity for us to expand,” Armeni said. “It’s not the money, it’s an opportunity to teach other people in other countries how to run a business.”

Keeping talent in Las Vegas

Founded in 2011 as a response to the brain drain of talent during the Great Recession, the academy wanted to encourage smart and dedicated people to stay in Las Vegas, said Gary Charmel, western regional president at Johnson Brothers. The programming is there to keep high-quality business people in the city, he said.

“The country was suffering but we were especially suffering,” said Charmel, who serves as an officer and mentor for the academy. “We decided, ‘What could we do here to keep people from leaving Las Vegas, especially talented young people?’ ”

The five-year program accepts a handful of graduate students each year. Students spend one to three months shadowing various board members, who include executives in banking, hospitality, law, sales and sports. They also learn lessons outside of the classroom such as dining etiquette and dressing for an important meeting.

Students are expected to stay in Las Vegas for at least three years after completing their two-year graduate degree.

Students are challenged to learn outside of their comfort zone through job shadowing and rotations. If they don’t like sales, they could spend a day with their mentor in negotiation meetings. If they aren’t familiar with restaurant operations, they could spend a rotation working in the kitchens of Wynn Las Vegas.

The adversity of a new situation pushes students. MacKenzie Jones, a current student of the academy, said she first shied away from sales positions.

“(Armeni) had asked me, ‘MacKenzie, do you like sales?’ and I said, absolutely not. I worked at an Olive Garden and it was hard to upsell a dipping sauce,” said Jones, a second year MBA student at UNLV.

But the lessons proved worth it. After her mentorship experience with Armeni, she sold a pen to her business professor in a class exercise so well that the professor told Jones it was the only time he’d ever called a student “brilliant.”

LVBA student Nikolas Fava, who will start his master’s in hospitality administration program in January, said the learning opportunities are invaluable and unique.

Fava’s mentor is Paola Armeni, a lawyer at Clark Hill PLC. Fava wants to work in the gaming industry but is using the law rotation to expand his knowledge base, he said.

“I knew nothing about law, and I walk in that office every day and I’m a sponge,” Fava said. “I learn so much every single time that I’m in there.”

McKenna Ross is a corps member with Report for America, a national service program that places journalists into local newsrooms. Contact her at mross@reviewjournal.com. Follow @mckenna_ross_ on Twitter.

Don't miss the big stories. Like us on Facebook.
THE LATEST
 
Sam Bankman-Fried, fallen crypto mogul, gets 25 years in prison

Prosecutors said he had cost customers, investors and lenders over $10 billion by misappropriating billions of dollars to fuel his quest for influence and dominance in the new industry.