Quick thinking and sound business decisions helped a team of Brock students rise near the top of a recent competition.

Four Goodman School of Business students, Julia Baird-Oryschak, Alyssa Dicienzo, Josiah Dueck and Majid El Assi, came together to claim third place out of 40 teams during a LIVE competition in Toronto Nov. 9 to 11.

Hosted by Nestlé and the University of Toronto, the event is a multidisciplinary business simulation designed to enhance students’ problem-solving skills and their ability to adapt to change through a fast-paced virtual economy competition.

“It’s not a traditional case competition and that’s one of the reasons I wanted to compete in it,” said Dicienzo, a fourth-year business student with a concentration in finance.

“It really keeps you on your toes and you need to have strong teamwork skills in order to navigate it successfully,” said the Niagara Falls native. “The best part was that we never knew what was going to happen next.”

Forty teams began with a brief outlining their virtual company. They were then required to make quick, informed decisions about product pricing and resource allocation in their quest to accumulate profits and capture market share from their competitors.

Every business decision students made was tied to a different outcome that led to different decisions later in the simulation. Seven rounds, each representing one fiscal year, were weighted differently for the final score and were impacted uniquely by decisions made in the previous round.

Brock’s participation in LIVE, which included several student teams, was organized by the Goodman Student Ambassador Association, a Goodman student club.

“It’s a great honour to have one of our teams ascend to third place in this competition,” said Goodman School of Business Dean Andrew Gaudes.

“We prepare our students to think critically and to think on their feet, so it’s always great to see them develop and to be recognized by industry as being prepared to do so. We’re very proud of their success at LIVE.”

Several student teams from Brock’s Goodman School of Business competed at the LIVE business competition hosted by Nestlé and the University of Toronto Nov. 9 to 11.