A first-place finish in a prestigious business case competition 10 years ago has led to a successful business partnership for two Goodman grads.

Darryl Moyers (BBA ’11) and Tyler Stark (BBA ’11) met in their fifth year at Brock University when a professor encouraged Moyers to find a partner to enter the Management Information Systems (MIS) event of the Inter-Collegiate Business Competition (ICBC).

“We hit it off and quickly realized our skills complemented each other in this specific space where technology and business meet,” said Moyers, who graduated with a Bachelor of Business Administration, Co-op with concentrations in Marketing and Information Systems. “Five hours in a room analyzing the case for the competition gives you a pretty good perspective as to whether or not you can work with the other person and whether your skill sets are aligned. Half the battle of ICBC was to come out of that room on the same page, aligned and still friends.”

The duo ended up winning first place in the ICBC MIS event, a title yet to be won by another Goodman student team. They remained friends after graduation and continued working together, first as data analysts for the Ontario government and then as business partners.

Tyler Stark (BBA ’11) and Darryl Moyers (BBA ’11) have been friends since they took first place at the 33rd Inter-Collegiate Business Competition in the Management Information Services event in 2011.

In 2014, they founded their own company, Moyers & Stark Consulting, a business focused on providing solutions for small-to-medium enterprises looking to implement customer relationship management software, such as Salesforce.

“We help businesses go through a transformation journey,” said Stark, who graduated with a Bachelor of Business Administration with a concentration in Information Systems. “A lot of businesses we work with are trying to provide better customer service and optimize their operations. We come in as business and technology consultants to provide training and support and help implement tools they can grow with.”

Their Toronto-based team is comprised of six full-time permanent staff members and two to three Goodman co-op students, depending on the academic term. Moyers and Stark hired two MBA Data Analytics students for the Winter Term, and this past fall, they employed three undergraduate students.

“We relish the opportunity to show non-MIS students the practical side of information systems,” Moyers said. “A lot of people view MIS as traditional IT support services, but that’s not what it is. MIS is more aligned with business process improvement and human change management. It’s a great challenge convincing a 50-year-old business owner who has been doing things on paper for a long time that there is a better way.”

Moyers and Stark take great pride in championing their degree and continue to stay connected with the professors who inspired them to excel in their field.

“Our professors not only encouraged us to work together on ICBC, they also set us up for success for where we are today,” Stark said. “We’re grateful for all they’ve done for us and would encourage students to give MIS another look or consideration. It’s a challenging and rewarding career path with increasing employment opportunities.”