Tianyi Liu is ready to take on the whole world, thanks to Ivey Business School’s one-year Master of Management: Analytics (MM-A) program.

The 2025 graduate began her working career as a business analyst in customer relationship marketing in pharmaceuticals with a further background in medical equipment and CRM development. She has not only tackled the blended 00-month program while working, but also developed two startup consulting ideas, at the same time.

“Ivey helped me realize that IT consulting is what I want to do,” said Liu, “I thought I would never have the courage to do this, because you don’t think you’re ready to take on the whole world.” But from the first semester, when she took the Ivey Essentials course, she just loved it and felt like, “this is something I wanted to do my whole life.”

With thoughts of going into cybersecurity, and other tech fields, Liu was awakened to the importance of data when her clients asked for the numbers that supported her proposals. Around the same time, a long-time mentor and successful stock investor told her: “No data. No finance.”

Liu recalled the realization that data and business went hand in hand. “I realized, ‘Oh wow, you can do so much more than I realized. It opened my world to data.”

Before choosing Ivey, Liu thought she didn’t need to go to business school. But she wanted a professional program to learn more about data, and the decision to go to Ivey was a “game changer.”

But it wasn’t just about numbers.

“I was so touched, you have no idea,” said Liu of her visceral reaction to the Ivey Experience and from her professors about leadership. “I found myself moved after almost every class because the lessons resonated so deeply. I had always learned business informally from my parents and friends, but I never understood the full framework behind it. Before Ivey, I thought business school was just paper knowledge jumping from case to case, insightful, but ultimately shallow compared to real experience. But at Ivey, everything finally came together. The structure, the leadership craft, and the way professors connected strategy, data, and decision-making transformed how I understood business. It felt whole, comprehensive, and alive.”

With a business background, Liu was very familiar with Ivey’s case methodology. But through her professors, she learned how to use data to arrive at the right solution.

The experience has had a profound effect on Liu, now building her life and career in Vancouver.

Liu’s introduction to the Ivey Essentials enabled her to become a valuable member of the class, developing into a solid leader.

The lessons in leadership enabled her to build character, become a stronger woman and a more empowering and strategic leader. These lessons encouraged her to jump in and start her businesses. “It felt more like a calling,” she said.

“I thought I was a natural businessperson. But after learning so much in the first and second semesters (especially from the Ivey Essentials), I realized I wanted to be a strategic consultant for sure and this calling just got stronger,” said Liu, who took the brief holiday break to get the new business venture underway.

She credited all of the people she met at Ivey for the transformation.

“I have met some lifelong friends at Ivey,” said Liu, who pointed to the instant connection she maintains with classmates even though they haven’t spoken in a while. “I continue to learn from them, which is very important.”