Business Management Certificate Alumni Profile: Ivan Liachko

Ivan Liachko, Ph.D.
Founder & CEO
Phase Genomics, Inc.

Please tell us a bit about who you are and your career:

I have been a biologist for more than 20 years. At the end of my postdoc at UW Department of Genome Sciences I founded a genomics startup and run it as CEO to this day.

What have you learned that you have been able to apply to your career?

Having very little formal business training, I enrolled in this program in order to help close gaps in my knowledge. I am very happy with how the course progressed; I was able to take away something useful from every module. I think that all the topics covered were useful as well in one way or another. I have been able to translate a good amount of strategic and communication processes learned in this class to my team.

As a CEO, you have leadership experience not only in running the organization but also with your team. What aspects of the program was most beneficial from your perspective and why?

It is difficult to pick one useful topic because they were all beneficial. I think the strategy and communication modules were the most immediately useful in my work, but pretty much every subject we touched upon in this class has affected my work in some way.

What did you value most about attending the program?

The diversity of the material covered really hit a lot of useful notes in subjects that I have not been trained in previously. It was fun to hear from a diverse group of instructors as well.

What would you say to someone who is considering attending the program?

I found this program very worthwhile.

Anything else you would like to share about your experience?

I think the case competition was a very neat experience and a good way to end the semester. I had never participated in one before and it was a good way of putting all we learned to good use.