Athletic director

Industrial Engineer, Feb 2008

UNCOMMON IE

THE TASK AT HAND: One might say that finance runs through Debra GoreMann. For although her career trajectory appears twisted - with corporate assignments ranging from materials science to investment banking to international business followed by a turn in collegiate athletics - it's a love of numbers that's been a steady driver. During her corporate years, Gore-Mann took up sports broadcasting as a hobby, having been a college athlete herself while studying industrial engineering at Stanford. At the same time she was tiring of a schedule heavily laden with international traveller alma mater sought a chief financial officer in its athletic department. The job description was written for her, it seemed. Then it was just a matter of time before she was courted to serve as athletic director at the University of San Francisco, which she joined in 2006. Gore-Mann says she carries the bulk of her work in two buckets: providing resources, whether through fundraising, staffing, or facilities improvement, and ensuring that student athletes have a positive academic and athletic experience.

EVER THE IE: Gore-Mann is not uncomfortable being the odd woman out: "I have a very good professional foundation both from industrial engineering and an M.BA. It allows me to perform in such a way that people can't use my gender or my race as an excuse. Because they know I'm competent. It's especially important in the spaces I've been in: engineering, which is predominantly male; Wall Street, which is predominantly male; and sports, which is predominantly male. Because engineering is very clinical, fact-based, it grounds me in allowing me to persist through things. I know that I need to do the process, do the analysis, and do my homework to create a compelling solution."