For Rong Fang, PhD (MBA 2025), finding success through the University of Washington Foster School of Business Technology Management MBA program was all about seizing opportunities. From landing her first role in big tech to joining the award-winning startup Elementrailer, Fang is riding a wave of career growth and exploration that continues to crest.
“Reinventing yourself takes courage, and adaptability is what makes it possible,” said Fang, now a Business Intelligence Engineer at Amazon’s Project Kuiper. “I’ve learned that opportunities rarely arrive with a clear label; they show up quietly, often disguised as something unfamiliar or uncomfortable.
The Search for Confidence and Strategy
With a master’s in geography and a PhD in environmental and data science, Fang originally thought she was bound for a career in academia as a forest ecologist. But when she instead ended up applying her skillset at startup jobs around the globe, she said she still felt like some piece of her educational journey was missing.
“I was deeply passionate about my work,” she said, “but I hadn’t yet built the confidence to advocate for myself, or the strategic framework to do so effectively.”
After supporting her husband during his own MBA, he reciprocated when Fang decided the Technology Management MBA might be just what she needed to take the next step in her career.
An ‘Intimidating’ Introduction to Entrepreneurship
Quickly, Fang immersed herself in the myriad opportunities available through the program. Just a few months in, she started exploring the world of entrepreneurship by attending the Dempsey Startup Competition to support classmate Bree Fraser.
As the 2024 co-chair of the entrepreneurship competition through the UW Foster’s Buerk Center for Entrepreneurship, Fraser played a pivotal role coordinating the program that invites student entrepreneurs to develop an idea, put together a founding team, write a business plan and present to investors.
Bree Fraser (MBA 2025) was co-chair of the 2024 Dempsey Startup Competition through the Buerk Center for Entrepreneurship.
The event culminates with the final four teams presenting to an audience, an experience that Fang at first found intimidating when she attended in March 2024.
“At the time, I couldn’t imagine myself leading something that ambitious,” Fang said. “It was intimidating. You’re expected to create something from nothing and convince a room full of people that it’s worth millions of dollars.”
That perception began to change just months later. After enrolling in the Environmental Innovation Practicum elective, Fang found herself on a team with Frank Lin, CEO and co-founder of Elementrailer, and a student in the Foster School’s Master of Science in Entrepreneurship program.
“He has that entrepreneurial energy — the drive and conviction to move an idea forward,” Fang said. “Being part of that process helped me realize that confidence isn’t something you wait for. It’s something you build by doing.”
Rong Fang, far right, joined the Elementrailer startup team founded by CEO Frank Lin, center.
Team Elementrailer Blazes a Trail
With Lin at the helm, Fang and the Elementrailer team went on to compete in multiple UW business plan competitions, winning the Reimagine Prize at the Alaska Airlines Environmental Innovation Challenge, placing second at the Science & Technology Showcase and winning Best B2B Idea prize at the Dempsey Startup Competition.
“I never thought I was going to be an entrepreneur,” Fang said. “When you find the right team, it makes you feel like you have the opportunity to be creative and help the team to deliver an impact.”
With lessons learned at each consecutive competition, the team was able to continue refining the business model for Elementrailer, which builds smart, electric trailers that extend range, improve efficiency and provide real-time telematics.
“We got really good feedback from the judges,” Fang said. “In the real world, you never get this kind of feedback, so it was a really good experience to help us improve our business model.”
While building entrepreneurial skills outside the classroom, Fang and her classmates also were diving into entrepreneurship as part of the curriculum. After focusing on business fundamentals the first year of the program, students then apply those lessons in their second year with courses on leadership and innovation, including a capstone Entrepreneurship Practicum.
Rong Fang utilized her MBA network and Foster career resources and coaching to take her career to the next level.
From Entrepreneurship to Big Tech
As her interest in entrepreneurship grew, Fang also was sharpening her professional trajectory — actively applying the skills she gained through the MBA while leveraging the program’s career management team to explore new career opportunities.
“When I first started the Technology Management MBA, my goal was simple,” she said. “I wanted to work at a big tech company.”
That ambition quickly met an unexpected opportunity when a classmate shared an opening for a contract role at Amazon. Fang was immediately intrigued, even though the position did not perfectly align with her previous experience.
“It was adjacent to data analytics and something I knew I could learn,” she said. “I didn’t wait until I felt fully ready. I knew I had to seize the opportunity.”
After securing the contract role, Fang moved quickly to close her knowledge gaps, applying concepts from courses such as Operations and Supply Chain Management and Managerial Accounting to real-world business problems. Within three months, she successfully interviewed for and transitioned into a full-time role at Amazon, taking her technology career to the next level.
“I found the role through the program’s network,” she said. “But it was the skills and strategic thinking I developed through the MBA that allowed me to succeed.”
Rong Fang visited South Korea with the Class of 2025 for its International Study Tour.
Finding Balance through Grit
Since earning her MBA in June 2025, Fang has decided to step back from the Elementrailer team to focus on her growing family. Her husband and son, now 4, are “her foundations,” and she says their support helped her find the balance to persevere through the program.
“It was a struggle to juggle work, family, school and the entrepreneurial competitions,” Fang said. “But my journey gave me the grit to keep moving.”
Through the program, Fang developed an entrepreneurial mindset that extends far beyond launching a startup. She describes it as a “way of thinking rooted in continuously identifying unmet needs, learning quickly, building strategy amid uncertainty, and reinventing oneself as conditions change,” adding that these skills that are just as critical in a corporate environment as they are in entrepreneurship.
Looking ahead, Fang says this mindset is foundational to her long-term goal of becoming a product manager, where she can sit at the intersection of technology, business and customer needs to build solutions with real impact. Whether operating within a global company or pursuing entrepreneurship again in the future, she approaches her career with the same philosophy: stay adaptable, keep learning and create value where it does not yet exist.
“I feel more empowered now,” Fang said. “I don’t have to wait for someone else to define my value. I have the tools, confidence and entrepreneurial mindset to create it — whether that’s inside a company or by building something of my own.”