From the classroom to the translator’s booth, Maria shows how teaching students is core to Bloomberg’s commitment to education

Bloomberg employees give back to local communities through their words and actions. Maria Baeva from the Moscow office reflects on her volunteer experiences with Junior Achievement, a Bloomberg Startup partner – and how she uses her experiences to teach the next generation of students on how to succeed in the global economy.

Countless stories have been written in distilling the core qualities of good leadership. Do you lead through encouragement? Does it require creativity? Leverage effective communication? For Maria Baeva, a News Administrator at Bloomberg Moscow, it’s more than that, yet also simple: “It’s teaching,” she says. “An ability to teach others and bring them along.”

Prior to working at Bloomberg, Maria spent 10 years as an ESL (English as a Second Language) teacher and English/Russian language translator. This experience as a teacher and translator helped her understand the needs of others, but also gave her a view of what’s lost in translation when it comes to training the next generation of leaders—a perspective that has been invaluable in her volunteer efforts with Junior Achievement of Russia.

Through mentoring, job shadowing and skills training, Junior Achievement (JA) Worldwide prepares students around the world for the global economy—making them a natural partner for Bloomberg. As part of our company’s philanthropic efforts through the Bloomberg Startup program, we are making education and technology training accessible to underserved communities around the world. Employees including Maria volunteer their time and expertise with education non-profit partners like JA, a partner in which we have been collaborating with in nearly 20 cities around the world.

Her global perspective developed in the classroom, in the translator’s booth and at Bloomberg helps her understand what students need to know most.

“With globalization increasing, the problems are more or less the same across the globe,” she says. “The biggest one is learning to be self-sufficient and proactive at your workplace. Most students I interact with are surprised to learn my manager is based in a completely different time zone, and in a different hemisphere.”

A lot of the challenges Maria observes in the JA students come down to communication skills. Great ideas presented without professional polish can be hard to get off the ground. To coach students on how to better communicate their ideas, Maria spends time reviewing the JA students’ PowerPoint presentation pitches of their business ideas and gives them guidance on how to tell stories more clearly.

“The ideas the students had were marvelous—really innovative approaches in solving critical issues, such as using recycled materials to build sustainable businesses,” Maria says. “But most students lacked PowerPoint skills to communicate their business plans clearly—so I happily assisted with editing and formatting.”

Earlier this year, Maria and other colleagues invited 40 students for a visit to the Bloomberg office in Moscow. As part of their experience with JA, students also have the opportunity to shadow their Bloomberg mentors and observe a day-in-the-life of a Bloomberg employee.

“We hosted job shadow sessions during which I would host one student for about half the working day,” she says. “I’d give them a brief office tour and then they would just sit with me at my desk and watch me work as normal. I’d explain what I was doing and why and answer any questions they had.”

Students quickly learn what it takes to succeed in global business. “Being fluent in multiple languages, having math and IT skills, being able to multi-task are all essential,” says Maria. “But I also want them to recognize that their careers are what they make of it—it’s not about being paid, it’s about finding that lifelong passion.”

Maria feels she’s found that lifelong passion in her work at Bloomberg. “For me, Bloomberg is my dream job,” she says. “I left my job as a teacher to work at Bloomberg and I have been here for over a decade now—come October, I’ll be celebrating my 11^th anniversary.”

By providing her with opportunities to learn, lead, teach – and most importantly, give back to the community, Bloomberg has become a place that connects all her passions.

“I don’t believe in taking without giving,” says Maria. “Because of that, I strongly relate to the Bloomberg culture of philanthropy. It is at the core of the company. To take what I love to do every day and pass it along to a new generation…it’s a wonderful opportunity and makes us a truly charitable enterprise.”

Since our partnership began with JA in 2012, more than 560 employees have volunteered over 2,300 hours across 205 events. Read more about our work with Junior Achievement and other educational non-profit partners, here.

Bloomberg Startup is the company’s global education engagement program offering year-round mentoring and a series of technical and leadership workshops to support academic achievement and college and career readiness for the next generation of leaders. Startup also provides internship and scholarship opportunities for high-achieving high school and college students from our non-profit education partners around the world.