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EXCELLENCEEvita LuneBy Arnas LaurynasSophia, Bulgaria. Imagine a womanthat is lead by custom officers to a smallroom, where a few refugees are prayingto Allah while waiting for the decisionabout their illegal immigration. Thewoman is crying. She has lots of stuff –is it clothes and some savings kept forthe journey? Nope, she is carring skiingequipment, portable PC and a few businesssuits. By the way, did I mentionthat she is a consultant coming fromShell Central and Eastern Europe HeadOffice? I must have forgotten to do that.Anyway, meet Evita Lune, the Marketingcourse director for Year1 and thesissupervisor for Year3. This is what happenedto her in 1998, when she went ona business trip and for some skiing withfriends to Bulgaria. The problem wasthat she could not get visa in the airport.Well, I will not go into details as itis a long story and the purpose of thisarticle is not to retell it.Career“Oh, how much time do you have?”Evita Lune has a very outstanding career.She started working in one limitedliability company as an interpreter andjunior specialist in the investment departmentstill being a student. However,her main employer was Shell. Inthe beginning, Evita worked as a marketingmanager for the 3 Baltic countriesfor a few years. Afterwards she gotpromoted to Shell Central and EasternEuropean marketing development teamwhich included marketing responsibilityfor 12 CEE countries, starting fromEstonia in the North, ending with Bulgariain the South. Later she got anotherpromotion within the Shell Company.It was not in marketing though; it wasin Shell EU strategy and planning teamfor 25 European countries, where Shelloperated. Evita worked as a financialanalyst: she was responsible for preparationof figures relevant for strategicdecisions. Promotions, promotions,promotions! I assume not everybodymakes such a carrier. The only way isto the stars… and then she quit. Due toseveral reasons she decided that shehad “all the possible knowledge andabilities to develop her own enterprise.”Together with a colleague from Shell sheThe Insider #3 (64), May 2004; Page 8established a fashion import firm.They were visiting Italian fashionfairs (is that work?), looking for suppliersfor retail shops in Riga andother cities of Latvia. Finally, endstop for now – SSE Riga; Robert Kilisinvolved her with the thesis processand just a couple of years ago EvitaLune became the thesis supervisor.Right now year1 is studying Marketingcourse directed by Evita. InJuly - August she will become executiveMBA program director. Oh,come on!Hobbies“Live short and play hard” – thatis Evita’s motto as things come tointerests and hobbies. I am not sureabout the first part of the saying butshe sure fulfills the second. She likes extremeactive sports, like slalom skiingin the winter, water skiing, roller-skating,swimming, and wind surfing. If yousaw a pregnant lady driving a motorboatpulling water skiers last summer,that was Evita. Now she’s learning todrive a motorbike, without huge successas she admits but with big interest.She told me that her husband drivesone, and she enjoys being in the passengerseat. Despite all this, there is anothersaying that all good things havean end. She can’t enjoy her hobbies tofull extent because she also has to performthe duties of a mother.FamilyAnd here we come to her family. Asyou could have guesed it is not very big,only Evita, her husband and her daughter.The daughter was born in August.Although I hoped that there would besome bombastic and romantic storybehind the relationship of Evita and herhusband, my hopes were not confirmed.She met him while working in ShellLatvia. At first, she got attracted to himmostly because he was also “extreme”lover. He went to work on his motorbike.Took Evita for weekend wind surfing,waterskiing, skiing. So as she explains“step by step he managedthrough these appealing sports somehowto get involved with me as a person.”Guys, there is so much to learnfrom him. Finally, after 8 years of friendshipthey got married. “Probably a gooddecision not to have family too quicklyand to see all those different countriesto enjoy all kinds of relationships andto enjoy all possible hobbies at thetime.”Marketing course (relevant for Year 1)Yes, yes, yes. We talked about it. Basically,Evita really believes that marketingis an extremely good career option,and who could argue with that. Andshe was not satisfied with the fact thatin the SSE Riga Marketing is coursesomewhat “full of water.” Evita tried tomake it difficult and challenging to us.“You should know something but moreimportant it is to try something and tofeel how it is, and to fail for some timeand to try again.” The Oriflamme assignmentwas to challenge us, to learnand experience something new, andmost important to challenge the attitudes.Will this be successful? Only timecan show. Despite the fact that, in myopinion, marketing is quite unethical, Irespect Evita Lune as a lecturer thatdared to bring something new to ourSSE Riga. And I think we all should .A word for SSE students“Final word for SSE Riga students…Well, all I have to say is that I have tremendouslyenjoyed communicationwith Year3 students within the thesisprocess, and you are extremely interesting,fresh, ambitious and hard workingpeople. One skill that I would recommendis indeed Emotional Intelligenceand just to remember that IQ itselfdoesn’t determine success neitherin personal, nor in professional life.Therefore, some emotional skills wouldopen you to be really successful. I haveinvested quite a lot of work with yourYear3 colleagues in their thesis processand after leaving the school they willnot ever remember people who helpedthem. In my opinion, people shouldthink of some emotional attachments asthey are developing, and would rememberthat these attachments are useful.