Poets & Quants Spotlights Recently Graduated Darden Entrepreneur

The MBA-focused publication Poets & Quants recently featured a profile of Cecilia Rios Murrieta (MBA ’22) as part of a feature of Class of 2022 students who have accepted positions at Bain & Co.

Rios Murrieta, who came to the University of Virginia Darden School of Business after a successful career as an entrepreneur in the spirits industry and launched a line of non-alcoholic canned drinks while a student, discussed her entrepreneurial drive and what led her to begin her post-Darden career with one of the world’s top consulting firms.

What did you love about the business school you attended? 
I loved that Darden was truly a student-led school. I had a great chance to experience this during my second year. I was on the student association as VP of International Student Affairs. During my tenure, I was able to collaborate with my fellow students and enact actual change to several aspects of our student life. By holding weekly round table discussions with international students, we were able to pinpoint and identify struggles that our community faced during their MBA experience. With the help of student club board members and other student leaders, we had a chance to implement positive changes to our many student-led activities.

What’s the most valuable thing you’ve learned so far at Bain? 
It must be learning to rely on others while seeing a project through to the end. I had a great experience in my last case, where we were working on a project to tackle a question in the DEI and Retail space that had not been addressed yet. It was an opportunity to work with my team at understanding what the impact of our work would be, while having the chance to truly own and create data that had not been explored yet. We all learned to rely on each other to question our perspectives and challenge ourselves to dig deeper. In the end, we delivered an amazing study that I’m looking forward to seeing published soon.

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What has been your most meaningful career achievement and how did it make a difference?
Starting a successful business from nothing has been my most meaningful career achievement. Having an idea, designing a concept and then taking the necessary steps to create and deliver a finished product has made me think that everything is possible. I’ve always been very inquisitive and creative, and being an entrepreneur has allowed me to look at every problem I face in a proactive way. For every problem, there is an opportunity.

Read the full interview in Poets & Quants, listen to a podcast with Rios Murrieta and read a story about her entrepreneurial efforts as a student.