Owden Godson

Owden Godson, or OG, is an entrepreneur at heart. After graduating from college, the Tanzania-native started his own company and after a few years became a co-founder of another company. His passion for entrepreneurship eventually led him to opening his own consulting business three years ago focusing on web hosting and development. However, OG soon discovered that he needed to enhance his skillset to better analyze the data being collected by his systems. 

“I decided to come to Emory because I realized that on top of building a lot of web systems and collecting a lot of data, I realized that I didn't have the skills to deal with this data for coming up with insights,” he says. “I had a lot of interest in business in general, business data and technology, and I thought Emory brought these things together.” 

From working with companies like Equifax during his practicum project and learning from knowledgeable faculty and staff, OG has improved his soft skills, as well as his technical skills like Python, big data analytics and more. 

“I think one of the best things that I've personally learned, which was new to me, was structured problem solving,” OG says. “This is taking a very big and complex business problem, breaking it down into smaller data problems and then dealing with those using technology and then coming up with actionable insights. These help businesses make data-driven decisions.” With all the new skills and experience OG will take away from the MSBA experience, he’s also learned a few key elements about himself along the way. 

“I thought I was the smartest person, honestly, but it taught me humility,” OG says. “I came here, and the program is very busy. You have to do a lot of assignments and accomplish a lot of different things and juggling all of them at the same time was quite challenging for me. I thought I would be able to do everything perfectly, but, you know, it taught me otherwise.” Like many entrepreneurs, OG also has short-term and long-term goals after the MSBA program. 

“I intend to get into the corporate world and apply my skills,” OG says. “But my long-term goal is to take these skills I have learned and combine them with my previous skills to grow my consulting business.”