Name: Devarsh Wali
Pronouns: He/Him
Semester of Internship: Fall 2025
Major: Engineering Management
Current Class Level: Master's Student
This semester I completed a(n)...: Internship
Internship, Co-op, or Research Site (Company/Organization Name): Presence
Location of the Organization (City, State): New York City, NY
Title of position: MBA Fellow (Strategy & Operations)
Tell us about your internship, co-op, or research opportunity, including your day-to-day responsibilities:
During my MBA Fellow (Strategy and Operations) internship at Presence, my day-to-day work focused on using raw data to support executive decision-making and improve cross-functional execution. I partnered closely with the Chief Financial Officer, the finance team, and product stakeholders to build automated reporting and dashboards, analyze trends, and surface insights that highlighted the highest-impact areas to prioritize. I also gathered stakeholder pain points through working sessions, translated them into clear problem statements and proposed solutions, and drove alignment by creating a standardized KPI glossary so teams used consistent definitions. Across the 10-week internship, I balanced four projects in parallel, delivered weekly updates to leadership, and kept execution moving by unblocking dependencies and clarifying requirements with each team.
Describe the process of obtaining your position. When did you hear of the position and submit your application?
I found the MBA Fellow (Strategy and Operations) role at Presence through my LinkedIn network while actively tracking high-growth startups. I first heard about the opportunity in early August 2025 and submitted my application shortly after, within the same week. After applying, I received the interview call in mid September and received the offer by late September to start my internship in early October 2025.
What resources did you use to find your current experience?
LinkedIn or other social media
What have you enjoyed the most about your position and organization?
What I enjoyed most was having a great mentor and getting to work directly with executive leadership at a high-growth startup. Being trusted with real problems, moving fast, and collaborating closely across finance and product made the work both challenging and genuinely rewarding.
How do you believe you have made an impact through your work?
I made impact by turning raw data and stakeholder pain points into automation and decision-ready insights for leadership. I partnered closely with the Chief Financial Officer, finance, and product teams to streamline reporting and prioritize the highest-impact areas, delivering four projects in a 10-week internship. My proposed automation solutions were estimated to save about 200 hours per week, and I reduced cross-functional conflicts by establishing a standard KPI glossary that made definitions visible and consistent across teams.
What advice would you give to another student who is seeking an internship or similar experience?
My advice would be to tailor your resume for every role and treat the search like a consistent funnel, not a one-time push. Apply early, keep your applications high-quality, and pair them with daily outreach to alumni or team members using one specific reason you fit. For interviews, use SAR-M for product and analytics questions (Situation, Action, Result, with the Metric you helped improve) to show structured thinking and measurable impact, and use STAR for general behavioral questions to keep stories clear and credible. As a weekly target, aim for 20–25 tailored applications and 10–15 tailored outreach messages per day, with 6–8 reusable stories ready to go.
Please provide a short reflection or quote about what you liked most about your position / earning internship credit / working with the Career Center.
What I liked most about my MBA Fellow role at Presence was working with raw data to automate reporting, surface clear insights, and help executive leadership, especially the Chief Financial Officer, focus on the highest-impact priorities. UMBC's Career Center supported me with practical resume and interview tips, which helped me land the internship and deliver across four projects in 10 weeks.