Externadista leads tropical fruit import in Poland

María Andrea Moore is a 2018 graduate of the School of Business Administration of our House of Studies and currently works as Category Manager in the company Jerónimo Martins - Poland.

Since she began her undergraduate studies at the Externado, María Andrea demonstrated that she would be a brilliant professional; she obtained the best performance during her admission process at the School of Business Administration, which is why she received a scholarship to begin her university studies. In addition to having honorable registration in other semesters, Moore was a monitor and, thanks to an international agreement of the Faculty, she did a double degree at the IÉSEG School of Management (France), where she studied her master’s degree in International Negotiation and Sales.

Once she finished her studies, María Andrea was an assistant in the Business Administration undergraduate program at Externado, the same School that trained her professionally; simultaneously, she applied for the International Management Trainee program at Jerónimo Martins and, after overcoming multiple filters, she was selected to work in different areas of the company.

“They called me and told me that I had been chosen and that I was going to Portugal, where I lived for two years. In this program they do cross-functional projects, and the last project I had to do was in Poland, then I went there and the pandemic started, and as I could not return, they offered that I stay; I ended up living in Poland for reasons of life, “says the externadista.

Moore is in charge of buying fruit for Poland’s 3,200 supermarkets: “My job is to look for suppliers in all Latin American countries, and in others such as Italy, Greece, Turkey and Spain; then I have to deal with all the import, export, sales, points of sale and other issues.

However, Maria Andrea decided to learn to speak Polish in order to communicate more effectively with her co-workers in Warsaw, a language she now masters and speaks perfectly, proving that she can achieve any goal she sets for herself.

Regarding the University, and especially its Faculty, the externadista student affirms that it was thanks to the support and motivation received during her studies that she has been able to achieve each of the goals she has set for herself: “since I entered the University, they always told us to go, you have opportunities, you have scholarships, if you don’t know something you can learn it; I always felt that support, they told us: if you want to do something, we are here to help you”.

Maria Andrea says she wants to stay one more year in Poland, would like to do a postgraduate degree in foreign trade, and will be open to new opportunities and paths in her life.

“I never plan for the future, I believe a lot in destiny, that things happen in a way that we will never understand. If I had suddenly thought ‘in 5 years I want to look like this’, maybe I would have closed myself to many other opportunities”.

From the Universidad Externado de Colombia, especially the Alumni Office and the School of Business Administration, we wish María Andrea much success in all the projects she undertakes and we appreciate the love and respect she has for her House of Studies.