The UConn School of Business\u2019 Hall of Fame Ceremony offered a collection of stories, both funny and poignant, an abundance of heart-felt gratitude, and enough great business advice to fill an Adam Grant bestseller. <\/p>\n
The annual event drew more than 300 people to the Hartford Marriott Downtown on Friday evening, to honor and celebrate five of the School\u2019s most successful alumni and share in the excitement of the School\u2019s achievements.<\/p>\n
The five alumni inductees were: <\/p>\n
In opening remarks, UConn President Radenka Maric<\/strong> described the alumni inductees as amazing people, who are resilient and lead with heart. They set an example for students and other young adults because of their hard work, commitment to great ideas, and perseverance, she said.<\/p>\n David Souder<\/strong>, Senior Associate Dean of the School and the master of ceremonies, said this year\u2019s celebration, as in the past, was tremendously well received. <\/p>\n \u201cWe had a full house turn out to celebrate these wonderful alumni inductees to our Hall of Fame. Each gave heartfelt and inspiring remarks that illustrate why they are so deserving of this honor,\u2019\u2019 Souder said. \u201cThe energy in the room was palpable and many people told me how glad they were to have been able to attend.\u2019\u2019<\/p>\n Perhaps the funniest story of the evening came from Siller, a member of the Dean\u2019s Advisory Cabinet, who described a challenge he faced early in his career. Two of the executives from his company were invited to speak at a large conference, and illness prevented them from doing so. Siller, only six months on the job at accounting firm Touche Ross, had to deliver the keynote speech.<\/p>\n He prepared by playing the theme song from the \u201cRocky\u2019\u2019 movie in his car to bolster his confidence. His colleagues urged him to speak slowly so there would be no time for questions at the end of the talk. But Siller was nervous and whipped through the presentation, leaving 20 minutes at the end for questions that he, as a novice, wasn\u2019t equipped to answer.<\/p>\n One of the senior partners came to his rescue, rushing onto the stage and saying: \u201cI\u2019m so sorry. Mr. Siller has an emergency to attend to!\u2019\u2019 and ushered him away. <\/p>\n From that experience, Siller said, he learned to always be \u2018game ready,\u2019 and to have emergency contingency plans. Be careful who you listen to, he said, as they may not be as versed as they appear. And always blast motivational music when you need to summon your courage. <\/p>\n The audience laughed loudly at his story. He closed his remarks on a serious note, urging the business audience to support philanthropy, and telling students: \u201cIf you work hard, take risks, and have some luck, you can achieve anything!\u2019\u2019 <\/p>\n \u201cNow that I\u2019m up here, it makes total sense why I chose business and not public speaking,\u2019\u2019 joked Elliott as she accepted her award. As a UConn student, Elliott played 135 games for the women\u2019s basketball team, including the 1995 season when the team won the NCAA National Championship. <\/p>\n This year, she completed her sixteenth season as a coach for the UConn women\u2019s basketball team. She also served as head coach of women\u2019s basketball at Cincinnati from 2009 to 2018.<\/p>\n Elliott teared up as she credited her late mother, Charlotte, for instilling in her the importance of education. Her father, James, who attended the Hall of Fame dinner, provided unwavering support and never missed a basketball game. <\/p>\n She also thanked UConn Women\u2019s Basketball Head Coach Geno Auriemma<\/strong>, who attended the ceremony, for \u201cseeing something in me that I didn\u2019t see in myself.\u2019\u2019 Former teammate and roommate Jennifer Rizzotti<\/strong>, now president of the WNBA\u2019s Connecticut Sun, was also in attendance. <\/p>\n Maric said Elliott has a hard job when she has to pull her boss, Auriemma, off the court before he says something inflammatory, a comment that delighted the audience. She said the women\u2019s basketball team and their coaches, which made it to the NCAA Final Four despite losing six players to season-ending injuries, are all champions because they \u2018accomplished the impossible.\u2019<\/p>\n Elliott said the neighborhood where she grew up, in Washington, D.C., didn\u2019t offer many options for upward mobility. Basketball and a strong work ethic became her ticket to greater things. When she took the stage to accept her award, Boucher said that never in her wildest dreams did she anticipate being inducted into a Hall of Fame. She vividly recalls sitting in the back of an elementary school classroom, not understanding a word of English.<\/p>\n She overcame that language barrier and went on to serve for 22 years in the Connecticut legislature. She dedicated much of her speech in honor of her late husband, Bud, who had unstoppable determination and optimism. She said she hoped students would follow his example and be fearless in their pursuit of success.<\/p>\n \u201cMany years ago, my husband, Bud, and I took a chance on a very risky startup,\u2019\u2019 she said. \u201cWe forged ahead even when all seemed lost. Bud is my inspiration and the greatest example \u2026 of never giving up, even when everyone else has given up on you. He was brave enough to fail even after countless failures\u2026until he succeeded beyond what even we originally imagined.\u2019\u2019<\/p>\n Boucher, who was accompanied by her son Chris and other relatives, is a staunch believer in entrepreneurship and the economic benefits it provides. The School of Business\u2019 Boucher Management & Entrepreneurship Department<\/strong> is named in honor of the couple.<\/p>\n McChesney recalled that in the early 1990s, he needed a place to thrive, be challenged, and to be encouraged. He found all of that at UConn, which he said shaped his career and his character. He graduated magna cum laude with a degree in finance before earning his MBA from UMass.<\/p>\n McChesney has built his career around understanding what makes a business or organization successful and identifying ways to create value for all stakeholders. He quickly rose through the ranks at Stanley Black & Decker, eventually becoming CFO of the Security and Tools business units, which include DeWalt, Stanley, Craftsman and Black & Decker brands. He was also instrumental in the merger of The Stanley Works and Black & Decker and the acquisitions of both Craftsman and Newell tools. <\/p>\n Today he is senior vice president and chief financial officer of MSA Safety Co., which focuses on protecting people, places, and planet. His family and friends came from across the country to celebrate his induction.<\/p>\n He encouraged students to never stop learning. \u201cI\u2019ve learned more in the last five years than I did in the previous 20,\u2019\u2019 he said. He also urged the audience to \u2018hold the legacy of UConn up high\u2019 and to be attentive and helpful to the community in which they live.<\/p>\n Fortin, the daughter of Italian immigrants, grew up with English as her second language. She was the first in her family to go to college, and UConn opened up her world to great possibilities. \u201cSometimes angels see our potential more clearly than we do,\u2019\u2019 said Fortin, who serves on the Dean\u2019s Advisory Cabinet.<\/p>\n Fortin said she never imagined she would be given such a significant award, and encouraged students to envision themselves on that stage someday. Take advantages of resources, dare to dream big, be curious and set big goals, she said. <\/p>\n \u201cCreate your life plan, and celebrate the wins because there will be moments you face setbacks. How you respond to these adversities will define you,\u2019\u2019 she said. \u201cBe gritty, and keep looking forward and plan your next move.\u2019\u2019<\/p>\n \u201cDestiny is not a matter of choice,\u2019\u2019 she said. \u201cIt\u2019s not something to be waited for but a thing to be achieved. Your future is waiting for you to seize it!\u2019\u2019<\/p>\n The event also recognized student fellow inductees Douglas Sisko<\/strong> \u201924 MBA; Mariella Magan<\/strong> \u201924 MS FinTech, Christian Chlebowski<\/strong> \u201924, and Carolyn Cumello<\/strong> \u201924.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The annual event drew more than 300 people to the Hartford Marriott Downtown on Friday evening, to honor and celebrate five of the School\u2019s most successful alumni and share in the excitement of the School\u2019s achievements.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":121,"featured_media":213510,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_crdt_document":"","wds_primary_category":0,"wds_primary_series":0,"wds_primary_attribution":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1862],"tags":[],"magazine-issues":[],"coauthors":[2105],"class_list":["post-213506","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-busn"],"pp_statuses_selecting_workflow":false,"pp_workflow_action":"current","pp_status_selection":"publish","acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-04-22 11:31:21","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/213506","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/users\/121"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=213506"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/213506\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":213536,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/213506\/revisions\/213536"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media\/213510"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=213506"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=213506"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=213506"},{"taxonomy":"magazine-issue","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/magazine-issues?post=213506"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=213506"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Siller Shared Funny Story from Early Days of Career<\/h3>\n
Elliott: \u2018He Saw Something in Me that I Didn\u2019t See in Myself\u2019<\/h3>\n
\n\u201cWhere you come from doesn\u2019t define where you go in life,\u2019\u2019 she told the audience. \u201cI\u2019ve had many unforgettable moments, and this is one. I\u2019m filled with gratitude.\u2019\u2019<\/p>\nBoucher and Family Champion Entrepreneurship<\/h3>\n
McChesney\u2019s Career Advice: Never Stop Learning<\/h3>\n
Fortin Tells Students \u2018Dare to Dream Big\u2019<\/h3>\n
\nShe credited accounting professors Dick Kochanek<\/strong> and the late Larry Gramling<\/strong> for providing tremendous supportive, influence, and encouragement during her college years.<\/p>\n