Trevor Ditullio, a recently graduated senior Entrepreneurship major, talks about his experience in the program and the work he has experienced in the field to help to build the foundation for his post-graduation life.
With a long work history already, graduating senior Trevor Ditullio reflects: “I work at one of the largest collision repair centers in the country, Caliber Collision. I’ve been there since I was 17 years old, going on five years. Right now, I’m a service advisor and I help to get damage appraised, like assessing the damages and building the contacts with the customer and getting the cars in and out of the shop.” With this continuous work experience with one employer, Trevor has deepened his understanding of the business world through the lens of his first job.
Trevor says his love for entrepreneurship is only reinforced by the classes he took at Rowan: “I love entrepreneurship, I love talking to people. I love learning about what the new trends are in business, learning what is going to be the difference maker in five to 10 years.
And in my career, it’s kind of helped both ways because like some of the things we talk about in class, I’m already there, like I already know what they’re talking about.I had a class on organizational behavior,” he says, adding that he felt confident in absorbing the material, reminding himself, “I had already been in an organization for half a decade.”
He continues, “So all those things kind of helped and prepared me in that sense and bringing in the stuff from school to work really was cool. So I get the best of both worlds.”
Further expanding upon this, he names some specific classes and professors that have truly helped him along the way in his experience at Rowan: “I’ve had the honor and privilege of being in a couple good classes that really help expand your network and help expand your ideas. So there was a class last fall that I took about innovation with entrepreneurship. It was innovative ideas with business and how you can take an idea and make it a reality and everything in between.” He also went on to say, “The most rewarding thing was just the ability that Rowan gives you to have an opportunity to network as well as to have the resources behind you to do it The resource that I’ve used mainly is my professors really, who really, you know, if I like, I’ll give you two professors, Greg Payton and Michael Dominik. Those two professors are the best when it comes to utilizing resources. They’ve been in the room that I want to be in. They have a lot of real world experience, which is important, and I’ve gone to them multiple times for like different email things of, you know, how can I improve my career just to talk to somebody who may not be in my industry, but also what does understand how that process goes.”
Trevor has some solid advice for any Profs coming into the Entrepreneurship program, or even Rowan as a whole: “If I had to give incoming freshmen and incoming people to the entrepreneurship program as well as Rowan in general is number one, use your resources. Rowan’s here to help you. You have a professor, you have other classmates that are willing to help you, use that to the best of your ability to build relationships.
My second piece of advice is don’t be afraid to fail because failure is a part of the learning process. And number three, be kind to yourself and know that the destination isn’t as important as the journey. The journey is what is most important. So don’t lose sight of the day to day things that you do. I feel like sometimes we all get caught up in that mundane routine that we all have. Wake up, go to work, go to school, you know, instead of actually being invested in what you’re doing and seeing what you can do to help other people and be there for other people. Ultimately success is not an overnight process. I feel like a lot of people in college life put a lot of pressure on themselves to get a lot of things done. So I just think from that perspective, just being able to just do your thing and be successful and work hard and be kind to yourself is the most important thing.”
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Story and interview by Connor Bicknell, senior communication studies major