A southern California native, Kristle Duran was drawn to the Argyros School of Business and Economics Executive Masters of Business Administration (EMBA) program from her many encounters with alumni throughout the Orange County business community, including her direct supervisor at the Boys & Girls Clubs of Central Orange Coast.

Kristle began her undergraduate career at UC Irvine and graduated in 2009 with a bachelor’s degree in Literary Journalism. After receiving her degree, she obtained her broker’s license and began selling residential real estate. This experience taught her resiliency, perseverance, and how to work under pressure.

After several years in residential real estate, Kristle started looking into vocations that aligned closer with her personal values. In 2013 she joined Boys & Girls Clubs of Central Orange Coast as Executive Assistant to the CEO. This was a short stint as by February of 2014, Kristle was promoted to Director of Strategic Initiatives. Within this director role she executed high-level priorities for the growing organization such as mergers, capital campaign construction projects, building purchases, and resource development initiatives.

Working closely with the executive team, Kristle realized that she needed to further her business acumen in order to participate in strategic discussions at a higher level. Her choice to attend Chapman’s Executive MBA program was a simple one. According to Kristle,

“Coming through the Executive MBA program at Chapman is one of the best decisions I have made for my professional growth. Dean Turk’s management class allowed me to assess my role as a leader and how to effectively manage change within my organization. Our financial acumen courses opened up a world once foreign to me and I was quickly able to participate more actively in discussions at work related to financial statements and the fiscal health of our organization. Ken Murphy’s operations class was a huge piece – his class taught me how to look at everything we do at work as a process and I was able to start thinking critically about how to adapt some of our key processes so that they align to our organizational priorities.”

Applying her expertise and the knowledge gained during the program helped Kristle to earn yet another promotion. In November 2018, Kristle was promoted to Chief Operations Officer of the Boys & Girls Club of Central Orange Coast. As COO, she oversees all direct services to children and families, and is responsible for program innovations, quality control, community networking, and finding ways to increase capacity to serve more kids. Her team is responsible for the delivery and growth of all of the key initiatives that make up the company’s “hub-and-spoke” model. This includes the different after school rotational programs at 4 different sites, 65 schools, teen services, health & wellness initiatives, and family strengthening programs.

Congratulations to Kristle on this well-deserved promotion. We’re proud of the work you do to make Orange County a better place for kids and their families.