A Private Equity Talent Pipeline Within LeBow’s MBA Program
There’s nothing like getting on the ground floor of a growing venture, and that’s just what a newly expanded experiential-learning opportunity for LeBow MBA students will offer.
Adelphi Capital Partners, a Philadelphia-based private equity firm, is partnering with the Lawrie Advanced Global Leadership Program, a highly-competitive enhanced plan of study launched in 2018 by J. Michael Lawrie, MBA ’77, founder and CEO of The Lawrie Group, LLC, to launch the Lawrie–Adelphi Emerging Leaders Initiative.
Through this new official partnership, Adelphi will commit to hiring two Lawrie Fellows as interns annually, turning a track record of success for LeBow graduates at the firm into a pipeline of new talent entering private equity and other sectors of finance.
Adelphi senior associate Garret Bullard, MBA ’20, got his start as an intern following his MBA studies. After his internship, founder Joe May ’81 brought Bullard on full time.
“When I started, it was early days — the company didn’t have a website or logo,” Bullard says. “Since then, we’ve grown and professionalized a lot while staying really lean. With some recent internal changes and adding new platforms using AI integration, we’re looking to take the firm to the next level.”
Bullard turned out to be the first in a series of hires from the Lawrie program at Adelphi. Over the years, seven Lawrie Fellows have followed in Bullard’s footsteps as interns with Adelphi, and as Adelphi’s portfolio of companies in manufacturing and industrial services grew through acquisitions, Bullard continued to develop in his role as the new firm took on new operating partners.
When the time came for Adelphi to expand its headcount to keep pace, the firm again looked to the LeBow MBA program, bringing on another intern and Lawrie Fellow, Patrick Short, MBA ’24, as a full-time analyst after completing his degree.
“As a small team, you can only stretch so far, and we saw we were at the point we couldn’t stretch anymore,” Bullard says. “We needed someone who could come in and get the job done, and that was Patrick.”
Both Bullard and Short have put the lessons in leadership and strategy from the Lawrie program to use at Adelphi.
“I had some experience in finance, though not directly with private equity,” Short says. “Garret and Joe took me under their wing from the start, and what got me into the position to succeed here was the LeBow MBA program and the Lawrie program.”
Open to select full- and part-time students in the LeBow MBA program, the Lawrie Advanced Global Leadership Program equips students to create value for companies and organizations through a model developed by Mike Lawrie throughout his business career.
“For employers, the Lawrie Advanced Global Leadership Program represents a strong pipeline of MBA talent with the analytical foundation and leadership capability to contribute early in their careers,” says Lawrie. “We’re seeing organizations benefit from interns and full-time hires who can accelerate execution, support critical initiatives and deliver immediate value.”
Interns coming to Adelphi through the Emerging Leaders Initiative will apply frameworks from the Lawrie program to conducting due diligence, analyzing deals and proposals and making recommendations for additions to Adelphi’s portfolio.
“The goal of this initiative is to provide individuals who show the proper aptitude, willingness and excitement about M&A and who might not otherwise have the opportunity,” Bullard says.
Since Short came on board, another Lawrie Fellow, Dashant Patel, MBA ’25, has served as summer private equity analyst, with two new interns to start via the Emerging Leaders Initiative during summer 2026.
