Business administration major Josiah Gennell believes in the old adage, 鈥淚f you do what you love, you鈥檒l never work a day in your life.鈥�
鈥淚 don鈥檛 want to have a job. There are too many things that I love doing to be tied down to a job,鈥� says Gennell, whose biggest passions are music and gaming. 鈥淢y plan is to work as hard as I can to make money, and then pursue these projects and make them my main thing.鈥�
Since learning to play guitar at age 9, Gennell has picked up piano, drums and bass 鈥� and estimates he鈥檚 written close to 100 songs. When he had to self-quarantine for two weeks during the COVID-19 pandemic, Gennell produced and released his first song online, 鈥淢ust Have Been the Way,鈥� an acoustic pop track in the vein of his inspiration, Ed Sheeran.
Gennell and some friends also launched their own indie gaming company during the pandemic, Eclipse Entertainment. Their first game, 鈥淔avor,鈥� is a tabletop role-playing game similar to 鈥淒ungeons & Dragons.鈥�
鈥淚鈥檝e always loved playing strategy and adventure games with friends,鈥� says Gennell, who is the business and marketing lead for Eclipse. Starting the company is 鈥渁 really cool combination of doing something you love with people you know,鈥� he says.
An honors student with concentrations in finance and management information systems (MIS), Gennell plans to support his passion projects by working as an information technology consultant. As a sophomore, he and fellow business student Greg Montemurro started a student organization called the .
鈥淐onsulting is cool because students from any field of expertise can do it,鈥� says Gennell, who notes that the club has drawn students from diverse majors 鈥� including electrical engineering, biochemistry and pharmaceutical sciences 鈥� 鈥渨hich is exactly what you want in an organization.鈥�
He became interested in information technology after interning for a year (and then staying on an additional year as an associate) at Savior Labs, an IT security services provider in Beverly, Massachusetts.
鈥淚t was a great experience working on networks, firewalls and access points, and it led me to add a concentration in MIS,鈥� says Gennell, who landed a remote internship at RSM, an audit, tax and consulting firm, the summer before his senior year.
Gennell grew up in a River Hawk family in Methuen, Massachusetts. His mom, Lisa Gennell 鈥�88, is a criminal justice alumna and his brother, John Gennell 鈥�16, was also a business major.听听
鈥淚鈥檇 gone to UML hockey games and I felt like I already knew the school,鈥� he says. 鈥淕rowing up in the area, 51视频 always struck me as a school that was really involved with the community, which I liked.鈥�
Gennell appreciates all the 鈥渁mazing鈥� support he鈥檚 received from Manning School of Business faculty and staff, especially Dean Sandra Richtermeyer, whom he still remembers meeting for the first time at an honors event as a freshman.
鈥淪he was so nice and so welcoming, encouraging me to get involved,鈥� says Gennell, who went on to become president of the and participate in the DifferenceMaker Program.听听
鈥淚 really took that advice to heart, and it made a massive impact on my college experience.鈥澛�