Hello hello, without this opportunity
I wouldn't be where I am. I'm funny,
ask Puneet Ranjan how a kid from
India makes a permanent mark on
Salem's Willamette University.
He'll tell you it's a long story.
I grew up in a small town in India,
Rohtak and went to boarding
school when I was seven years old.
And came back home at 14 because
my father ran out of money.
Rengen could know it yet,
but that difficult experience
would become a valuable lesson.
It taught me the value of hard work,
which I think is essential
to anybody trying to succeed
that I'd turn in 1984 when he got
a Rotary scholarship to Willamette.
He left home for good,
so sight unseen,
never been out of the country,
never been on an airplane.
I came from Rohtak, Haryana.
To Salem OR and to beautiful
Willamette University range
and arrived with no place to stay.
He wandered around campus
and into a fraternity house.
There were a few fraternity brothers
that were putting their beds together
and I walked in on them and I said,
I'm an international student
and I have no place to stay and
they let me sleep on the sofa.
That was my first American experience.
It was the beginning of a decades
long relationship with Willamette.
This is where I got my
opportunity. My start. Rengin
studied hard. He majored in economics,
earned a Masters degree in management,
then applied to a long list of jobs.
I didn't have any grand plan.
One at Deloitte at the time.
It was known as the Lord Haskins and sells
Deloitte Haskins and Sells rejected me.
I actually have that rejection letter.
Another two sross gave him a
chance before later being bought
out by Deloitte, the firm that
once rejected Renjin kept him on.
I taught myself to like it
and become. Good at my craft.
The accounting firm operates in
150 countries with billions of
dollars in revenue. In 2015,
Rengen was named the Lloyd's Global CEO.
He's the first Asian born person
to lead one of the world's largest
professional services firms.
Looking back now when I was
18 years old in Rohtak,
Haryana and if you had lined
up all the kids. That were 18.
I don't think anybody would have picked
me to be the global CEO of a $50
billion multinational organization.
Under his leadership,
Deloitte launched world class and
initiative to advance education
and professional skills for 100
million people across the globe,
including in his home country,
175 million women and girls
in India are uneducated.
To beat the leading and
because they are uneducated,
they don't have access to the same set
of opportunities that you and I do.
And so through education we
are impacting the lives of
hopefully 50 million by 2030,
when the brutal second wave of
COVID hit India, the Lloyd launched
a project to treat the sick first
started in my home state of Haryana
and then we are now trying to do it
across India and South Africa is to
see as to how we provide care to
mild and moderate patients of COVID
and reduce the crush on hospitals.
His commitment to getting back.
Let him back to Willamette.
Having lived the immigrant experience and
being profoundly grateful to Oregon and
to America for giving me this opportunity,
I felt it was important to give back three
years ago, the Rengen Center was
established here on campus I.
How are you a spaced focused
on diversity and inclusion?
Well, it's great to
see you all in here I'm I'm
glad that you're using it
where students can find
support and community.
For me this is really important
in terms of giving back.
It's for people like you and
also for kind of re emphasizing
the immigrant experience
and experience. Highlighted with this plaque
dedicated to my mom and dad,
I think there would be proud
now as rinjin reflects on his journey.
I think my takeaway is it
takes a lot of hard work.
Takes a little bit of luck.
Please help me to welcome Penny.
He's grateful for the row that led him
to Oregon, a place he now calls home.
It's where I got my education.
That's where I got my start. I was in
your position 32 years
ago. It's also where I fell in love
and my wife is a native Oregonian.
He built a life here and is proud
of his story, his American dream,
and I think we need to celebrate this
ability of immigrants people like me.
People that look different.
To come here for this wonderful
country to embrace us,
give us the opportunity and for us
to then be able to contribute back.