The College of Business congratulates Brian Loiacono, this year’s recipient of the Jack North Student Leadership Award.
This award was established to honor Jack North, senior executive vice president at State Farm Insurance. North served on the College of Business Advisory Council and as chairperson for the first Illinois State University Capital Campaign that raised $96 million for the University. He is a dedicated servant leader and supports this award to honor an outstanding student who shows potential as a future business and civic leader.
The recipient of this award must be graduating senior or graduating BS/MPA student majoring in the College of Business in good standing with a cumulative grade point average of 3.00/4.00 or higher. In addition, they must display extensive involvement in College of Business and Illinois State University activities, reflect a commitment to service leadership by showing involvement in community and civic activities, and reflect integrity in their daily life.
Brian Loiacono is an Honors Human Resource Management and Organizational Leadership double major who has a 4.0 GPA. Ever since his freshman year, he has been extremely active with registered student organizations. He has a strong passion for developing as a professional, as well as becoming the best leader he can be. Brian has held many leadership positions on campus. During his freshman year, he created the student organization Christian Business Leaders (CBL). CBL helps students understand how to apply their faith and values in the workplace and everyday functions while building a community of like-minded students. He served as president of CBL from August 2014 to April 2017. Under his leadership, CBL grew from a membership of five people to nearly 50 members. Following, Christian Business Leaders won Registered Student Organization of the Year for the 2015–2016 and 2016–2017 academic years. This award is given to an RSO who made a significant impact on the ISU campus and Bloomington-Normal community by activities that reflect their mission and who exceeded their goals. Currently, he serves as the student advisor, helping to grow and develop new leaders in CBL.
In addition to CBL, he served as the College of Business Executive Council (COBEC) president for the 2016–2017 academic year. This council serves as the student advisory board to the Dean of the College of Business. The role as president includes: managing the overall affairs and meetings of COBEC, identifying plans of action for the organization to implement and continually encourage collaboration amongst all student organizations. During his time as president, COBEC witnessed more interaction between RSOs than in previous years and completed over 150 volunteer hours. During this time, he also served as the Student member of the College of Business Strategic Plan Steering committee. Following, Brian served as the treasurer of ISU’s chapter of the Society for Human Resource Management during the 2016-2017 year. He is serving as the president of ISU-SHRM for the 2017-2018 academic year.
Professionally, Brian has worked in the Human Resource department at Marklund since 2013, starting as a Human Resource Clerk, and then serving the organization in a higher role as a Human Resource Generalist. During the summer of 2016, Brian held the position of Community Investment and Employee Engagement intern at Zurich Insurance Group. During the summer of 2017, Brian interned at Target as a Store Executive Intern. Brian accepted a position at Allstate Insurance in their Leadership Development Program, which he will begin after graduation.
