A year ago, unexpectedly looking for a job, Honors College alumna Meadow Clendenin found herself sitting in front of a Toyota interview panel explaining what set her apart from the thick
stack of other candidates. The answer? Her Honors College thesis, written 20 years before.
“It jumped off my resume because I didn’t have experience working in the auto industry, but I
had spent more than a year researching marketing in the U.S. and Japanese auto industries and
had a minor in Japanese language and culture,” Meadow says. “When they asked, ‘Why do you
want to work for Toyota?’ I was able to say, ‘This is a full circle moment for me. I was
graduating college 20 years ago presenting my research on marketing practices in the United
States and Japanese auto industries, and now I’m looking at working for a Japanese auto
company that is a real marketing powerhouse.’”
Toyota hired her as managing counsel. Her argument had compelled, and the circle was
complete.
Meadow graduated from Oregon State in 1999 with an HBA in international business and
Japanese. She went to business school and thought she would go into an industry career, before
realizing she loved traveling for fun more than for business.
She worked for Marsh, a professional services company, in Portland for five years, eventually
becoming assistant vice president there. Her experience had piqued an interest in the law, and
she decided to head to law school, earning her J.D. from the Emory University School of Law in
2007. She wanted to become a deal lawyer, so she moved to Dallas, where she worked for
McGuireWoods, a large firm, and then a private equity fund – which began closing the business
she supported in August, 2017 and led her to that full-circle moment.
“Things have a way of working themselves out,” she says. “I couldn’t have predicted it.”
For her honors thesis, Meadow worked with Steve Kim, a professor of marketing at the time, on
a cross-cultural study of marketing practices. “He needed help doing marketing research. It was
easier to focus on one industry, so the auto industry made a lot of sense.” Plus, she says, “I love
cars. The first thing I did when I graduated, I bought myself a Lexus, which is Toyota’s luxury
brand,” she says.
Meadow also had a background in Japanese, not only a minor in the language, but also
experience living in Japan over summers. She would visit her mother, who was the director of an
English program in Kobe, Japan. There, Meadow took college-level Japanese classes before
ninth grade. She continued studying Japanese during her senior year at a high school in Portland
and then at Oregon State. “So when I was looking for a topic, a comparative study between the
U.S. and Japan made sense,” she says.
The cultural knowledge that led her to her thesis with Dr. Kim served her well as she began
working at a company heavily influenced by Japanese culture.
“One example is Kaizen, or continuous improvement. I was already familiar with that concept
because of research I had done with my thesis. It was nice to walk into a company, even though the industry was brand new to me, where I had that knowledge. A lot of American companies
have a different mentality – maybe various viewpoints may be considered, but the boss
ultimately makes the decision. When working in a more consensus-driven culture, more
deference and consideration is paid to what the actual group response is to an idea.”
Meadow says Toyota is one of the most diverse places she has ever worked, and its inclusive
culture contributes to that diversity. “The legal industry as a whole has struggled with diversity,
especially with how to retain women lawyers. Toyota has done a great job attracting diverse
workers and supporting the fact that people should not just live to work but work to live,”
Meadow says.
Her interview with Toyota was not the first time her thesis has helped her: “Even in law school,
it helped me write my way onto the Emory Law Journal.” One could get in the journal either by
having outstanding grades or through great writing, and, while her grades were respectable, she
had to complete a write-on project to earn her spot. “I was going on vacation after the first year
of law school. Usually to write on, people had two or three weeks. I had 10 days, but I did the
write-on project and earned a spot on the law journal. I had already written a thesis; it helped
prepare me for this rigorous writing project.”
Another Honors College experience she has relied on over the years was a course with Carole
Crateau, a writing professor in the Honors College from 1995 to 2003. Meadow says that she
remembers one particular day in Carole’s class, which was one of the first the college offered.
“We were sitting in class one day breaking down one sentence, analyzing it, making it more
concise, to convey the same amount of information in fewer words. That resonates with me
every single day as a lawyer. It’s really hard to convey complicated ideas concisely. Carole
helped me to be analytical, really self-analytical, to actually make sure that every sentence has a
meaning and a purpose for being on paper. Especially as a lawyer, the meaning of each word is
really important. It’s such a simple exercise, but I had never sat down and analyzed sentence
structure in that way. It’s so helpful to have that skill.”
Meadow acknowledges that for many students, this kind of intensity and the honors thesis can
seem like an insurmountable obstacle and a potentially overwhelming time commitment. But,
she says, “For me, as hard as it was to complete my thesis, it clearly has paid dividends.”
CATEGORIES: All Stories Alumni and Friends Features