Layering experiences
Jackie Taylor Holsten (JD ’99) added her law
degree to solid experience in city government,
creating a unique mix of skills and relationships
that propels her work as senior vice president of
human capital development for the Holsten Real
Estate Development Corporation. Holsten was an
administrative officer for the Permit Division in the
Chicago Department of Buildings when a radio
commercial for an LSAT prep course caught her
attention. Before she knew it, she was resigning
her position to become a full-time law student
at Loyola.
“Coming into law school as someone who had
been working for a number of years, I was excited
to sit in the classroom and see how the law affected
the day-to-day professional life I’d been living,” says
Holsten, a member of the Loyola University Chicago
Board of Trustees. “Because I knew a lot of people
from my work life, I was able to help other students
who were looking for jobs and connections.
Loyola was an atmosphere that was nurturing and
conducive to sharing, and that made me want to
do the same for others.”
After graduation, Holsten returned to city
employment as assistant commissioner of the
Department of Planning and Development
before joining Holsten in 2002. She heads Holsten
Human Capital Development (HHCD), which she
transformed from a division of the corporation to a
separate, nonprofit entity.
The Holsten corporation has been a pioneer
in developing mixed-income housing, often on
the former sites of Chicago public housing. “The
company created this division to make sure that
Chicago Housing Authority residents mixing into
these new communities have the tools and support
systems they need to succeed,” Holsten explains.
HHCD guides eligible CHA residents through
the screening and selection process for new
housing, and networks with area providers to
offer employment training and placement, health
and wellness screenings, financial awareness
education, youth development programs, and
a variety of workshops to build participants’
knowledge and skills.
Among the seven city and suburban
developments served by HHCD, Holsten says she
has a special fondness for the Hilliard Apartments
in the South Loop. Trees and grass surround these
historic high-rises, which house an ethnically and
economically integrated community that erases
the formerly sharp demarcations between the
CHA community and nearby Chinatown. “We’re
proud that Hilliard is in the middle of a community,
not on the edge of one,” she says.
Holsten, who is married to Peter Holsten,
president and founder of the corporation, says even
her free time goes to activities related to her job. “If
you believe in and love what you do, it’s not work,”
she says. “It feels good to have pulled all the pieces
of my experience together. There’s nothing I’ve
done in the past that’s not useful in my present.”
Following his interests
Andrew T. Berlin (JD ’85), chair and chief
executive officer of Chicago-based Berlin Packaging,
has always been interested in business. After a
stint practicing law, he followed a career path that
combined the two.
Berlin’s wide-ranging interests are reflected in
his education: an undergraduate degree in political
science, graduate study in military history, an
executive business program, and law school. After
earning his law degree, he practiced commercial
litigation for a year at Katten Muchin. “I enjoyed the
firm and am thankful for the job they gave me, but I
discovered the practice of law wasn’t really for me,”
he says. “I thought commerce would suit me more
because of the opportunities to interact with more
people and solve different kinds of problems.”
When Berlin’s father acquired a 90-year-old
packaging company in 1988, he asked his son to
come on board as temporary general counsel.
“So soon after an acquisition, there were lots of
legal things to be wrapped up; then I turned my
attention to marketing, building databases, and
recruiting employees,” Berlin recalls. Within a year,
he was fully immersed in all areas of the company’s
business—and became its president.
Although the Berlins’ original intention was
to flip the company, they changed their minds
as Berlin Packaging thrived. The largest North
American hybrid packaging supplier of plastic,
glass, and metal containers and closures, the
company now has sales approaching $700 million.
“We’ve had record years for 18 years in a row,” says
Berlin, whose emphasis on “mutuality of obligation”
principles between employer and employee
earned the company a case study in Jeffrey Pfeffer’s
bestseller,
The Human Equation: Building Profits by
Putting People First.
Though Berlin has decided he’s in the
packaging industry for the long haul, he’s used the
company to finance other acquisitions—including
translating his love of sports into business interests.
He’s a limited partner of the Chicago White Sox, and
chair and owner of the South Bend Silver Hawks
baseball team, a Class A affiliate of the Arizona
Diamondbacks. “I follow my passions—I like to keep
life colorful,” he remarks.
The father of five, Berlin devotes most of his
free time to his wife, Courtney, their two young
children, and his three adult daughters, but also
makes time for reading, movies, and travel.
“I got a great law education at Loyola,” he says.
“It was a formative time for me, and I forged some
friendships there I have to this day. Even though
I wasn’t sure I wanted to be a lawyer, I was excited
to be part of the Loyola family—and glad that my
mom, Randy Lamm Berlin (JD ’91 and a part-time
School of Law faculty member), decided to go
there later.”
Indispensable legal skills
No matter how they arrived in their current
positions, alums agree that their Loyola law
education brought them skills and work habits that
are indispensable to the practice of business.
“The phrase we hear over and over from
business people who have law degrees is that the
critical thinking and analytical skills they developed
as law students can really help set them apart from
people without that training,”Yellen reports. “In fact,
teaching critical thinking is probably what legal
education does best, and people who have that
ability are at a real advantage in the business world.”
“My legal education serves me every single
day,” says Lansing. “It’s a way of thinking. So many
legal issues are business issues and so many
CHOOSING COMMERCE
(CONTINUED FROM PAGE 8)
“IT FEELS GOOD TO HAVE
PULLED ALL THE PIECES OF
MY EXPERIENCE TOGETHER.
THERE’S NOTHING I’VE DONE
IN THE PAST THAT’S NOT
USEFUL INMY PRESENT.”
(CONTINUED ON PAGE 12)
—J A C K I E TAY LO R H O L S T E N ( J D ’ 9 9 )
Jackie Taylor Holsten, senior
vice president at Holsten
Real Estate Development
Corporation, is proud of
her company’s success in
creating thriving mixed-income
communities like the
Hilliard Apartments.
»
SPRING 2012
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LOYOLA LAW
