As part of the fall 2026 residency for the Columbia University School of Professional Studies M.S. in Technology Management program, students visited AlleyCorp's brand-new office building on Broome Street in Manhattan. They toured the firm's workspace, met founder and CEO Kevin Ryan on the roof deck and joined a fireside chat with Susan Lyne of BBG Ventures.
AlleyCorp builds and backs companies from the ground up. Students toured the offices and learned how a venture builder operates day to day. Ryan, co-founder of notable companies including MongoDB, Business Insider, Zola, Gilt Groupe, Pearl Health and Transcend Therapeutics, welcomed the group and shared how he thinks about starting companies and assembling the right teams.
Kevin Ryan, Susan Lyne, and TMGT industry liaison Dawn Barber spoke to students on the AlleyCorp roof deck.
The centerpiece was the fireside chat with Lyne, whose career path is anything but linear. She began in magazines, leaving UC Berkeley to assist the editor-in-chief of a San Francisco publication, then rose to managing editor of the Village Voice at 27. She went on to launch Premiere magazine, move into network television at ABC Entertainment and lead Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia through a turbulent period. She later became CEO of Gilt, and today she invests in startups through BBG Ventures, focusing on women and underrepresented founders.
Lyne's most memorable lessons were about stepping into roles she wasn't fully prepared for and moving from traditional media to e-commerce, with little to no technology experience. She described repeatedly taking jobs where much of the work was unfamiliar because she knew what unique strengths she could bring. At ABC, she looked for what had worked in the past but had disappeared from the schedule, which led her team to shows aimed at women, including Desperate Housewives and Grey's Anatomy. At Gilt, she carried lessons from television programming into e-commerce, using timed sales and attention-grabbing media plays to keep the brand in the headlines. She also spoke candidly about leaving ABC just before those hits launched, and about how that setback led to new opportunities.
Susan Lyne and Dawn Barber joined students for a fireside chat at AlleyCorp's offices.
Her advice on career decisions resonated with students. She described reviewing each year what she had learned and where she excelled, so she always had a clear sense of what she could offer next. She also encouraged students not to wait until they can check every box on a job description before going after a role.
For students in the Technology Management program, many of whom balance careers and coursework, experiences like this are central to the residency experience. Seeing a working tech and venture environment up close and in person, and hearing directly from leaders who have shaped media, commerce and startups, connects classroom concepts to real decisions and real careers. The conversations that follow a session like this can be almost as valuable as the session itself.
It is also a reminder of why New York is such a powerful place to study technology. Within a few subway stops, students can visit a venture studio, meet a founder who built a household-name company, and hear from an investor backing the next generation of entrepreneurs. Few cities offer that density of talent, capital and openness, and the Technology Management program’s residency is designed to help students take full advantage of it.
About the Program
The Master of Science in Technology Management at Columbia University prepares graduates to lead digital transformation, and align technology and business strategy with an ethical lens. Through experiential learning, industry partnerships, and Columbia-supported research, students gain fluency in digital platforms and emerging technologies, and learn to design human-centered solutions that drive innovation and sustainable impact.
The program is available for part-time or full-time enrollment online or on campus in NYC. Learn more about the program here.
