“[The Tepper School] was the best three years of my life…period.” It’s a declaration of high praise coming from William (Bill) Oplinger (MSIA 1998), a man whose experiences run the gamut from leading investor relations of Dow-30 corporation Alcoa Inc at age 35; to becoming CFO of the large, vertically-integrated company; to most recently, stepping up as CEO of Alcoa Corp, the upstream spin-off and 135-year-old aluminum industry leader. Through it all, Oplinger has enjoyed a varied, multi-function career and honed a diverse and invaluable skill set.
Raised in Richmond, VA, the young sports enthusiast and avid reader showed early talent in math and science and his banker father steered him toward engineering. But while the young man dutifully majored in industrial engineering and operations research at Virginia Tech, it didn’t take him long to realize his true interest was in business. Sticking it out to complete the degree in 1989, he chose Westinghouse Electric and their marketing and sales area for his first position. “Westinghouse was a huge company then, with a great program,” he explains. But it was sitting at the Point in Pittsburgh, enjoying the fountain on a perfect summer day that solidified his decision. “I’d never been to Pittsburgh before,” he says, “and I thought, ‘This is where I want to live.
Westinghouse ultimately had other plans. In 1991, the company moved Oplinger and his new wife, Kelley, to Charlotte, NC, where he began his move up the ranks. He found the time instrumental. “Eleven years in marketing and sales at Westinghouse taught me so much that I still use today,” he says. “The importance of relationships, of knowing your customers, and of how to negotiate.”
Four years and two children later, Oplinger realized it was time for a career change. He’d developed a strong interest in the corporate finance side of business and felt graduate school would help in his transition. Looking to complement the ‘softer’ skills he’d so well-developed, he was drawn to the Tepper School, nationally recognized for its quantitative excellence. Even better, it was back in Pittsburgh, along with his wife’s family. When Westinghouse gave Oplinger the chance to keep working and offered to subsidize his education, it was a done deal.
While Kelley managed the home fires, Oplinger threw himself into the Tepper School flex-time program. “The students at [The Tepper School] really challenged me,” he recalls.
“I was with some of the smartest people in the world who were working really hard to learn as much as they could and improve their skills as much as possible. I had world-class professors, like Rick Green and Duane Seppi. It was known as being the most challenging curriculum in the MBA world, which I reveled in. And going flex-time. you could apply what you learned at night the following day and be an absolute genius at work.
“It was the most energizing three years of my life,” he declares.
Following graduation, Oplinger stayed on at Westinghouse a few more years, then in 2000, made his move to Alcoa Inc. It was a global company with a breadth of available financial functions, but what ultimately swayed him was an endorsement from a friend who worked there. “You will work for people smarter than you,” he said. To the 32-year-old with an insatiable desire to learn and grow, the opportunity was irresistible.
Oplinger left his position of responsibility — complete with large office, couch, and conference table — to become an entry level analyst. In a cube. “What did you do?” exclaimed his then-six-year-old son upon seeing the new digs. The risky move began paying off more quickly than Oplinger could have imagined. Within a year, he was running the group. Shortly thereafter, he was asked to head investor relations — in New York City. Despite this huge drawback, he jumped. “Head of investor relations for a Dow 30, Fortune 100 company at age 35, working directly with the CEO and the CFO?” he says, “You could never get that experience.”
And so the family packed up for Connecticut and Oplinger spent the next 15 years at NYC headquarters, rising through positions of increasing responsibility, both in the financial and operations arenas. By 2013, he was sitting in the CFO chair, helping to lead the large, vertically-integrated aluminum company whose operations encompassed everything from mining to manufacturing customer components. He had time to lead a successful strategy review that resulted in significant change but by 2015, the CEO had decided to split the company in two — into the upstream, primary functions of mining, refining, and smelting and the mid/downstream functions further processing and manufacturing components for the ultimate customer.
When the dust had settled a year later, Oplinger had chosen to become CFO of the upstream arm, renamed Alcoa Corp. He enjoyed the challenge and nature of the low-cost commodity business as did all the loyal and proud employees who made the same decision. “It’s a very hard part of the business,” Oplinger allows, “but I wanted to be here.”
First, the company mines bauxite ore in some of the most ecologically sensitive parts of the world, including the Brazilian rainforest and a forest in Australia. They then chemically refine the raw aluminum into alumina and ship it to numerous global plants with low-cost electricity to use in creating pure aluminum. It's a growing, yet highly competitive business, with Chinese aluminum having grabbed the lion’s share of the market, unlike Alcoa Inc’s earlier days when it held that title.
And while excited to take on his role in the ‘new’ company, the process of dividing an old and established entity had been anything but easy. “It’s like declaring a divorce but having to live together for the next year,” Oplinger says. While difficult and contentious, however, it was ultimately a very positive move as the split was “tremendously successful” for both halves.
As an additional fortunate and full-circle outcome, the new Alcoa Corp leaders decided to move their headquarters right back to Pittsburgh. “As a low-cost commodity company, we moved back to our roots,” Oplinger explains. “This is where our founders started the company back in 1888.”
In 2022, Oplinger was happily settled into his financial role when the CEO apologetically asked him to lend his varied skills where they were most immediately needed. Would he consider a return to global operations as COO? Oplinger surprised his boss with an enthusiastic, “I would love to run global operations!” As he explains, “I love being in the plant and I love being with the people. Global operations is thrilling. You have a problem and a hypothesis of how to fix it. You implement the hypothesis and either it works or it doesn’t and you go back to the problem and do it again. Being COO, you can really make a huge difference in how the plants are run and on people’s lives. It’s super exciting.” And he did, indeed, love the assignment.
This time, the dust was still flying when, within the year, his CEO boss left the company. And when the board asked Oplinger to step in, that’s exactly what he did.
Since then, Oplinger has been busy leading Alcoa as they “step up their game significantly” to meet the rapidly changing sustainability expectations of the communities, NGO’s, and regulators relevant to their facilities; to improve operational excellence and reduce costs; and to “grow the company in a way that delivers shareholder value.” They’ve recently completed their largest transaction, buying out a minority partner in a $3B deal that is already “going extremely well.” They are essentially “doubling down on our business, on our key geographies” as they see demand growing. Oplinger aims toward no less than to “establish us as the premier, the best aluminum company in the world.”
He believes his Tepper School education will help him do just that.
“There are skills that I learned in class that I still use today,” he says. “I made a tremendous career shift that I wouldn’t have been able to do had I not gone to Tepper. But more importantly, I was with the best and the brightest and held my own and gained tremendous confidence.”
Ever grateful, he and his wife have been unfailing and very generous Tepper School supporters and Oplinger returns to speak to students in classes and on panels. “I want people to have the same experience that I had, to sit back and say it was the best two or three years of their lives,” he explains.
“I just can’t speak highly enough of it,” he adds. “I was so engaged and just loved being there, loved every minute of it.”
“It was totally life changing.”