From learning to leadership
Dallas Rogers, ’23 BFA (photography), has found her dream job helping people tell stories and put on events at White Tie Productions. Photo by Allen Ellis
Editor's note: This story was featured in the spring 2026 issue of ASU Thrive.
Story by Bret Hovell
Throughout their careers, ASU graduates achieve success in almost every industry imaginable. By embracing ASU’s dedication to lifelong learning, these three alumni have created unique career paths that have allowed them to give back to their communities and embrace the culture that makes it America’s most innovative university.
Dallas Rogers, creative director
Dallas Rogers, ’23 BFA (photography) with a certificate in entrepreneurship and innovation, has found her dream job helping people tell stories and put on events. Perhaps it’s appropriate, then, that she found that job in a scene that could have been out of a movie.
Rogers was weeks away from graduating from ASU after studying photography. She was on her way to her senior exhibition and had been applying for jobs.
“I was thinking about my career and got a little lost in thought, and I got honked at by the person behind me,” she remembers.
Jolted back to the present moment, she saw a vehicle for a company called White Tie Productions.
“I kind of just had this moment where I was like, you know what? Anything I see in the world and observe, I might as well just give it a shot.”
It turned out that White Tie Productions — a Phoenix event production company — was owned by Ross Snyder, ’17 BS in marketing, who was receptive to connecting with another Sun Devil and hired her. There she would put her entrepreneurship skills, eye for aesthetics and appreciation to use as a creative director. The culture of her employer matched ASU’s: She was encouraged to ask lots of questions and to try new things.
Recently, Rogers has started to inline skate, and the first thing she learned to do was safely fall.
“Don’t be afraid,” she says, “because falling actually propels you and gets you closer to the opportunities that you’re seeking. It is simply something that comes in the adventure of learning.”
Advice: Take risks and try new things.
Kyllan Maney, professional artist and teacher
Kyllan Maney, ’94 BFA (painting), wears many hats. She is an accomplished public artist and muralist — what she considers to be a dream job.
Her career connects back to an opportunity she had as a college student at ASU: a job she held for all four years of college at the ASU Art Museum.
There she learned how to judge wall surfaces and what different kinds of paint and material present well and how to create exhibitions, which she does with her students at New School for the Arts and Academics, a public charter school in Tempe.
And she was inspired by the work of the professional artists who came through the doors, including an exhibition by the Los Angeles muralist Judy Baca.
“When I saw that exhibition, I realized in that moment, this is what I want to do,” Maney recalls.
She has been with the school for 24 years teaching students not only how to make art, but about the business of art, like how to write an artist’s statement and how to make a proposal.
“You can be the best artist in the world, but if you don’t understand those things, it can be very hard to navigate in the art world,” she says.
She applied for and received a grant from the city of Tempe to create a mural with her students that is still on the front of the New School’s building.
And she has been involved with public art around the Valley including painting on streets and roundabouts around Tempe.
Recently, Maney’s journey has returned her and her work to ASU. She was selected to paint a mural inside Tempe’s newest residence hall, which is home to many students studying in the Herberger Institute for Design and the Arts.
“It’s symbolic of connection, it’s symbolic of the plants on campus and it is just a calm, peaceful, tranquil place,” Maney says.
It was a proud, full-circle moment for Maney.
“It was a great honor for me, especially since that was where the dream to paint murals started,” she says. “That I was able to do it for the art students specifically, that was really important to me.”
Advice: Find a community that you feel connected to and study the thing that you love the most.
Chris Zajic, vice president of finance
Chris Zajic, ’03 BS in management, has risen to the top of the corporate world working in renewable energy. But when he came to ASU he had his eyes locked on ESPN.
“I wanted to be the next SportsCenter anchor,” he says.
A change of heart led to a change of majors and to Zajic buckling down inside ASU’s business school.
“I loved the classes I took,” he says. “I can’t remember all of my professors’ names anymore, but I can remember exactly how and what they taught. I couldn’t wait for class.”
His pivot launched a successful career. After graduation, Zajic started at a commercial real estate company in Los Angeles, where he learned how to put together financial analysis that tells a story. That allowed him to work closely with executives, where he learned how important corporate decisions are made.
After a position as the manager of corporate finance at a company in Denver, Zajic and his wife moved to Florida, where he began work at NextEra Energy Resources, which works in both traditional and renewable sources of energy.
Zajic is now serving as the vice president of finance for the firm.
Throughout his career, Zajic has benefited socially and professionally from his connection to ASU. Many of his colleagues in Los Angeles were from schools in the same athletic conference as ASU, and he found a robust alumni network at his stop in Colorado.
Now he runs an annual scholarship for students in the W. P. Carey School of Business.
Zajic also takes mentorship seriously, both formally and informally. He has a particular interest in helping awardees of his scholarship learn to navigate corporate America faster.
“I’ve gotten to the point in my career where I think it’s time to start giving back to the next generation,” he says.
Advice: Take mentorship seriously and give back to the next generation when you can.
About the author: An Emmy Award-winning journalist who covered the White House, the Capitol and national politics for CBS News and ABC News, Bret Hovell has spent the last decade working in higher education.
Learn from faculty like no other
A university that is rapidly reshaping the future cannot rely on the models of the past. That’s why ASU is home to more than 5,600 faculty leaders drawn from every frontier of modern human progress: inventors, scientists, policymakers, researchers, teachers, artists and entrepreneurs who refuse to accept the limits of traditional academia.
Their expertise spans the full landscape of knowledge. But what truly sets them apart is how they operate. They function as a catalytic force, united around a rare clarity of mission and a mindset that nurtures talent in all its forms, and says yes to breakthrough solutions, and yes to moving faster than the institutions around us.
5,600+ faculty members
400+ ‘prestigious faculty’ as honored by the National Academies
58 notable awards including Nobel laureates, Pulitzer Prize winners and MacArthur “genius” Fellows
Learn more at asu.edu/academics/faculty-excellence.
More Sun Devil community
Master the next level
Story by Amanda LoudinIn today’s job market, certainty is rare. Shifting economic indicators, evolving industries and rapid technological change have students and professionals alike asking the same…
ASU anthropologist Robert Boyd a pioneer in cultural evolution
Robert Boyd did not walk into the room expecting a surprise.When Arizona State University President Michael Crow’s office asked him to appear at a specific time with no explanation, Boyd…
'Stories of the Street' aims to humanize Phoenix's unhoused residents
When Sreevarenya Jonnalagadda first volunteered at the André House homeless shelter, she wasn’t sure how to act. “I didn’t know what to do with my legs or my hands — I was just, like,…