Everyone likes to think of themselves as curious, until they have to practice it in front of others. Curiosity sometimes asks you to admit, out loud, what you don’t know. Jackub Galindo, a former student worker at UC Irvine Beall Applied Innovation (BAI), spent two years learning to do just that.
“I learned how to ask deeper and more insightful questions that would help me reach my goal,” he said of his time at BAI. “Being comfortable to speak and ask questions without having to second guess myself was incredibly instrumental for me.”
Galindo, a first-generation college student, graduated from UC Irvine in the summer of 2025 with a degree in business administration and an emphasis in finance. Two years before that, in 2023, he started a work-study position at BAI as an enterprise collaborations analyst “My role was essentially a liaison between industry and academia,” he said. When a company wanted to fund or partner with UC Irvine research, Galindo built the shortlist, narrowing 15 or 20 possible researchers or labs down to a handful. First, though, he had to quickly come up to speed on subjects like lithium-ion batteries and AI.
Stuart Mathews, Director, Industry Alliances, and Galindo’s supervisor at BAI, saw the results firsthand. “You could give him a complex problem, like researching the AI industry in Orange County, and he could handle it as if he was an analyst with at least five years of experience in the corporate world,” said Mathews. “The work he produced was not what you’d expect from a 20-year-old.”
“I learned how to ask deeper and more insightful questions that would help me reach my goal”
The team Galindo worked on was lean. It was never more than four people, and that suited him. “You really had to be a self-starter,” he said. “Everyone was working on distinct projects, and so you really had to put yourself out there to get things done and move forward.”
Since the work was nuanced and complex, Galindo found himself reading about these topics in his spare time. “Generally, I’m pretty curious,” he said, “and so this research just felt like light reading.”
Today Galindo is a private equity analyst at Skyline Investors, a $125 million fund with seven portfolio companies covering healthcare, consumer services, and property management. The team, again, is small. That has allowed him to touch nearly every aspect of the business, from sourcing deals to underwriting. And it often puts him in direct contact with the leadership and founders whose companies the fund is evaluating.
“One piece of feedback I receive in my current role is that I carry myself well in professional situations, especially when I’m talking with leadership. I think that stems from the early exposure and trust I was given at BAI,” Galindo said.
As Skyline’s portfolio grows, so will the list of businesses and industries that will be new to him. Then again, he’s had practice getting up to speed quickly