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October 05, 2007

A Month in Review

After a looong hiatus, I guess I'm back. It's not even the difficult part of the year yet and time is already at a premium. So many events, so little time to write about them.

Well, let's start with the actual education, much of the reason why I'm here, I guess. The first month of classes introduced us to courses that get us in the right frame of mind for the rest of the program. Business stats taught us how to translate regression analysis into layman English - something that a stats course had never done in undergrad. Strategic Problem Solving (SPS) gave us frames on which to hang our problems as well as logical ordering by which to solve them. Understanding General Management (UGM) introduced me to cases and confirmed my assertion that much of life is predicated on luck.

(Aside - The sciencey side of me coming out, evolution of great companies remind me a bit about theories on mammalian evolution. If you take the development of auditory and olfactory senses for example - I'm oversimplifying so bear with me - early mammals couldn't compete with the more established reptiles of the day during daytime, so there was gradual selection for those more active at night. Well, being active at night requires the ability to interpret your surroundings somehow. Smell and sound. After the dinosaurs died out, mammals emerged to the daylight armed with this new tool that conferred additional benefits in this new environment. Companies have the same type of path as well - Apple was suffering for much of the 90s, their strategy almost turning their bunker into a grave. Well, now times have changed and Jobs looks like even more of a genius. Mammalian evolution. Companies. End of aside.)

We had a surprising amount of fun in Business Communications, where they've shown us how to speak like politicians. I was personally concerned as the class briefing for the course seemed a bit... desperate. It came across as a sales pitch where the salesman knows he's selling you crap and feels terrible about. I didn't think it was warranted at all, the class was great. The facilitator taped us speaking throughout the day and the difference between the beginning and the end was impressive. The end of the day looked much more refined and polished, even though we had even less time to prepare our presentations.

We ended our month with a few days of Global Leadership Assessment for Managers (GLAM). We learned about ourselves and how we function in a team environment. The simulation was the most enjoyable part. Our group has great potential to help each other grow throughout the year. The 360 feedback wasn't surprising for me and the NEO-PI was a good tool to help us standardize the language about our strengths and weaknesses.

Outside of school been punctuated with great events too. (In pointish form as I should start working on my assignments soon)

• Club info sessions have begun and I feel behind the 8-ball on everything. What do I join and stay active in? Industry? Finance? Marketing? Sailing? World of possibilities.
  
  
• I went to Edmonton to visit Ikea where I felt right at home.
  
  
• The Maida Vale Mêlée - our house warming event. We had an amazing turn out, I imagine there were about 200 people in at some point or another. Of note was the presence of Richard. Richard lives across Elgin from us with his grandmother. Apparently, we were making too much noise at the party so his Grandmother told him to come over and ask us to keep in down a bit. He saw what a great party it was, so he ended up staying for drinks and was one of the last people to leave.
  
  
• Dinner with Madmoiselle N. An absolute highlight! N provided some great philosophical insight and always manages to help me put things in perspective. She also got me across the river which made me realize that I'm actually living in freaking London. London!
  
  
• I went to Ricky Gervais's show - Fame - where I laughed my ass off.
  
  
• Two words: Pub Golf. For those uninitiated in the sport, Pub Golf is where you visit nine different pubs (holes) and order a pint at each. The number of sips it takes to finish the particular pint is equal to the number of strokes taken. We ran through these roughly 9 pints (there were par 1 holes where we could do double shots instead) in around 2 1/2 hours. A notable point to whet your imagination is that the average adult human stomach can hold roughly 1.5L (2.6 pints) of liquid. This was one of the most drunken and enjoyable nights we've had at the school. One of my buddies described the next day - "I woke up at 2 with writing all over my chest. There was the terrible smell of burned hair - for some reason someone had burned off my chest hair. I remember it happening, but I don't remember who did it."

Alright, that's it for now. I'm sure I'm missing out on things, but business stats calls.

Labels: Activities, MBA

Posted at 11:37 AM
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