December 01, 2008
The famous Michigan weather
It’s interesting how much people may warn you about the weather in Michigan before coming here and how unprepared you will nonetheless be in the end. We have not gotten into winter but the streets are already covered with snow. I just returned today from Thanksgiving break and found Ann Arbor covered in snow. Of course, this made the route back home very interesting. This weather can sometimes make you feel as if you are winning a small battle in the street, going from home to the business school can be an interesting journey, crowned once you cross the door of the B-School and feel that welcoming warmth of the lobby. Winter in other countries starts to feel as a joke already, yet we continue to receive the same warning: “This is nothing yet”; so obviously, it still seems that we are underprepared.
What has the weather to do with the school experience, apart from making it a journey to get in time for early morning classes? Well, I think Michigan weather is very much like the experience of coming to school to be challenged in an MBA. You get to the city while it’s still warm outside, everything feels like new, you realize that getting here was a big challenge but that you’re already done with the application, you know that there is more still to come, but you think it will not be as difficult for you. However, the cold weather steps in so quickly that it might even be overwhelming at times; you soon understand that it really is here to stay and that you have to and will overcome this. You realize that you need to adapt to this new time quickly. It not only changes how you dress but how you think about the environment.
So why do I think that the MBA experience resembles facing the Michigan weather? Because it is about quickly learning to manage a changing environment, an environment that will not be indulgent, an environment that will demand you to think differently, an environment that will challenge you consistently. However, you also get to realize that although the environment might be demanding, it is still shaping everything into a really awesome experience, parallel to the beautiful and picturesquely white-covered streets of Ann Arbor right now.
Posted by jorgelrh at 02:01 AM | Comments (0)
November 03, 2008
Our challenges
Fall-B has just started and we’re seeing a new set of challenges in the road ahead. On the grounds of school work we find ourselves facing new courses. Certainly, we find that our overall workload may have increased a bit due to some courses, the need to read more, prepare more assignments, and face the inevitable and dreaded deadlines that come in turn. Of course, just as easy as the stress went away it returns to try to hunt all of us down.
Fortunately by now the majority of us are better prepared to handle it. Fortunately by now we have grown a sense of awareness of teamwork, and know that we can rely on our teammates and that the outcome of our work will be great. It is simply indescribable the sense of pride that one gets after reviewing the final draft of a team assignment you just submitted, the quality of the work turned in simply leaves you in awe. No doubt that coursework might be challenging at some points, but it is also great to overcome all of these challenges through teamwork; we get value from our MBA experience in these challenges as our teamwork capacities continuously develop.
So what about the other major challenges we may find now? What about everything that is happening to the global economy? This is indeed a difficult economic environment and the road ahead seems to have a very steep hill to overcome. These obstacles are indeed something that the world as a whole needs to face. However, I feel that my experience at Ross is in fact providing me an edge to be able to better face the difficult conditions that lie ahead.
Trying to understand what brought us back to this point I find that the underlying issue is that the economic incentives that promoted excessive risk-taking blinded market participants, driving them to forget all linkages that exist between economic variables. My experience at Ross as to now is helping me understand things on a broader scope. I am learning to see the world through the eyes of my classmates, understanding from that point of view the need for a holistic frame of mind, considering the risk-return duality in a more integral way. So the additional I feel we get form our MBA experience comes from the fact that we will be prepared to utilize this frame of mind, to deal with risks better in the future.
Posted by jorgelrh at 12:53 AM | Comments (0)