First Step on the Last Path

The first weekend of the last semester is underway. We are all looking forward to finishing and getting our lives back, but we have been mentioning to each other about how we will miss catching up with each other every couple of weeks.

Old courses have all been wrapped up and (most) grades received. For the most part I believe that people were happy. There weren`t any final exams, so all of the marks were based on essays. This has it`s advantages and disadvantages, but I believe that most students preferred this method to final exams.

New courses will be starting this weekend, although everyone has started making their predictions based on course outlines.

8 weekends of school work left - Corporate Strategy, Information Systems, Mergers and Acquisitions or New Capitalism and Major Project.

The semester culminates with the class trip to Hong Kong and Tokyo. It will be a bittersweet as it will be a lot of fun, but it will also probably be the last time we will all be together (save for graduation). Lots to look forward to.

How Frozen Pizza Is Made

An interesting video on how frozen pizza is made.

(via kottke) A blog well worth reading!

Leadership

The class is coming to the conclusion of it's first semester of year 2. As the calendar year comes to a close, thoughts turn to our trip (see previous post) and graduation.

Some of the benefits of non-core courses in the second year is more emphasis on class participation and less on finals and midterms. I really prefer this way of instruction. This encourages students to prepare, to participate and the think more out-of-the-box about concepts rather than learn them by rote and write them down on an exam for marks.

Leadership is the first class that we have finished this semester. I really wanted to enjoy this class, but unfortunately I didn`t get out of it what I wanted. The amount of reading was quite voluminous with at least six HBR articles to read each class. I don`t mind doing the reading, if it is beneficial, but doing the readings and not following up in class was frustrating for me.

This is a subject matter that is difficult to cover in just 32 hours. Hitting the high points and delving into a few important points would have been more beneficial than trying to cover it all and then expecting the class to go into the depths on their own.

Overall, I enjoyed the class, but I don`t think that I got out of it what I wanted. This feedback has been provided to the instructor and I hope that the class improves for the next class.

International Trip - The Decision

Before there was 1 - there was 4: Hong Kong/Beijing; Hong Kong/Tokyo; Santiago/Buenos Aires; Dubai/Bangalore.

The Dubai/Bangalore trip was popular however there were two drawbacks: the time to be spent in the air and the school was finding it difficult to find a tour operator. However, the school said that if the class voted for that trip, the would work something out. This trip got a boost earlier that day when a manager from Emirates Cargo came to talk to us about his company and what it is like to travel to and visit Dubai.

The Santiago/Buenos Aires team brought in a case of wine to help "smooth" the voting. The Hong Kong/Tokyo team had a member that was willing to pay for all drinks on the flights! All is fair in the voting process apparently.

The rules were set out - simple majority of votes wins. There were 35 students casting votes - first group to 18 votes wins.

ROUND 1
Hong Kong/Beijing dropped out of the voting. There was a general feeling that this trip was two cities in one country although vastly different.

ROUND 2
Dubai/Bangalore dropped out.

Down to South America and Asia. The bidding war went up when it was pointed out that there may be free drinks on international flights and promises of fully paid nights out were flying all over the place.

FINAL ROUND

Hong Kong/Tokyo is the WINNER!!!

Everyone is very excited and looking forward to the trip - not just because it is the culmination of two years of seriously hard work.

Those poor investment bankers.

Great video!

EMBA Information

If anyone would like information about doing an Executive MBA - particularly at the University of Calgary, I would be happy to have a conversation or provide information about either the program or anything else surrounding the requirements.

Leave a comment with your email address and I'll send you an email. I can delete the comment afterwards so that your email address isn't visible online for long.

I look forward to hearing from people!

No shortage of fodder

With the current financial "crisis" going on, there is no shortage of people being affected. From the young (RESP) to the old (RRSP) to the middle-aged (both).

Every class that we are in is talking about it - from International Business to Leadership. A lot of questions, but not a lot of answers.

Optimal Class Size

The University of Calgary Executive MBA program has just had a new intake for the graduating class of 2010. The class is 51 students strong. The class two years before (that just graduated) was 52 students strong.

Our class has just 35 students. Is that an advantage or a disadvantage?

I think both. Smaller class size allows students to get to know each other better, but also means that you have a smaller network with which to draw upon.

I imagine that the break even point for the course must be close to 35 students. Given the success in Calgary over the past couple of years, we were all surprised at the small size of the group. One would expect the demand for executive education to be quite a bit higher, but we seem to have been a "gap" year.

Does that mean that we will get less to spend on our International Trip? Time will tell.

International Trip

Where to go? Where to go?

As part of our course at the University of Calgary EMBA program (just to increase my Google hits!), we go on a 10 day international trip. The class has established a steering committee and each group (6) has to make a presentation on a trip to two different cities in the world where international business can be examined.

I'm pretty sure that most of the class doesn't want to do Western Europe or the US, so likely it will end up being Asia. Last year's class went to London and Paris. Asia has a large emerging market and there are plenty of opportunities.

First year done....

1 year. 2 semesters. 16 weeks. Whatever you want to call it - we're all done the first half of our program.

While I think that everyone had a better understanding of the demands that the second semester would have on our lives, the amount of work was still a surprise. Finance, Managerial Accounting, Operations and Economics dominated our lives for a long time.

I struggled with the Economics the most - which is ironic because of my BA in Econ. Finance is the other bug bear for me. I enjoy it, but I think that the "fuzziness" of it, makes me desire the "strictness" of Accounting.

How to Bid for the Olympics

One of my favourite parts of the course is that every Friday we are in class, a guest speaker comes and talks about their company, their career or one of their projects.

This week we had Roger Jackson come to speak. He is one of the most successful Canadian Olympic athletes, has been instrumental in working with the science of sport in Canada and is currently working on the "Own the Podium" initiative to increase the number of Canadians winning Olympic medals over the next couple of Olympics (something we have not been very good at in the past).

However, he was not here to speak about any of that. He talked to us about working on the bid team for the London 2012 Olympics. There was a huge infrastructural hurdle to get over, getting the public and the media on side as well as communicating what the differentiator for the city would be to the Olympic bid committee. It was very interesting and I can't imagine taking on such a daunting project.

Two things I picked up:

1) Always hire people smarter and brighter than you: I've always known that this is a good idea, one that my last employer was very good at.

2)"You don't get what you deserve, you get what you negotiate" - my new favourite business saying.

They ended up winning the bid (by 4 votes) against Paris. Winning the bid is just the first step, but what a step it was.

It takes 15 years.....to dominate the world.

Every Friday we have a guest speaker that comes in to talk to our class. Usually it is some captain of industry that has some sort of connection with the Haskayne School of Business at the University of Calgary. We've had politicians and entrepreneurs and they usually have an interesting story to tell. It's good to hear from people that have become successful and faced some hardships that they have overcome. All of them have worked hard to get where they are, but it's great to hear them and make a connection.

This is a title quote from our latest guest speaker Benno Nigg, co-director of the Human Performance Lab at the University of Calgary.

Benno was headhunted by the University from Switzerland in 1981 to come and start a Biomechanics department in Calgary. He had no idea even where Calgary was and when he accepted, he started with 5 people in an old locker room in the Physical Education building with 2 computers and a whopping 10Mb of disk space. The department has grown to the Human Performance Lab and it has become the dominant centre in it's field.

They only rely on the University for 31% of their funding (perhaps helping in it's success) but gain most of their funding from Industry and grants.

He was quite inspiring to listen to. He has worked hard to build a centre of excellence which helps a lot of Canadian Olympic athletes. He has helped Adidas test new shoes as well as helped David Beckham improve that kick.

Benno has been at it for 15 years and reckons that it takes that long to dominate the world. These days it seems difficult for anyone's attention span to remain for 15 years - everyone seems to be looking for the quick wins and then move on. Benno is 70 and still seems to be going strong (those Swiss and those mountains I bet) but has an absolute passion for what he does.

Do you have the passion to dominate the world?

Quiet - very busy.....but 1 semester down - 3 to go.

I'm not sure how many people are actually monitoring this blog, but it has been very quiet recently, for which I apologize.

I survived the first semester. Overall, I am happy with the outcomes, however I know that I need to work on my ability to manage my time. One of my favourite adages is "start as you mean to go on". I hope that understanding the workload up front and apportioning my time appropriately will help me feel less "overwhelmed" at the end.

Having said all that - I have decided to change employers. Not only employers, but change careers as well. This will throw my life into a bit of chaos as I will have a steep learning curve at work as well as at University.

I'll muse more on the Winter 2008 semester shortly.

Leading Clever People is Hard

There is desire by every organization to hire the "best and brightest" to innovate and contribute to the success of the company. In some industries, like drug companies, Research and Development is key the continuing growth of the company; without it, there would be no business and no competitive edge.

Hiring these people is hard; keeping them is even harder.

From HBR:

7 things that make clever people hard to manage:

1. They know their worth. The tacit skills of clever people are closer to those of medieval guilds than to the standardized, codifiable, and communicable skills that characterized the Industrial Revolution. This means you can't transfer the knowledge without the people.

2. They are organizationally savvy. Clever people will find the company context in which their interests will be most generously funded. If the funding dries up, they have a couple of options: They can move on to a place where resources are plentiful, or they can dig in and engage in elaborate politics to advance their pet projects.

3. They ignore corporate hierarchy. If you seek to motivate clever people with titles or promotions, you will probably be met with cold disdain. But don't assume this means they don't care about status; they can be very particular about it, and may insist on being called "doctor" or "professor."

4. They expect instant access. If clever people don't get access to the CEO, they may think the organization does not take their work seriously.

5. They are well connected. Clever people are usually plugged into highly developed knowledge networks; who they know is often as important as what they know. These networks both increase their value to the organization and make them more of a flight risk.

6. They have a low boredom threshold. In an era of employee mobility, if you don't engage your clever people intellectually and inspire them with organizational purpose, they will walk out the door.

7. They won't thank you. Even when you're leading them well, clever people will be unwilling to recognize your leadership. Remember, these creative individuals feel that they don't need to be led. Measure your success by your ability to remain on the fringes of their radar.

Are you smarter than an Executive MBA?

http://forum.calgarypuck.com/showthread.php?t=49591

(Ironically this is on a Calgary Flames forum)

Pretty hard if you are not aware of the world around you.

28th Place

In the recent Financial Times of London survey, the EMBA program at the Haskayne School of Business at the University of Calgary rated 2nd in Canada and 28th in the world. This is up from 45th place in 2006 and 65th place in 2005.

I'm often dubious about these surveys. As my marketing professor was mentioning just the other day (ahem), how you ask the questions and what you are valuing as well as how respondents answer is often key to getting an equivalent ranking.

Regardless, well done team.

Excel 2007 Can't Multiply

According to AppScout, there is a bug in Microsoft Excel 2007 which produces the wrong answer whenever the product of two numbers is 65535.

Here's the whole story. And here is Microsoft's answer.

What is 65535? Why it's 2^16 - 1. Hmmmm.....pretty significant.

Careful how you use those numbers to make decisions - don't repeat TransAlta's mistake.

Marketing Concepts

With the start of my first ever Marketing class, I've started to become more aware of advertising and messages that companies are using to communicate with potential customers. I've also become aware of all the scorn that has been inflicted (or justly earned depending on your point of view) on the Marketing industry. I'm sure I'll have more to say on this as I get further into the "Art of the Message".

A quote from Peter Drucker:

There will always, one can assume, be some need for some selling. The aim of marketing is to know and understand the customer so well that the product or service fits him and sells itself. Ideally, marketing should result in a customer who is ready to buy. All that should be needed then is to make the product or service available.

A recent Dilbert.

Apologies to Mr Porter

For those people who have studied Michael Porter's 5 Forces, have a look at this at the Indexed site.

Indexed has some great cartoons - really worth reading on a daily basis.

Where are all the Executive MBA bloggers?

I know that blogging isn't quite de rigeur in the working set. It's still relatively new in the student set - but it's becoming more and more prolific. There are some great MBA blogs out there and most of them are aggregated at the opencoder.org site for Students, Applicants and Alumni.

There seems to be a complete absence of Executive MBA bloggers. On the opencoder.org list, this is the only EMBA blog and one of only 3 from Canada.

When prospective students are looking for the program to invest their time in and wondering if they can cope with the work/life/school balance, any prior experience that can by provided by current students is greatly appreciated.

I remember the first week at school where we had a panel discussion with some recent graduates and it was fascinating to hear their "coping" mechanisms as well as dirt on all the courses to come. Tips and techniques are always appreciated.

Go on, you can do it. Just start up a blog here at Blogger or at WordPress - they both have good blogging systems that are easy to us. It's really very easy and you have lots to say.