Finishing Four

This semester has come to a close, so I thought I would create a highlights reel.  This semester we had our first ever class blocking with two 15 week classes.  Prior to this there was always one class that was only 10 weeks paired with a 5 week class.  I will tell you, this makes the semesters feel longer.  This also doesn't mean they will take that 10 weeks worth of class and stretch it into 15 weeks.  This is certainly 15 weeks worth of material to cover.  The classes were Economics, Marketing and Competitive Strategy(EMCS) with Dr. Roy Steele and Managing Operations and Technology(MOT) with Dr. David Cameron.  The top theme of the semester was Strategy.  What I heard the most from my fellow students- this is the semester we felt we "earned" our MBA.  This is the first semester that the work matched our expectations of what we would have to put in to get our MBA.  Now that's not just a reflection of "out of class hours" spent.  The quality of those hours spent, were spent with a higher level of expertise demanded from us.  There have been many semesters in which I've spent 10-20 hours outside of class to complete homework, and if I am honest- that first semester really felt like busy work.  This semester was not busy work.  Prepare yourself future cohorts.  Here's what you get to look forward to-

Each class weekly assigns a chapter of reading to cover.  For EMCS, those chapters are easy 40-60 pages of reading, and I think MOT's were about the same, but this text was a bit dryer, with no pictures or handy summaries down the margins.  Then EMCS divided the teams to the professor's own liking (the University didn't convey we were already divided up, and when asked about it, he was told to continue in this direction if we wanted to).  What this meant was we were managing two groups.  One for a major project due at the end of the semester in EMCS, and the other for weekly assignments in MOT plus the group project.  Each class had a weekly Case Study on top of the projects and reading.  The case studies were handled a little differently in each class.  For EMCS this was a weekly Executive Summary.  For me these averaged a weekly 6-8 page paper.  For MOT these were handled within the groups.  So each group had to come together weekly to write a Case Summary identifying the Business Operations Issue and Salient Issue, Complications, Market Implications, Recommendations and more.  This was about an 8 page paper written weekly by the group.  In the last 5 weeks of class this become more about a presentation, and we gave a weekly slide show presentation over the case and our Group's Analysis. 

Of course, what is a semester without a semester long project due at the end? 

In MOT you are to identify a public company and find a Salient Issue, and each member has to write a section of the paper.  Which is graded individually throughout the semester.  Then a collaborative paper is written, and the last week of class this is turned into a presentation in front of the class.

In EMCS you work with your group to identify a company without a business plan or an outdated business plan.  By the end of the semester, you are to write a business plan for that company and present to the class.  The structure for this project changed a bit throughout the class, so ,by the end, 2 out of the 4 groups ended up presenting on established companies, which probably have a strong business plan and the other two worked with start-ups actually in the Austin area to give them some direction.  We were of the later groups, and this actually was more of a challenge, but I feel our group got more out of the project.

For our project, we worked with a company that will export and import from Morocco.  It has just recently been founded, and will likely take off January 2012.  We had dinner with the founders, and got to hear their ideas and direction.  Being that they are so new, we got to do a lot of market research and helped in building support for the direction of the product lines they will work within.  When it came down to the presentation, ours was much more rudimentary; however, I feel we actually went through the process of what it takes to get a business off the ground.  I felt that our work was important as it would actually be used by the business.  Its was like a mini-capstone, and I really enjoyed it. 

I encourage groups out there, when it comes to this project, take on the start-up.  You already know how to do research and build a presentation around it.  Challenge yourselves to really work with a company that will benefit from your efforts- even if it does make the project a little more "hairy".  As we all learned in our MBA Launch, life is messy, and I really feel like this project is a "safe haven" to try your hand at entrepreneurship and making some real world change for the business of your choosing.

Our cohort was really exhausted coming from semester 3, and semester 4 offers no rest for the weary... but the challenge makes you pull yourself up by your bootstraps, and get on with it.  Now- we find ourselves 2/3 of the way done.  Next semester is the last one with just classes.  The last semester sandwiches class with the capstone project.  Before we know it, August will be here, and this will end just as quickly as it launched.

This week, my core group will meet over dinner.  We'll celebrate our successes, and discuss what we hope to accomplish through our MBA's on a personal level over the next semester, and hopefully find strength in our team members to accomplish those goals.  I really love the Cohort format, and am glad we can have this sense of companionship, challenge and camaraderie within this learning experience.  Course, we have self named our team "Team Awesome", so I may be just a bit biased...
:)

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to All!