Semester III: Two Parts Ethics, Three Parts Finance and a Dash of Leadership- a Recipe for the Half Way Mark

This week our cohort began the final leg of the uphill journey of our Concordia MBA.  After this semester, we will be halfway through the program... the tipping point.... the epic turn before the downhill run!

I just can't begin to explain how quickly this time has passed.  Last August, starting the program feels as though it was just 5 months ago.  Its so hard to believe that a full 9 months have passed!  Its hard not to be overcome with the sheer intensity that has gotten us here, and the mass of knowledge that we have compiled... everyday I'm still drawing new connections between the courses we have taken!  And the thing I feel that has grown the most in all of this- my confidence in what I know.  Sometimes you can be a confident person, knowing who you are, but if you are uncertain about venturing new ideas due to a lack of a solid knowledge foundation... well, I found that it can limit potential.  Its a very uplifting and empowering experience to stand on this kind of solid foundation.

As a student, to be honest, I'm feeling a little overwhelmed right now.  We just had team changes and the accomplishment of another semester under our belts, both were positive experiences.  But then you are brought back to reality that this isn't over, and semester three, in a way, feels like you are starting over again.  (A positive way of wording that would be "a fresh start")  Right now we've got emails flying in our new team trying to determine a brand new structure of operating than from our previous teams.  We also are engaging in two new classes that from the syllabus are a little intimidating.

(Course, isn't that the way it always is?  You look at a syllabus, and you think- "they've got to be kidding, right?" Then when you complete the course, should you remember to look back, you see that little by little everything was completely accomplished).

So in feeling a little like this all needs to start to get organized I opened an excel doc and lead off.  I went through both syllabus and made row headings of "Date", "Week", "Ethics", "Finance", "Leadership", "Group", and lastly "Unavailability".  For the columns, I then had a date, then below I had the week numbers 1-15 across 15 columns.  Then I went through each syllabus and put all the assignments in so you could see week by week what each class was expecting.  I highlighted when group projects were due, and then listed my name under weeks where I knew that weekend I would be out of reach.  I then posted this document on Google Docs and invited my teammates to list the weekends they are unavailable.  Now that we've all posted, we are going to meet prior to the second class at 5:15 to start mapping out the projects progress over the timeline, and take advantage of the weekends we all have available.  This will then be mapped out in each column with the Row Heading "Group".
(I tried to insert a print screen, but couldn't.  If you want to see it laid out, comment with your contact.)

I'm not out from under feeling stressed about this semester just yet, but I know with the right amounts of preparation and getting things done early on, this will make for a great last semester til we are half way done!