Wednesday, February 13, 2008

Finally...electives!

I am loving P3; it's a combination of being in Asia and finally being able to choose courses. Here is a quick breakdown:

VOBM (Venture opportunities & business models)
Professor Phil Anderson is really incredible. The guy is the most efficient person I have ever met...I think he may have an agenda for each class broken down to half-minute intervals; not even 1 second in his class is misused. What's more, the class is so interesting. Many name it their favorite class of the period. The class is kind of an intro to venture capitalism. Phil puts a lot of effort into these classes. He writes several "live cases" for each period where you read of a current dilemma faced by an entrepreneur and then the case "comes to life" as the entrepreneurs come to discuss the case in class. The guy even personally takes ~14 pg transcripts of everything that was said during the visiting lecturers and sends them out in “less than 24hrs”…amazing.

Strategies for Asia Pacific
Fantastic look at doing business in Asia. Professor Michael Witt seems to be quite an expert on the region and makes even history lectures entertaining with his un-PC version of events. The first set of lectures were backgrounds of the larger countries (Japan, Korea, China) and then we moved onto case studies looking at how to partner and what to look out for. The professor’s explicit objective is to make sure we don’t get completely taken advantage of on business deals in the region. Seems that screwing people in Asia is popular in more than one way.

Negotiations:
OK, this is a good course and could make it into a core course. I think maybe it was a bit over hyped (as seen in that it is the only course that cost most people some of their bid points...even though there are 4 full sections offered). Professor Horacio Falcao is certainly entertaining, but the best part of the course is the frequent role-playing negotiation exercises that we carry out. Debrief discussions in lecture tend to drag on a bit too long for my liking. I think the course only needs 12 lectures rather than 16 ala IPA.

The last 2 core courses are also very good. International Political Analysis is relevant to business people…even if some people grew tired of Kapstein’s Davos name dropping. I liked the guy and found the course great. Apparently some of French students were offended by some of his views on politics in their country. E.g. France turned over monetary policy to Germany because they “needed adult supervision”. Probably most realize that French policy kills businesses and growth in their country, but I guess they don’t like being told that by an American.

Macro is also very good. I’ve had the course in undergrad, but it is a nice refresher and Ilian Mihov is a great professor…keeps it at an “Econ for MBAs” level.

P4 electives are shaping up to be just as good. Here are a few of the courses I’m looking at: Realizing Entrepreneurial Potential (basically a step-by-step guide to acquire a company), Private Equity, New Business Ventures (taking a venture idea from the P3 VOBM or Ent. Field Studies course to the next level).

Monday, February 11, 2008

10 month MBA???


INSEAD's 10 month program is less than half as long as most other top MBA programs. Such a shame that the tuition fees aren't adjusted accordingly!

There are the obvious advantages:
- less time out of the workforce
- less redundancy for those of us with business backgrounds

The are serious disadvantages:
- Shallow courses: the myth goes that we learn everything the other schools teach in half the time....while we probably are assigned readings on everything the other programs teach, there is no way we come away with the same depth of knowledge as students who have twice as much time to absorb the material and work on applying it. The periods here are so intense that we are lucky to be able to do a fraction of the assigned readings, let alone really get a firm grasp on all of it.
- Shallow networks: while we all make great friendships with a handful of people, it seems like I'm just getting to know many others when campus swaps means I may never cross paths with them again.
- No time to spare career wise: you needed to be ready to tell IBs exactly why you wanted to be a banker from day one of the program. If you missed that opportunity, you had approximately 5 months to polish up your "I wanna be a consultant" speech and practice calculating how many ping pong balls fit into a 747. For me, I'm desperately trying to iron out a workable entrepreneurial idea, probably at risk of not being critical enough given the lack of time to develop plans B, C, & D.
- No time to explore interests: from clubs to careers to electives, if you want a chance to look around and feel out what is best for you....too late, you really needed to have that figured out a month ago.

Sunday, February 10, 2008

Happy New Year!


Chinese New Year that is (a.k.a CNY). Students on the Singapore campus are celebrating with trips all over the region given that the campus was shut down for 2 days last week. It is a welcomed break, although strange considering INSEAD's statement on the class schedule:

"INSEAD is international and its MBA programme is extremely intensive. Classes are therefore arranged in the evenings or on Saturdays when necessary and may occasionally run on Sundays. Neither local nor international public or religious holidays are observed."

Somehow INSEAD is better able to keep the French from observing traditional days off than they are able to keep the Chinese from observing them in Singapore. I'm not complaining, I just found it interesting.

The Singapore campus has been a great change from the French campus. On the one hand, I'm enjoying the courses here so much more. True, this is mostly because I have been able to choose my own courses now that we are in P3. But, being in Asia puts the whole Asian spin on all of the topics which I really enjoy. After all, this is where the excitement is going to be in the next decade. Forget about the US & Europe....an international MBA really needs to get exposure in Asia.

Secondly, being in a major business city makes it possible to gain exposure to amazing external resources. In most of my courses this period, we have had top quality outsiders come in for various topics. Plus, the school is able to put students into touch with great business people to help with various projects. It is quite a bit harder and less convenient to organize these things when you are out in the forests of France. It is a shame that so many students still don't take advantage of this dual-campus opportunity!