Inside the London MBA

Some other MBAT notes

I could also add a few lines on my MBAT experience. Awesome!

I was part of the x-country race in which twelve of us ran seven kilometres across hills and mud around the HEC campus. I was also the captain of track & field events: 100, 400, and 1,500 meters; long jump; short put and relay. In both: x-country and track & field, London Business School came first.

Indeed, there were some very skilled people out there, for example: Christian Wentzel got medals in the 100-meter race, relay, long jump and short put, while Karen Milligan came second in x-country and first in the 1,500-meter race. People like Peter Biskup also did a great job putting the teams together and coordinating the events on the day.

It is by far one of the best events of my MBA experience and strongly encourage you all to be an active part of it in any way you can.

Bringing home the gold

An LBS three-peat it was at MBAT this year - our annual European MBA "Olympics"

For me, the experience was not quite what I had expected it to be. The nine hour bus ride over wasn't as long as I had dreaded. With stops before the border crossing (and almost leaving a couple people behind), a train container ride under the channel, some inter-bus activity (to be left unnamed), and lots of laughs.

The first night there, the teams all danced to the tunes of No Donuts for Hilda, our official band. I turned in early to make sure to rest up for the next day's activities. Spent the morning watching the badmitton tournement, along with the basketball team (kick another school's @ss), and the rock climbing team scaling up the wall of the gym. Around 11, I headed over to the lake, where the football, tennis and rugby games were happening. Also where our big red Booz(e) bus was parked.

The women's football started playing our first game at 11:30 - two beautiful goals by the unstoppable strikers - our team captain, and our macroeconomics professor :)  A bit after half-time, I subbed in for who usually is my defense partner. Less than two minutes into the game, I found myself on the floor, having attempted to take on the opposition, holding onto a very sorely sprained left knee. That was it, I was out of the games, and out of the whole weekend's competitions.

Heartbreaking to say the least. All those Saturday morning football trainings. All those 50 hours of salsa preparation. But after coming to terms with it, I realized things could've been worse and I should enjoy the good weather and the relaxation of being a spectator. I could even be one of the judges for the salsa competition.   

Luckily, one of the salsaros' girlfriend was a pro dancer, and learned in 4 hours what we learned in 4 weeks. No one could even tell she was the sub. And our team brought home the bronze! Tough competition, I'd say. I'm happy to see that the team did their best show ever.

And the Women's football team? The next games, they finished 9-0 and 6-0. 5-1 in the semi-finals. And 3-0 in the finals on Sunday! They brought home the gold!  And so did the men's football team too!! 

Though I didn't get to participate as much as I had anticipated, I know I have lots to look forward to next year. With Apples (my awesomest study group mate) and Stella (a fellow Texan) as the new Student Association sports reps, we're bound to have an even better time!

Victorious again: UCLA case competiton

The case teams from London Business School are on fire this year. Our team had another massive victory at UCLA, Anderson winning top honours over 15 other schools including Chicago GSB, Oxford Said, USC Marshall, NUS, HEC , IESE and many others.

The team (all MBA2009s):

Rodrigo Ormaechea
Abhishek Kapur
Ilias Anagnostopoulos
Arturo Silva-Santiesteban

http://www.anderson.ucla.edu/x19893.xml

This is particularly good news for the consulting club which worked hard to get teams together and increased participation at such competitions as compared to previous years.

Beautiful European Places

After twelve weeks of hard work, I decided to take a break in Nice, Monte-Carlo and Luzerne. These places are so beautiful. For months I limited my weekends to Amsterdam and London and only by accident I ended up in Southern Europe, from where I moved to Switzerland by mere luck. I liked Switzerland and Monaco the most. Luzerne is so small and authentic, and with places like Mount Pilatus (2,132 meters high). Monte-Carlo is charming and just beautiful, and only a few minutes from Nice. This time I limited my travel to Europe because I had to be back in London for my last school term. Yet, there are many others who are either already working, or taking a long time off to do more serious travelling around Asia or South America. Indeed, our flexible MBA programme has given us a broad range of options to develop and enjoy.

Final application deadline for Full-time MBA beginning in August 2008

A quick note to remind those people still considering applying for the autumn 2008 intake, that the final application deadline (Stage 4) is Friday 02 May at 17.00 (London time). If you are planning to submit in Stage 4, our advice is not to leave it right up until the last minute to submit your application.  In the hour or so before the deadline the server is EXTREMELY busy!

Although this has been another extremely competitive year in terms of the number of applications received, there are still places available in Stage 4. In order to maintain our unique international and professional diversity, a number of places are reserved for our final stage. 

Stage 4 candidates will receive notification of whether they have been selected for interview via email on 04 June 2008, and Stage 4 interviewed candidates will receive their final admission decision on 04 July.

Confirmation of receipt of documents

Upon submission of your online application you will receive official confirmation via email. Please don’t contact the Programme Office asking for confirmation of receipt of GMAT, references or transcripts. Due to the large volumes of mail that we receive during this period we cannot offer this confirmation. We advise candidates to check with their courier company as to whether the documents have been delivered.

A quick note to remind those people still considering applying for the autumn 2008 intake, that the final application deadline (Stage 4) is Friday 02 May at 17.00 (London time). If you are planning to submit in Stage 4, our advice is not to leave it right up until the last minute to submit your application.  In the hour or so before the deadline the server is EXTREMELY busy!

Although this has been another extremely competitive year in terms of the number of applications received, there are still places available in Stage 4. In order to maintain our unique international and professional diversity, a number of places are reserved for our final stage. 

Stage 4 candidates will receive notification of whether they have been selected for interview via email on 04 June 2008, and Stage 4 interviewed candidates will receive their final admission decision on 04 July.

Confirmation of receipt of documents

Upon submission of your online application you will receive official confirmation via email. Please don’t contact the Programme Office asking for confirmation of receipt of GMAT, references or transcripts. Due to the large volumes of mail that we receive during this period we cannot offer this confirmation. We advise candidates to check with their courier company as to whether the documents have been delivered.

Duke Duke Duke!!!!!

Somewhere in a land far far away, a team of brave warriors came together to take on the biggest challenge of them all.....the 2008 MBA World Rugby Championships.

These warriors landing on foreign shores, training hard and training well in order to achieve what had for so long eluded them - a place in the grand final of the World Champs.

Following an intense period of training both on and off the pitch, the LBS Rugby Football Club fielded two extremely capable and prepared teams for the 2 day event hosted by Duke University in Danville. Given our performance from the previous year, we started from a medium position in the seedings, with both teams pitched against competent opponents.

Both the Red (Warrior) Team and the Blue Team fought hard through terrible weather conditions in their initial matches, successfully securing positions in the quarter final and knocking out the Harvard 'B' Team, an important step in reclaiming the club position following the HBS dominance at the previous London tournament. Due to the fantastic playing skills and points accumulation, LBS 'A' (Blue Team) managed to finish top on the first day, and was seeded in the number one spot going forward to the final day activities.

The final day was a question of survival, with many members of the Red and Blue team broken and new recruits actively sought for some of the most prestigious positions on the field. These brave new warriors fought with verve and vigour, taking with them the team spirit into battle and successfully suppressing formidable opponents including Wharton 'A' who had already assumed a position in the final, only to be thrashed by the more capable and passionate LBS Blue Team.

Despite their dominance at the London tournament, HBS were nowhere to be seen in the final and an all-European showdown ensued with London pitched against the 2007 winners, UCD Smurfit in what was to be an epic battle. Running bravely through the mud the LBS warriors fought hard against a team of younger, fitter and well drilled opponents. Although at the final whistle the score-line reflected a Smurfit victory, no-one watching the match or leaving the field could be in any doubt as to the passion and thirst for the game shown by the LBS RFC.

The female RFC also did astonishingly well, almost bringing home the crown but unfortunately pipped at the post by North American teams who had a legacy of success and a much stronger level of experience.

The first final in ten years and a fantastic positioning of all teams in the final 16 is something to be extremely proud of. If you are going to join ANY of the clubs next year, then make sure it is the RFC. A brand of brothers (and sisters) who will go out of their way to support each other, battle for each other and show the true spirit of LBS...friends for life and without doubt the best network there is in any business school bar none.

Warriors Unite!!

      

LBS Men's Rugby Club

The Responsible Careers Conference is coming up!

Our team has been working on this since September. And wow, have we come a long way since then. It's going to be a great program, with attendees from the entire UK MBA Community. You can check out the agenda details and buy your tickets here: http://www.londonresponsiblebusiness.org.uk

People, Planet, Profits:      How Responsible Business Impacts our Careers

     The Responsible Business Club would like to invite you    to its annual conference. The event is an opportunity to    meet business leaders and learn how their careers have    increasingly focused on issues of responsibility and    sustainability. You will also be able to connect with many    prominent organisations that are looking for support in    responding to the call for responsibility in business.   

Topics include:

   

  Business & Climate Change   Emerging Markets   Business & Government   Sustainable Finance   Careers Fair       

Organisations participating include:

         

ARUP, Unilever, Cadbury-Schweppes, Cisco Systems, Accenture, UNDP,         HSBC, and Standard Chartered Bank

BU Tech Strategy Case Competition

I'm proud to announce that the London Business School team (Rene Plug, Sasa Brcerevic, Tobias Schweiger and me) have finished in the 3rd place (out of 16 teams) at the BU Tech Strategy Case competition. We are still in Boston recovering from the celebration last night.

http://www.casecomp.blogspot.com/

Discovering Entrepreneurial Opportunities Trade Show

So tonight was the big night - where everyone showcased their work from the term, researching unmet needs in the market and coming up with viable products to meet those needs. Our group, having identified our tendency to develop good content but not deliver the best way, had made a commitment to do well on this project this term. But as the term went, with milkround and loads of other commitments, it had fallen by the wayside for sometime.  Amazingly enough, the last couple of days we pooled together as a whole team and created... the SUPASNACKA.

What I was most proud of was seeing our most quiet group member get passionate about the project. Though nervous about pitching to the angel investors judging our work, he mustered up that passion in his presentation, and it showed!  One of the VC guys even left his card with us. At the end of the night, there was a prize handed out for the best idea. Guess who took that prize home from Stream B. :)

Cheers to group love!

Where Next for Corporate Responsibility?

London Business School hosts a distinguished speaker series about every two months. This week it was the Chairman and CEO of Nestle, Peter Brabeck-Letmathe. (Concidently, he's from Villach, a little Austrian-Dolomite town I've driven through many times).

Prior to the event, there was a discussion on the Responsible Business Club board about wheter of not we should challenge the him regarding the controversy around their baby-milk substitutes, which is related to a boycott since 1977.  Though not confronted with this particular topic directly, Hr. Brabeck handled the brand issue swimmingly well. Acknowledged the issues, apologized for their mistakes, and called for people to judge them based on what they are doing now. Perhaps, companies (and people) learn from hard lessons...what matters is the reaction, no? Are consumers forgiving if disasters are handled well? Are shareholders forgiving?

Snippets from his speech I particularly liked:

"... more and more people have realized that Corporate Responsibility cannot be an add on to the business, but needs to be a part of the core business strategy."

He covered a handful of initiatives Nestle is championing around water conservation and women empowerment in developing countries. Then went on to close with...

"Do we do all these things for a business reason? Yes.

Are we doing it in a way that bring poor people out of poverty, creates a sustainble environment, and brings about better nutrition? Yes

And what makes them sustainable is that they aren't done with charity contributions, or grants, which always have an end point and often don't reach scale. They are a part of a business process which can be sustained for decades without outside support."

That just sounds so right.