A Run

Weeks 39 to 56: Module 2b, New Venture Project, Joint Elective Period, Graduation and Job

2010-07-04T06:25:00.001+05:30

It’s been 25 weeks since I last wrote – my sincere apologies.

I returned to Canada on January 3^rd, after the China Study Trip and a nice quick little vacation to India. I just had one big thing in my mind: “Job Search”. I was struggling to allocate time between Job search and maximising the value from MBA. Above everything else, the new venture project literally took away all the time that I had, until early March. Module 2b had three core courses: Marketing, Operations and Leveraging Information Technology – I wished that we had pursued these courses earlier in the program, prior to the October interview cycle. Apparently, the structure of the Ivey MBA has been changed for the 2011 class and I understand that they will be completing all the core courses much earlier.

The elective season arrived in no time. We shared the electives with the Fall class and some of them were brilliant. I managed to enrol for the following electives: Entrepreneurial Manager, Corporate Strategy, Global Marketing and Project Management. I wished that I pursued more, but I had to spend extra hours on the job search; and I was struggling to get the balance. At this point, I sincerely hoped the MBA to have been a two year program to be able to digest the maximum. Real life is similar with no or little time and prioritizing is the key. I wouldn’t call myself an expert but I do realize now that my time management skills have improved.

Here’s a high-level summary of the learning from Module 2b and electives:

Marketing: Strategic planning and marketing management process, marketing research, consumer behaviour, business-government-institutional buying, market segmentation, cash flow dynamics, product strategy, new product planning/development, integrated marketing communication, personnel communication(sales), distribution, pricing, marketing services, global marketing, marketing plans and financial analysis for marketing decisions

Operations: Process Management, capacity, inventory, quality management, materials requirement planning, supply chain, lean systems, statistical process control, outsourcing/off-shoring and operations strategies.

Leveraging Information Technology: Systems development, business process management practices, make vs buy decisions, procurement options, vendor selection and contracting, ROI of a software as a service, Enterprise resource planning, risk management in information systems projects, systems testing, system conversion and implementation, change management, acquiring and implementing(putting information systems in place), information security, outsourcing, organizing data(business intelligence and data governance), Information technology Strategy, organizing information systems resources, knowledge management, social media, realizing value from e-commerce, realizing value from mergers and acquisitions and enterprise architecture.

Project Management: Defining and organizing the project, Planning the project, Managing project execution, Triple constraints(Scope, time and cost), Project Team, Quality of Deliverable, Communication, Risk, Project mistakes, organizing projects, network diagramming, scheduling, critical path method, cost-time tradeoffs, dependencies, risks, tracking and managing projects, closing and reviewing projects, structured frameworks for making project management related decisions.

Global Marketing: Performance driven global strategic market planning, branding, global market opportunity assessment, customer insights, marketing planning process, customer value proposition and adoption of innovations, competitive advantage, execution and controversies.

Entrepreneurial Manager: Valuations, IPOs, business models, financing new ventures and terms sheets

Corporate Strategy: Concept of corporate strategy, organizational structure and controls, intersection of leadership and corporate strategy, corporate governance and corporate strategy, corporate strategy versus business unit strategy and strategic leadership

If I was given an opportunity to go back to Ivey and pursue a course, I would dare any course except the new venture project (NVP). It was such a tiring experience and almost incorporated learning from every single concept that I learnt at Ivey. NVP has been an unbelievable source of learning opportunity and I was thoroughly impressed with the depth and width of topics that our team addressed during analysis. I strongly recommend Ivey students to capitalize on this wonderful opportunity.

The graduation day (10^th May) arrived and the rollercoaster finally came to a stop. I felt as though I was living in a vacuum with zero cases to read. Graduation ceremony went along very well and I was conferred with the Master of Business Administration Degree. Ivey MBA definitely exceeded my expectations and I am deeply contented with the learning that I have had during the past year. Obviously MBA is not an immediate career accelerator, but I do realize that on the long run it adds tremendous value. There’s no doubt in my mind that I could accelerate a little bit closer towards my dreams and I sincerely hope to take my Ivey learning forward towards making my dreams real.

I managed to get my first Canadian job a week after graduation. I accepted an offer with CGI as a senior consultant and I started working on May 17^th. I am now providing consulting services for a major Canadian Bank and the role is a mix of business technology and project management. Part time, I also volunteer for a non-profit-incorporation in Toronto, as a Director of Board, where I am responsible for providing strategic and operational guidance.

China Study Trip

2009-12-25T09:30:00.022+05:30

Dec 08 2009 – Time to pack

It’s time to leave to China the day after I completed my last deliverable for the second electives season. The China study trip is worth 0.5 a credit – as big as an elective course. Packing was a little bit of a challenge because we are allowed to carry only one suitcase (for check-in, max 20 kg), a handbag (max 5 kg) and a laptop bag, to be able to fulfil the domestic flying limitations in China. I bought two Hundred Chinese Yuan from the Masonville Mall in London-ON, just sufficient for the CAB ride from Beijing Airport to the Hotel. Incidentally, one could find better exchange rates in China, at least as cheap as 15%. The VISA to travel to China was originally arranged by the China Study Trip Student senators in collaboration with Mike Consular (Visa) Express Services, Montreal. Canadian and Indian passport holders do not need a visa to enter Hong Kong for short trips.

The China study trip officially beings on the 12^th Dec and ends on 10^th Dec, including visits to Beijing, Shanghai, Shenzen and Hong Kong. I will be going to India after the China trip and return to Canada early Jan. The month long trip includes flying in Air Canada, Air China, China Eastern, Jet Airways, Jet Lite, King Fisher and British Airways.

All set to leave...

Dec 9th and 10th 2009 – En transit from Toronto to Beijing

Dec 9th marked the end this year’s unusual winter. Historically, in London ON, winter begins early November and it snows heavily between November and February. But, this year saw a bizarre winter and it didn’t quite snow big until now. But the day I left London, saw some serious snowfall and I was excited to watch the city white. But what worried us was the fact that flights from Toronto were delayed at least by 60 to 90 minutes. Luckily, my flight to Beijing left on time. It’s an Air Canada Boeing carrier flying between Toronto and Beijing nonstop. Some of my friends did miss their connection flights at San Francisco and they had to leave the following day.

The flight service in Air Canada was just about average. The 14 hour nonstop flight was wasn’t as brutal as I had expected and we finally landed on the 10^that Beijing Capital International Airport at about 5:00 PM. Certainly, it is one of the best airports in the world. I couldn’t resist myself appreciating the architectural marvel, the soaring aerodynamic roof and the subway trains for internal navigation. After completing the immigration formalities, we headed out to take the taxi ride to hotel. Taxis in Beijing are quite reliable and the only challenge with them is that the taxi drivers do not speak even a single word in English. We kind of managed to explain the destination with the help of hotel names written in mandarin. Thanks to the China study trip senators for advanced planning. First impressions of Beijing were quite impressive. Some places looked like India but I have to admit that the buildings and the infrastructure are way better. After 45 minutes, we reached the Oriental Bay international hotel. We paid about 75 Yuan for the taxi.

A bunch of students that came in the same flight of mine headed out to Houhai for dinner that night. It’s a lake surrounded by variety of restaurants and bars. The Houhai lake was frozen and it was as cold as Canada. I understand that finding vegetarian food is going to be a challenge in China. The fact that most of them do not understand English and that they consider Egg as vegetarian rendered things worse. I managed to survive anyway. The traffic in Beijing is worse when compared to Canada but I could easily understand that it was better than in India. Cars seemed to dominate the streets as opposed to two wheelers in India. Traffic was a kind of cultural shock to my North American class mates. Nevertheless, I was so glad to find some serious crowd after a long time.

Dec 11th 2009, Friday – Forbidden City, Tiananmen Square and Karaoke

Friday was not a part of the official China Study trip and my class mates were arriving at Beijing at various times and a group of us decided to head out to the Forbidden City and Tiananmen Square. Just that the heavy winds blew us off and was very cold the entire day.

Gugong or Forbidden City was the Chinese imperial Palace for five centuries across two dynasties, the Ming and Qing. The palace spans across an area of approximately 7.8 million square feet. We were told that the palace complex consists of more than 900 buildings and over 8000 rooms. This palace was established in early 1400s when the Ming Dynasty moved the capital to Beijing (North capital) from Nanjing (south capital). The entry fee is about 40 Yuan. Overall - an impressive one. Tiananmen Square is a place of historical importance in China. 'Tiananmen' literally means gateway of heavenly peace. It also has the 'Mausoleum of Mao Zedong', the Chairman Mao memorial hall. The place marks several significant Chinese events such as Tiananmen Square protests of 1976 and 1989, May Fourth Movement in 1919, the proclamation of the People's Republic of China by Mao Zedong on October 1, 1949, etc. Later the afternoon, we headed out to the Houhai for lunch and Karoake party.

Dec 12th 2009, Saturday – Great Wall of China, Bird’s Nest and Dinner with Tsinghua MBAs

The China study trip officially commenced on Saturday, with 76 students, 1 faculty, a local guide and two buses. The day started off with an hour drive to the Great Wall of China section in Mutianyu. The entry fee is about 40 Yuan. We had to climb through steep stairs and the Chinese proclaim that if you could climb the Great wall, then you are a real hero. To me, it is an experience of life time and the fact that the wall spans over 6000 km is unbelievable. We were told that the wall was originally built somewhere during 700 BC and 200 BC and was renovated by the Ming dynasty in 1300s AD. On the way down, I took the exiting toboggan slide chute.

In the afternoon, we visited Beijing National stadium - Bird’s Nest. It is said to be the world’s largest steel structure worth over $400 million, constructed using more than 100,000 tons of steel. The stadium was being prepared for the snow season carnival when we visited. We also had glimpses of Water Cube, Olympics Tower, Pangu Building(7 star hotel) and the Ling Long tower.

Later, we had dinner with Tsinghua MBA students. Tsingua School of economics is one of the top business schools in China which runs an international MBA program in collaboration with MIT Sloan School of management.

Dec 13th 2009, Sunday – Cultural Plunge

Sunday has been quite an interesting and a challenging day. We were on our own and had to complete a cultural plunge exercise without the local guide or pre-arranged buses. In groups of four, we were given tasks such as finding locations, involving in a bargaining purchase, understanding benefits of a Chinese herb, appreciating the local cultural flavour from tourist spots such as temples and courtyards, experiencing weird Chinese foodies etc. The fact that not many Chinese understood English made things challenging. Overall - a great day to understand and comprehend the local culture.

Following is compilation of my experiences from the day:

Yonghe or Lama Temple: this is place is also known as the temple of peace and harmony. The main Deity is a tall structure of Maitreya Buddha. There were quite some similarities to temples in India, but I was surprised to find that people wear footwear inside the temple unlike in India. I also found some statues similar to Indian Hindu Gods like Hanuman and Kali Maatha. My North American counterparts were surprised to find the way people worshiped with incense sticks.

Hutongs: These are kind of narrow streets formed by lines of courtyards. We had to learn the Chinese pronunciation of three such Hutongs. Hutongs represented Beijing’s cultural significance but having said that, we understood that many hutongs were demolished in mid 1900s to commercialize.

Tian Tan or Temple of heaven: It is a complex of Taoist buildings constructed during the 1400s. The religion practised is Taoism. On a side note, the major religions practised in China are Buddhism, Taoism, Islam, Catholicism, and Protestantism. More than the magnificence of the temple, what I appreciated is the variety of activities around the temple. People were happily dancing, singing and playing a variety of games all over.

Photo with a person in uniform: This was the toughest thing to do without knowing the local language. We had at least ten requests that were turned down by men in uniform, such as police men, military men and security guards. Anyway, we finally managed to find someone in the Tian Tan temple.

Xiushui or Silk Market: This is perhaps one of the best tourist attractions in Beijing. It accommodates over 1500 stores more than 20000 people visit the place every day. We were told that over a million people visited market during the Beijing Olympics. Our task was to bargain a price and buy a gift item. We were advised by our Chinese classmates to start with price as low as one tenth of what the shopkeeper lists and negotiate upwards. It sounded similar to the experiences that I’ve had in India. Later we went to a medical shop and completed the herb buying exercise. We bought a local herb that cures digestion problems. Finding a shop where we can find herbs, and understanding the benefits was a tough deal without knowing the local language.

Shorts Building: Another task during the day was to locate the Chinese Big shorts building around the silk market. Later we discovered that it was the CCTV (China Central Television) building. I’ve never seen building of this kind and I loved the architecture.

The one exercise that we postponed is experiencing weird Chinese cuisine. I had a friend of mine in Shanghai who actually took us out to a local Chinese restaurant and ordered some brilliant stuff. There was a hot pot in the middle of the table with two kinds of soups boiling. We received a variety of partially cooked dishes. We then cooked them in the hot pot and I loved the food. Meat eaters enjoyed more than the veggies and the highlight was a live turtle. It literally moved its limbs and head in the plate – kind of seriously gross. Altogether, we paid just 130 Yuan for 5 people.

The day ended with the dinner with Ivey Beijing Alumni.

WOW!!!

Dec 14th 2009, Monday – Chinese Business Environment

Understanding the way Chinese businesses operates has been one of our top agendas of the trip and Monday was quite an important day in this regard. The day started off with a presentation from SABMiller (South African Brewery) – one of the world’s largest brewers with sales over $21 billion. The second session was an alumni panel discussion on the successes and failures of China market. We had three Ivey alumni participating in the discussion panel. Finally after lunch, we had a presentation on Chinese economy. There were representatives from the Canadian Embassy in China. Later in the evening, we took the China Eastern Airlines flight to Shanghai.

Dec 15th 2009, Tuesday – GM Factory visit and Yu Garden Market

While Beijing is obsessed with the Chinese cultural flavour, Shanghai is more westernised. Beijing has about 17 million people and Shanghai about 20 million. One could easily witness exceptional skyscrapers and some are better than their counterparts from developed countries. Forenoon, we went to the one of the Shanghai General Motor’s production lines. They had a very efficient process and the production line produced 2 cars every three minutes. To me, it was quite obvious that there was a lot more room for improving automation. But the availability of cheap and massive labour force must have rendered things this way. Later, we visited the Huangpu River, Bund and the Yu Garden Market. We had some free time in the afternoon and I met my undergrad buddy who is pursuing MBA from CEIBS (China European International Business School, Shanghai). Finally, we had the dinner with Ivey Shanghai Alumni.

The one thing big that shook me at my hotel room in Shanghai is the fact that the bathroom walls were transparent –Eventually, I figured the remote switch to control the curtains. Whew – sigh of relief ;-) Hee Hee !!!

Dec 16th 2009, Wednesday – Presentations, Seafood and Acrobatics

We had a series of presentations and panel discussions on Wednesday. The topics included real estate bubble in China, super trends of future China, presentation on Dupont China, etc. For lunch, we went to a seafood place where people had to choose fish fresh pools the restaurant cooked them fresh. Luckily, I found some veggie stuff as well. Later in the evening, we witnessed a brilliant acrobatics show.

Dec 17th 2009, Thursday – Baosteel and Maglev

On Thursday, we visited the Shangai Baosteel Corporation Factory in the morning. I understand that the steel factories are typically huge and this is the first time I am getting to witness one. Baosteel employees more than 110000 people and it has over $21 billion in revenues. Baosteel is the one that supplied steel for the construction of Bird’s nest in Beijing. The factory has the capability to produce over 20 million tons of steel annually. We also had a company presentation in mandarin and a classmate of us, translated in English. They are located very close to the port of Shanghai and they have some serious location advantages.

In the evening, we took the Maglev (magnetic levitation) transport to reach the Airport. The train took about 7 minutes to complete the distance of around 30km, with a maximum speed of 431 km/h. We were told that the train achieved a maximum speed of 501 km/h during a test run in 2003. This technology is however, slower than airplanes because of the air drag, which is comparatively less at higher altitudes. I read in wiki, that this technology can achieve speeds of over 6000 km/h if deployed in an evacuated tunnel. Interesting!!!

The flight to Shenzhen got delayed by over 2 hours and we reached our hotel close to midnight.

Dec 18th 2009, Friday – Huawei, Great Wall computers and Hitachi

In the morning, we visited the Huawei Factory and had several presentations on supply chain, human resources and Huawei’s business in general. The one thing that impressed me in all of the presentations is the fact that we could literally witness several aspects that we learnt at BSchool, such as joint ventures, economic policies, etc. Later in the afternoon, part of the group visited the Shenzhen port and the others went to Great Wall computers and Hitachi.

Dec 19th 2009, Saturday – Hong Kong

We left to Hong Kong from Shenzhen by bus and I loved the scintillating scenery. . It was a 2 hour drive including all required immigration checks. In the morning, we had presentations from the Hong Kong Canadian Chamber of Commerce on economy and public policies, a session from HSBC on Asian debt and equity markets and a panel discussion with Ivey Hong Kong alumni about life at Hong Kong for expatriates. The China Study trip officially concluded. Overall - an incredible one.

Later in the evening, some of us visited the Victoria Park and the Kowloon side of Hong Kong in a ferry. Next day, I took my flight to India.

Weeks 35, 36, 37 and 38: China Study Trip and Vacation

2009-12-25T09:10:00.001+05:30

Pretty much during the whole of December, I will be traveling. The first two weeks in China and Hong Kong for the China Study Trip and in India during the next two weeks for Christmas vacation. School reopens on January 4th and I’ll arrive on the 3rd. I will post a separate blog on my experiences in China.

Weeks 32 to 34: Electives Season 2

2009-12-22T20:22:00.005+05:30

I enrolled for two electives this season: Global strategy and New Venture Creation. Global strategy has been particularly intense with 2 long cases (Mostly Harvard cases ;-)) every class and new venture creation had some innovative deliverables. Global strategy had a final exam worth 30%, 40% class participation and a hand in report worth 30%. Professor Shi-Fen Chen was engaging almost everyone in the class and he has some amazing sense of humour. New venture creation on the other hand had a variety of evaluation components such as reflection paper, top 10 learning list, coffee shop income statement estimation exercise, $7 capital innovation entrepreneurship challenge, etc. Overall, I found myself amazed with the variety of topics covered in the 4 week period.
Topics Covered:
Global Strategy – Why companies go global?, Drawbacks of Multinational enterprises, comparative analyses of various entry mode choices such as exports, licensing, joint ventures, wholly owned subsidiaries and acquisitions, pre-requisites and processes for internationalization, Prof Raymond Vernon's Cycle theory, evolving mentality: international to multinational to global to transnational, creating worldwide innovation and learning centres, technology licensing, contract manufacturing, direct investments, Original equipment manufacturer(OEM), single party manufacturing, contractual co-marketing, single party manufacturing, arm’s length co-marketing, extension of internationalization theory, long-run sustainability of internationalization, culture, ecology framework, competition and legal environment, Value Chain Environment Analysis, Responding to conflicts in environmental forces, Developing transnational strategies: Building layers of competitive advantage, Developing a transnational organization: Managing integration, responsiveness and flexibility, financial and hierarchical control, managing organizational structures, HQ Subsidiary relations, Handling expatriates, international structural stages model, integrated network model, decentralized federation, coordinated federation and centralized hub, managing accounting records, managing human resources, financing the expansions abroad, currency risks, implementing global strategy in terms of Global business management, Worldwide functional management, Geographic subsidiary management and Top level corporate management, exchange of trades and international business ethics.
New Venture Creation – opportunity recognition, green venturing, social entrepreneurship, business models, management practises, venture creation, venturing with friends and family, finance and corporate venturing. I’ve had some interesting learning during the period of the course and I am including my innovation challenge reflection paper and the top 10 learning list in this post.

Innovation challenge Reflection paper Google Docs download link
Reflection Paper

Top 10 learning list Google Docs download link
Top 10 Learning List

Macro Economics Learning

2009-12-22T19:26:00.004+05:30

As I’d originally promised, here’s a detailed post on the Macro Economic Boot Camp, as part of the GLOBE module.

Google Docs Download link

Macro Economics

The GLOBE module ended with State of the World, a 48 hour project followed by a presentation by all learning teams. Overall, GLOBE module was relatively less intensive, but quite a good learning experience.

Weeks 21-31 at Ivey: Elective season 1, Jobs Update and Globe Module

2009-10-26T09:07:00.005+05:30

Elective Season 1:

Having completed the module 2a, the JD-MBA students left to continue on their Law courses and we had about 40 AMBA (Accelerated MBA) students starting with our elective season. These were the students that graduated from the Ivey HBA program and most of them had business backgrounds.

This is the first of the three week elective period. Invariably, all the electives at Ivey are worth 0.5 credits that demand 30 hours of in-class work. Three electives: Financial strategies, completion and competitor analysis, and negotiations were offered during this season. I had enrolled for just one elective to facilitate job networking events and other career related activities. But despite that, numerous other priorities started to crop up. Interview preparation, Clubs initiatives, MBAA senator-ship, New venture project and the regular class work – all started to come by together. Thank goodness, my elective schedule allowed my Friday’s off and I that could catch up. China Study trip, Russia Leader project and the China Teaching project are among the other priority projects that some of our students are currently involved.

The competitions elective has particularly been interesting and Prof Mark Vandenbosch is a specialist. He kick started the class with a card game to illustrate the game theory and best drove his points home. The elective course had a variety of eye opening cases, games, presentations, individual/group competitive thinking notes and a case exam. Not surprisingly, this course has a 40% weightage for class participation – highest that I’ve ever seen. The overall objective of the course was to enhance the ability to recognize and analyze strategic issues from a competitive and game theoretic perspective. The course increased our awareness of behavioural biases in competitive situations and competitor analysis, and understanding competitive intelligence programs. It covered the following topics in a broad sense: Game theory, behavioural analysis, competitive intelligence systems, commitment and credibility, positioning, business systems analysis, value curves, identifying competitors, competing on cost/quality, cost drivers, Hypothesis testing, Action-Consequences-Evidence model, Preemption, Burning Bridges, Reputation/Small Steps, Remove Control, Chicken/War of Attrition, Evolution of Cooperation, Customers as Hostages, Confusopolies, Judo Strategy and Winner’s Curse.

Jobs Update:

The season saw numerous company information sessions and job applications started to show up in the career management portal. The postings during the season were primarily dominated by Consulting, Investment banking, Rotational programs and other finance related positions, primarily because of the fact that recruiting cycles for the Finance/consulting industries fall during this period; other jobs are expected to show up in future. As of now, about 1/5^th the MBA class is placed, with 6 more months remaining in the program. Obviously the lack of internship concerns career changers for the want of relevant work experience and in particular if you are targeting top-tier companies unless you are exceptional. Following companies have extended final offers so far: TD Bank, RBC, Deloitte, Capgemini, Accenture, CIBC, BMO, Scotia Bank, A.T Kearney, BCG and Monitor group. More updates to follow later.

GLOBE Module:

Global Business Environment (GLOBE) is intended to provide students with the global outlook/big picture of the environment. We share the classes with the Accelerated MBA students who recently joined us a month earlier. There are about 100 students spread across two sections. The module runs for about 7 weeks and Professor Tony Frost has been impressive. Macroeconomics, Technology, Entrepreneurship, Government and Public policy and Corporate Governance are the broad issue areas covered in this module. The module has been extremely interesting to me so far and I’ll write a separate post on key learning from this module.

End of Module 2a

2009-09-05T02:49:00.004+05:30

Friday (28^th) marked the end of Module 2a with three four-hour exams on consecutive days. The first four months at Ivey have certainly been transformational. I am glad that I could comprehend the financial statements and business snippets in news that once made zero sense. I am amazed, having looked back into what we have learnt in this module. Here is a quick high-level review of learning from module 2.

Designing and Executing Strategies:

High-level orientation to what a General Manager's does; competitive advantage; globalization; Traditional Manager vs. Cross enterprise manager; assessing performance of the organization(past, present and future measures in terms of profitability, financial position, market performance, organizational health etc) ; setting direction(mission, vision and values); strategy creation; implementing change; performance matrix(complacent organization vs. crisis vs. troubled organization vs. desired state); Collins and Porras vision framework; Strategy triangle(Foals, Value proposition; Product market focus and core activities); corporate strategy; Diamond E Framework(Strategy linkages to Management preferences, organization, resources and environment); strategic tension; various tools for environment analysis(Porter's Five forces, Porter's Industry value chain, Game theory, PEST and DPESTO, scenario planning, new economy models such as Disruptive Technologies, New economics of information, Unbundling and long tail, blue/red ocean strategies, Global industry models and stakeholder analysis); Business Environment Analysis Model(BEAM); Valuable-Rare-Inimitable-Organized(VRIO) analysis; Gap analysis; recycling obsolete strategies and re-instantiating new strategies; organizational capabilities, behavior, culture; Strategic choice and options; Strategic planning; leadership; implementing strategy and performance assessment.

Managing Financial Resources:

The finance course has particularly been an irresistible experience to me. Having come from a non-finance background, I had obvious troubles during the initial days. There were numerous topics fragmented across the entire course that originally didn’t make complete sense to me, however, towards the end of the course, all the bits and pieces came together as mergers and acquisitions; it all made sense. Thanks to Prof. Hatch’s well rounded teaching style in terms of news snippets, current trends, well guided case discussions, powerful lectures and his “Stay tuned” topics. I can’t believe the variety and depth of topics that we could cover in such a short period of time (8 weeks). Here’s a quick (yet long) overview of topics:

Roles and responsibilities of a financial manager; Different types of businesses (corporations, sole proprietorships, partnerships, etc); Examples of Capital investment decisions and financing decisions; Finance as a career option; organizational goals from finance perspective; ethics and management objectives; enabling managers to maximize the firm value and shareholder value; financial markets; financial intermediaries; financial institutions; business size-up(Business assessment framework; economy and industry analysis, firm analysis in terms of operations, marketing, human resources, technology and financial statements/ratios); types of banks; dividend policies; blended payments; burden coverage; sustainable growth in dividends; projecting financial statements; cash-budget method; sustainable growth rate model; Collateral Security, Bankruptcy and Reorganization; Sovereign Funds; Pension funds; leading economic indicators; interpreting earnings reports; debtor in finance processing; understanding the debt market; valuing bonds and stocks(bond characteristics, interest rates vs. bond prices, current yield vs. yield to maturity, bond rates of return, yield curve, corporate bonds and risks of default, dividend discount model, capital asset pricing model, price/earnings multiple approach, stocks and stock market, book value, adjusted book value, liquidation value, market value, growth stocks and income stocks, risk measurement and management(market risk premium, beta and alpha, cost of capital, criteria for evaluating risk - optimal capital are cost, risk, flexibility, control and timing ), Weighted average cost of capital, optimal capital structure, financing decisions, investment decisions(Discounted cash flow, price earnings and comparable analysis, value creation and value-based management, economic value added, free cash flow to the firm approach, free cash flow to equity approach); payout policies; credit management and collection; credit decisions; mergers and acquisitions(types – horizontal, vertical and conglomerate, synergies, evaluating mergers, leveraged buyouts, management buyouts), international financial management(currencies, exchange rates, spot/forward/futures rates, interest rates vs. exchange rates, hedging exchange risks, derivatives, call and put options, swaps); insider trading and control.

Accounting and Control for managers:

Non quantitative vs. quantitative information; overview of financial reporting, management accounting, management control and tax accounting; financial statements (balance sheets, income statements, statement of cash flows); accounting terms and definitions; sources and uses of cash; day to day cash flow management and sustainable growth rate; accounting practices(GAAP, IFRS, etc); accounting principles such as money management, entity, going concern, cost, dual aspect, accounting periods, conservatism, realization, matching, consistency and materiality; revenue recognition; timing of recognizing revenues(production method, installment method, collection method, bad debts, revenue adjustment vs. expense, monetary assets interest revenues, etc); assets and expenses decisions; financial ratio analysis ; long lived non-monetary assets and their amortization(depreciation techniques); cost behavior; variable, fixed, differential and full costs; cost-volume charts and interpretation; profit graphs; operating leverage; influence on costs; taxes; overhead; activity based costing; differential costs and analysis; contribution margin and analysis; return on investment analysis; management control(various phases; controllable/non controllable costs, goals vs. objectives; responsibility vs. full cost accounting, effectiveness vs. efficiency, transfer pricing, management control process, behavioral aspects of management control, responsibility centers, investment center issues, measures of performance, non-financial measures and balanced score card techniques)

Week 20 at Ivey

2009-09-05T02:49:00.001+05:30

The last week of module 2a - the most stressful week up until now!!!

Do, review my next post which will summarize the learning from this module. Everyone in my class prepared hard and their commitment seemed obvious. They were all helping each other and Spencer had almost zero free breakout rooms at any given time. Three four-hour exams on consecutive days has definitely been intense. By the time we could recover from an exam, the next one was due and technically, there was hardly any time to prepare they day before. If you haven’t prepared during the entire term, then you can never. All the exams were case based, open book, open computer and open notes. Adding to the stress, those who had signed up for the IBI financial technical training had two full-day workshops during the weekend.

All set to get started with the first elective season for the next three weeks. I have signed up for just one course Competition and Competitor analysis. The job search as well, is all set to begin. Stressful, yet enjoyable and transformational ride so far…

Week 19 at Ivey

2009-09-05T02:48:00.000+05:30

In addition to the regular class/case work and job interview preparation, my responsibilities started to expand in terms of club-leaderships and senatorship. I’ve started to feel the pressure and the fast approaching exams was scary. The week saw yet another airlines case in strategy and several other interesting cases in finance (international financials management) and accounting (balance score card, budgeting, etc). The highlight of the week was Monitor Group’s information session and mock behavioral interviews. There were Ivey Alumni from Monitor to facilitate the event and we had several impressive interview takeaways.

Job postings and information sessions have started to show by in eZone (Ivey’ internal content management system). September and October are expected to be loaded with numerous finance/consulting networking events and interviews. The week ended with the Ivey MBA Formal (farewell dinner) for the outgoing September class.

http://photos.tdotspot.com/Graduation/Ivey-Fall-Formal/

Week 18 at Ivey

2009-09-05T02:43:00.002+05:30

Monday started off with a strategy case on Hungarian wines and later a valuation case in finance. Afternoon, the MBA Association had organized a Q&A panel with Fall MBA students to guide us through the electives selection. The week saw several interesting M&A cases in strategy and finance and a few accounting cases on the management accounting, management control, balanced scorecard and non-financial measures topics. There were also several important sessions such as Cover letter clinic, marketing interviews clinic, Get-Connected week feedback session, Dragon boat practice sessions, United Nations initiatives presentation, and consulting case interview preparation sessions. Finally, the new MBAA executive committee, senators, club presidents, vice-presidents were all in place and our class took charge of the new tenure.

Week 17 at Ivey

2009-08-08T03:56:00.002+05:30

Get connected week ended up keeping me busy the entire week as opposed to my expectations of a long break from class work. Well deserved holiday: Civic holiday arrived on Monday but I ended up falling busy preparing for the Tuesday’s cases. I expect the next two months to dreadfully load us with regular casework, job search (major consulting and finance companies interview cycles fall during this period), new venture project/Ivey consulting project, club leadership and Ivey MBA association senator-ship activities. Three more weeks, and we should be done with our Module two. Time flies by and there has been zero time to relax. The September 2009 cohort is all set to graduate in two weeks and the incoming September folks have their pre-MBA program starting this Monday. There are also a whole lot of events planned by our cohort for the new comers during the next couple of weeks.

Week 16 at Ivey: Get connected week

2009-08-08T03:55:00.011+05:30

Get connected week has been more than productive exposing us to a variety of networking events and mock interview sessions. Following below is an outline of my get connected week experience. Do note that there were sessions from other companies during the week and those mentioned below are just the ones that I took part.

Monday

04:30 AM: Alarm goes off

06:00 AM to 09:00 AM: In transit from London to Toronto

09:15 AM: Arrive at the Ivey ING Leadership centre, Toronto

09:15 AM to 10:00 AM: Breakfast and registration

10:00 AM to 12:00 PM: Keynote address by Mark Healey (partner at Torque strategy and incoming Chairof the Ivey Alumni Association Board of Directors)

01:00 PM to 03:00 PM: Consulting - Inside Edition, a panel discussion where representatives from different consulting companies provided insights on consulting careers. The panel consisted of members from BCG, AT Kearney, Surje and Monitor.

03:30 PM to 05:00 PM: Hotel Checkin

05:00 PM to 06:30 PM: AT Kearney Networking event

07:00 PM onwards: Networking night at C-lounge where 72 Ivey MBAs connected with over 125 recruiters and alumni

Tuesday

10:00 AM to 11:30 AM: Life beyond e-Zone, a session on hidden market Job search strategies outside the Ivey bubble

12:00 PM to 02:00 PM: Sales vs. Marketing the great debate

02:30 PM to 04:00 PM: Meeting with my first Alumni Partner who worked with Microsoft as a strategy consultant and currently partnering his own consulting firm

06:00 PM to 07:30 PM: Johnson and Johnson information session

Wednesday

08:00 AM to 10:00 AM: Monitor group networking event

12:00 PM to 04:00 PM: Trip to CN tower

06:00 PM to 07:30 PM: Deloitte Consulting information session

Thursday

08:00 AM to 10:00 AM: BCG information session

01:30 PM to 02:00 PM: Informational interview, CIBC’s Technology Leadership Associate Program

04:00 PM to 04:45 PM: Mock behavioral interview with Ivey alumni from Accenture

04:45 PM to 05:30 PM: Mock interview with Ivey Career management member

06:00 PM to 07:30 PM: McKinsey networking event

Friday

09:00 AM to 11:00 AM: Meeting with my second alumni partner who is the CEO and president of Scott Mission, a not for profit organization in Toronto.

01:00 PM to 02:00 PM: Visit to the Oracle’s office at Mississauga and meeting with old contacts

02:00 PM to 03:00 PM: Meeting with undergraduate alumni who works for Capgemini consulting

Saturday

Trip to Niagara Falls

Sunday

03:30 PM to 04:30 PM: Meeting with my third alumni partner who works with McKinsey

06:30 PM to 09:00 PM: In transit from Toronto to London

Week 15 at Ivey

2009-08-08T03:55:00.006+05:30

The cases were getting tougher and tougher and all the students were in full swing preparing for the Get connected week, the following week. I was busy emailing and touching base my alumni partners, old Oracle contacts and a few recruiters to snatch informational interview opportunities during the week at Toronto. We also had mock-interview sessions from Career management and the Ivey consulting club. Personally, I found the feedbacks to be extremely useful.

Week 14 at Ivey

2009-08-08T03:55:00.005+05:30

Week 14 was the toughest week at Ivey thus far. In addition to the regular case studies, we had a finance quiz, an individual report assignment on evaluating the strategy of an organization where I worked previously, Accounting mid-term 40 hour report, Electives information session, Finance Club’s sessions on investment banking, equity research, asset management, private equity, and hedge fund, MBAA Executive speech and elections, May cohort case competition information session, and consulting club’s market entry/pricing session and case interview preparation sessions. Whew!!! There arrived the well deserved weekend - not to take a deep breath and relax, but to catch up on missed notes and prepare for the following week’s cases.

Week 13 at Ivey

2009-08-08T03:54:00.005+05:30

Week 13 has been quite a busy week with tough cases and all three courses (Strategy, Finance and Accounting) seemed to relate to each other one way or the other. Every class seemed to build on the previous classes’ concepts and a miss was more than costly. In addition to regular case load, we had a student led Q&A session for get connected week, Ivey consulting project session, career management individual appointments with career managers, information session on the Calgary Recruiting trip, finance club interview preparations, financial technical training (IBI) sessions and a session on professional dressing from Channer, London.

Week 12 at Ivey

2009-08-08T03:54:00.004+05:30

Second week of module 2 started off with the e-Bay case building the foundational platform for strategic analysis. The consulting club has been conducting weekly case-interview clinics and on Monday, we had a workshop on Case Types. On Tuesday, we did a finance case that prepared us for the use of monthly cash budgets and pro forma (projected) financial statements using Excel spreadsheets. Personally, I find Prof. Hatch’s classes (finance) to be incredibly well rounded. Not only does he facilitate the cases expertly, but also expose us to a wide variety of miscellaneous topics and news items. Tuesday’s Classes ended with an accounting issue (case) where we analyzed the accounting practices for R&D projects. The second half of Tuesday had two exiting sessions: Ivey Career management’s technology industry overview clinic and a 2*10 idea generation session for new venture project where our ideas were critiqued and challenged by seasoned serial entrepreneurs from Tech-Alliance. It has been a tiring day and the well deserved break (Canada day) arrived on Wednesday. In addition to other cases, the week also had an advanced business analytics mini-course, and a case-interview preparation session.

Reflections from Module 1

2009-06-27T11:19:00.009+05:30

I still can’t believe that we are done with our first term. This is my 12th week in Canada and it appears as though I landed a week ago. Time Flies by!!! I took some time to take a step back to see what we have gained in module-1, in order to understand the depth of learning. The best thing is that we were exposed to numerous learning methods primarily built around case-studies: High profile Guest speakers, workshops, role-plays, readings, assignments, video clips, movies, presentations, elevator pitch and business plan competitions, information clinics, individual feedback sessions, numerous self assessment tools, fun-filled practical demonstrations, etc.

Here’s a high level summary of our learning from DMA and LPO:

Decision making and Analytics:
Probability and distributions, Data Modeling, Hypothesis testing, Regression Analysis, Confidence Intervals, Statistical Quality Control, Simulation Analysis, Decision Trees and expected values, Time value of money, Optimization Modeling, Numerous MS Excel tools and functions, Revenue Management, Queing, hotel pricing, asset allocation, Bids, etc

Framework of learning throughout "Leading people and organizations" course:
Strategic Challenges: Deciding the right things to do, How to do the right things, Mission, Vision, Values, Objectives, Behaviours; Executional Challenges: Implementation, Alignment, Change, Performance, Management; Developmental Challenges: Building Organizational Capabilities, Leadership Development, Core Competencies; Personal Challanges: Maintaining balance, Integrity, Humility, Enthusiasm, Resilience, Building personal capabilities.

***Leadership has been truely fascinating and I promise to write separate blog posts on leadership learning.

Whew!!! That’s a lot of learning...

Week 11 at Ivey

2009-06-27T11:17:00.003+05:30

Module 1 finally got completed with the presentation on Monday. Tuesday was our day off to prepare for module 2 that commenced on Wednesday. This module will take us through the core business foundations of cross enterprise leadership, i.e., strategy, accounting and finance. We started with a strategy case on Wall-Mart where almost all the functional-silos were covered. There were professors from Strategy, Finance, Accounting, Marketing, Operations and IT, team-facilitating the discussion around the case. We learnt about value proposition, achieving cost leadership, macroeconomic perspectives, competitive advantage, etc from Strategy’s view; Accounting Professor introduced as how to measure the performance of the strategy using numbers; Marketing professor on branding, market segmenting, competition, etc; Managing flows that create value from operations’ perspective; IT on the importance of leveraging technology in a complex organization like Wal-Mart and finally, Finance perspectives on performance ratios, inflation, interest rates, etc. On the whole, Wal-Mart highlighted the integrated behavior of various disciplines to create values in the firm. Cross Enterprise Leadership’s business intelligence seems to have started taking its shape in this module.

The Accounting cases introduced us to basic accounting fundamentals and accounting standards. Finance case on Friday, equipped us with the size-up techniques in order to analyze a business from a manager’s perspective to improve processes within the organization (or) a banker’s perspective to make a decision on say, loans.

Module 2 seems to be promising!!!

Week 10 at Ivey

2009-06-27T11:17:00.001+05:30

The last week of module 1; We had the final guest speaker for leadership course, J.-Robert Ouimet(Chairman of the Board and Chief Executive Officer, Holding O.C.B. Inc. ). Final exams seemed to have arrived earlier than the original anticipation. The decision making course, had a four hour final exam on Thursday. We had to rip apart the given case and provide recommendations on decisions, to the President and Vice president of Analytics, from a consultant’s perspective. Two hours after the case exam, the 24 hour leadership integrative report started. We had to work with our learning teams on a given leadership case for the next 24 hours and submit a report. The following Monday, we had to present the case to a panel consisting of Professors of Leadership, Communications and Career Management, and guests that were Presidents and CEOs from different companies. Whew!!! What a way to finish. Looking back at what we were exposed to in the module, I was overwhelmed with the depth of knowledge that we gained.

Week 9 at Ivey

2009-06-27T11:16:00.001+05:30

Week9’s LPO classes were sort of building more on the Change-Management perspectives. We had Guest lectures from David Loree(Organizational behavior professor at Ivey), Wade Oosterman(Chief Brand Officer at Bell Mobility and Channels), David Estok (Editor-in-Chief, The Hamilton Spectator) and Violet Konkle (former COO, Walmart Canada). In addition to the regular decision making, leadership and career cases and, communications classes, Career Management had organized resume review sessions, and Finance and Consulting industry overview clinics. The consulting club officially kick-started its activities with an introductory session on case interviews. There was also an optional (paid) Financial Technical training workshop (IBI) during the weekend. The most important highlight in week9 was the self assessment report that was due on the Thursday. We deployed numerous self-assessment techniques such as PERSONAL VALUES, MYERS-BRIGGS TYPE INDICATOR (MBTI), CRITICAL INCIDENT TECHNIQUE (CIT), DAVID BAUM LEADERSHIP WHEEL, Sigma Testing PERSONALITY RESEARCH FORM, 360* FEEDBACK and CAREER LEADER. Honestly, I found this to be very useful in terms of providing useful insights on my career aspirations and skills. It’s true that the no self assessment tool can be 100% accurate, however, the tools did reasonably predict personal traits and behaviors, enabling me to understand myself better and make better/effective career decisions.

Week 8 at Ivey

2009-06-27T11:15:00.002+05:30

1. Leadership style assessment (based on David Baum Leadership wheel)
2. Case on Jack Welch’s leadership and how he transformed GE,
3. Dean’s quick visit to provide updates the program: She provided a quick overview on her background, the boards that she’s been part-taking, the direction and strategy of Ivey, and CAD $50 million grant from the Government for building Ivey’s new campus.
4. DMA quiz worth 20%
5. Introductory sessions on the Leader project, China Study Trip and India Study Trip. Every year a group Ivey students teach foundations of decision making and entrepreneurial skills at a variety of sites in Russia, China and more recently in India.
6. Fridays top highlights were the Morgan Motors case and Shakespeare Stratford festival case, a guest lecture from Antoni Cimolino - the General Director of the festival and a play. We did get a chance to visit the theatres and the production behind the scenes. Leading change seemed to be a hot topic in the Leadership course, and the Stratford case drove its point home as why and how transformation efforts can fail
7. Regular DMA and LPO cases, otherwise

Week 7 at Ivey

2009-06-27T11:13:00.000+05:30

Monday, Week7 started off with a stimulating commitment workshop as part of the Leadership course. Honestly, I was amazed with the learning at the end of the three hour long session. It was all about harnessing the power of persuasion. The workshop primarily consisted of role plays where all the students assumed and played their roles as part of their learning teams. After the individual role plays, students were cold called to play their roles with external guests(these guests disguised themselves as the real people that were mentioned in the exercise and took our nerves away; later we found that they worked for a professional organization that conducted role plays, etc to demonstrate different leadership learning). At the end of the day, we learnt the importance of influence, persuasion, feedback, coaching, etc. During the second half, David Fear - President, Ziff Brothers Investments, Europe delivered his guest lecture on candor and the importance of candid feedback.

Tuesday, in addition to scrutinizing two bidding decisions (DMA cases), we had the first official discussion on tactical career management. Sharon Foulon, the director of Career Management at Ivey facilitated the discussion, along with her team. We were introduced to our relationship managers who indeed have had extensive experience in diverse functions and recruiting. Later that afternoon, we also had a quick introductory session to the community action day.

Wednesday, we explored another bidding decision case and an advanced optimization modeling case. DMA cases were getting tougher and learning was immense. Later we discussed an Managing your career(MYC) case. There was a guest from the Library who delivered a very informative lecture on using the library resources at Western University. We were also exposed to the mammoth of online journals, magazines and reports that we had access to.

Thursday started with a simulation and decision modeling case. We also discussed a couple other cases for Managing your career. The highlight for the day was the Guest speaker: John Furlong, the CEO of VANOC (Vancouver Olympics Organizing committee). He had teleconferenced from Vancouver.

Friday, we had around 20 guests to our class: The prospective MBA students who took part in the class visitor day. They witnessed the DMA case discussion live, where we discussed a real-estate litigation case with the help of regression analysis. Earlier, we had two communications sessions, as electrifying as usual. The day concluded with a guest lecture: Steve Papagiannis - Manager, Solution Specialists, SAS Canada. He exposed us to the advanced data modeling and analytics techniques in the real world. Friday was also the deadline for the first tuition installment.

On Saturday, MBA students from both the cohorts participated in a local community action service. We had been to a farm land near the Fanshawe Pioneer village to help the farmers grow Tomatoes using organic techniques. Watch the press coverage here:

Week 6 at Ivey

2009-05-24T02:55:00.002+05:30

Monday was a well deserved holiday(Victoria Day), after the tiring Pre-MBA and week 1 of MBA. Not realizing that the groceries shops are also closed on National holidays unlike in India, I had a long walk with no fruit.

Tuesday, we had an electrifying communications session from Professor Denis Shackel. We also had to prepare for a 3 minute speech for that class. We delivered the individual presentations to our learning teams. All the speeches were recorded and we should be receiving our feedback from the professor, shortly. Later, Jeffrey Gandz Managing Director for executive programs at Ivey (who also is a member of Board of directors at Maple Leaf Foods Inc) delivered his guest lecture. Guest speaker series has been truly inspiring. Listening and learning from real life people has been terrific.

Week 6 had presentations from the Ivey Consulting Projects and New Venture Project coordinators. Students are required to participate in either of the two projects. More details on these projects to follow later. We also had tutorial sessions for the Decision Making and Analytics course. Reza walked us through several key concepts and it helped us tie the many loose ends.

On Thursday, we had a brief session about consulting companies and handling case interviews. Diana Wong( a current from My cohort who has extensive consulting experience) led the session. The consulting club plans to conduct “case-interview mocks” every Sunday.

The week ended with the Outward Bound Ropes Course, coordinated by YMCA at Western. The session was wonderful. Almost everyone had to push outside the comfort zone and work as a team to reach the goal. The course easily demonstrated trust, empathy, leadership, teamwork, commitment, overcoming fear, etc.

I’ve started to cook and surprisingly, things seem to work well so far. I hope I can continue and build on my cooking abilities before I complete the MBA. We also had a couple of Golf sessions at the Windermere golf Centre driving range. At the outset, I had to unlearn my cricket postures ;-)