Yesterday, I attended another MBA pre-daparture
seminar presented by the CEO of Accenture Japan, Mr. Chikatomo Hodo.
Hodo-san joined
Accenture after he graduated with an Engineering bachelor degree from Stanford
University. Later he quit his job for MBA study in University of Columbia. He didn’t
think of returning to Accenture after the MBA, but a coincidence meet with his
former boss at an escalator (in a train station?) changed his mind. He returned
to Accenture and become the CEO in 2006.
Just some notes of his talk yesterday.
What he took away from the MBA
1)
Health : become more health conscious and
routinely doing sports
2)
Common language: not just English, but also
the understanding of different culture and idea
3)
Finance knowledge: able to judge a company by
numbers
4)
Discussion skill: able to actively participate
in the discussion, know when to lead, when to follow, and how to guide the
discussion to desired conclusion
5)
Contacts: his school location in NY provides
lots of chance to meet the prominent figures not only from the business fields,
but also politics, NGO, academic etc.
What he thinks he should have done in the MBA but didn’t
1)
Take other undergraduate subjects besides the
MBA subjects.
2)
Go to the developing country for exchange
program. (As he said, the economic centric is moving towards the developing
countries from developed countries.
3)
Learning other language – Chinese, Spanish
etc.
4)
Learning art – music, dance, pure art, liberal
art etc.
The characteristics of a Global Business Leader
1)
Individualized MACRO view – poses own Macro
view for decision making
2)
Enjoy risk-taking – keep challenging, no gain
comes without risk. But the important thing is to ENJOY. Enjoy the good
outcome, and even enjoy the failure, because it is where you can learn from.
3)
Passion – a passion to the job, to the people
and to the society
4)
Communication skill, flexibility, professionalism
What to do for self improvement
1)
Self reflection – reflect every 3 years. If
you found you did not stretch in the past 3 years, means that you should seek a
change instead of staying in the current position.
2)
Design & stretch – understand your
capability, design the steps to achieve your aspiration, and stretch yourself
with every little step.
3)
Network & Connecting Dots – building a reliable
relationship with friends, colleagues, business partners etc. The dots you
created at different moments will connect themselves at last.
Hodo-san closed his presentation with the famous speech
by Steve Jobs in the Commencement Address at Stanford University.
“Again, you can't connect the dots looking
forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that
the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something —
your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down,
and it has made all the difference in my life.”
Well, I do believe that what I have achieved so far is a
consequence of the connection of what I did before. However, since there are so many
choices available in this Informatics Age, I always try to make easy life
by predefine what is relevant and what is not relevant before I decide what to
do. This is important for time management as well as for "life efficiency", but at
the other hand, there is also a hidden opportunity cost by turning down some of
the “irrelevant” choices, which probably an important “dot” in my life.
Back to the school, I think I should be GREEDY again! Doing
all kinds of study, participating in all kinds of activities, meeting all kinds
of people, and grasping all kinds of opportunities. And who knows, these will be the
essential dots for me to connect from the past to the future!
