White Christmas???

When I was small, I thought the Christmas in the western countries was like, the shopping malls were crowed with people busy on shopping, the shops were decorated with Christmas Trees, Christmas decorations and illuminations; streets were covered by snow, children were playing with snow and some built the snowman in the playground, people wearing in festive color especially with the red Santa hats, singing Christmas song here and there, the noise of joys were coming relentlessly from your neighborhoods...

Well, there's the power of TV, make your childhood believe everything shown on the TV is true. And today, I celebrated my first Christmas in the western country, in a city with the most student in the Europe (told by someone but not sure whether this is true...), the Manchester. As you can imagine, most of the residents, the students, have gone back to their home in other cities or other countries for vacation, and therefore the city was very very very quite, even the pubs that used to be noisy in the weekdays were closed and the whole city was in terrifically peace...

No shops open on the Christmas day, even at the busiest shopping district, Arndale. The shop that I found open today in the city was Spar, a convenience store. People walking on the street were mostly Asian face like me. I think they might also wondering where the hell of all the people gone. Shouldn't people come out and celebrate in the festive season???

Still waiting for my first snow in Manchester. But unfortunately instead of snowing, the city raining as usual. So, my anticipated White Christmas was more towards a Grey Christmas...Never thought that I will hate raining so much...As in Malaysia, the rain bring the cool breathe to the hot weather, so I doubted people associate rain with bad weather...Well, I fully appreciate this association now. Yes, rain means freezingly cold, wetting your shoes and socks, made you feel uncomfortable to walk on the street...

So, how I feel about my first Christmas in the western country?

Well, not so bad actually. Had a wonderful petite Turkey Christmas eve dinner with my wife, strolled on the people-less Manchester's streets (happen only on Christmas day), relaxed at home with Nescafe and a chocolate cake bought from Spar, played iPad games, planned for next year Europe trip, and now writing this blog. Everything is so calm, peace and relaxing...so what can you ask more?

Still anticipate for a White Christmas?

Of course! But may be in other cities. After the boxing day, I have planed a trip to Inverness, the north most city of UK...hopefully what fall from the sky will be snow instead of rain.    

Dec. 21 - End of the World

After sending the NfP report to client tomorrow, my first MBA semester will officially come to the end. Not sure whether the end of semester also meaning the end of the world, as the rumor of December 21, the end of the world according to Maya Calendar was here and there. Not so much in UK, but the people in the the Fast East, including people in my hometown which is located near the equator, scrambling to buy the winter cloths as rumor says that the temperature will drastically change from above 30 degree Celsius to below 30 degree Celsius. Some even made a joke that if the end of the world end up didn't come, there will be another baby boom next year September!

Anyway, whether the end of the world will come or not tomorrow,  it is still worth a celebration for me - I survived the first semester of my MBA! Phew...can't imagine that 4 months have passed since the course started. Still couldn't enjoy the city especially the weather, but the MBA is really something worth coming for. Looking back the 4 months, can't tell how much I have learned, how much my perspective have changed, and how much new experience and new skills I have gained. To summarize it, 4 core subjects - Accounting (both financial accounting and management accounting), Corporate Finance, Marketing, Business Economics; series of soft skills lecture in Skills for Successful Management Module; one big real-client project - the Not-for-Profit Project, weekly guest speaker series, career management sessions, supplementary English classes, numerous group works and presentations in the core subjects, company events, networking events, internship research, internship interviews, private social events...

Wow, I have gone through so much things in just 4 months! So, what did I really take aways in these 4 months. Here are the 5 main GAINS!

1) Equiped myself with the basic business knowledge
Accounting, Finance, Marketing and Economics are the most basic business knowledge that a manager, or at least a senior manager should know no matter which profession you are or what industry you are in. Even as an engineer (like me), if you are in the manager level, you should not only well-verse in your engineering problem solving, but also the basic business knowledge that enable you to articulate the company business performance and strategy to your subordinate, evaluate the efficiency and profitability of the project (or at least your own team), market your company to client externally, or market your team or department internally, judge whether you are still in the right industry considering the change in economic environment etc.    

Well, can't say that I mastered all the knowledge within 30 hours session classes for each subject. But the key ideas and how to apply these ideas are efficiently taught through the well-designed curriculum. I think this might be the strength of Manchester Method - the so called "Original Thinking" and "Learning by Doing". The course stimulated your independent thinking in the lectures, made your hands dirty by lots of case studies and group works. As people used to say, "Knowledge in your mind is useless if you can't articulate it or put it into application".

2) New exposure to other industries
Have no idea at all what is the different between an investment banking and a commercial banking. No idea what really Private Equity and Venture Capital do. No idea how a strategy consultant can advise a company CEO who has more industry experience than him. No idea how to establish a start-up. No idea what is a content business. No idea what is arbitration...

Well, when you get to know more, you will know that there are more you don't know. The finance industry, the consulting industry, the entrepreneurship, the media industry, and lots more that I think I would never not know in detail if I didn't come for the MBA. There are lots of fun and bright people out there in different industries, which broaden your horizon and again stimulate your thought. Looking back my previous years as a civil engineer, professional interactions were confined to other disciplines engineers and architects, which somewhat help you to think deeper but definitely not wider.

And it is just feeling so good that you can talk the talk whether you are in a group of engineers, or bankers, or entrepreneurs, or consultants, or accountants or any other professions. And most important, you enhance your chance of employability in a different industry if, let say your industry is heading down the slope.

3) Team work in a multicultural context
Talked about this in my previous blog. See NfP.

4) Ability of multi-tasking
All MBA schools assume that you come to the MBA with aims to become a future leader. And they also assume that requisite quality of a leader is ability to handle multi-task at the same time. So, they designed such a curriculum that make you do everything but you just can't finish everything to perfect. You have to attend the classes, pre-reading of case studies, solve the after-class assignments, participate in the group works, attend the company events, socialize in the networking events, etc. all in one day!

So, everything is about efficiency. Efficiency in your pre-reading so that you can grasp the key ideas after your first reading. Efficiency in the lecture, for me is more on staying focus. Efficiency in the group meeting, pre-determine the agenda, prepare before the meeting, set the time limit. Efficiency in assignment and efficiency in so and so and so...

Sometimes the situation is just not possible for you to handle both at the same time. So, you may need to weigh which one is more important, rather than which one is more urgent to you. Choose the more important one and drop the other one.

5) 114 great friends from 29 countries
For sure, this will be the greatest take away from the MBA and even after the MBA. Thanks to Manchester Business School evaluation system that emphasize on collaboration rather than competition, we can observed generous knowledge and information sharing among us. The friends with accounting and finance background particularly helped us passing the exams! Not forget to mentioned also since everybody has different industry and culture background, you will find a lot of fun and learning in this diversity. And of course the after-study, after exam parties, trips, all contributed to the unforgettable memories of the MBA!

Those are the key gains in the first semester. So, what to do with the end of the world???

Well, we can't really do anything to prevent it if the end of the world is really coming. So, why not just stay calm and think that, if it didn't come tomorrow, how should we live a more MEANINGFUL LIFE hereafter...   

NfP

Just completed my personal reflective report on the NfP (Not for Profit) Project. Here are the points.

Team Working
Our team consisted of 6 MBAs from different countries and different background. With a team of such a diversity, one may expect that the team work will be interesting and productive as the team has access to a range of perspective and skill.   

In fact, diversity can actually hinder integration and may increase the occurrence of conflict within the team. This was exactly what happened in the meetings. Everyone had their own interpretation of the project needs and own ideas to implement the project. But hard to achieve an agreement as everyone had different point of view. As a result, the team spent long hour in meetings yet no concrete conclusion. Sometimes, the conclusions were made recklessly due to tiredness and frustration of further discussion. Obviously, the outcome due to these conclusion was undoubtedly poor in quality.

The team was aware of the severity of the problem only after half way of the project We received our first score in their MBA program, the score of the project interim presentation. The score was below passing mark and everyone was shocked. Our ego as an MBA student was badly hurt and after a reflective meeting, we committed to put more time and more effort into the project.

Later, I learned about the Belbin Team Role in the Skills for Successful Manager class. Interestingly, our team members are obviously in different team roles. Since the result of the SHL psychometric test was confidential, I could only guess my team members' team roles based on my observation. I guessed there were a "Shaper," two "Plant", a "Finisher-Completer", an "Implementer" and a "Monitor-Evaluator". What lacked in our team were a "Co-ordinator", a "Resource Investigator", and a "Team Worker". No wonder our team has a lot of ideas, but no one try to coordinate between us, no one try to explore resource outside the team and no one being diplomatic to support the team.

With the commitment and better understanding of each other, we started to split the work according to the strength of each members. We set a limit for the meeting time and tried to carry out the meeting efficiently with better preparation before the meeting, threw ideas and discussed but let the person-in-charge of the work decide the final decision, and ensure all action items decided in the meeting were carried out in action.

As a results, our work was gaining momentum and we managed to work efficiently and harmoniously compare with before. We managed to finalized our study results and gave a presentation to our client confidently.

Key learnings:
1) Recognise strength and skill of each members is important at the first stage of any project.
2) Understand interpersonal style (for example the Belbin Team Roles) of the team members can help to achieve better efficiency in team.
3) A team work efficiently when the team has a balance of all team roles.
4) Diversity can help as well as hinder the efficiency of team work. 
5) A meeting without clear objective, time limit and a decision maker is doomed to be fail.

Consulting Skills
Another problem in implementation was non of us had consulting experience before. We were unclear about what need to be do, and how could we do in a consulting project. Therefore, due to lack of experience as well as delay from client side, we could finalize the project scope only almost one month after the project launching. 

After finalized the scope, we had long discussion about what data is required and how we could gather the data. We thought of carry out survey but later found out that within limited time and resources, the limited numbers of questionnaire that we could gather would be statistically insignificant. We carried out several interviews but the responses were not encouraging.

Nevertheless, we gradually understood what need to be done, and how to carry out our study. We prepared a project structure breakdown to visualize the whole process. As taught in the Consulting Skills class, "Begin with the end in mind" by visualize the end, the deliverable to client in mind, we could actually think backward of what need to be done in order to achieve that. Based on the project structure breakdown, we divided the tasks and work independently but supportively.

I found that newly learned knowledge from Financial Accounting and Corporate Finance class was quite useful in the analysis of the project.

Key learnings:
1) Identify the business need and finalized scope with client as soon as possible.
2) Work up a clear and realistic work plan.
3) Begin with the end in mind.
4) Quick understanding of client's issue and add value with the implementable recommendations.
5) Financial/Management Accounting, Corporate Finance, Marketing and other MBA subjects are the fundamental knowledge to support any consulting work.

Presentation Skills
The comments on our interim presentation were no clear structure, lack of logic in content development for the presentation content and not appear confidence, no eye contact, reading slides for the presentation delivery. No doubt our score was below the passing mark.

To improve our presentation, we got the feed back from our supervisor, and carried out peer assessment on our presentation style. While complementing what done well, we also pointing out what need to be improved in each other presentation. We scrutinised the logic in content, we checked the necessity of each and every slides, we made sure all slides carry clear messages to the audience.

Our final presentation was quite successful, at least to our own perception. We appeared confident in the presentation and managed to articulate our ideas and recommendations clearly to the client.

Key learnings:
1) Use eye contact, appear confident, speak with passion in presentation.
2) Make a logic, a story line to link up the whole presentation.
3) Bring the finding forward to the beginning of the presentation will give audience the whole idea of the presentation.
4) Ask why you need the slide - eliminate any unnecessary slide.

Manchester Survivor

My smartphone showed a temperature of 3 degree Celsius out there, and the weather forecast said that there would be a mix of sunshine and shower. I was changing with the Manchester Survival T-shirt and a running short pant. Putting up the additional jacket and tracksuit, I walked to the school to meet my fellow teammates. The weather was freezingly cold even in the jacket and tracksuit. I doubted whether I would be willing take it off once I reach the event center.

Arrived the event center 1 hour earlier. But the game already started with the first wave runner. Our team - a team of 10 and a team of 5 will run in the 4th wave. Took off the jacket and tracksuit, quickly worked out to warm up the body. Running around the field, discovered several scary obstacles along the runway. Several 2 meter high grasswalls at the first 100m, 2 pools of muddy water contained in the giant steel trash bins, and a 8 feet wall at the last 100m.

It was a 10km run. Sounds easy right? That was what I thought, but there were 15 physical obstacles (according to the guide, but I felt there were more) in the run. So, besides running, you will encounter 1 to 2 physical roadblocks every 1km. And the obstacles, can be high walls to test your upper body fitness, pools of water to slow you down (there was a pool where the water deep enough to cover your top, damn freezing!), hurdles in the arena to test your agility, burden to test your strength, fun stuff likes mud crawling, mud sliding, water slide, bouncing castle etc.   

Tried to get to the front line at the starting point to avoid slowed down by other people during the first few obstacles. Climbed over the grasswalls, 2 meter height woodwalls, several hurdles, ran up and ran down the stadium spiral carpark driveway, ran up and ran down the stadium audience seat stairs, ran surrounding the stadium, when I thought I already finished half, almost fainted down when I saw the signboard showed a 2km on it. Oh, my god, still 8km to go!

Later came to a canal. Never think that the organizer want us to get wet that early. It was still 3km! And the canal was deep enough to cover my top. Getting all wet including my head and continued running to avoid cold. Run, run, run, passed the bouncing castle, ran into the woods, the fun and dirty parts began. Mud crawling, mud sliding, can't remember when was the last time I played with mud. But, it was really fun!

The organizer would never want us to finish it easy. They made us run with sandbag, gas tank, etc, do the rope swinging, puzzles, when I finished 8 km, I started feeling cramp in my thighs. Slowed down my pace and walked for a while, wondering how many obstacles left and any other surprises. Passed the 9km, came to the big pools of muddy water that I saw before, I know I was closed to the finish line. Crawl over the giant steel trash bins, walked through the muddy water, finally came to the monster 8 feet wall. I can't do it without help! None of my team member was there with me at the moment. I tried to be friendly and helped several people to climb up the wall, and lucky  enough to get help from someone else to climb the monster too.

Climbed on the top of the 8 feet wall, the finish line was just 10m in front. Jumped down the wall and ran passed the finish line. Phew! Never think that a 10km would be that hard for me, but anyway I made it! I survived! Took pictures with those arrived earlier. My other team members arrived progressively. All 15 of us made it! 

Went back home, took a hot shower, enjoyed the hot lunch prepared by my wife, went into bed, wake up and writing this blog now. Still can feel the pain on every inch of my muscle. But, the pain is a result of enjoyment, satisfaction, and achievement.

MBS 2014 Team!

Ready, Start!

Thinking of wearing these next year...

My wife was struggling washing this for me after the game

(Photos by Mary)

Financial Accounting

Phew! A new word learnt from my British friends to express relief from fatigue. Ya, the Financial Accounting exam is just over. Hardly imagine that within 5 weeks of 15 hours lecture, I eventually managed to understand the substance of the mysterious accounting statements, read the financial statement of any of the listed companies without frowning and at least capable of some general analysis of the company performance.

It all owed to Peter, the lecturer of the financial accounting class. A British gentleman with lots of sense of humor. He made the dull accounting numbers a series of interesting stories. He made the seemingly complicated concepts easy to understand. And he made us (or some of us) the accounting beginners comprehended the tricks and the so called creative accounting behind the book.

As Peter mentioned in the first class, the course aim is not to teach you how to prepare a bookkeeping. It is all about how to understand the financial statement, analyse it, and use it for management decision as a future manager. The course is to demystify the financial statement, so that you won't be scared away by the accountants that speak to you in the accounting jargons which seems to be a foreign language. You can talk the talk and finally you will learn to love accounting!

Well, I don't know whether I have fallen in love with accounting, but at least accounting is no more a boring subject for me. It was so delighted that unconsciously I able to discuss about some company business performance using the accounting knowledge learnt from the class in the chat with friends. That's super cool! 

The course covered of course the 3 main financial statements, the balance sheet, the income statement and the cash flow. But not much discussion on how to prepare those statement. The emphasis was more on how to analyse them and what are the tricks that some companies use to disguise their profits. A more detail discussions were done on topics like tangible assets, intangible assets, leasing, employee benefit, and group companies.

A 5 weeks lecture, 15 hours, plus 3 workshops for the preparation of exam, and 2 thick textbooks, numbers of powerpoint slides. That's the speed of a subject in an MBA program. Looking on the piles of other text book, I realised that the journey is still long away. NfP project submission and presentation, Economics presentation, Marketing presentation, Economics, Marketing, Finance, Skill for Successful Manager exam will occur subsequently in next 5 weeks.

Not feeling "phew" anymore...but at least I am enjoying the learning process. I don't aim to be an accountant, an economics, or a Finance or Marketing expert after all these courses, but if I can talk their language, understand their tricks, and may eventually manage them (haha!), wouldn't it sounds great!  

Pronunciation

Due to the difficulty in hearing the British pronunciation, I joined the free pronunciation class offered by University Language Centre.

 

I don't know how other country people learn the English pronunciation, but in Malaysia, we never learn the phonetic symbol. We learnt the English pronunciation simply by following what teacher pronounced when we were small. When we grew up, we naturally developed an "ability" to pronounce the new word that we didn't know by reference to another word with similar spelling or pronunciation by someone who we first hear. Therefore, it is not surprising that for some words we pronounce it in a wrong way.

 

Well, it is hard to judge who is wrong or who is right nowadays as the English speaker are not only British and US (though the pronunciation of these two countries somehow different to each other), there are also a large population in India, China, Southeast Asia and some other countries who speak English as well. The pronunciation is deemed to be correct as long as the majority pronounce the same way.

 

And I am in Manchester now. The Mancunian (what Manchester people call themselves) pronunciation is thus the correct way. When people tell you "boss", you should know that he is referring to a "bus". When your friend says "see you lat-er (pronounce separately)", you should understand he means see you later. When the kid say I want to eat "tomat-o", you should give him a tomato.

 

As the teacher said, I am not asking you to learn all this, but you need to be aware that people here pronounce that way and it is better to train your ear from now. She showed us the phonetic symbol, as well as several features in the "natural pronunciation" like the sounds, stress and weak form, intonation and connected speech.

 

Felt like went back to the primary school, we read the phonetic symbols one after another by following the teacher pronunciation. And I did realized that I mis-pronounce (at least in UK term) several words since small.

 

Don't know how much my pronunciation will change by the classes. Hopefully after returning to my home country in future, my friends will not say that, "Hey, I find your English is difficult to understand..."

 

Weekly Diary 24-30 Sep

Monday

The first day of MBA stage! Although the courses started a month ago, but they were merely the pre-MBA courses. (But I' was already busy like hell!) Started the first class in Marketing, Corporate Finance, Economics and Research Method. Since large volume of content (equivalent to 2 to 3 chapters in a 1000 pages thick text book) has to be covered within the each 1.5 hour classes, the lecture can only touch on the key messages that the professors wanted to deliver. Without pre-reading before the class, and revision after the class, it is quite hard to follow the pace of the teaching. Several take-aways from the class:

Marketing: Do the right things, not the things right, especially in a recession period

Finance: Finance is about making investment decision (where to invest) and financing decision (where to get money)

Economics: Phenomenon before the sub-prime crisis: bank lending to bank, lending to household for real-estate speculation, and less lending to business which incur less genuine revenue generation.

After the class in the evening, continue with meeting of Non for Profit (NfP) Project. Followed by VCIC launching meeting which finally finished by 9:30pm! Oh hell, what a long long day!

Tuesday

Again a long day, Economics and Financial Accounting in the morning. Energy Club launching in the lunch break. Career Management Service Workshop, Guest Speaker Series in the evening and NfP project meeting with Client. Finally decided the project scope with Client. A big advance in the NfP project!

Wednesday

Marketing, Finance, Accounting, NfP meeting... Finished the Guest Speaker series report.

Thursday

Skill for Successful Manager (SfSM) - Class in Project Management and Working in Team. Quite impressed by the speaker to cover everything in Project Management in just 1 class by taking the example of a project to start a car race team.

"Working in Team" as the name sounds discussed about how to work in a team. Interesting points in the discussion of the disadvantages of a team work:

1) Team loafing: people tends to work lesser in a team than if they work alone.

2) Poor decision: group decision is better than average member decision but not as good as that if most competent member.

3) Dominant voice: decision may governed by the dominant voice which may not be the best decision.

4) Conformity: follow the majority which may sometimes misleading

5) Production blocking: individual will generate more ideas well if they work separately and combine ideas than if they work together. Conclusion -> brainstorming is not productive.

A game was introduced to test our team type. 5 minutes to figure out what to bring to a desert island for survival after your plane crash into the sea. Our group picked 4 correct items but a last silly choice which is SALT!

Friday

A good off from the school. Revision, pre-reading, revision, pre-reading...now only I know what GDP exactly is…

Saturday

Appointment day with the Talktalk internet installation engineer. I have subscripted this internet a month ago but the installation can only be a month later (which is ridiculous to my sense). Heard from friends that they didn't get the connection on the appointment day, either due to the reason that they didn't receive the router package, or the installation engineer didn't turn up the day or some other technical issues. Worried about same thing happened to me, I tried to email and call the customer service few days ago. But the Talktalk customer service was just suck, no reply to email, busy hotline which kept me waiting and ate up my handphone credits. As expected, I didn’t receive the router package by that day and although the engineer did come, he couldn't open the connection box for the installation. Felt really frustrated and disappointed with the impotence of the UK internet providers!

Sunday

Day off to Liverpool. Known to be poorest and dirtiest city in the past history of UK, but it really changed to a well-developed and clean (cleaner than Manchester at least) city. Visited the Liverpool Museum, Tate Art Gallery. Maritime Museum, Liverpool Cathedral, St. George Hall, World Museum, and Walker Art Gallery…all in one day! Amazed by the size and architecture of Cathedral, as well as the ancient and cultural collection in World Museum. These 2 are the must visit in Liverpool. Lazy to upload the photos, but I believe Ma Rui will, so please have a look on her Blog (the link at right) if you are interested.   

Pre-MBA is over!

Can't imagine how fast the time passed. Being still puzzling and struggling about the tremendous amount of learning in the first few weeks. The Pre-MBA stage is over! The so-called honey moon stage in MBS MBA program is over! Oh my god, is me the only one couldn't enjoy the honey moon period, or someone else also share the same experience with me. If I felt hard in this stage, how do I going to survive the remaining 18 months?!!!

Nevertheless, I still have a lot of take aways from this stage. The pre-MBA stage not only provide a chance to learn about those basic theories in the business subjects, which is essential for people with no business knowledge background at all like me, and most important, a chance to reflect, to scrutinize my personality from my own as well as from the feed back of fellow MBAs that worked together for the past few weeks. It is really a precious chance to know not only how you see yourself, but also how other see you as a team member, or as a person. Well, I have to admit that I have fields to develop as well as fields to keep.

Some of the highlights of the Pre-MBA stage:

1) Launch of NfP (Not for Profit) Project

115 of us are divided into 23groups with 5 to 6 people in a group to work on the consultancy projects in Not-for-Profit Organization. The projects cover wide range of business issues like fund raising, branding and marketing strategy, new service development and launching etc.

Our group consisted of a Brazilian Finance Manager, a Peruvian Innovation Office Director, a Korean Banker, a Indian Healthcare IT Consultant, a Russian Automotive Project Manager, and me, a Malaysian Civil Engineer. Being a group with such a diversity, the meetings were always full of argument

The real challenges are how to define the problems from 6 different perspectives, draw out the best ideas from everyone, and achieve an agreement on what is the best solution. So far, we were quite ineffective in the meeting as it was really difficult to come with a conclusion satisfy all 6 people. Nevertheless, those meeting outcomes are slowly and slowly transforming into something more tangible, which may be our first piece of deliverable in the MBA!

2) Skill for Successful Manager

The so-called soft skill course which cover courses in consultancy skills, presentation skills in this stage and will be followed by subjects in project management and negotiation skills in next stage. There are also 2 psychometric tests (Hogan & SHL) to check the individual personalities. The results really mirror myself, the weakness that I knew it for long but never take initiative to improve it. No more excuse to run away from it. Now is the time to fix it right here, right now!     

3) Brathay

The seniors told the excursion in Brathay will be the best days in the MBA. Can't judge yet as I was only went through the first month in the MBA. But the memory in Brathay is definitely unforgettable. At the famous Lake District, beautiful landscape, blessed with the sunny sky at the last day (raining the other 3 days!), challenging outdoor activities, reflective group feedback, interesting and funny group performance, really a perfect temporary run-away from the stressful MBA study. Here we built our rapport, our team work and our self-confident!

4) Career Management Service

MBS really put a lot of effort in the career management. It might due to majority of the students are here to seek a career change. Career related workshops are held regularly just like the other core course in the MBA. So far, we have the CV workshop, business etiquette workshop, alumni panels, career safari, guest speaker series. More and more on-campus company presentation will be held in the near future.

 

5) Time Management

Not a subject in the pre-MBA, but really a essential  skill to survive in the MBA. All courses have projects or assignments, case studies as well as pre-reading for each class. And it is just impossible to do everything perfectly. Think of your MBA objective, set the priority, and allocate the time efficiently, you may miss some of the works, but you won't miss your big objective...this is what being told...

Talk is always easier than do. In fact, I am still wondering how the hell to go thru this 18 months...

Drowning...

MBA is tough, it is what MBA students or alumnis used to say. I knew that and psychologically prepared for that. But I never knew that it is really that TOUGH. Only 2 weeks passed, and I seems to be drowning in the overwhelming workloads, the pre-readings, lectures, revisions, feedbacks, group works, group discussions, projects, social events...oh my god, how could I manage all these things?

Sense a smell of crisis whether I can live through the remaining 18 months. Nevertheless, this is my own choice, which I made up to stretch myself, and to discover the unknown me. And that's why I'm here, so I should stop grumbling and work on what I should do. One of the lecturer told that there are 3 types of students: the performer (aim for good grade), performance avoider (less study, more party), and mastery (care about what really learnt). I consciously trying to be the third one, to learn something, to take away something from each lecture, discussion. But experience told me that when there are a due date for everything, and they all come in the same time, you tend to ignore the learning and just try to finish everything for the purpose of submission.

"Don't forget the brief half way through the project", this is the advise I get from the Consultancy Skills class. "Start to write the report with executive summary" , similar advice by the lecturer on our Not for Profit Project. I think it is applicable for my MBA journey as well. "Don't forget the original motive (to get an MBA) half way through the study", "Start to plan the journey with the final ambition in head". And the project is about scoping, research, analysis, interim reporting, final reporting and presentation. While MBA journey is same thing like scoping (identify what you really wanna do), research, analysis, interim reporting (self check with original motive whether it is still on track), final reporting & presentation (final check of what have been achieved and what have not).

The study is tough. Luckily the lecturers and professors that I met so far are all very good in teaching. Unlike the classes that I have back in Asia, the classes here are more interactive, provocative and reflective. And this is the backbone of MBS method, the so-called Learning by Doing. Students have the hands-on chance to learn through projects and group works. What's more is the classes on soft skills, the skills that I wanted the most. As the lecturer on Presentation Skills say, "Without a good presentation/communication skill, what inside your head is just nothing, because you just can't express it". And expression itself is just not enough, it has to be impressive, effective, in such a way that the listener will take away only the key messages, nothing else, that you wanted to tell.

Sell attributes, not products. Another take away from the Introduction to Case Studies Class. Whether it is a marketing strategy, product development, or even job searching! We are selling our attributes. No company will hire you if you don't have the attributes they are looking for. Therefore, MBA study is kind of process to add attributes, valueable attributes to yourself.

Again, MBA is tough, and I'm feeling kind of drowning. I don't whether I can survive till last. But the goal is clear, and I just can't let it go.

 

First Impression

After a 7 hours flight from KL to Dubai, a 5 hours transit wait at Dubai International Airport, another 8 hours flight from Dubai, I finally reach Manchester, the first city that I am going to start a new live outside of Asia. There are always lots of excitement together with confusion when one arrives to a new city. And my first week in Manchester is considered a smooth and quite lucky one (although it can be better if I knew the city better and knew british english better...). At least I have settled down with a lovely apartment which is near to the school as well as the city centre; know where to shop, where to dine and where to party; or I should say that there should be no problem for me to survive in the next 18 months. 

For those who have never visited Manchester before, here is my first impression. Since I have been living in Tokyo for the past 10 years, it is inevitably that I tends to compare the city with Tokyo.

1) City
Manchester is the "second" city in UK according to BBC survey in 2007, mainly contributed by its popularity in Football. A very small yet vibrant city, with the mix of ancient and modern architecture. Although the public transportation is very convenient in the city, with free mtero shuttle, tram, train, but basically you don't need one to travel within the city centre. A walk around the city centre that cover the main spots like the China Town, Piccadily Station, Piccadily Garden, Arndale Shopping Centre, Town Hall, John Rylands Library and the Manchester Central will take you less than an hour. The city is busy even on the weekdays, with lots of activities/festivals over the weekend. I was so lucky to witness a gay parade, the so-called Manchester Pride during first weekend in Manchester. Residential area is clean and beautiful but the city centre where drinkers and smokers gather is so...

City Centre View

     Manchester Pride Parade

 
2) People

Manchester is the city with largest student population in Europe with several big univeristies in the city. Therefore, the population in Manchester is young in general and full of diversity. Walking on the street you will pass by the Whites, Blacks, Asians, South Americans, etc. A mix of colors, culture is normal and so no one will look at you strangely and say, "Hey, there is an alien here!". British men are very gentlement, as what I read in the books. They are polite and helpful, especially in showing us, the easy get lost new comers the way to our destination. But I have to say that I am still struggling with the British Accent or "Mancunian" Accent in specific. They tends to pronounce "u" as "o", like "bus" as "boss", "pull" as "poll" etc.   

 

3) Weather
Rain, rain, and rain. A waterproof jacket and umbrella is neccesary whenever going out. But I was so blessed because there were few sunny days (although mix with rain occasionally) in the week. The sky was so clear in the sunny day. And people were out especially in the garden to enjoy the sunshine. The temperature was just nice, about 17 to 24 degree celcius, so quite comfortable compare to the hot and humid summer in Tokyo.

Blue sky at the Media City, Salford Quay

4) Food
Thanks to the diversity in the city, there are lots of international cuisine besides the "notorious" British food. Tried the "famous" fish and chips at the Lowry Outlet Mall but will never give it a second try. There are many Chinese restaurants and Chinese grocery store in the city which help to reduce my homesickness somehow. Eating out is generally expensive, although the lunch menu will cost a bit less. The cheapest (and may be the most delicious one) is a home cooking dish, as the grocery  price is quite cheap compare to Tokyo. Not forget to tell that there are lots of pubs. For beer lover, the pubs can be found any corner in the city.

British "famous" Fish and Chips

Indian

Chinese

Nando Chicken

5) House (Accomodation)
There is a saying in Chinese that the man's happiest life is getting the US salary, a Japanese wife, a Chinese cook and a British house. It sounds that the British House is highly regarded by the Chinese as the best in the world. So, how about the reality? Well, depends on the location (city centre or suburban), the price (a businessman afforable or student affordable), the type (house or flat), it will varies significantly. I can't make any conclusion yet right now to say whether staying in a British House really contribute to the man's happiest life. But at least for the same price I pay here, I can get a more spacious, stylish, better location and well furnished apartment compare to Tokyo, one of the most expensive city in the world.    

6) The University
The Univeristy of Manchester is located at the south of the city centre. Due to its gateless campus, the universities building made up part of the city. Just like the city, the architecture is a mix of the 18th century and modern. The university museum,which is also called the Manchester Museum is housed in a castle-like building aged more than a hundred year while the Univeristy Place just opposite the Museum is new and stylish. One thing to my surprise is there is no free student sport facilities. I have to depend on the street jogging for free work out.

University Buildings

Anyway, these are all my first impressions after a one week stay. For sure there will be more to discover and the feeling may change when time pass by. And the fact is, I am already here in Manchester! This is the city that I was looking forward since a year back and that I will spend my next full 18 months (if I am not going elsewhere for the internship & exchange). For better or worse, it is up to me to explore. One thing for sure is, this is not the comfort zone (both the city and the program) for me, which will indeed stretch me after I get over with it. 

Previous blog tittle of "Road to Manchester" may sounds obsolete now. While I am thinking for a better tittle, let me tentatively rename it as "Roads in Manchester" to kick start the new journey!

<Lost my grandpa while writing this last week. May he rest in peace and continue to witness my endeavor from the heaven.>  

The Speech

Still wonder what to say in tomorrow morning farewell speech. Out of a blue, I received an invitation mail two days ago from the department secretary, asking me to give a farewell speech in front of all department members.

Being 6 years in the company, I have seen many retirement speeches in the department, but not once a resignation speech. As in the Japanese culture, a resignation (vs retirement) is not something blessed for. So whoever resigns, will leave quietly, without alerting anybody…

I think I am lucky. Resigning for a reason, a reason not because to abandon something, but to strive for something. Something that still obscure that I need to figure out at a different platform before I decide where to go eventually. And luckily I have the supports from my fellow colleagues, and my bosses, who despised my decision at first but showed their appreciation and blessing at last.

I feel thankful. Thankful to the company, my fellow colleagues and my bosses. Throughout my life in the company, I have learnt so much from them. One thing I like the Japanese so much is their generosity in sharing their knowledge. And what’s more is the friendly environment that I can work comfortably. Work itself is stressful, but due to the Japanese “helping each other” culture, there is never a one person problem, there is only a team problem, where all team members share the problem and solve the problem together. And I always believe that the generosity and the teamwork are the two main characteristics that make Japanese strong.

Spending almost 10 years in Japan, I am leaving a place where I love so much which I am not sure whether I will be returning in future. Sounds paradox as you may ask why leaving a place that you love so much? Well, my answer will be, the outside world, whether better or worse, you will never know without exploring. Through continuous expedition, then only you will find your true love, whether it is your dream job, your dream life, or simply the place to settle down.

So, what should I say in tomorrow speech? The reason, the thank you, the don’t forget me…? All these are just not sufficient to express my real feeling. A feeling that is a mixture of pain for parting, anticipation for new life, and anxiety for the future… I don’t know what will happen after the MBA, where I will go and what I will do…

But one thing I know for sure is, from the deep of my heart, I sincerely feel grateful of joining the company. So, whatever the tomorrow speech will be, I think the key message will simply be “nagai aida osewa ni narimasita, hontou ni arigato gozaimasita, korekara mo zutto zutto yorosiku onegai itasimasu!”

  

What is consulting?

Just finished reading this book “What is Consulting” written by Kouichi Hori, previous president of BCG Japan, and currently the chairman of Dream Incubator (DI). He has been working as a strategy consultant since his graduation from the Harvard University MBA program 30 years ago. Some notes on this book:

Essence of consulting – thinking what is the problem?

Why need consulting –

1) Company may not really understand the customer need

2) Company tends to be bonded by previous success (experience)

3) Consultant pursues thoroughly the cause and causation

4) Consultant owns the skill and experience for strategy planning

Consulting process –

1)       Interview : find the gap in understanding/needs/feeling

2)       Accumulate facts

3)       Graphing : determine the x and y axis

4)       Present

5)       Implement (by Company)

Pre-requisite to be become a consultant

1)       Intelligence : logical thinking

2)       Flexibility : willing to hear what others say

3)       Diligence : curiosity + inquiring mind + hard work

4)       Toughness : able to work in pressure, able to stand up after fall down

5)       Luck : gambler luck?

MBA graduates promoted averagely after 3 and 7 years. But the “UP or OUT” is common within the consulting field where half will out within 3 years and half of the remaining will out within 7 years. But most OUT will still success in other fields because the logical thinking and look big perspective learnt in the consulting will help in any other fields.

Consulting fee – Manhour rate x Manhour x Multiplier

Multiplier > 3.0 accounted for overhead and benefits of the consulting company.

What is interesting about consulting – a consultant alone can bring a significant change to the company

Safety Net

Eventually I decided to tear off the safety net, the safety net that will guarantee my employment after my MBA. Well, may be you will say I am stupid. I can just be silent and make the decision only if I found another place to go after the MBA. But I just want to play fair with my company, a company that I love so much that I even have the feeling of being a betrayer by speaking up the resignation.

My immediate manager was angry. I understand his feeling, he is the one who most support my decision for MBA study, which involve a temporary leave from the company for a period of more than a year that busy schedule due to new projects is expected. Being a typical Japanese, he simply believe that I will return to the company as soon as I finish my study.

And I myself also thought of returning to my company, although my company rejected my application for company funding for my MBA study, by saying that there is no such a system of education funding in the company. Nevertheless, it is a comfortable place to work, with friendly people, challenging international mega projects, decent pays and benefits which no one should have think of leave at the first place.

My manager asked me what changed my mind? I honestly told him that I have been struggling for this idea for a long time. Spoke with several MBA alumni and students, attended several MBA career seminars, all gave me a clear message that one should try to embrace as many new challenges as possible in the MBA program, which can be a perfect platform for transition or I would say reborn. And that is how one will eventually find out what he loves the most and does it for life.

I am still in the quest - the quest for my perfect career. Therefore, I need a reset. Start with what I have so far but without need to look back. And since there will be no safety net, the only choice is to move forward. Move forward for new challenges, for new knowledge and skills, for new friendships and networking. And who knows, I can still contribute to my beloved company in future, whether I will return, or work at different a company as a partner, collaborator or even customer to my current company.

My manager looked at me calmly this time and said, it is very hard for me to say yes in my position. But since you already make up your mind, I respect your decision. But be reminded that this is a Japanese company, once you leave, we will not accept you again even if you willing to return, no matter how competent you are.

I told him, I love the company, and I just need to find out what I love the most. If I eventually find out that here is where I should return, I will still try to return, whether you are welcoming me or not.

He smiled.

The Hedgehog and The Fox

My wife asked me what is the meaning of the Hedgehog Concept that I wrote in “Career Design”. I told her that it is a business concept derived from the famous essay, “The Hedgehog and the Fox” by Isaiah Berlin. He used the typical image of the dowdier Hedgehog and the cunning Fox to describe different categories of people.

Berlin divided the writers & thinkers into 2 categories, hedgehogs, who view the world through the lens of a single defining idea (examples given include Plato, Lucretius, Dante, Pascal, Hegel, Dostoevsky, Nietzsche, Ibsen, and Proust) and foxes who draw on a wide variety of experiences and for whom the world cannot be boiled down to a single idea (examples given include Herodotus, Aristotle, Erasmus, Shakespeare, Montaigne, Molière, Goethe, Pushkin, Balzac, Joyce, Anderson). ~ a reference from the Wikipedia~

A more straight forward and simple explanation would be the fox knows many things; the hedgehog knows one big thing. And Jim Collins, the author of “Good to Great”, states that concentrating doing what is relevant based on the 3 Circles of Hedgehog concept, is essential to turn a good company into the Great Company.

Then, my wife asked me again. Are you the Hedgehog or the Fox? Ohh… I never think of that before. But frankly speaking, my eagerness to learn new field of knowledge, my passion to challenge new things, and my ambition to be an all-rounded person somehow tell that I am unconsciously trying to be Fox than a Hedgehog.

But at the other hand, I know that a cunning Fox that knowing everything in the superficial level will definitely cannot win the competition with the Hedgehog. So, like the Hedgehog, I have been very “loyalty” in my major, an engineer, a backbone profession since my undergraduate, postgraduate study till now.

Ok, I might be wrong for the definition of Hedgehog. Continuing a profession for long is not the concept of Hedgehog. The concept of Hedgehog, according to Jim Collins, is to understand what your passion is, what you can do, and what will give you the economic support to continuing doing it. So, the next question is, is the profession of being an engineer fulfill my passion, capability and economic requirement?   

No grumble for the capability or economic factors, but have to admit that current work not really burn my engine to sprint me forward. As what Steve Jobs said, if you haven’t find something you are really passionate about, keep finding.

I do agree. For me, life is just about finding. Since small, we find who to become friends, what to study, which university to go, which company to join, what occupation to do, who to be the lifelong partner, where to settle down, what business to start with, etc. Each finding comes with pleasure or sorrow, surprise or anger, satisfaction or disappointment, laugh or tears. No one can do the right thing, meet the right person, in the right time right place in the first finding. But just believe in faith, and never give up finding, we will eventually found what we want in heart.   

So, if you know where your passion is, just go for it. Who cares you are the Hedgehog or the Fox.