The very first day-September 17th,2006
"How dull it is to pause ..to rust unburnish'd and not to shine in use" as Lord Tennyson has quoted in his famous poem Ulysses.As I landed at Heathrow back in London once again but this time on a different note,to fulfill a dream and learn the unknown,know the unexplored.Earlier work has brought me here but never felt this way.It was a myriad of emotions that were locked up in my heart..yes here I was as a student going to the university of my dreams 'Cranfield School Of management'..with so many aspirations and such high hopes.I was received at the airport and ushered in a Vauxhall to the beautiful scenic campus at Bedford.I got my accomodation at Lanchester Hall.While I was strolling down the campus lanes,met a few others of our Pre-MBA group-everyone excited and jet lagged cos of the long way they have come from.
The next morning was something that I would love to cherrish for a very very long time.It was my first day to be there in the prestigious lecture halls at the SOM.It all began with the speech of our Full Time MBA director Mr John Glen who inducted us to this elite community and introduced us to Mr Graham Heard who was responsible for the Pre-MBA programme.Initial sessions of banking facilities,MIRC presentations followed.So far so good..it was my idea that we would go easy the first day.
But I was wrong.Bang!post lunch we strated with the business simulation game conducted by Karen Valverde.We began with what is called 'Minimax'.It was a game that we played in two markets.Each market consisted of four companies who competed with each other for similar but not identical products.We were broken up into eight teams each simulating a company playing in the respective market.The challenge was we had to make some very important strategic business decisions in about 20 mins each.We floated through a hurricane of decision making...which involved concepts in accounting,finance,strategy,operations everything in a nut shell.My team comprised of Dumisa (from South Africa),Vijay(from India),Moorthy(from India),Cesar (from Spain), Thomas (from Germany) and myself.Cesar and Thomas had not yet arrived for the Pre-MBA ,would probably join us next week.
We worked hard,made tough decisions,did a lot of number crunching.The results were declared after four periods.To our despair we had been bankrupt!!.The lessons we learnt were really important.It is rightly said "Failures are the pillars of success".We learnt the hard way that for any decision we make in life,perhaps the most important thing was 'Strategy' which we needed to think about,understand and thereby implement.So our learning had begun even before we could setlle down..that told us of what was more to come in days ahead.
The next morning was something that I would love to cherrish for a very very long time.It was my first day to be there in the prestigious lecture halls at the SOM.It all began with the speech of our Full Time MBA director Mr John Glen who inducted us to this elite community and introduced us to Mr Graham Heard who was responsible for the Pre-MBA programme.Initial sessions of banking facilities,MIRC presentations followed.So far so good..it was my idea that we would go easy the first day.
But I was wrong.Bang!post lunch we strated with the business simulation game conducted by Karen Valverde.We began with what is called 'Minimax'.It was a game that we played in two markets.Each market consisted of four companies who competed with each other for similar but not identical products.We were broken up into eight teams each simulating a company playing in the respective market.The challenge was we had to make some very important strategic business decisions in about 20 mins each.We floated through a hurricane of decision making...which involved concepts in accounting,finance,strategy,operations everything in a nut shell.My team comprised of Dumisa (from South Africa),Vijay(from India),Moorthy(from India),Cesar (from Spain), Thomas (from Germany) and myself.Cesar and Thomas had not yet arrived for the Pre-MBA ,would probably join us next week.
We worked hard,made tough decisions,did a lot of number crunching.The results were declared after four periods.To our despair we had been bankrupt!!.The lessons we learnt were really important.It is rightly said "Failures are the pillars of success".We learnt the hard way that for any decision we make in life,perhaps the most important thing was 'Strategy' which we needed to think about,understand and thereby implement.So our learning had begun even before we could setlle down..that told us of what was more to come in days ahead.
posted by Sats at 11:25 PM
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