Week 21: Business Decision Models, Operations Management, Marketing Fundamental, Finance Fundamentals (Module 5 con't)

Week 21 is ending. There is just one more week to go until we get a break for a few days. Also, fall has "officially" arrived. In addition the mornings and evenings have started to get a bit "chilly" and some of the leaves have begun to change. Nothing like a brilliant red maple leaf to remind you that you are in Canada and that winter is coming.

Monday through Wednesday I was attending various information sessions in the evenings for oil and gas companies that came to campus. It seems like most of them were willing consider my prior experience and education. The companies I went to were Shell, Nexen, Imperial Oil and Total. Imperial is coming back Wednesday of next week to give a MBA specific session.

Classes have been busy. Lots of late nights reviewing various team term projects. Lots of very early mornings to get in just one more rehearsal/practice before a presentation to the class. All teams had to give presentations for Operations Management, Marketing Fundamentals and Business Decision Models.

Operations Management presentations were on our final reports for the projects we did analyzing the locations we did our field trips too. Ours was on Amey's Taxi here in Kingston. Other groups did them on: Cancoil Thermal Corp., Dofasco, The County Cider Company, Hotel Dieu Hospital and many others. With the completion of this report and presentation we are pretty much done this course since there is no final exam.

Marketing Fundamentals presentations were on each teams product re-launch. Our team did the zeppelin and proposed launching a small fleet of these giant floating hotels to offer luxurious cruises to the very wealthy. Other teams chose: Clear Pepsi, Dodge LeFemme, Britney Spears, Concorde, iCam, Kindel, Electric Sports Car by GM, Segway and many others. In addition we had to submit a very substancial report.

Business Decision Models presentations were of each teams choosing, but a lot of teams decided take advantage of their field trip in Operations Management and modelled the business they visited. Our team modelled the call center and taxi allocation of Amey's Taxi. Other teams did: Cancoil Termal Corp, Dofasco, "Match Maker" for the class based on surveys the class filled out (by far the funniest, hopefully other classes do this as well to "maximize" happiness), Personal Interactive Meal Planner (Pimp...lol), eBar (this optimized our MBA student lounge snack offerings), class seating arrangement (this "broke" solver as it was too complex), Cell Phone Plan Optimizer, NHL team chooser to beat the Maple Leafs, Traffic Light and a few others.

Homecoming is also this week. There is a big football game that everyone is going to and there will definitely be some social gatherings. The police banned the sale of kegs earlier this week in an attempt to try to curb the over enthusiasm expressed by some of the undergraduates, but I think they will just succeed in covering the roads with broken bottles since undergrads will be undergrads. The class has created some interesting t-shirts we hope to sell at the game to make a profit! (Note: Turns out this went very well. We broke even and made quite a health profit to contribute towards the class' trip to MBA Games. The party was something else...)

I also had an appointment with Julia Blackstock. She is definitely one of the better business career center people available to the students. Very knowledgeable, to the point and friendly.

David Edwards from the business career center gave a lecture on salary negotiation. A lot of people have been getting calls to interview for positions with the companies that they applied for on the Career Services Network, so the timing is about right. Although I am familiar with a lot of what David presented, it was good just to be re-familiarized with it so I have a clear understanding of this topic. After all, I'm hoping I will be in a situation where I need to do this sometime in the near future.

Case competition teams are beginning their practice sessions where they can find time. We need to have a series of internal competitions to see who is going to represent Queen's MBA at the various case competitions before Christmas.

All the sports teams are now in full swing. The hockey team is playing on Monday! Point fours are still going strong! Everyone is tired, but I still see a lot of smiling faces. This post has been somewhat random and poorly written, but that only reflects the tired and fatigued state I'm in. One more week...

Week 20: Business Decision Models, Operations Management, Marketing Fundamental, Finance Fundamentals (Module 5 con't)

Week 20 and the pace is picking up...as if that was possible. I have been getting up at 7 AM (tried 6 AM and it was a "no-go") and working straight through till 12 PM (some later) every night for what must be the past 3 weeks straight. Weekends are those prized days that I get to sleep in to 8 AM (sometimes even 9 AM! OMG!). My only solace is that pretty much every other person in the program is in the same situation and is feeling the same pressure and fatigue. Just a couple more weeks and we get a few days off!

This week I attended On Campus Recruiting sessions for Cormark Securities, Secor Consulting and Petro-Canada ("retail locations/lubricant divisions"). All were interesting, but I don't think any of these companies are "me". I will stick to my original plan to look for work more closely related to upstream oil and gas.

Classes have been tough this week. Although we had Wednesday off, it was just used to attempt to catch-up on all the work we have due. There was also a finance test on Friday morning. I certainly hope the school addresses the issue of the professor teaching this course for next year. He is not being very effective and a lot of the students are somewhat frustrated by the situation. A lot of people needed to skip class the day before the test, myself included, just to attempt to get prepared because we have been too busy to find the time in the past few weeks. As if that wasn't enough, recently I just discovered the finance text we are using for this class is used in a commerce undergraduate course. They do cover the text in 4 months and we do it in 3 weeks! But what the hell, we can take it...after all we are MBA's, right?

(Strange that the one of the central themes of the Organizational Behaviour and Leadership courses was "work-life-balance", yet all MBA programs pretty much throw that to the wind.)

Friday afternoon we played "the Beer game" in operations management! What a blast. It was played with different teams sitting around tables and operating a "supply chain" of "beer" symbolized by poker chips. This game definitely taught us all a good deal about the "bull whip" effect using a fun and hands-on approach. Everyone "bet" $2 up front. This "all-or-nothing" prize was awarded to the team that succeeded in keeping up with supply while minimizing inventory and backlog costs (i.e. achieving "the goal"). I would post more here, but it would only ruin the experience for others.

We also had another prospective student join our class for a day this week. It is that season again when the next year's class is busy submitting applications, coming out to be interviewed and sitting in on lectures. Weird to think I was in that position just under a year ago. Now I'm clinging to a coffee cup to fight off sleep so I can complete the endless stream of assignments. Yep, livin' the grand life...sigh.

Even with everything going on there are still people managing to find time to fit in some exercise. Yesterday evening I was in the pool with our "inner-tube" water polo team during our first intramural match. Other people have found time to play some basketball and soccer. Still others are making time for running and swimming regularly. All of this is supported and encouraged by the programs program who supply equipment, entrance fees and "fit-to-lead" trainers where needed. It is a good way to begin training for this year's MBA Games in Halifax. (checkout the video Dalhousie has put up on YouTube for more info.)

This weekend is going to be filled with editing reports and team work sessions to continue the Business Decision Model "field trip" presentation and Marketing "product relaunch" presentations now that the "lead/second" pairs have brought them to "95%".

Also, I have information sessions for Imperial Oil, Nexen, Total and Shell next week. That is only going to add to the workload...

(now I really have to get back to work and stop procrastinating by writing on this blog. It is amazing what seems interesting and "uber" important when you have so many other things that need doing)

Week 19: Business Decision Models, Operations Management, Marketing Fundamental, Finance Fundamentals (Module 5 con't)

Week 19 started with a presentation from Bruce M. Kagan, CEO of Blackmont Capital Inc. This was an interesting presentation from an individual who has risen quickly through the ranks for the banking world. Afterwards, a few of us that signed-up were able to have lunch with Bruce and spend some additional time talking with him. One word of advice that he gave was to be the guy that "shines". If you can choose between taking on a significantly larger job that you will do an "okay" job at or a job that is smaller that you will "excel" at, then you should choose the job you "excel" at since you will stand out. Standing out is how you advance in the banking world.

What was really neat was that Blackmont was in the news for the next two days after, on the front page of the business section, as various rumours were circulating about a possible deal between CI Financial and Canaccord regarding the fate of Blackmont. It was really neat to meet a key player in this real world drama as it unfolded.

Monday to Wednesday were regular classes, but on Thursday and Friday we had a quick 2 day course on Business Communications (MBA834 Business Communications). This course was taught by two instructors from Ottawa who have 70 odd years of experience in television journalism between them. In addition, they have assisted executives with communicating better for the past several years. Several teams and individuals volunteered to present to the class. They picked a presentation they had done previously in the program, or created one based on a personal subject, so that they could be analyzed and suggestions made on how to improve. I definitely think this course was useful, but I wish it had been included earlier in the program. We could have benefited more from having it earlier in the program and used these learnings in all the subsequent presentations.

For fun the class is still keeping up with the weekly "point four" and various sports teams are still being formed up: volleyball, basketball, hockey, inner-tube waterpolo, etc. It is hard to commit to these since I find myself very busy and don't know where I would fit them in.

This weekend is going to be brutal for workload. There isn't enough hours in the day anymore and without the team working together this would never be achievable. We are approaching the end of the module quickly and there are larger "term" projects due. In addition there are the usual smaller assignments due. On top of both of those are the ever looming mid-terms and final exams. As if this wasn't enough, people are still busy signing-up for and attending evening info sessions for On Campus Recruiting as well as applying for jobs that have been posted on the career services network. The only real "light-at-the-end-of-the-tunnel" is that this will all be over in a few weeks...and then the next module will start.

I need to keep reminding myself that not only did I voluntarily sign-up for this craziness, but I competed for the opportunity and paid for it too.

Week 18: Business Decision Models, Operations Management, Marketing Fundamental, Finance Fundamentals (Module 5 con't)

Week 18 saw the undergrads return to campus in droves! Frosh week is in full swing with all the first year students being put through the paces by their second year overlords. Lots of craziness on campus. Although it is amusing and their presences adds a much more human feel to campus, the downside is that we now have to compete with the undergrads for meeting rooms, space in the cafeteria, space in the library, etc. In addition they are kind of noisy. Last night they turned Goodes Hall into a dance hall and the music was loud enough I gave up on trying to do any reading whatsoever.

This week has been full of half days. Most of this additional time outside of class has been taken up by assignments or extra studying. In addition the on campus recruiting (OCR) events will kick off next week so a lot of people are busy making final preparations. They need to do this now since next week's workload looks like it could be much more demanding.

OCR for the next few weeks is mainly information sessions hosted by various companies looking to hire grads from all of Queen's. Quiet a few are coming, but not all of them are targeting MBAs. Then certain companies will be returning to interview students they are interested in during the week allocated in October.

Lots of teams have found places to go and tour for their MBA 841 Operation Management project. My team decided to approach a local taxi company, Amey's Taxi, and we did our tour today. The owner was very open and happy to answer our questions. Should make for an interesting project.

Lots of sports teams are getting organized for intramurals. Looks like the MBA class will have a volleyball, soccer, badminton, basketball, and hockey team. I haven't been on skates for over 5 years, but I'm still going to sign-up for the hockey team. Now I just need to find equipment.

This weekend will be filled with more homework, a few team working sessions and hopefully some fun. Looking to watch the first year engineers try to climb the greased pole to remove the "tam" and to attend a free concert by the Arrogant Worms.