6:30 AM Wake-up (Snooze) Wake-up

7:00 AM Breakfast – Cereal and milk (while remembering how nice it would have been to have idlis and dosa)

8:15 AM Bike to school, dump your stuff in the locker, check which of lecture rooms you ought to be in and go to class.

8:45 AM First class of the day – These are long 3.5 hour classes; struggle to be awake

9:15 AM Resist opening lap tops; Slowly, people start checking emails and make diligent notes side-by-side

10ish Coffee break – Grab a coffee or tea and also the free Financial Times and Wall Street Journal at the Common Room. Brood over when the economy will be on track or catch up with group mates on the assignments due.

11ish to 12:15 PM Back to class; Case Study time – Most classes begin with theoretical concepts and end with a discussion on the case study that was on the reading list.

12:15 to 1:30 PM Lunch or luncheon group meetings; If you aren’t lucky to have a relaxed lunch, grab a sandwich and come back to sit in one of the career presentations or an OBN meeting

1:30 to 4:45 PM Second class for the day; A similar schedule like the morning class, with a coffee break ofcourse.

4:45 PM Technically done for the day with all classes complete during Michaelmas and Hilary terms.

5:00 to 8:15 PM During Trinity term, a third class may be on schedule depending on the electives chosen.

5:00 PM to late You could end up doing one or all of these – Group meetings for discussing assignments; Writing and uploading assignments; study at the library; attending weekly debates at the Oxford Union; attend guest speaker events at school or elsewhere in the university; do pre-readings for next day’s class; attend a BOP; listen to a concert at the Sheldonian; workout at the college or university gym; attend meditation classes and an umpteen other things.

10:00 PM Back to comforts of the room; cook food; watch NDTV news over dinner (atleast in my case); do pre-readings for next day; plan calendar for next day; write journal entries and more…

12:00 midnight Time to crash…

Apart from all this, you can make time to row on river Isis, go punting on river Cherwell, take a walk in Port meadows, read in the Bodleian library, attend a prayer at the Church, visit one of the many museums, attend a book reading, be an activist, play cricket for the SBS team, walk down Corn market street to have the famous West Cornwall Pasty, drink beer at Eagle and Child, eat Michel’s crêpes at Bonn square, hear a Nobel laureate speak at the Sheldonian and many many more things. It is all a matter of priority and time management. If you are at Oxford, you will do them all and have one of the most enriching years of your life.

I was part of the Cisco team, and I was thoroughly impressed with the depth of analysis they apply to each potential partner. They consider the technology, obviously, but even more so the people. If the cultural fit isn’t there, they don’t make the move; ” They’re the best at acquisitions for a reason”

For the afternoon, the trekkers were treated to an impressive array of events at Santa Clara University’s Leavey School of Business. Our hosts, Dean Barry Posner and Professor Al Bruno, arranged a panel of local entrepreneurs, a discussion about their social incubator, a lecture on the current economic crisis and outlook, and even let us sit in on one of their classes. They topped this all off with a reception where we got to meet professors and current students.

If you’re going to be in Silicon Valley, make sure you get to know Al Bruno and Dean Posner. Not only do they know today’s leaders, but they’re ensuring that they’ll know tomorrow’s as well.

Thursday, April 9th
Silicon Valley is an area proud of its history (and justifiably so), and this day started out with the trekkers gaining a little historical perspective. Joe DiNucci arranged a morning tour of the Computer History Museum in Mountain View. There we saw everything from punched card processors to supercomputers, including one machine with a built-in ashtray. They certainly don’t make them like that anymore.

After two hours of computing history, we were jolted with a vision of the future. Qik founder Ramu Sunkara showed us how his software can turn a cell phone camera into a real-time webcam. The technology is still under development, but the current results are impressive.

In classic Silicon Valley style, Ramu started Qik in his garage. His advice was simple – team up with the smartest person you know, and don’t let failure get you down. Even when all hope seems lost, success can be just around the corner.

For our afternoon session, the trekkers were treated to three hours with LinkedIn founder and CEO (and Oxford alumnus) Reid Hoffman. Reid spent a few minutes talking about his background and about LinkedIn, and then he shifted to giving us direction on finding jobs and funding ventures in this economy. To give justice to the quality and quantity of information Reid (aka “The Godfather”) shared with us this afternoon would take 1000+ words, so I’ll just summarize as best I can. With money tight and jobs scarce, social networks are even more critical to finding funds and employment. Build those networks… and then use them!

Insight from Reid Hoffman:

Get LinkedIn or be left out.

Trinity term is our last academic term, and all the classes are electives. Mine are: Cooperative Strategy; Managing the Project Portfolio; Leading Strategic Change; Social Enterprise Design; Social Finance; and Trade & Globalisation. After getting a strong business foundation (and, in my case, expanding my horizons quite a bit) with eight core courses, it’s nice to take classes in subjects closer to your hoped-for career.

Which, of course, leads me to a sticky subject. Our class entered Saïd Business School just weeks after the crash of Lehman Brothers—late enough that everyone could see that a full-blown economic crisis was occurring, but too early for anyone to really understand what was happening. The Careers Service staff did not mince words in an orientation presentation to us in the fall: “We usually tell students to be prepared for Plan B. But this year, we’re telling them to be prepared for Plan B, C, D, E…all the way down the alphabet.”

My personal aim is to enter into a career in international development, (though in what particular sector, I don’t know). It’s a bit tough in this field because development agencies, governments and other NGOs don’t often think to recruit at business schools, even though there are a number of us interested in public service-type work. Many financial institutions and other large corporations continuously hold recruitment sessions and interviews at Saïd Business School, and I know a few people who already have job offers as a result. However, for firms (such as international development agencies) that don’t recruit so far in advance, or don’t come to the School at all, you have to be a little more creative.

In September, I’ll return to Washington D.C., my beautiful hometown and the seat of the U.S. government—and currently the only organization around shelling out billions of dollars in investments. Maybe I’ll ask Obama for a job…

I’m really looking forward to being able to go to a few more of the broader University speakers/events than I’ve made this term.  Some of us had lunch with the Dean of the school this week, and it was quite embarrassing to say that I’d been too busy to see Romano Prodi speak, or to go to a talk from a group of central bankers.  Also next term there will be cricket to watch, punting to attempt, barbeques and amazing college balls to go to and rowing to do when it’s not freezing cold (and certainly not snowing).

There may even be good news on the job front, but not holding my breath waiting for that one.  Clearly this year is a tough time for job seekers, and especially for those who wanted to get an MBA to move into, or back to, financial services.  Whilst it seems like a lot of the traditionally larger MBA recruiters have been quiet this year, there are still jobs out there, at least judging by the FT jobs pullout each Thursday.

Last night we finished our Trading Game for the term.  We had about 50 players, from staff and students.  Clearly people invest differently in a competition, but to give you an idea of how hard it is to make even virtual money right now, only 5 players made money over the 6 weeks and the results ranged from +37% to -55%! 

To round out a story on our Trinity term electives from my previous blog:  I got all 6.  It’s not that easy to decide how much to bid, so for anyone who is reading this next year, I bid:  Private Equity (35, full), Corporate Valuation (26, full), M&A + Restructuring (28, full), Real Estate (15), Managing High Growth Companies (14), Taxation & Business Strategy (2).

Interestingly, there are no exams for my chosen electives, which makes the in-term assignments even more important to the overall mark.  Because of this, and despite the group arrangements not yet being announced, people are keen and have been sorting out attractive groups well in advance.  When your marks (and sanity and enjoyment) depend on who you work with this is fairly rational, but it does mean you don’t get to work with new people very often and might end up in groups with the same people across several courses.

I saw a comment on the blog last time about the admission process.  There is quite a lot of info in the brochure plus you can ask questions on the facebook group, or ask one of the bloggers here, or call up the admissions team.  No doubt they’re flat out right now, but they were really helpful when I was applying.

Also, since I’m on the subject of admissions now, if I was going through the process again, I would aim for the earliest round I could, be really clear about why I wanted to spend time and money on an MBA, and I wouldn’t get concerned with data or comments you see on blogs/forums on how hard it is to get in, or whether there are percentage differences in success rates, or whether interviewees have a certain %age likelihood of being admitted etc.  Being a data-hungry kind of person, I admit I didn’t follow this bit of advice, but frankly knowing it doesn’t help.  All good programs are selective and the rational strategy is to prepare the best application you can, so it is just something you have to live with.

If Week 0 was fast, week 1 has been an absolute blur!! I had signed up for the Peer support program — a student welfare initiative introduced at the Said Business School last year. All this week I was attending the training sessions for the same which were from 9-5 Monday thru Friday pretty much. As the name suggests, the programme is designed to train a group of students in basic listening skills so that they can provide support to those of their peers experiencing difficulties. It is a great platform to meet and bond with a small group of people (fellow peer supporters) and go through some interesting interpersonal and listening exercises. But as the training schedule suggests, it is a weeklong commitment and hence advisable only for those who get to oxford early enough or can work within the framework of the commitment. I had the opportunity of being part of a fantastic diverse group and that has made it a super experience.

Also this week there were a few career events. First up was my CV review session with a sector consultant for Finance. As was expected and was the aim of the exercise, I was advised a boatload of helpful changes that I needed to make for my resume. These changes had to do with my experience in the finance sector being minimal to the fact the each demographic usually requires a slightly different CV format and I had to tune mine to UK format. I also had lunch with Alasdair Bell, President of Oxford Entrepreneurs Society, a student run society. Alasdair came across as exceptionally bright young Oxonian and I look forward to being involved with the society in some capacity in near future.

Then there were a few guest speaker/seminar sessions. The first was from Morgan Stanley group with a few analysts and associates sharing their experiences and insights with regard a career in Investment Banking. I thought it was an extremely informative session. Later in the week was a talk by George David, Chairman and CEO of United Technologies Corporation. This was a great talk by a great individual — very insightful, crisp and authoritatively delivered — in short very American! He also raised an interesting debate with his comments over the Indian and Chineese markets by not mincing words in suggesting that he believed the Indian market and economy was going nowhere unless there was some consistency with their foreign policies. I as a few others though begged to differ on this count.

We also had a few introductory workshops. One each on finance and consulting. They again were insightful and it was enlightening to see the different demeanour, tone and effect of a finance person from that of a consultant. The finance sector consultant team were very aggressive in their presentation and making the point that the profession is not for the faint hearted and requires you to be very much on the top of the game. Though I feel their hostile style might have scared away a few fence sitters considering finance (me being one of them), I feel they provided an honest picture of things as they are. The consultant sector group had a more open and friendlier feel to their pitch. Also the fact that the consultancy companies shall come for placement in the next semester as opposed to finance whose placements will be done by November, meant that there was some more breathing space.

Lastly not to miss out on the fun, there were some great parties. The Said business school had arranged for ‘Oxford Pursuit’ — a hunt via clues of the oxford city in groups of 5 which were randomly selected. I had a great time. I got one person on our group I knew from peer support and 3 new people I met. It was lot of fun though we didn’t fare as well . Following the pursuit, we had the informal meet and greet party at the ‘Oxford Retreat’ — a great pub right by the Hythe Bridge — literally a few feet away from SBS. Me along with 3 other friends had been arranging for this get together earlier this week and had got a great deal on drinks and reserved area for the 220 SBS students. IT was a fun fun night!! Had a great turnout, the place was awesome with outside and inside areas and I hope all there had a good time. Special thanks to Vebster and people at the Oxford Retreat!

This afternoon we had the Oxford Reception — a formal lunch with all SBS students and their families arranged by the Business School. I just came back from a friend’s place where we had a dinner for 7-8 of us. It was a perfect end to a long day. No networking, just relaxing, great food and casual banter. Just loved it!! Thanks to Pushpak and Alka (the hosts) for the same. I am already beginning to feel the pinch of 16 hour days with work, networking and partying!! And classes haven’t even started yet.

Overall an unbelievable week. But one thing that stands out is the unbelievable diverse set of people I am going to share this year with. Americans, Indians, Canadians, South Africans, Spanish, Norwegian, Danish, British…..the list is endless with regards the different nationalities I met who are going to be with me for the course. Even more diverse were their back grounds with doctors, army men, civil engineers, IT professionals, non-profit and a lot more. Add to that the overall diverse culture and ambience of the world’s oldest and most premier Umbrella University — Oxford and that makes it an invaluable experience.

Coming week is gonna be crazier — its the induction week so there are going to be lot of college events (Christchurch events as that is my college), fresher’s fair, formal introductions at Said, more peer support training and definitely more partying! Hold on…here we go!!!

 Here’s what Wikipedia says about NC:

Negative capability is a theory of the poet John Keats, expressed in his letter to George and Thomas Keats dated Sunday, 21 December 1817.

I had not a dispute but a disquisition with Dilke, on various subjects; several things dovetailed in my mind, & at once it struck me, what quality went to form a Man of Achievement especially in literature & which Shakespeare possessed so enormously – I mean Negative Capability, that is when man is capable of being in uncertainties, Mysteries, doubts without any irritable reaching after fact & reason.

There fact is that with major challenges like climate change and religious conflict, the idea of a direct, easy solution is ridiculous. 

This year’s capstone focused on climate change. In groups of ten, we picked a client company and designed scenarios in which the client would have to prepare for a situation where they would be most uncomfortable and least prepared. My team’s client was a large oil company, based out of Tejas. The James Martin Institute invited numerous panelists ranging the US chief negociator for the Kyoto Protocol to major investors in solar power. On the final day, my team and I were grilled by a panel of experts regarding our scenarios.

While capstone went on, a number of classmates and I were still shuttling around finishing up job interviews. I finalized my own plans to work for an investment fund in Dubai until end of December. After that time, if the company and I like each other, I might stay on. Otherwise, I have a few other “fish in the fryer” including a speaking circuit in Shanghai. Improving Mandarin has many obvious benefits, but what I’d most look forward to is having deeper and more meaningful conversations with my parents.

Looking back, in order for us to finish all of our work on time, we had to do something that was unexpectedly very, very difficult for me. We had to 100% trust each other to cover our respective sections. There were parts in my section that my teammate had not seen before the final presentation and vice versa.

Now, don’t misunderstand. I’m not a controlling person or somebody who likes to be involved in every little detail. But, what I’d become accustomed to in the classroom was the ability to read all parts to any group paper we handed in for grading. There was always time to object to a sentence here or a graph there.

But this summer, given that each part of our final report was so new that there was no time-efficient way for each of us to become mini-experts on all areas, we had to trust each other to do our best and “deliver” on the final day.  

So why did I find letting go to be challenging? Shouldn’t I have been excited to do less work? Wouldn’t anyone have wanted to pass off the responsibility to draw solid conclusions about very unknown topics? Especially since I’ve never been a brainy-act, this prospect should have left me whooping for joy.

After thinking for a while, I think that I was uncomfortable because I’ve never been in a pressure situation when it’s been okay to pass off responsibility. It has usually been just the opposite. Usually when something of value is at stake, I’ve been asked to take on as much as possible.

Besides learning about hedge funds and renewable sources of energy, I learned about the trust necessary for smart people to handle tough problems in a time crunch. It’s not like natinal presidents know more than his or her cabinet members do (although it helps to know the basics), instead s/he selects advisors wisely, then trusts them to do their jobs.   

 Yesterday evening our supervisors took us out to a relaxed, multi-lingual, white table cloth restaurant in Chelsea called Chutney Mary. The eight of us went around the table describing what our dreams in life are or have been. I was moved by how honest and personal we all were. Our discussions were healing and our ideas were soulful. That dinner is one that I’ll compare all other dinners to.  My SCP team and I didn’t anticipate having such an intimate experience with our summer employers, and now, more than ever, we feel the fates are on our side, helping us to meet incredible minds and big hearts.  

Things that didn’t seem to matter to me before (like the prospect of eating cookies at 3 pm) now seem somewhat privileged and different. While things that previously impressed me (like unlimited laser printing and handfuls of nice pens) don’t excite me as much anymore.

Where I am still ill-adjusted is the degree of debate entitled to employees in my position. While at school, when arguments arose during group meetings, winning the dispute wasn’t the primary objective of classmates. Instead, what mattered most was that we worked in harmony and turned in a finished work product with passing marks. Comparatively, in this job, a passing mark is not the target at all. Here, we have specific definitions for successful goal achievement. And therefore, when disagreements arise, we must not quickly reach to put on our diplomatic peacemaker hats. Instead, to best serve the company, we actually need to hold our ground even if the discussion gets heated (but not over-heated–ow!) Allowing our classmates-now-turned-colleagues to find holes to poke in our seemingly water-tight arguments is the only way to best seek an optimal solution for our company. We need to push our concerns forward lest the project suffer as a consequence of our desire for non-confrontation.

Transitioning from being more agreeable than not, to being more critical than not, is absolutely necessary for the nature of our work in futuristic investments in the environment. Because no one has really “been here before” as investors, we as a team are strongest when we challenge each others’ thinking. I suppose in other organizations and situations, team accord might override sound objection. One example might be when executing an order for the military. But here, to “win” together, we must not always “think” together. Just another observation

Our project – reviewing the value proposition of one line of products – is one with both tremendous depth and considerable width, and so the first week was mainly taken up in forming a realistic scope with which we could direct our line of attack. We have so far had two reviews with our sponsor, who seems to be happy with what we have achieved/the direction that we are going in, and been introduced to both the Managing Director and several members of the executive committee who all seem to have a real interest. It seems that this project is really high profile and I am led to believe that real decisions will be based on our results. As proof of their intent, and in addition to the office based work, two members of our team (there are four in total) will travel to
India next week to visit customers so as to understand exactly what they require from the company offering. DTC are certainly ensuring that there are no barriers to us collecting really robust data with which to make our recommendations.

From a ‘non-work’ point of view, our apartments are quite luxurious and perfectly placed for exploring London (being located in the centre of Marylebone). We have more restaurants within walking distance than we realistically can visit in the time allocated and can walk as easily to Oxford Street as we can to Regents Park. In the evenings I am even managing to either get to the gym or, when the weather is nice, take a run around the park. This is certainly very different to the ‘MBA hours’ that I was pulling less than a month ago.

Every Tuesday all the MBAs that are in London for the summer meet up for dinner. Last week was Italian, this week Sushi. It’s great to hear how everyone is doing/adjusting to working life. Seeing as there are about 20 of us here, it makes for a nice evening.

So that is it so far for the SCP. I am really enjoying the DTC and remember now why I love London so much.