Block 1 Wrap Up : Courses

Block 1 had three courses:

International Management (IM): This course was interesting for me as:

  1. it talked about topics like the geographic orientation of the management style of organizations, for instance, whether they were ethnocentric (controlled by the parent office in home country), regio-centric, polycentric … etc somethings we usually know but at times fail to notice
  2. Cross Cultural sensitivity: specific interest to me was the hofstede's cultural dimension index (http://www.geert-hofstede.com/geert_hofstede_resources.shtml) that measures various (often perceived) intangible measures of cultural distinctions between people belonging to different countries and regions, and its corresponding influence on the workplace.
  3. Organizations structures: most interesting for me here was the matrix structure and its effects in the workplace with regards to power influence and politics within the organization
  4. Cross cultural game/exercise where we were split into three distinct teams with weird names and were given specific characteristics that we had to exhibit in our behavior, for example one group was instructed to maintain safe distance from others, while another was asked to hug! We were not supposed to tell the other groups what our characteristics were.. On the face of it , this exercise appeared futile, but when enacted, it gave a very clear picture about how cultural differences lead us to form dislikes and distrust towards other cultures and how best should we approach people of other cultural backgrounds.
  5. ABN AMRO takeover case study , which was current and undecided at the time we took it.
  6. This was also the course with 3 industry experts to speak on IM topics (see my previous post)
  7. We had to take a test, write a research paper, analyze a company and give a presentations + paper on it!!! Phew loads and loads of work.

Prof Ruigrok is a charming person with an ever-smiling face and tries to incorporate our needs into his teaching (the ABN AMRO case for e.g.). some students however felt that IM as a subject did not add too much value for them, but others like me felt we had benefitted.. now how big the delta benefit was .. well it depends!

Finance I: Here we learnt about the basics of finance, things like book keeping (accounting), inventories, profitability, cash flows etc etc.. most importantly concepts of management accounting and financial accounting were explained, with a greater emphasis on managerial accounting (that's what future CEOs like us would have to do right!!).

What I liked was that the prof (Fleming Ruud) approached the subject from a CEO's point of view.. so we didn't kill time trying to balance the balance sheets and stuff..and neither did we try doing each and every numerical problem, but focused on concepts and how they can be applied to financial reporting and the implications of various alternative approaches on the balance sheet… don't get me wrong .. solving numerical is important but perhaps from a CPA's point of view..and on a time efficient MBA.. it made more sense to set priorities right!

From a CEO's perspective one needs to know about the accounting heads, accounting systems (IFRS/ US GAAP) , inventory, financial reporting, etc . We worked extensively with the Novartis Annual report and analysed various concepts we studied wrt the Novartis balance sheet, although financial statements of other companies were also analysed. We also did a group presentation assignment of analyzing the fine print of Novartis annual report and all of us came up with very interesting findings.

The exam too was equally good (not because it was open book) because it asked questions that made us apply the concepts we learnt to analyze the scenarios presented and prescribe how we would go about with our evaluation of the state of financial health of a corporation

This was perhaps the best course of the block 1 !!

Marketing:

Taught to us by two different professors (professors Marcus Schoegel and Andreas Herrman) we learnt the STP (segmenting targeting and positioning) concepts besides a host of other key issues in marketing.

Prof Schoegel is a high energy guy with an animated course delivery i.e. variations in voice , tone and expression and cool quips.. makes u laugh a lot…a really good thing, because marketing tends to get abstract. However, I really appreciated the two lectures of Prof Herrman who evaluated the quantitave sides of marketing of how customer behavior could be analyzed and tweaked to favor certain products, and how this knowledge can be used in pricing strategies to derive maximum profit for corporations.

We also did a group case study evaluating various strategies for BMW group going forward and gave a presentation (that was hotly contested and questioned). Some of the topics covered were : Web 2.0, expanding target base, targeting silver generation, innovative pricing options etc.

While the course was good.. being abstract it really didn't empower me as a CEO to evaluate how I could exercise control over the marketing aspects, i.e. how do I know how much to invest in mktg, how to evaluate how effective the marketing campaigns are and how to correlate mktg expenses with sales growth especially in the age of multi content marketing (online, print, TV, etc) . But as they say mktg and consumer behavior is too abstract to have straight answers.

In case you want me to write about anything in particular pls leave me your comment, and i'll write a post about it!

There's more coming soon.. stay tuned!!!

 

Block 1 Wrap up: Company events

Hi folks!



First and foremost I humbly apologize for not posting earlier.. the last two weeks had been very testing.. with so many evaluations and events to juggle!



But then .. there was light at the end of the tunnel.. the 1st teaching block came to an end on Oct 12. (yeah I know that was a week ago.. but I've had a break and really wanted to chill out!!.. sorry guys I'm human (oops a tiny li'll mouse ) after all!!



Ok lemme start this wrap up by listing out the key company events:

  1. SWX: Chairman Swiss Stock exchange (SWX) Dr. Peter Gomez, (also Dean of the Executive School (ES-HSG)) spoke to us in a day long session about
    • St. Gallen management model,
    • merger of SWX Group, SIS Group and Telekurs Group: challenges, methodology, and future pathways
    • Mergers of Stock exchanges: pros and cons
  2. Novartis Workshop for their Finance Development program. See my previous post (http://mba-hsg.blogspot.com/2007/09/novartis-presentation.html)
  3. Lhoist lecture: Sr. VP, HR of Lhoist (http://www.lhoist.com/) came as a guest faculty as part of the international management course (Prof Winfied Ruigrok) and spoke of managing multicultural and globally dispersed workforces, family enterprises (Lhoist is a niche family enterprises) and attracting talent to "non-sexy" (I banking/ MC/Fortune 100) companies like his. He was earlier no. 2 man in Hilti HR division.
  4. Roland Berger Case Study Workshop


  5. Investment Banking Days (IBD), with nearly two dozen investment banks on campus with workshops/ interviews (see previous post http://mba-hsg.blogspot.com/2007/10/investment-banking-days.html). I would like to add here that BCG and Mckinsey who were not original part of the IBD also later queued up to woo candidates and had 1-2 hour sessions in the 2nd week of IBD late in the evenings (since all IBD slots were already full)!
  6. CapGemini Lecture on Outsourcing: Again a guest lecture during the Intl mgmt course (Prof Winfied Ruigrok) for a corporate Rep on outsourcing: motives, methodology and repurcussions
  7. Credit Suisse Workshop: Again as a part of the Intl mgmt course (Prof Winfied Ruigrok)

    Not bad for a short 5 week 1st teaching block! What say?

 

Investment Banking days

Category: , , By Stuart

The Investment Banking Days (IBD) is an annual event at HSG. In this 2-week long event (October 1 – October 12’07), various investment banks come to campus and conduct workshops and interviews for prospective interns and full time positions for the following year.

(
http://www.investmentbankingdays.com/)

This event is NOT exclusive to the MBAs but is more for the Bachelor’s , masters and PhD students of St Gallen. While we MBA students were invited to the workshops, only few interviews were offered primarily because the Investment Banking in Switzerland is a small market for experienced hires like MBAs. Fresh graduates and less experienced people are preferred because they can start from scratch as analysts.

MBAs on the other hand, are advised to apply at the London Office as the Big Ben is a bigger financial hub. However, my friends were also able to obtain individual contacts, dinner invitations and recommendations from I-bank representatives, who they had impressed during the workshops… so these are leads you could convert..

The MBA office also held an MBA only Apero with these bank reps for better access to the banks..

So u see.. it depends on ur skills and abilities.. one more thing, I banks prefer people from quantitative backgrounds (Economics, Mathematics, Commerce.. etc) and also professionals with prior Finance /I banking experience.

This year the following I-banks have come to campus.. JP Morgan, Goldman Sachs, Credit Suisse, UBS, Morgan Stanley, Deutsche Bank, Bank of America, Barclays Capital, Citi, HSBC, Dresdner Kleinwort, Pricoa Capital, Sal Oppenheim, Royal Bank of Scotland, Lehman Brothers, Société Générale, Exane, PW Partners, Bank am Bellevue & Rothschild.

The workshops are usually about current issues.. here’s the list of the workshops:
MSREF - Private Equity Acquisition Process -Morgan Stanley
M&A - Defence Strategies in a Competitive Bid Situation -UBS AG
M&A Workshop -Lehman Brothers
Convertible Bonds - Financial analysis and workplan of a transaction -Barclays Capital
Different perspectives on an M&A target -Citi
Managing Credit Risk in volatile Markets -Goldman Sachs
Lunch & Learn: Corporate Finance in der Praxis -JP Morgan
Women's Round Table - Manage your career -JP Morgan
Grow or go? M&A issues for a global company -Rothschild GmbH
Cross-Border M&A, an example from the Healthcare Industry - Bank of America
Managing at the Top: Global Markets at Deutsche Bank -Deutsche Bank
Your step into the Financial World - M&A in Practise -Deutsche Bank
Stepping into the global footprints of HSBC with Investment and Private Banking -HSBC Bank plc
Investor Solutions Case Study -Dresdner Kleinwort
Independent Financial Advice -PW Partners
How to Sell Innovative Structured Products? -Société Générale

And each of these I banks are conducting interviews for short listed candidates… We also had a few fun events.. like Go-Karting (sal Oppenheim)…

The benefits of this event are very evident:
Banks get to know good candidates.. candidates learn about prospective I-Banking roles and the university leverages its popularity in a win-win manner. I spoke to these bank reps about St Gallen.. and they unanimously said that they love St Gallen.. and that’s why they come here every year in droves!!

 

MBA reality check

By Stuart

Reality check? Isn't it too soon to do one? After all I got here just 4 weeks ago???

Well the point I'm trying to make is that as prospective MBA students, we feel think that MBA is hard work and lot of fun.. the reality is that MBA is a great deal more intense than "hard work" ..and a little less than anticipated fun ;) this is especially true in the One year MBA format (like the one at St Gallen L

We've also had a couple of company events and since 1st October we have the investment banking days (IBD).. which calls for a separate post meanwhile just check (www.investmentbankingdays.com)

In the last three weeks alone, we've done :-

All Work

Finance: 20 + chapters of the really big fat finance book, group presentation and research paper on Novartis's annual report and share price performance.. and next week we have the big daddy of all finance test … huh!

International Management: 1 Research Paper, 1 test (don't even think of asking my grade!) 1 group simulation exercise (for which we won some good money!), case study in class about diversity and next week we have to submit a group presentation as well as a research paper.

Marketing: for three straight weeks we've worked on a group presentation on various strategies for BMW (our mktg prof consults for BMW)… in diverse areas like innovative pricing, Web 2.0 implementation, conquering new target groups etc.. and now we have another research paper to write…

And to add to all of this we have the huge course binders for each course that has just zillions of papers that we have to read (without having anytime to do so!!)

No Play???

It would be unfair to say that we didn't have fun..

We've already had three MBA parties (plus one more scheduled tomorrow) , besides over half a dozen aperos … besides some of us went to the Oktoberfest in Munich (beer.. beer… beer… beer…!!!!!)

The point is it gets very tough to do all of this within 24 hrs x 7 days no matter how smart u r!! so guys .. MBA is really hard work and really lotta fun…!!!

Cheers!!!