r u sure you want to buy 8 cans of Guiness?

"It's like making love in a canoe, too close to water."
This is how one of my classmates describes American beer.

So I am in Europe now. You would think I would get a GREAT selection of beer. Guess what, the Swiss aren't all about having different kinds of beer.

I haven't had that much beer since I got to Switzerland. And the beer I had was limited to the plain old lager, or the little bit of Guniness that costs 8 ($7) Swiss francs a pint. I want some ale, or some amber, something that you would enjoy coming out of a Swiss winter.

I decided that it was time to start consuming beer again. It's time to stock up on some beer at home. So I went down to a grocery store down the road. Mhhhhh. Not that many choices if you are looking for alternatives to lager. Not to mention expensive. A six pack of 12 ounces of ale costs 12 francs ($10). But there is was, my trusty Guiness, and it's on sale! At 24% off (yes, that is 24%, not 25%, ok? It's Swiss percision!), a pint still costs 3 francs. But hey, it's cheaper than having it at the bar, and it also means I can have it whenever I am at home!

There I was, with 8 cans of Guiness at the register. What do you know, the register rang it up wrong without the discount. Not only that, the chic was questioning my sanity at buying 8 cans of beer at 4 francs a piece (the dicount didn't come through). She said something like: "U know that it's 4 francs a can, not 4 francs for four cans?"

Certainly, I am not idiot. But how do I tell her that I am aware of thee PER CAN price, and am perfectly willing to pay for that beautiful Irish black gold even at 4 francs a pop. Well, when you can only use sign language you get creative. Wave your arms alot and be animated. You either scare the hell out of them or make them laugh.

Oh well. The bottom line is that I still managed to get the Guiness without a word of French (and only paying 3 francs a can)! Oh boy, do I enjoy it!

deux crossant

Exam week. The bad news is there is a 4 hour exam every afternoon. The good news is that we get the morning off to study everyday. Rolling out of bed this morning, remembering that I ran out of bread, I decided to run out to the corner bakery two minutes away. With a dash of rain, and my trusty Tevas, I got two crossants. And how? Easy.

The nice lady at the bakery doesn't speak a word of english, and my french stops at counting to four. Well, thank goodness, I don't really need to buy five of anything this year. Everytime I go, I use "un" plus the best prounciation I could muster of whatever the sign if front of the bread says. But, today, I was in a much better situation. I knew that "two" is "deux", and crossant is, well, crossant. That was easy. So, I proundly said, "deux crossant" (I don't know how to say "please") while holding up two fingers. Money and food exchange hands, trade completed.

On the way home, I smiled. Crossant in Europe taste just a little better than in the States, I was going to enjoy fresh crescent for the first time in Lausanne (I have class Saturday mornings, and bakeries don't open on Sundays). How nice. What make me laugh even more was, what would have happened if after I said "deux crossant" while holding up two fingers, she replies"how are you this morning?" I would probably be really dumbfounded, probably thinking that something went wrong with the crossants.

I guess it doesn't make a difference how many languages I speak, as long as french isn't one of them, I could be in deep trouble just buying "deux crossant".

so soon?

Two and half months and 5 kg of added fat later (that is almost 10 pounds!), it's final exams time. I hate tests. I am here to learn, not to be evaluated. (and I know how much, or how little I have learned)

We have had 8 subjects, and the exam will include only 5: finance, accounting, OB, marketing, and operations. I thought finance was going to be a bitch until the professor went over the past three years of exams. Just go over them and you will be alright. I think. Accounting, another matter. As someone with an enginneering background, you would think I am good with numbers. Well, I have no idea what is going on in that class. I am not passionate about, I don't care about it, I will never be an accountant. Of course, if I need it, I will find someone whom I can trust, but that is the extend of it.

The rest, I will probably just bullshit my way through it. Wish me luck.

what's on your mind?

Our operations class is taught by various professors based on their areas of expertise. Of the 4 or 5 professors that have taught, Corey Billington was one that proved to be popular with most students. Corey came from HP, where he ran the supply chain, then purchasing. What makes his lectures special are not limited to his extensive knoelwedge of purchasing or supply chain, but the practical management experience he brings to the table.

For those of us with some people management experience, and those who are going to manage teams, the management tools or advice he offers, are applicable immediately. You know, MBAs prefer practical stuff over things like WACC calculation or absorbtion accounting.

The topic discussed yesterday was on layoff skills. Well, a pretty passionate dicussion, as you can imagine. Some of us have been through it (including myself), and have seen plenty of bad examles! So, here is what Crey has to offer. Prepare, prepare, prepare! So when the time comes, you just execute the plan. The moment you know that it might be coming, take your staff aside, and ask them, in a private setting, would you have a preference. Some people might just tell you that they would prefer to take the package. It's better than not asking, and have someone be unhappy, because he/she wanted the package but did not get laid-off, while the person who got laid-off is also upset because he/she didn't want to leave.

If course, there's more complexity (that is why you go get an MBA to get a full explaination). For example, someone asked: "Would you really want to tell your boss your mind is somewhere else?" The answer: "come on, the average adult thinks about sex 6 times a minute, do you really thinkg your mind is at work?" The witty comments make his lecture just so much more enjoyable!

Chinese "commerads" in class

Those of you who know me know that I am still pretty black and white in my political opinions. The operations case today discussed a company's decision to go to China, among the prime reasons, is that most of its clients are in Taiwan, and they wanted to serve their customer better by producing the machine closer to the customers.

So, I asked an obvious question. If they want to be close to their customers, why don't they manufacture their machines in Taiwan? I guess what most people don't know is that direct trade is not allowed between China and Taiwan, and everything must be shipped first to a third country before it arrives at the shore of taiwan.

The professor answered by saying Taiwan is pretty expensive comparing to China. Before he could finish his answer, one of the Chinese classmates in class yelled out loud: "Taiwan is a part of China." Much to my surprise, most of the class boo'ed him out. I almost wanted to say: "well, the fact that he has to make this statement probably suggests the truth is otherwise." But I didn't. I didn't want to make a scene in class. Knowing the Chinese, they will probably never stop arguing. It just wasn't the right forum (although past experiences have proven that they will argue the point in any forum).

What is it with these people? Why is everything political to them?

BTW, my name tag in class says "American".

(Oh, if you want to know, in the case, the company eventually decided to outsource to contract manufactures in China, then ship the parts to Taiwan, and had the machines assembled there.)

Copyright

Again, we had a case about China. This time, it was about a manufacturing company in europe sourcing assembled parts from China. One of it's fears is the chinese habit to copy everything they can get their hands on. The classic total ignorance of stealing someone else's intellectual property "with pride" as they would put it.

The prof made a comment, quoting an executive whose company's product was copied: "for them, the definition of copyright is the right to copy."

I guess that is another definition for copright, as to Free Software Foundation's CopyLeft concept.

pick your future world leader

Here is an interesting exercise we did in one class. After reading the description of three distinctive leaders below, we were asked to vote for one as the best fit for a world leader. (Since the ones now aren't all that great)

Candidate A: associates with crooked politians and consults with astrologers. He's had two mistresses. He chain smokes, and drinks 8-10 martinis a day.

Candidate B: was kicked out of college twice, used opium as an undergraduate, now sleeps until noon and drinks a quart of whisky every evening.

Candidate C: is a decorated was hero. He is a vegetarian, doesn't smoke, drinks only an occasional beer and hasn't had any extramarital affairs.

So, what's your pick?

If you know me, what do you think I picked?





Here is who the candidates are:
A: Roosevelt
B: Churchill
C: Hitler


So, what's the point?
Perception counts!

Conjugal visits, revisited

Well, maybe I spoke too soon on how wonderful and how much people look forward to conjugal visits. One of the visits from this weekend resulted in some pretty serious heartbreak. Come to find out, two relationships have already been broken since school started less than two months ago. One of them was a 10 year relationship (not mine). I guess they weren't kidding when they told us that IMD does lead to some life changing events!

I must confess that my girl friend of 10 years and I did break up last August, and it was mutually agreed upon (can you use "amicable" if you were not married?). She was starting her MBA program at London Business School, and I was coming to IMD. But there were reasons other than just our MBA programs.

Not to blow my own horn, but based on my own experience, I did tell Charlie (someone from my study group) two weeks ago, that if a relationship has gone on for ten years, and it hasn't led to marriage, chances are something is seriously wrong. I predicted that the person with the 10 year relationship in my class was going to end her relationship sooner or later. What do you know.

Conjugal visits

So, here is how it works at IMD. About a third to a half of us are married or the significant other is here. For the rest of us, me included, well, are here by ourselves. This however, doesn't mean that we have no "significant" other. (Unlike most MBAs in other schools, the average age here is 31.5, so most of us have pretty steady relationships)

We are here from 8am to 5:30pm everyday. After 5:30, most study groups meet after a quick dinner. My group typicall meets at 7:30 and we can go until 1, 2 or 3am. Even on Saturdays, we have class in the morning, and the afternoon are often reserved for project work. For example, we have class scheduled until 5pm this Saturday. As you can see in some of my previous blog entries, this becomes frustrating after a while. I am either here at IMD, or in my apartment. We are pretty much locked in at IMD when we are not taking a shower or sleeping.

So, here is how I call the visits by "significant others": conjugal visits. It's a free pass, or almost. The group becomes a lot more understanding if you show up late, or sometimes not show up at all. Hey, after all, we don't get a lot of conjugal visits. The 90 MBAs this year represent 45 countries. This means most us travel pretty far to get here. This week, a girl from Brazil is visiting someone from my team, and another is visiting from Spain before moving to New Zealand.

So, a lot of action from members of my team this week. (My time will come.......)

inspirational leader?

While reading a case on Ogilvy & Mather for the OB class (they call it Leading People in Organizations at IMD), I came acrss this line:

"Graham Phillips....... was appinted Roman's successor...........But few would describe him as an inspirational leader."

Well. That is an interesting point. I started asking myself, am I, or will I ever be aninspirational leader? Well, certainly, I can't, and don't claim to be an inspirational leader right now. Ask the guys that were on my team in Cendant. I think I am FAR from being an "inspirational leader."

But what made me think was, what IS an inspirational leader? How do you be an inspirational leader? How do you inspire others? I must say that personally, I have met very few inspirational leaders. To name a few that I know? Well, maybe Armin, my high school principle. How about someone else? I can't come up with one right now? Have you ever wondered? Do you know anyone personally who is an inspirational leader? Or is it just one of those story book concepts that seldom exist in real life, the Gandhi types? I don't know. I have been inspired by a few people in my life, but I can't remember who they were. But I am sure they have made an impact on me.

So, if you know how to become an inspirational leader, would you at least post a comment here or just email me? I am sure all the MBAs here at IMD would appreciate it!

Ralf Boscheck

(written way back in Febuary, but never finished it until today)
Ok, you have heard me rave about this guy for way too long. Here he is. http://www01.imd.ch/faculty/vitae/index.cfm?id=127
Don't freak out. He doesn't look like this any more. Not sure why they don't update pictures. Today was his last session with us. He gave us one of his two "quizes". It was, as usual, true or false. I get a feeling that he isn't all too crazy about the idea of exams. (The MBA program director commeneted to me at the beginning of the program that they are trying to have a few more tests during the program this year) Maybe Ralf is just going with policy. Anyway, like I have said, he is pretty damn good. Just like a classmate said, the stuff that Ralf teaches is not really going to be used in our jobs in the future, but it is great as personal development. I agree 100%.

He offered some advice. It wasn't the classic kind of advice that just makes me yawn. He told us a story about his first year here. One of the professors told him that before long, he would lose sight of how quickly time passes, and warned him to treasure his time at IMD. His advice was around how we should learn about life during the year we are spending here, and not just about academics.

It moved us, and the applause didn't stop until Ralf exited the auditorium. I think most of us identified with what he said. In addition, it wasn't some arcane advice on economics. Most of us took a year off because we have reached a point in our lives where we just need to figure out what we want to do. I am no exception. I am spending all my time in class, and I am missing out on what I came here to do: think.

cabin fever

Urgh............
Cabin fever set in last weekend, and took a little bit to get out of it.
I have been in Lausanne for a month and a half. I have only been to center of town once, and it was in a bloody hurry to get some basic supplies at the Coop. I have spent all my time between my apartment, and IMD. Bloody hell. I have not even had the time to go see my god doughter in Basel.
Last Saturday , I spent the night talking to my friends state side. A big thanks goes out to Banjot and Mark. I felt much better after talking to them. Of course, YiChun had the best stuff to cheer me up with.

Got a little sick on Wednesday. I think I just didn't have enough sleep. I actually felt like puking in the morning. I guess my body isn't built to only take on 6 hours or less of rest every night.

8 hours of lecture is just too much if you really listen to great professors like Ralf Boschek. They just have so much to offer. Sitting through one of his 4 hour lectures just takes everything out of you.

Then the unthinkable happened. It was the first time I missed Philly. I listened to WHYY, Philly's NPR station. It was just like I was back in my car, driving back home after class at Wharton, listening to the news, the traffic. Traffic jam from aouth to Girard ave on 95. I felt so home sick. I miss going to PJ's with the guys after work (or during our one on ones). I miss our bartender who always knew what I wanted. I miss going out, I miss the restaurant scene. The guys, and the house, really made me feel like Philly was home. After all these years, living in boarding school in Switzerland, college in PA, then job in Charlott, NJ, moving to NJ. I finally found "home" after I bought the house and made friends with the folks at Cendant.

I miss everyone, everything in Philly. I really hope this year at IMD is going to be worth my while.

Evian and beyond

I miss the Ecole.

It was nice and cold this morning. YiChun made the effort, as she does everyday, to wake me up. Except she called from a plane today. She was heading down to KaoShung for a wedding.

I took the longer path to school to enjoy the view more. I left the house 5 minutes earlier than I normally would. The sky was clear toward the lake, and you could see Evian from this side. The Alps showed up as well. It was beautiful.

It reminded me of the Ecole. I miss the Ecole. All in a sudden, I had the urge to go and visit Armin and Natalie. I just wanted to give up a whole weekend's work and go up to the mountains to decompress. Go skiing. I am in Switzerland, and haven't gone skiing once. I need to get out of this town and just regain some perspective.

I t was a beautiful morning. The first morning I enjoyed taking the walk to school.

I actually enjoy econ?

Well, isn't this amazing?
I hated econ in college. You call that science? Physics predicts that the apple will alwys fall from the tree, you can try this again and again, the apple will fall, and always downward too! Econ? You can't tell me what will happen with, say the S. African rand tomorrow. Or, so I thought.

Ralf Boschek. What a guy! You have to give him credit for getting me not just interested in econ, but excited. It's one of the classes I actually get exicted about. I will have to admit, that it is hard to concentrate at times, but given the circumstances, and I sure you can understand. We have two 4 hour sessions everyday. Sometimes, we have Ralf the whole day. I think once or twice, we had him three sessions in a row in two consecutive days.

Maybe because most MBA types think alike. I talked to a few people, we all like macro better. Maybe we all like to look at the big picture better?

See the picture. This is from today's session on macro. Pretty cool. This guy fills up 7 boards in 4 hours.

interesting exercise

Did this in class. I thought it was an interesting exercise to do with someone you know well. Brings up a lot of questions and things to discuss. It reveals a lot about our values, etc. "Why did you rank it that way?" is the question you should be asking the other person.

As he left for a visit to his outlying districts, the jealous baron warned his pretty wife: "Do not leave the castle while 1 am gone, or 1 will pun­ish you severely when 1 return!"

But as the hours passed, the young baroness grew lonely, and de­spite her husband's warning, decided to visit her lover, who lived in the countryside nearby.

The castle was located on an island in a wide, fast‑flowing river, with a drawbridge linking the island and the land at the narrowest point in the river.

"Surely my husband will not return before dawn," she thought, and she ordered her servants to lower the drawbridge and leave it down until she returned.

After spending several pleasant hours with her lover, the baroness returned to the drawbridge, only to find it blocked by a madman wildly waving a long, cruel knife. "Do not attempt to cross this bridge, baroness, or 1 will kill you," he raved.

Fearing for her life, the baroness returned to her lover and asked him to help.

"Our relationship is only a romantic one," he said. "1 will not help. "

The baroness then sought out a boatman on the river, explained her plight to him, and asked him to take her across the river in his boat.

"1 will do it, but only if you can pay my fee of five marks. "

"But 1 have no money with me!" the baroness protested.

"That is too bad. No money, no ride," the boatman said flatly.

Her fears growing, the baroness ran crying to the home of a friend, and after again explaining the situation, she begged for enough money to pay the boatman his fee.

"If you had not disobeyed your husband, this would not have hap­pened, " the friend said. "1 will give you no money. "

With dawn approaching, and her last resource exhausted, the baroness returned to the bridge in desperation, attempted to cross to the castle, and was slain by the madman.

Directions: In the preceding story there are six characters. They are (in alphabetical order):

the baron
the friend
the baroness
the lover
the boatman
the madman

Using the list above, rank each character according to how responsible he or she was for the baroness's death. Rank the characters from 1 to 6, with 1 being the most responsible and 6 being the least responsible.

I went over the exercise with someone I hold very dear to my heart. The interesting thing is that she and I had the total opposite ranking for the first and last spot. Very thought provoking.

Given that this exercise was given in a business school setting, we also discussed how some people ranked the boatman and how it related to people's lack of confidence of business people's ethics and morals.

what happens when you are on 5 hours of sleep everyday

差點把自己活活氣死

It's been a long day. I had class until 7pm and didn't get home until about
7:30.
I had lunch @ noon.

I thought to myself. Well, I had some stirred fried broccoli and beef
leftover from the weekend in a bowl in the fridge. I wondered how much of
it was left, so I went to check it. The bowl was filled to the top. "Oh
perfect," I thought to myself. All I have to do is make some rice in the
rice cooker, when it's ready, I can just heat up the broccoli and beef in
the microwave, and voila, DINNER!

So I threw the rice in the rice cooker, then went on to wash dishes from the
last three days. (yes, it was three days. I am a bachelor, and I live
alone, and it wasn't that much)

Done with the dishes, heat up the food in the microwave. Oh, the rice isn't
quite ready yet. Pretty hungry, so I fished out a piece of beef and chucked
it in my mouth. Oh, oh. Why is there a bit of white stuff under the
broccoli? A pair of chopsticks and two seconds of fumbling led to a
discovery. I must have had half a bowl of leftover rice along with the
broccoli. Damn. Don't have enough food. Oh shit.

Recovery strategy: make some soup, have it with bread, and salad. Sia
survives!

This is what happens when you attend an one year MBA. Your are in class 8
hours a day on less than 6 hours of sleep. Your brain starts to delete
things out involuntarily. Always have a business continuity plan, I mean,
meal continuity plan.

another personality test

We must have taken a dozen career orientation test, personality test, and what-kind-of-manager-r-u tests. Sure, Myers-Briggs tells me whether I an an extrovert or an introvert, but none have been as revealing as this test you are about to see. Take a look at the four objects above, and pick one. There is a square, a triangle, a "Z" and a circle.


Now I am going to tell you what type of person you are. Keep in mind that I was only able to write down some of the descriptions of the traits, so I don't have everything in here. Nor do I know if this is at all scientific. It's fun anyway.

If you picked the triangle, you are an organized individual. You tend to enjoin things to be neat, tidy.

If you picked the square, you are a very fare person. You are also a very good listener, and someone who people seek advice from..

If you picked the "Z" figure, you have picked the shape that is different from the rest.
congratulations, you are a natural leader.

The last but not least, the circle. The prof counted the number of people who raised their hand for the circle. breathed a sigh of relief and said, well, at least you are still somewhat of a majority. Indeed, about half of the people raised their hands in the classroom. What does this mean? If you picked this, you love sex and alcohol.

Guess which one I picked?

win-win

Definition of a "win-win" situation from our operations professor:
"You punch the same guy twice." You win twice.

(the guy wears pretty tight fitting pants from Zara)
P.S. Zara was a great case study.

Photographic memory

I have never seen anyone with a photographic memory. We had a professor
this morning teaching us how to do presentations. One of his points was
that if you make your presentation interesting, people would remember a lot
more of it.

To demo the point, he asked a classmate to randomly come up with 20 things.
He wrote them down on a transparency as the items were read out. He then
turned off the projector and asked the class how many items people could
remember. I think some of us remembered 5, or 10 things.

He then turned on the projector so we could see the list. With his back
facing the projector (so he couldn't see the list), he read out items on the
list in sequence. Not one screw up! Then, he read it out backwards.
That's not it. He also listed five things and the associated positions they
were relating to others (like 5 is elephant, 10 is firehose.)

Incredible!
(I want to be on whatever he is on)

Funny conversation

In class today, we discussed wether there is a common ethical standards
across the globe. The conversation evolved to translating specific words
from english to your own language and come up with a motto, then translating
it back to english so you can share it with the class.

On the topic of generosity, someome from Argentina said:
"Someone who east and doesn't share, must have a frog in his stomich."

So, it's a pretty cool motto.
A classmate from Iceland said:
"Well, the french must love that"

Funny how mottos in one culture don't work in another.

Oh one more thing, German economists are pretty intense. In 4 hours, he
covered 4 big topics in micro economics.