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13 Feb 2014, 00:00
| FROM IMD Admissions Blog: Supply Chain Stories |
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Supply Chain Stories Today we had an entire day of our Operations and Supply Chain Management course, which is taught by Ralf Seifert and is part of our common core. What has been fascinating to me about the course thus far how supply chain decisions have huge impacts on all other aspects of a company, such as product development, customer service, organizational structure and even leadership. As usual, the learning didn’t stop at the doors of the classroom. In the afternoon our groups went through an online simulation where we were faced with various product development and supply chain decisions which would impact demand, sales, costs, service levels and profits. Also, during lunch I had the chance to meet with some IMD alumni and an executive from a nearby FMCG MNC and discuss sustainable supply chain management. This is an example of the learning experiences at IMD. Ashley Silver |
13 Feb 2014, 15:00
| FROM IMD Admissions Blog: 5 tips for the IMD assessment day |
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Over the last few days we’ve had a few prospective applicants visiting IMD, and sometimes even sitting in during our classes. Seeing them has really taken me back to this time last year, when I had submitted my application and was eagerly awaiting an invitation to assessment day. The assessment days for the class of 2015 will start taking place very soon, so I thought I would share 5 tips from my experience going through the process, I hope they will prove helpful! #1 – Get to know your fellow interviewees The people IMD attracts are truly fascinating – and because of the variety of profiles and nationalities, chances are none of your fellow candidates will really be your competitors. Take the opportunity to get to know them, and even meet before the big day if you can. Many (if not all) of them might end up being your classmates next year! #2 – Bring your partner to Lausanne with you if you can I am so thankful that my wife was able to come to Lausanne with me during assessment day. She was able to get a feel for our future home, and most importantly she saw firsthand what good fit IMD was for me. Going to business school was a big decision, and working through the whole process together made us feel very confident it was the right move not just for me, but for us both. #3 – Practice the impromptu presentation timing Speaking for five minutes can actually be tricky! It’s a long enough time that you have an opportunity to elaborate on your points, but also a short enough time that you can easily run out with a couples slides still to go. I found it helpful to do timed practice runs, so I could have a reasonable sense of how long to speak for on the big day. #4 – Don’t ignore the case study preparation, but don’t stress too much about it either I remember being quite apprehensive about the case study coming into assessment day. I spent quite a bit of time digging up data related to my topic, and exploring different outside sources. In the end it probably would have been sufficient to read the case a few times, come up with a list of the key themes, and be familiar with the exhibits and numbers/statistics to back up my points. #5 – Soak it all in Assessment day gives you a really good idea of what life as an IMD student is like. Take advantage of the opportunity to imagine yourself here, and ask plenty of questions. The whole process is still fresh in the current students’ minds so they will be more than happy to help you out. Best of luck! Marcelo |
15 Feb 2014, 06:00
| FROM IMD Admissions Blog: Valentine's Day with surprises |
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Yesterday during Valentine ’s Day we had some positive and negative surprises. The positive surprise was the Partner lunch, when our partners could join us to take a lunch in the IMD restaurant. That’s a great initiation that we can share the amazing restaurant experience with the partners as well time to time, and have a more relaxed atmosphere all around when they join us. During the afternoon we had a negative surprise with the first unexpected accounting quiz. Our Friday afternoon was covered fully by balance sheet, income and cash-flow statements, and Leif has explained the interrelations between them. The major trick was, that he also put into the story the seasonality, therefore it was not a simple issue especially for those, who are new in this area. After everybody agreed in the last coffee break, that it is good, that weekend is coming and we will have time to overview all the materials, he called us in the class and distributed our first quiz about the issues just learned. We were shocked, but more or less solved the questions. The second surprise came when we finished the repetitorium at eight and all the quizes were in our mailbox with the evaluation by Leif. For me the major learning point was, that we have to concentrate and run with full speed even on Friday afternoons, when we are really tired. After this long week we decided to enjoy also a little bit our life in Lausanne, so we went to have some beers and burgers, proving that the MBA life is not only about pressure and hard work, but sometimes you can have also some fun. Have a nice weekend! András |
16 Feb 2014, 14:00
| FROM IMD Admissions Blog: The Intimacy in a Class of 90 |
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The Intimacy in a Class of 90 One phrase you often hear out of IMD is that “you cannot mass produce leaders.” This is one of the reasons that IMD’s MBA only admits 90 students each year. Each day I see the value in being a member of a smaller class, both through our relationships with each other as students and through our relationships with the professors and staff of IMD. In fact, an effort is made to make sure we all work together and that the IMD team knows us as individuals. The result of this speaks to the superior tailored experience of IMD. The professors know the names and the backgrounds of each and every student, as do the rest of the staff. We also went through an exercise to learn the background and expertise of each other. Students do not just reach out to professors, but professors reach out to students to contribute to certain class presentations, to share ideas for further research based on class discussions and to build upon the knowledge base of IMD. The “close-knit” family feel of the program plays out in various ways. Open invitations to people’s homes for meals, sharing of notes and expertise on topics where one struggles and a very open candor with professors are all a result of the intimacy that comes with a class size of 90. Ashley Silver |
17 Feb 2014, 15:00
| FROM IMD Admissions Blog: Is it sustainable to be sustainable? |
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We had a very interesting class in Operations today. We discussed Unilever’s sustainability effort, where they made a commitment to source 100% of their Lipton tea from “Rainforest Alliance” certified suppliers. Reading the case I was taken aback by this initiative - it was a bold move for Unilever, a huge company and a huge brand. Best case scenario, the sustainable effort leads to better working conditions for tea farmers, a stronger brand and additional market share for Lipton - the old win-win. Worst case scenario, the new setup raises production costs for Lipton, but results in no additional value or market share, eating into margins and potentially resulting in damage to the brand’s reputation. High stakes! One thing that was fascinating about the discussions was that my classmates had some great insights and well formulated opinions on the best approach to implementing this initiative. What happens if the effort fails and Unilever don’t meet their goal? Should they have made such a big public commitment so early? Should they have waited, or been more cautious? We heard some sound arguments on both sides, including from a few classmates who have had direct experience either with Unilever, with sustainability initiative (or both!) At the end of today’s class I probably had more questions than answers. It is obvious sustainability is a growing concern in today’s globalized world and its importance cannot be understated. Businesses are increasingly engaging in social and environmental responsibility initiatives, and the growth of “eco-labels” shows the public is paying attention. However, there is still no easy way for a business like Unilever to implement large-scale initiatives – which can truly transform an industry – without undertaking major risk. In a way, it was a little frustrating to walk away from the classroom feeling like there were no definitive “right” answers. At the same time, I found it highly stimulating to put myself in the shoes of the Lipton executives, and think about the effect that businesses’ strategic choices may have on our planet in the future, for better or for worse. Marcelo |
18 Feb 2014, 15:00
| FROM IMD Admissions Blog: Travel to the tech world |
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The recent days were really colorful for us. I spent my Sunday with introductory interviews with psychoanalysts for the PDE process. Monday was about Finance and Operations classes, followed by today with our first Marketing class and an Economics session with full of heavy content. Although all of these classes were very informative, the top of the recent days was our guest speaker today evening. We did not know, who will visit us during the extra one and half hours scheduled in our calendar, but I hoped we will hear about some real life experiences. And yes, it was absolutely about this! Our presenter was an IMD MBA Alumni, Thierry Maupilé, Chief of Strategy from Cisco Service Provider Segment. His presentation was very motivating as we could see, how a man who attended in the same program could make a fantastic career after IMD both as a manager and as an entrepreneur. He was very honest and has not only spoken about building his successes from navigating in difficult times in corporate environment to building a start-up to a 3 billion USD value business, but also shared some of his experiences from his failures as well. He shared with us his passion about the technology industry and his vision about the future of the sector. I’m very happy, that we will have several innovations sessions with Cisco to understand their real life experiences on this essential process, I have to say, this evening proved again my choice of coming to IMD. András |
19 Feb 2014, 09:00
| FROM IMD Admissions Blog: Understand My Day |
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Follow the below link to another video blog! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tlmX5mhcFDs&feature=youtu.be Ashley Silver |
20 Feb 2014, 14:00
| FROM IMD Admissions Blog: Deadlines looming |
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So far, in my opinion, the schedule has been tough but it’s been manageable. Sure, some nights I didn’t spend as much time analyzing the case studies as I would like, or some other times I didn’t get to the optional readings… Admittedly, I did have one mishap, when I flat-out missed a deadline on a Finance problem set. But hey, no one is perfect - and thankfully that wasn’t for a huge percentage of the grade! All that aside, I haven’t forgotten Ralf’s words from the beginning of the year: “come on time, and come prepared!” I think I’ve been able to do an okay job on both fronts. I am a bit apprehensive about the next little while though. The day-to-day work and preparation for lectures will continue to be just as intense, but approaching deadlines will add that extra element of stress. This coming week, for example, the Industry & Competition Analysis exercise is due. This is our first long-term project, which we have been working on for four or five weeks now. My group still needs to do a good bit of polishing up on our story and our presentation, and we also need to put together the background memo explaining our rationale. We’ll probably be spending a lot of time in the dungeons, on top of all the additional hours we are putting in individually. (I have to say, it does make me feel better when I hear that other groups are facing the same concerns! Misery loves company, I suppose!) It’s all part of the experience, and I am glad my team is pretty easy-going and can have fun even when the pressure is on. It sure will be a relief when we start handing in some of these big assignments and have a bit of a breather… although that probably won’t happen until Easter break! Marcelo |
21 Feb 2014, 13:00
| FROM IMD Admissions Blog: End of Operations |
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Yesterday we had a full day of operations class with Ralf Seifert. That was an exercise with several aspects, and integrated many areas we have learnt during this course and also some elements from others as well. I don’t want to give out too many information on the case itself, but it was about products and a brand, which is well-known, so we became very passionate about it. We have felt that the four hours plus the lunch time we received (to make our proposal and prepare a presentation on it) is very long, but we realized during the work, that this was absolutely the opposite. We have spent quite a lot of time with convincing each other, but then we split up to bring also some efficiency into our work. With a very intensive finish we made it just-in-time (as you do in the case of an Operations assignment...) and we were also one of the teams who presented it to the class. Unfortunately this was our last real class with Ralf Seifert. We will have a factory visit with him later, but we gave him a long applause at the end of this long day. Everybody with whom I spoke from the class agreed, that Operations was the most useful class until now, which we will quite probably use a lot in our post-MBA life. But this was not the only reason, why we liked this class. Our professor, Ralf Seifert could catch all of us with his credibility, preparedness and very nice teaching style. Thank you Ralf for this course, I hope you will offer some elective courses as well! András |
23 Feb 2014, 12:42
23 Feb 2014, 15:00
| FROM IMD Admissions Blog: There’s a first time for everything…. even seeing a Jungian psychoanalyst! |
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Many of the students had their first session with their Jungian psychoanalyst this weekend, the optional elective that is part of the IMD program and complements the leadership stream. This allows each student 20 hours of sessions with a trained psychoanalyst to better understand themselves and what makes them who they are as a leader. It was my first time as well and I must admit that I was a bit nervous about the whole thing. What should I say? What would we talk about? What would I reveal? Other students have felt a bit anxious about the whole experience as well. With many of us hitting points of exhaustion and dream like states while conscious, there has been no shortage of “subconscious” outbursts from the funny to the absurd. Now we just need simply reply “you should probably talk to your analyst about those feelings!” and we all have a good laugh. My first session was quite low key. I went through moments that I remembered from the past week, talked about instances where I felt uncomfortable, uneasy, frustrated, happy, sad and then we started to discuss why, and then things got very interesting. I am off to complete some reading for Entrepreneurship class tomorrow, then I best go to bed before I say something that I will need to talk to my analyst about! Ashley Silver |
24 Feb 2014, 16:00
| FROM IMD Admissions Blog: Role models galore |
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One thing I have really enjoyed about the IMD experience so far is the sheer number of role models I’ve had a chance to interact with. At this stage, we’ve had quite a few guest speakers come to our classroom and share a little bit about their experience. Sometimes it’s been alumni, some very recent ones and some from a few years back, who spoke about their memories from their IMD years and the path they chose after graduation; other times it’s been entrepreneurs, investors or just very successful folks who are part of the IMD network. One thing all the guest speakers have had in common is that they are impressive and inspirational people, who I hope to be able to emulate in the future. Today, for example, we had a visit from one of Switzerland’s most successful entrepreneurs and investors, Martin Velasco. Among many of his ventures is Anecova, a life sciences business focused on finding the next breakthrough in assisted reproduction. They are in the process of developing a procedure called in vivo fertilization, where the reproductive cells are placed in a capsule and implanted back into the mother’s womb, allowing her to go on to have a healthy pregnancy. Truly inspirational stuff! In his talk today, Martin shared a little about his background and career, and spoke about what he considered critical when pursuing a new business opportunity. One of the most striking things to me about the talk was hearing how Martin is able to identify the right individuals to partner with in his ventures. He gave the example of a restaurant – you don’t have to know how to cook to run one, but you absolutely need to be able to find a good chef. He highlighted one thing we’ve been hearing over and over again – the importance of a strong network. I can see how he has been so successful at inspiring people to rally around him, with his disarming humility and genuine desire to make a difference. I hope the stream of guest speakers will continue throughout the year. I’ve found them a great source of motivation and inspiration. It makes me hope one day I’ll be coming back to IMD to share my own story! Marcelo |
25 Feb 2014, 16:00
| FROM IMD Admissions Blog: Welcome to IMD - a partners view |
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I believe, many of you are interested in how our partners experience this year. Let me share a very lively summary from Olivia, partner of one of my classmates: Moving from sunnier warmer climes to wintery Lausanne to be with my partner who is studying an MBA, I find that I frequently ask myself questions as I go about my daily life. From ‘how much?’! in the supermarket to ‘how far?’ as I climb up yet another hill to ‘how cold?’ as I try to decide how many layers to wear and ‘how long?’ as I contemplate the time between the 5 minute conversations I have with my partner as he comes up for air, before being swallowed back down into the IMD world. You start to weigh up whether it is better to have a non-communicative, peace-needing, studying zombie in the apartment with you, or if it would be better for them to stay at IMD working and only come home once they are too tired to string a sentence together and just want to go to sleep. You start to bargain with your partner whether, if they try some IMD immersion for 5 days, you can save up those small windows of conversation and maybe, just maybe, have a whole hour of coherent conversation over dinner at the weekend. And this is just in a child-free household, those partners who would like to see their children before they are asleep each night have another set of compromises and arrangements to negotiate. Knowing this, it is commendable and very much appreciated that IMD recognises that the happiness of the partners and their families contributes greatly towards a successful MBA year for the students with partners and families. Many partners may have sacrificed a lot (albeit mainly willingly!) to join the MBA students in Lausanne, leaving behind their jobs, friends, family and support networks, and we appreciate that IMD puts a lot of work into helping us make connections, maintain our own identities and find opportunities for learning, developing and enjoying life in our own way, especially during the initial first few challenging months. As we get to know each other it’s wonderful to find ourselves part of this interesting group of people, both MBAs and partners, from all different backgrounds and cultures, and comforting to know that none of us are alone in going through this experience. There is aways someone around to meet up with for a coffee or a walk to explore this beautiful part of the world. The first partner pot-luck lunch was a feast of specialities that really demonstrated the diversity of the group. Home-made favourites came from India, Spain, Italy, Hungary, Croatia, South Africa, Brazil and Japan to name but a few. Despite warnings from the chefs about not being able to get the right ingredients and not getting it quite right, it felt like a culinary world trip with a homely touch. We are also enjoying discovering the delights of local food in the form of fondue and raclette nights. Yes, partner life in Switzerland involves a lot of cheese. I recently had a short-break to visit family and as my plane touched down at Geneva airport I realised how happy I was to come back to Lausanne, see everyone again, and continue carving out my new niche during this once in a life-time opportunity. Olivia |
26 Feb 2014, 17:00
| FROM IMD Admissions Blog: Presentation Pressure |
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Our first major deliverable is due this Friday and my group is rushing to finalize a project we started our first weeks in January. As per IMD's style, we were thrown a huge curve ball just yesterday that majorly transformed our perceptions and our work product We are doing our best to adjust the best possible but it is a compromise between time, performance and group alignment. This Friday evening will certainly be a relief and I look forward to an event sponsered by our social committee to end the week right! Sorry for the short entry- I am rushing off to complete a report! Ashley Silver |
27 Feb 2014, 06:32
27 Feb 2014, 16:00
| FROM IMD Admissions Blog: 5 questions to ask an IMD student |
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Once again, I am thinking back to this time last year when I was still a wide-eyed MBA applicant. Between the MBA fairs, the IMD online events and the assessment day, I was able to get a really good feel for the IMD experience. I must say, some of the best information about the day-to-day reality of being an IMD student came from the current students and recent alumni I had a chance to talk to. Thought I’d help out incoming applicants with some suggestions on what you should ask an IMD student when you meet one: 1 – Who are your favorite professors? Before you start classes, you have no idea how interesting, charismatic and colorful – not to mention accomplished – all the IMD professors are. So hearing about them should give you a good flavor for what the classroom experience is like. 2 – How is the start-up project going? At this stage, the initial excitement from hitting the ground running with the start-ups has died down, but there is still a good bit of motivation left in the tank, which should give you a realistic picture of what students like and dislike about this type of project. 3 – Are you finding the leadership stream useful? The leadership stream is a very unique aspect of the IMD MBA program. Hearing about the current students’ experiences with the coaches and analysts might help you start thinking about how you would be able to benefit from it in the future. 4 – Is there really no free time? Sure, the MBAs are extremely busy most of the time, but we all seem to find a way to socialize, spend time with family and/or take some time to recharge every once in a while. Never too early to get some ideas on how to do it. 5 – Why are you here? I always find it interesting to hear why people chose to do an MBA, and where they are looking to go once they graduate. Although the students come from different countries and different industries, it turns out we all have more in common than it might seem! Marcelo |
01 Mar 2014, 02:00
| FROM IMD Admissions Blog: Submission of ICAs |
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“ICA “, this magic word was all around us in the last weeks. This means Industry & Competition Analysis, and we had the submission deadline just yesterday. It meant a strong pressure on us, and we have spent late night hours with pushing the project forward and come up with a proper analysis about an industry which was quite far from us even two months ago. Now we feel glad and satisfied that in a few weeks’ group work we managed to prepare an analysis which catches the major points of a complex and broad industry. The first time I felt this was when we had a phone interview with an expert from one of the big players in our specific area, and he confirmed our main findings. This was very important for us to go forward and to further fine tune our analysis and the end material. Unfortunately, we could not make the presentation of our findings yesterday, so we should wait to close the topic until Monday, but luckily, that’s not so far. As this was our first big delivery during the program, our Social Committee organized a nice celebration yesterday. With beers, wines, music and dance we could forget a little bit the pressure from the last weeks and enjoy the promise of the weekend (although the shadow of the Economics quiz is coming closer, but that’s another story). András |
02 Mar 2014, 14:00
| FROM IMD Admissions Blog: Learning and Achieving in Teams |
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Click here for another video blog! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K7Fddepx ... e=youtu.be Ashley Silver |
03 Mar 2014, 01:34
03 Mar 2014, 13:20
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