Where else do you go when you have a meeting? I think the epitome of “let’s get coffee” is Starbucks, although I didn’t have any coffee! Yesterday afternoon I met with the director of the Student Business Ambassadors, the undergraduate organization I will be mentoring. We had a great meeting, and have some good ideas to improve the organization forward. I am can’t to help them out and make their ideas come to life! I am really looking forward to working with them.
This weekend is the first ever Kelley Women’s Weekend! An opportunity for the current Kelley Women to showcase the school and what makes Kelley special to about 30 prospectives. We have some great alumni visiting and a lot of great sessions planned for the attendees, should be a fantastic event!
Today it wasn’t quiet breakfast in bed, but breakfast with our program chair. Was a great opportunity to talk to him about our experiences so far and what he hopes to do with the program going forward. I am always so pumped after talking to him, and I love how approachable he is. Great to have someone steering the ship who loves Kelley as much as I do.
So after 4 hours of class, I have officially finished my first week of business school. There were times when I didn’t think I would keep up but I have been able to survive.
I did sort of shut down once I got home though, I did read for critical thinking for next week but I didn’t email my contacts back like I should have. Was just done for a bit.
At about 5:30 we headed back to school for Kelley field day. We were divided up among our cohorts and competed against each other in various physical challenges, like water balloon tosses, tug of war, 3 legged races, dizzy bat relay races, water balloon volleyball and to cap it off a car pull. I got to compete in every event and my team mate and I got second for the female teams in the car pull. The green cohort didn’t win overall, oh well, hopefully we will be able to redeem ourselves later in the semester.
After we finished up at Kelley we headed over to the soccer field to watch IU go against St. Johns. They ended up tied but it was fun to just unwind.
Going to have to head to bed soon, we are having our friends over again tomorrow morning for the second installment of the Top Chef breakfast club.
What most people will tell you makes an MBA program is the network you acquire (there are a lot more factors, but this is right up there in developing rankings, etc) and tonight was my first exposure to Kelley’s recruiting network. I was pretty impressed to say the least, 40 companies there to speak to the incoming class who has only had 3 days of school. Just mindboggling! Most of us don’t have any experience in the fields we are planning on pursuing post-grad yet we have people here that want to meet us, so cool.
So the day started out with management and econ, then some researching down in the lounge. At about 3ish we headed home, watched an episode of Mad Men and then did some more schoolwork. We grabbed a quick bowl of soup and then headed to Bloomington’s Convention Center to meet the company representatives.
I was a little nervous, didn’t really think i was prepared to meet them, but it ended up being a great experience. I met with reps from Nestle, Best Buy and two from various marketing functions within Walmart. I learned a lot and think I can add a few to my list of companies to pursue.
Then I wrapped up the night with some thank you notes and some webinars on networking for my LPCD deliverable.
All of our classes tomorrow got bumped to friday to accommodate more Round Table meetings (8 more companies on my docket) and seminars for us to attend. should be another adventure in networking!
Day 2 of the program and I am already putting in twelve hour days! Got to school around 8 am for my core classes.
Today was critical thinking, quantitative analysis and accounting. I loved critical thinking, Professor Metzger is a riot and really does make you question your logic…and it was only our first session! I am really looking forward to the rest of the semester. Quantitative analysis was a lot of housekeeping, but that should be expected when you have a class so heavily dependent on tools, need to make sure everyone is on the same page. And accounting was accounting, going to be hard to get excited about that class.
Then it was time for lunch down in the lounge, which was basically me eating a peanut butter sandwich while I read up on CPG and retail happenings. Once all the crumbs were gone it was onto econ reading and case prep before a team meeting to work on the econ assignment. An hour later, I had some answers written up and a very confusing supply curve. We’ll see how we faired tomorrow.
After the team dispersed, I hung around in the breakout room and worked on my Friday accounting homework. Need to get it out of the way so i can focus on Round Table research and the Thursday night football game! Had only one problem left before I had the 1st Kelley Women meeting.
The meeting was really informative and talked about opportunities for leadership in the organization. I have already applied for a co-chair position, will find out sometime next week if I get it! I love the organization, it is such a champion for women in the workplace. We also talked about the upcoming National Association of Women MBA conference I am attending in Disneyland at the end of October. Kelley is hosting the event and it should be a great opportunity to network.
Finally left the Godfrey Center at 8:30, not bad for my second day! Once back here at the house I put in another couple hours finishing accounting homework, recopying last night’s speaker notes and researching half of my Round Table companies. Now its time to hit the sack so I can do it all over again tomorrow!
Today was another full day of MBA programing. The morning started out with back to back presentations on time and stress management. Stuff you guys all know I need help with ;) After a few takeaways…cheap massages offered by health services, SCORE! It was on to the club fair/expo. We had representatives from almost every club come and talk to our cohort and then they let us all out to talk to the reps at their tables in the atrium. It was craziness! Although I pretty much knew which organizations I wanted to join, I did learn about the Kelley International Perspectives scheduled for next year (China, Dubai/Egypt, Israel and Ireland) I am definitely interested in doing one! Just got to figure out which one.
Then it was time to come home and get caught up on some scheduling stuff for class. I got my outlook all set up for the next two weeks so I can tackle the work a little more effectively (hopefully)
When 4:30ish rolled around it was a mad dash to get all gussied up for our MBA induction ceremony at the union. It was an amazing event, I was getting misty at the end of it when the Dean remarked on us writing our new chapter. Just so pumped to be surrounded with so many bright and talented people, we have such a great class. I am really looking forward to seeing all of what class of 2011 accomplishes.
We all made our way to the Tudor room for a wonderful reception and cocktail hour…that lasted for a few. We actually shut the place down because we were having such a great time catching up with our classmates.
We walked Addie around our complex when we got home and I pounded out some finance problems. Now it is time for bed as i can hardly keep my eyes open.
the life and times of an mba student
