Cross-Atlantic MBA Blog Repository

Revenue leakage: Inside a logistics company

2009-05-13T02:29:00.000-07:00

To describe revenue leakage in a logistics company, it is important to know how such a company works in general terms.

A logistics company brings together transport and warehousing service providers with companies who need to distribute good. These service providers might be part of the logisitics company or third parties, but are always treated, by the billing department, as third parties. Both the clients and the service providers are based in different countries and many, many locations need to be served by the distribution network.
The clients need goods to be transported from a number of distribution centers to a large number of destinations. And, sometimes, from these destinations back to the distribution centers. Based on these needs, the client agrees with the logistics company what kind of services it needs and how much it is going to pay for those. A contract is drawn up with precise definitions of the activities contracted, as well as a table with rates (prices) for these activities, usually called rate cards. Typical activities include incoming phone calls at a call center, receipt of wares in the warehouse (inbound), preparation of wares for transportation (outbound) and the transportation of the wares to the destination. This transportation can happen by air, by truck, by courier, express, same day, next day, etc.
In the same way that there is a contract and a rate card between the clients and the logistics company, there are contracts and rate cards between the logistics company and the different service providers. Ideally, the activities are defined in the same way in both contracts, but that is not always the case. Naturally, there should be a difference in the rate cards of the clients and the providers, which is how the logistics company generates their revenue: clients pay a higher price for an activity than the price the logistics company pays to their service providers. In exchange, the logistics company maintains and operates the distribution network for the client.

Revenue leakage in the logistics business

2009-05-13T01:52:00.000-07:00

My consulting job at DHL was to look for revenue leakages in the billing department of one of their units. During a reunion with my master thesis team, including the professor who counselled us (Prof. Schiereck, then at EBS, now TU Darmstadt) I discussed this shortly with them. From this discussion, my friend Boris, who is a lawyer as well as an MBA, sent me an e-mail analyzing revenue leakages from a point of view of a law office. I started to write him a response, but decided to use the blog for this, explaining a bit more about revenue leakages in a logistics company.
I will do so in a small series of articles in the next days. I think this is a good way to power up this blog again after a long pause.

First week at the new job, last post?

2009-02-11T03:16:00.000-08:00

Please click on the image to read my text. It was an experiment and it didn't come out exaclty as planned. Sorry for the inconvenience.

Pulse Smartpen: quick and dirty review

2009-01-19T18:44:00.000-08:00

**** (that's 4 stars out of 5)
Potentially life changing gadget

I believe the Pulse Smartpen is a fantastic platform for many day-to-day applications. The working principle of it just makes so much sense!
Fortunately, there is an SDK for external developers, unfortunately, file formats and communication standards don't seem to be open, but I am no software expert.

But back to the pen. Very well crafted, looks serious and professional. I can really use it in a board meeting. Although it is kind of bulkier than I expected, but maybe my expectations were too high. On the other hand, it is smaller than many highlighters in the market.

The screen is very good.

Interface quite intuitive everywhere: pen, software, notebook.

Writing recognition works fantastically well! Not only is the transferred "image" very detailed and looks natural, the software recognized my handwriting without any previous "training" when using the search function.

I do seem have to have problems transferring the audio sessions, which can be a deal breaker, but Customer Service has been very responsive so far and I hope to clear this soon.

All in all, I am very happy with the purchase, as long as the audio part starts working properly. I believe there is room for improvement and further development, especially in extra applications for it and am awaiting eagerly to beef up the functionality of my pen.

Written for: http://www.amazon.com/review/R374WV94NBJ5C8/ref=cm_cr_rdp_perm

An encounter in Brussels

2009-01-16T13:00:00.000-08:00

Written on my phone on the plane coming to Brazil.

The Belgian who took over my apartment in Brussels is an ex-TV reporter who has once been to an extremely remote area in Brazil to cover a story about seringueiros, castanha-do-pará and indians trying to live in a sustainable way. He said that reality isn't as romantic as it sounds.
He has been living in Congo for years now, working with NGOs rebuilding bridges. More than 80. He told that you just had to free things up, and people would do the rest. He rebuilt the bridges and saw the business men coming, and thinks profit is a good thing to bring on development.
We talked about living with few things. Me with only what fits in a suitcase, him with what he had available in two years of living in the jungle. Less is more.
Another thing he told was that, in his experience, the best thng NGOs could do was to dissiminate knowledge.
Cool guy, this Jan. Good way to leave Brussels.

BusinessWeek's slideshow of Queen's School of Business

2009-01-02T05:53:00.000-08:00

My colleague Manish sent us an interesting link to this slideshow at BusinessWeek:

Queen's School of Business Tour

Je suis arrivé au Brésil.

2008-12-25T13:58:00.000-08:00

Temperature at 9 o' clock in the morning.

At my uncle's in the middle of São Paulo. Yes, it's true.

Tomorrow, the beach! See you in 2009.

Last day at DHL

2008-12-23T07:21:00.000-08:00

I spent the last 3 months in Brussels, Belgium, working in the finance department of DHL Service Parts Logistics, in Vilvoorde.

If there is something that I am taking with me from this experience, besides what I learned about billing and invoicing, is the openness and friendliness that I found in this company.
I also have rarely seen such an international ambient, where each one was accepted because of their skills, regardless of origin. The number of countries represented in this office of 150 or so people certainly rivals what I have seen at my MBA term in Warwick, and that was already extreme!

It was a good time to put things into perspective and I am glad I came. Now I just have to pack and wait for the plane to Brazil tomorrow.

A good MBA reference site in Germany

2008-12-18T09:20:00.000-08:00

I just received another newsletter from the http://www.mba-channel.com/ website. It is a relatively new website, started this year, and it has developed nicely.
What I like most in that website are the reports they write about different topics with a very critical view. From time to time they actually critic or put some school in check, which I think is very healthy.

One of the things that I found out during the MBA is that there is MBA reality and what I call the MBA "media hype". MBA schools are very clever in using the media for publicity. Of course. Positive reports go hand-in-hand with paid advertisements, as is usual in any industry. This gives MBA candidates a skewed impression of how an MBA develops, what one can expect of it, the job market reality afterwards. This gets reinforced by the fact that those owning an MBA title, like myself, will very seldomly critique the title and its institutions in a negative way. After all, we don't want to diminish the value of our degrees, do we? We have to care for our brand.
I continue to be extremely happy with my MBA experience, don't get me wrong. I met a lot of great people, visited interesting places, learned a lot, had lots of fun and, all going well, will double my salary in February.

Anyway, I just though of writing quickly to endorse the mba-channel.com website, which has also an English version.

Ah, they also tried to build an MBA community, which is commendable, but it hasn't really picked up yet. Maybe it is because they are offering features like blogs, photo albums, polls, etc., that people already use in other sites which are not MBA-specific. Maybe, instead of trying to create a whole new community environment, they might focus on getting content from elsewhere together, or focusing user interaction around their best features: their specialised stories and information.

Mannheim, Queen's and BusinessWeek

2008-12-12T01:26:00.000-08:00

OK, so I checked out BusinessWeek's slides on the top non-US business schools, knowing very well that Queen's School of Business had grabbed the first place for the third time in a row (2004, 2006 and 2008). My surprise was to see the banner on the top of the page:

Mannheim is investing quite a lot in marketing. We have seen them on Facebook, I have seen them on the schedule leaflets on the ICE trains to Mannheim and now, BW.
I guess that all is good, after all, the better the Mannheim name is known in the business world, more valuable my Mannheim MBA degree gets.

The consultant's suitcase

2008-12-07T15:05:00.000-08:00

I am looking for a new suitcase for next year. Being a management consultant living 5 days out of 7 in a hotel will certainly be a new routine for me. And, since it will be quite a tough routine, I am doing some research to get the basics right.
But it is not that easy to find out what I'll need, consultants don't seem to blog too much (with the exception of Paul Dunay, maybe, but social media is his speciality). And, surprisingly, luggage manufacturers don't seem to have models aimed at the 4+1 management consultants, which indicates that, just maybe, this is a niche which could be filled. At least it gives food for thought for the future of this blog.
I decided that, for a 5 day stay away from home, I would need the following:

an extra suit (jacket and pair of trousers)
4 or 5 shirts
at least one t-shirt, if not more (have to figure out if I should wear undershirts)
3 or 4 ties
a pair of jeans for the evenings
an extra pair of shoes, just in case
underwear and socks
one pullover, possibly
a pair of shorts for sports. If the hotel has a pool, speedos
toiletries

I used the tip to start with half of the suit jacket, fill the case with the rest and then flap the other half of the jacket over the other clothes. This should avoid getting the jacket creased across the middle, it makes sense.

Surprisingly enough, I found out that all of the items above fit in my carry-on (inflight) trolley. I wasn't very confident it would, but suspected it. That's why I did this small experiment. It worked.

Next week I'll take this trolley with me and look for a substitute. After all, althought it is still in good condition, its looks aren't what they once were. But it has served me well since 2004: China - Brazil - Germany - Brazil - Germany - Moscow - Germany - Brazil - Germany - England - US - Canada - Germany - Belgium. Not too bad for a case that cost me around 15 dollars, if I am not mistaken.
I am also talking to some of my consulting colleagues to see what their experiences are. What has worked for you?

Defeat of purpose

2008-12-07T14:50:00.000-08:00

This is for my college media and design professor Luli Radfahrer, who posted a similar picture after a trip to Holland. The picture above comes from the same country, from Utrecht, and is a counter-example of good design. The flies, btw, are stickers, not originally placed by the manufacturer.

The MBS Facebook network

2008-12-04T00:51:00.000-08:00

Thanks to Sascha, MBS FTMBA08, now there is a network for the Mannheim Business School on Facebook.

If you have an e-mail @mba-mannheim.com, you can join.

Go to:

Settings
Networks
Type "Mannheim Business School" in the "Newtork name:" field
Fill in the details
Click on "join network"
Check your MBS e-mail for a confirmation link

That's it.

BTW, I highly recommend you to send an e-mail to the IT guys and ask them to forward your MBS e-mail to your personal account. I use it with Gmail, it works like a charm.

Disqus comments

2008-11-13T01:23:00.000-08:00

I have been reading about Disqus for some time now and tried to give it a shot.

Disqus is a comment system for blogs which should make commenting here more interesting.

Please, try it out and let me know what you think. From this post on, new posts will use Dis qus.

Blogger is back, will I be back too?

2008-11-11T13:43:00.000-08:00

Since mid-August I had been locked out of blogger.com. Today, after almost a week without posting, I found out that my login at blogger.com works again. No idea why, no word from the not so nice people at blogger.com.

Funny that this happens now, because I have been thinking about this blog and its future. What is its purpose and who my audience is or should be.

When I first started blogging, it was a way to keep friends and family informed, and it was relatively private. I had a robots.txt file which prevented google to list it. It was written in Portuguese. And I passed the link to selected friends and family.

The MBA changed the aim of this blog. It certainly changed the audience I had in mind for it. I still wanted to keep family and friends informed. Luckily, they are all smart and well educated, so it was possible to change the language to English ;-) This was necessary to include three additional groups of readers: future MBA colleagues, potential employers and future MBA candidates.

I am happy with the results. My MBA colleagues, their relatives and members of the 2009 class of the Mannheim MBA told me they read this. My family and friends certainly do. And, if your google "Fernando Bresslau" you find this blog followed by my LinkedIn and Xing profiles.

But soon I will be definitely employed. And I have been far from the MBA life for a couple of months already. So the audience of my blog will revert to what it was before: family and friends. With one big change: more of my friends now don't speak Portuguese, so the language will continue to be English.

I will certainly blog about my new job, the industry and the trends. But this will be on a blog separate from my personal blog. I could be blogging, starting in February 2009, about the chemical, automotive or wind power, depending where I'll land. And I would then blog with the interests of the company in mind. But this is the future, let's see.

I was also thinking about the declining frequency of my posts here. Sure, I have a project at DHL Brussels which keeps me busy 8 hours a day, job search and career decisions get another chunk of my attention and other beautiful things in life also captivate me, Brussels is an interesting city.

I certainly have transfered much of my broadcasting to a new tool, twitter. Actually, twitter linked to my Facebook status, through which I reach most of my MBA colleagues. Interestingly enough, Luli Radfharer, a professor at the arts and communication school at the University of São Paulo, whose courses I took in 2002 and 2003, twittered about an article stating that blogging was passé. I kept in touch with Luli over all these years through our blogs at first, and now through twitter. And I can see where Paul Boutin, the article's author, is going. He has good observations on how blogging has emerged and developed, and what we can expect from personal communication (or broadcasting) in the near future.

I will continue to blog. But I suggest you to follow me on twitter or on facebook. I will certainly be more present there.

And if this article is a bit confusing, please excuse me. It has been a long day, a long week, a long month and a long year. Can't wait to go to Brazil on Christmas and take the whole month of January off.

Harmonica Masters' Workshops 2008

2008-11-02T22:59:00.000-08:00

It was great to be in Trossingen again and feel kind of at home once more. I was very fortunate to meet several of my friends, listen to great music and see the first snow of the season. It was a great weekend, even though I am really, really tired.

A familiar view

2008-10-22T14:08:00.000-07:00

I took this picture when the ICE back from Stuttgart was passing exactly in front of my former apartment in Mannheim. Nothing special about the picture, but I just found it interesting to be suddenly in one of the trains that would bother me for months with their screetching noises...
BTW, the building to the left is a DHL building.

And thanks to Facebook updates...

2008-10-13T13:43:00.000-07:00

I met these three wonderful girls for 20 minutes while changing train connections in Mannheim, tha was great! And this is maybe my favourite Mannheim photo ever! Don't you agree?

After the Delloite Minis...

2008-10-12T00:56:00.000-07:00

I present you the PWC Minis!

At least they have Cooper in their name...

Added-value Graffiti

2008-10-10T14:13:00.000-07:00

Comments and suggestions for your job search strategy

2008-10-08T07:11:00.000-07:00

I just answered a questionnaire by the Mannheim Business School on my job search. In the end, they asked to highlight what we thought was important and add other points. I added a few.

These are the points that the school suggested which I think are important:

Career fairs
Contacts to professors or to external people that came to our lecture
Online career services
Analyzing and focusing on capabilities and experience
Career services by partner schools

There is no order of preference in the list above, nor in the list below, where I went on writing down what I thought was useful for my search.

Apply to companies which are not on the top of your list first
www.monster.de
EBS Symposium
Konaktiva Darmstadt
www.access.de
Send a big number of applications, but keep them relevant.
Evaluate clearly what is important to you: salary, function, industry, location, work-life balance, company culture, ethics and reputation. There isn’t only McKinsey with fat bonus.
Keep track of your expenses and follow up on interviews.
Share jobs with your colleagues; they will send you good jobs back.
When talking to companies at fair boths, go in pairs for a general Q&A session, than come back with focused questions alone.
When talking to a company, try to have a specific position you want to apply to in mind. Germans like to see focus and confidence.
Rewrite CVs and cover letters constantly, ask others for feedback and keep good version control. Expect to dedicate several hours a week for this task.
Install a PDF printer driver to convert your documents. Send only PDF files to recruiters.
Consider going back to your country of origin as a very concrete option.
Be prepared by the fact that the MBA is still a big unknown in Germany.
Learn as much German as you can.
Use your master thesis project to interview high ranked executives in companies you plan to apply for. It is easier than you think, you learn a lot, you train for a real job interview and you get valuable contacts.
Don’t expect too much from the semesters abroad in regards to job search. The timing is not right. Use the career services to refine your application documents and goals.
Get as many reference letters as you can from past employers or professors as soon as possible. In Germany, every line of a CV has to be confirmed by an official document.
Use Xing.com. In Germany, it is more important than LinkedIn, even if it has a horrible name.
Use LinkedIn. Get recommendations from contacts.
Blog and Twitter about relevant aspects of your MBA. I got a job lead through twitter.
Let your colleagues know which kind of job you are looking for: industry, function, location.
Get your GMAT book out and do some math exercises. Good preparation for consulting interviews.
Look for MBA specific positions. In that way, you avoid being compared to 24 year old undergrads fresh out of college.
Don’t ignore positions for 24 year old undergrads fresh out of college.

Strike on Monday

2008-10-03T01:40:00.000-07:00

From www.xpats.com:

SOCIAL - Unions call for Monday strike
BRUSSELS - The country's three leading trade unions have called for a general strike on Monday to bring pressure on public authorities and employers over the cost of living. Public transport and services, schools and retailing are likely to be the most affected. The VBO/FEB employers association has called the strike irresponsible in the present economic climate while the government will be spending the weekend reajusting the state's budget, taking an expected 7 billion euro shortfall into consideration. Meanwhile, luggage handlers at Brussels Airport are on strike today over work conditions and low pay. (Source:xpats.com)

I still don't know how I am supposed to come to work. But where there is a will, there is a way.

400 mini Delloitians

2008-09-27T03:25:00.000-07:00

I am staying at a hotel near the Delloite building in Diegem, Brussels. To get to the train or bus stops I pass their parking lot, which is packed with blue Cooper Minis, often with Delloite green side-view mirrors. I then asked one of the Mini drivers about the cars and she told me that Delloite had hired 400 new people and they all got Minis to start with.

Vilvoorde

2008-09-27T03:15:00.000-07:00

The DHL SPL office is in the town of Vilvoorde, just outside Brussels. I took the chance on Thursday after work to explore the streets a bit. The following picture is a 360° panorama taken from a roundabout.

Discover Simple, Private Sharing at Drop.io

I am testing drop.io with this picture, but you can try to download the original panorama here.

I made some other stitches and put them up on drop.io too: http://drop.io/vilvoorde.

Of course there are more pictures and you can take a look at them on Picasa, it is worth it.

080925 Vilvoorde

First impressions of Brussels

2008-09-25T22:19:00.000-07:00

I have been in Brussels before, twice. Once for an afternoon, then shortly after for a whole weekend. And I still have the impression that all is very, very new to me. And that's because it really is. The first time I had Brazilian friends showing me around by car. The second time I had local company and advice, so I didn't pay too much attention to how things work around here.

For me, the most striking feature of this city is the plurality of languages. Arriving at the Noord Station (Gare du Nord), the train announcements where done in four languages: French, Dutch, German and English. You don't get always the four-language-menu, but in most situations you see the French-Dutch combination. Restaurant menues, party flyers, product packages, promotion material, advertising, maps, etc. And this is not bad. Because I speak both Portuguese and German, I usually can understand more than 50% of the French and Dutch written material I get in my hands. So, when something isn't clear in one of the languages, I just turn to the other and am, usually, able to fill the gaps. Curiously enough, I am observing that I prefer to start with French.

But even if you don't have the advantage of my two mother tongues, you usually can get by with English in Brussels. It is not always easy, but it certainly is not a problem. People are very open to foreigners and try to help where possible. I guess they have to, after all, we are in the European capital and internationality is a strong part of reality.

The other thing I noticed here was the German railway system. Sounds strange, but, although the Belgium system is very good by any standards, the comparison just shows how incredibly advanced, well organized, tidy and even pretty the German transportation system is, starting with the websites. To get around in Brussels, you use www.stib.be. To get around in Germany, very often you can use the national rail website, even for city connections: www.bahn.de. Otherwise, you use the regional websites, like http://www.rnv-online.de. And I even found out that it is sometimes easier to use the www.bahn.de site for connections in Belgium and the Netherlands.

Another practical aspect I dedicated some time yesterday to was mobile telephony. While in the US I had the worst conditions, followed closely by Canada and at a greater distance by Britain, in Belgium it is very easy to get a prepaid SIM card with a simple prices overview. I am paying 20 cents per minute anytime, any Belgium line and 10 cents per SMS. And I might get interne for 50 cents a Megabyte, if I figure out how. That is certainly not bad, but, in Germany, I was paying 9 cents per minute or SMS and 24 cents per Megabyte. Again, going abroad (whatever abroad means in my case) is a good exercise to put things into perspective.

And now I'll go down for some breakfast. I spent some hours in Vilvoorde yesterday and took many pictures. I'll try to post them in the weekend, I am curious to see the results.

19th EBS Symposium

2008-09-22T03:41:00.000-07:00

I applied for and was invited to the EBS Symposium this weekend. It is an impressive event held by the European Business School, a private institution, and its students. It seems that 1200 people were invited, among students, young professionals and representatives from the business world.
The list of speakers was also impressive, with many high caliber personalities there. Unfortunately, many simply didn't show up, maybe because of the consequences of the games played in Wall Street last week. But, just as an example, the German or European bosses of the main consultancies were all there. Again, impressive.
I stayed with 4 other students i nthe apartment of 3 EBS students. This was a good thing, as this created a group of familiar faces with whom I spent most of the time during the event.
We were well taken care of. Besides the simple, but free accomodation, we had a very good shuttle service, all meals taken care of, internet access and even a very nice party on Friday evening, at a winery. I didn't stay for the party on Saturday nigh.
Some of the talks were very good, like the one from John Major and the one from Dr. Burgess, EMEA Chairman of BearingPoint. Other talks were not as good and I missed one or two talks because they were post poned or simply cancelled, without notice. But there was always something going on, so that was ok.
Furthermore, there was a good career fair and pre-scheduled interviews with interested employers. The list of companies was very good, of course. But after being in Berlin, Mannheim, Darmstadt and München at career fairs, you start recognize some of the faces and new information gets more scarce. The interview with KPMG was very interesting, though, and I got the confirmation that I would be invited for the next partner round. But this will probably be after Belgium and Brazil, in 2009. Let's see.

I have put some pictures up on Picasa. I hope you enjoy them.
Tomorrow I should be leaving to Brussels, finally.

Tayloring marketing campaigns

2008-09-22T02:27:00.000-07:00

It is impressive how it is now easily possible to create billboard with location specific data. It makes targeting much, much more effective. But it increases the probabilities of mistakes. You don't have to aprove one design for a whole regions, but dozens, hundreds or even thousands. In this example, the ad directs you to places where you can get the catalog near the billboard. Note that the word "Straße" is mispelled.

Brussels, DHL: the next step

2008-09-17T14:45:00.000-07:00

It happened very suddenly during the "thesis week", the days before the deadline. An e-mail from a good friend from Warwick advertising a job at DHL in Brussels, a CV and motivation letter sent very quickly and an interview on the next day: I will be working for DHL in Brussels until Christmas.
It is a very interesting project in the finance department, working with the finance director of DHL Service Parts Logistics. It is a new field for me, therefore I expect to learn a lot.
I am also excited to be in Brussels. I have been there a little over one year ago and have some confusing, but nonetheless, fond memories from the city (well, not really the city).
I am also glad to have some time to research and think about the next permanent employment. This job gives me the opportunity to do the job search while employed, which takes some pressure of the job hunt. I now have the time to consider the offers that I already have and the ones I expect to get in the next few weeks carefully.
Of course, linked to the job search, DHL itself and the DPWN group are employers which have been on my radar since the beginning of the MBA and I am looking forward to getting to know this group better. They are growing rapidly and I expect to find interesting possibilities there.
So now you know. If any of you plans to be near Brussels in the next few months, send me an e-mail, I would be glad to show you around and, if possible, even offer a coach or sofa to sleep for a night or two.

Imported traditions

2008-09-14T04:05:00.000-07:00

Jalal just posted this:

It was fun!

Welcome to the Mannheim FT MBA 2009!

2008-09-12T19:27:00.000-07:00

Last year we were not able to attend the graduation ceremony of the Mannheim FT MBA 2007, as we were already scattered around the globe, having the first subjects of our own course.
This year things are somewhat different, and we have students staying in Mannheim for their complete MBA. So they were able to attend our ceremony and even our party afterwards. It was cool to meet them by chance yesterday and see them officially for the first time today. It is a pity that this will also probably be the last time that the two classes meet in such big numbers, but I am happy to say that they are a really cool bunch of guys. And there is even another Brazilian to make things a bit more fun!

Welcome guys and girls and all the best for your MBA! Don't forget to learn how to row, go the the Schneckenhof parties, check out the Hafenstrand bar in the summer, eat takeout food from Mr. Chang, watch videos in the classrooms in N2 and go to the Pfalz for some wine tasting.

The Mannheim FT MBA 2008 is officially over!

2008-09-12T19:17:00.000-07:00

And the ceremony was really nice, the "Rittersaal" at the Mannheim University Palace was a great place to celebrate it.

And the party afterwards was even nicer! I am still coming down from the thrill of it, I had a blast and was very happy to meet new people, enjoy the company of good friends and have my cousin representing my family.

Everybody almost done, short update

2008-09-09T02:26:00.000-07:00

All groups have handed in their dissertations (as you can see in the picture) and most of the groups have done all their presentations too. So, this week is dedicated to finishing things in Mannheim. My group still has to prepare the results for the company (we'll meet one last time next week in Hanau), but most people are going after their own things: job search, apartment search, vacating the apartments in Mannheim, buying dresses and shirts for the graduation ceremony, receiving relatives who have already arrived for the party on Friday, etc.
We are also slowly saying our goodbyes. Yesterday we had a nice get-together at Markus' place, on Sunday I even went rowing one last time, tomorrow some people are meeting in Frankfurt, Thursday is Hafenstrand and Schneckenhof double party night and Friday is Friday.
Personally, I am moving to Darmstadt first and have 3 or 4 interviews scheduled in the next 10 days. There is so much I want to do, but I seem to have too little time. Nonetheless, I am still able to "waste" time reading a book or surfing the internet, when I should be concentrating on work. So let's try to do the latter.

Thesis is ready, call me Master

2008-09-04T17:16:00.000-07:00

It is done. It's just not printed yet and B is going over it one more time, but the version I have on my USB stick is already very, very good (IMHO).
This was the last step of the MBA and it is done. Now tons of paper will be expelled to recycling and I and our team room 3.3 will be cleaned. For the first time this week, my computer will be taken home.
BTW, great infrastructure here at the new learning center at N2: good internet connection, air condition (sometimes too cold), great chairs, tables, white boards, flip charts, printer & copier, water coolers and even a kitchen. I lived here for the last 3 or 4 days, just going out to buy food (scattered all over the room at the moment), eat at the mensa (cafeteria)or go home to sleep.
B and T are creating the final PDF of the thesis now, the printer will start working in a few minutes.
And I will unplug now. I am not a bit sleepy, but tired as hell. It was a great week, and it hasn't ended yet.

Mannheim Business School 2.0

2008-09-02T14:18:00.000-07:00

So this is what I found while surfing my colleague's Facebook pages for productive, thesis related purposes.
I would be really interested to learn how Facebook advertising is performing for Mannheim Business School. In Canada we had a presentation of the founder of www.redflagdeals.ca who said that his results with Facebook had been very disappointing.

The end from another perspective

2008-08-30T04:28:00.000-07:00

My blogging Warwick friend Chris is also feeling the end closing. But he has already started saying his goodbyes, this hasn't really started for us, although we have seen some of our own leave for good (to get cute little babies, for instance).
I haven't felt the sadness yet and the party at N2 yesterday was more of a celebration. But go check Chris' impressions out.

Now I can say that it is almost over

2008-08-29T11:52:00.000-07:00

We had the final presentation of our thesis today at the Heraeus site in Hanau, and all went really, really well. Heraeus is an interesting German, family owned high-tech company and it is not everyday that you have the opportunity to present and discuss your findings to the two most senior managers of a company with 12 thousand employees in over 70 countries and a turnover of more than 11 billion Euro. Yeah, billion.

Our academic supervisor, our project sponsor (head of corporate development) and a great team!

The presentation went smoothly and was actually fun. I was very happy with the results of the team and so were the professor and the company, I had the impression. It was an intensive 2 months of work, getting ourselves into a very new subject for us, but the conclusion we got were solid and useful for the company. And we learned a lot, especially from the 10 or so interviews we conducted with senior managers from important corporations.
But not all is over, we still have 50% of our thesis to be written this week and, after that, we all will be MBAs, deservedly.

But tonitght we have decided to commemorate a bit. And I should go back to where the music is playing.

Façade in Mannheim

2008-08-24T04:09:00.000-07:00

Just one spot I discovered today Mannheim. I must have probaly seen it almost everyday while walking to class, but hadn't paid attention to it.

Message to the next MBS Full Time MBA students

2008-08-23T03:13:00.000-07:00

Hi all,

I understand that some of you are already arriving in Mannheim around the 10th of September. My plan is to see how I can bring you and the FTMBA 2008 students who are still around together. One of the great things of the MBA is to meet new people, and this should be fun. And useful for you, you should feel free to ask us any questions you have.

Until the 5th of September, none of us 2008ers will have much time, as we are all working on our thesis. On the 12th of September we have our graduation ceremony. So between the 10th and the 15th of September we should have several chances to meet.

Let me know your plans and we will work from there. You should also forward this message to your other colleagues and tell them to get in touch with me. I'll be happy to organize this.

Now let me go back to my project presentation slides.
All the best,
Fernando

Communicating the purpose through

2008-08-20T12:17:00.000-07:00

I am eating something similar to a Soupy Snax, so I decided to publish this text I wrote as an MBA assignment. It is one case were I can combine the themes MBA and harmonica safely.

I had previously seen the Soupy Snax 4:00 example somewhere, but it is a very good instance where the purpose of the product is so well communicated to the client.
In yet another example of the harmonica industry, Hohner has secured for them the best name a diatonic harmonica could ever have: "The Blues Harp".
Harmonicas are divided in mainly 3 groups: traditional instruments, chromatic instruments and, the most popular, the ten hole diatonic harmonicas. The latter are the more affordable models and are the only ones whose notes can be soulfully bent, giving it the characteristic wailing sound so intrinsic to harmonica blues playing.
But these instruments are not known as ten hole diatonic harmonicas, but under the nick name "blues harp". So, by registering this name decades ago, Hohner has made sure that, when an aspiring musician comes to a music dealer and asks for a harmonica to play the blues, he or she will probably ask using the most common name in English (and several other languages, additionally): "I want to buy a blues harp". The consumer is not aware that he is using a specific model name, but he has narrowed the choice of the dealer to this Hohner product. If he or she asks for a blues harp and gets a Hohner Blues Harp, he or she will be reassured to be buying the correct item. If the dealer offers a Suzuki Folk Master, which is a very similar instrument, the customer might become confused.
Just as a side note, the most traditional blues harmonica is The Hohner Marine Band, which, for a harmonica, is an awful name, as it doesn't convey any meaningful message to today's population (the Marine Band was a popular American Navy brass band in the late 19th century).
Hohner has tried to name their chromatic harmonica in a meaningful way. A chromatic harmonica is a harmonica which, differently from the other two categories* of instruments, can play a full chromatic scale. It was probably the most significant invention in 200 years of harmonica history. The name the Germans out of Trossingen came up with was "The Chromonica", which should convey the differentiating quality of this instrument. They had success in that, as it is easy for a buyer to figure out that he or she is doing the correct purchase when looking for a chromatic instrument. But Hohner's hopes of establishing the name Chromonica as a synonym for chromatic harmonicas didn't really work out that well. Some older generation Germans will use it in that way, but most of the harmonica community uses the term "chromatic harmonica" instead.
During my stay there, we launched the "7 Blues Harmonica Starter Set", which is a set with 7 inexpensive and low quality harmonicas, for a very affordable price. We tried to manage consumers' expectations by including the "starter" word in the name and by mentioning in the package that this was the ideal product for starters wanting to experiment with different keys or tonalities. Furthermore, we refrained to use the expression "blues harp" to differentiate this product from the actual "blues harp" model.

*Okay, not really. Richter style harmonicas and even tremolo harmonicas can be played chromatically with the use of advanced techniques.

Recruitment Goes Mobile

2008-08-18T14:18:00.000-07:00

I saw the title above in a twit from SJDelaney and thought that was a very counterintuitive thing. I don't want to look for jobs using the small screen of my mobile phone. And my Nokia E61 has a pretty decent screen. So I dismissed it as a hype, but went after the post anyway.
And lo and behold, I had to change my opinion after reading this paragraph written by Julian Stopps:

At the same time changes in corporate culture have motivated employees to migrate their job seeking off the PC and onto the mobile phone. The tightening of business policies and attitudes towards acceptable Internet usage has resulted in companies restricting access to career sites from office computers. Employees who wish to conduct their job hunt over lunch now have little option but to use an Internet cafe or their mobile device.

Well, I am looking intensively for a job from my own computer and wouldn't want to migrate to mobile. But now I see why other people might want to. Always question your assumptions.

2008-08-15T03:08:00.000-07:00

This is the great team I have been working since June. During this project, we have interviewed all 5 Business Units of Heraeus to establish the technology fields we would look at, I developed an online algorithm for skimming the internet, we identified over a hundred information providers, had interviews with high profile professionals in 3 international high-tech corporations and got in touch with at least 2 VC firms.
There is still a lot of work to be done (like preparing the final presentation and actually writing the thesis), but I am very happy with the results so far, considering all the other paralel activities that have taken place (like job search and rowing competition) during this period.

Another Mannheim night scene

2008-08-08T02:58:00.000-07:00

View of the train station.

Intercultural tidbit

2008-08-08T01:46:00.000-07:00

I just happened to write down today's date on a (unfortunate) bill I just paid:

08.08.08

In Chinese, that's 八八八 (bā bā bā). And eight is a very lucky number in China.

So I guess that it is not merely coincidence that the Chinese olympic games start today.

The castle at night

2008-08-03T11:38:00.000-07:00

One of the nice things of studying in Mannheim is certainly the castle where the university is located. I especially like to take pictures of it at night.

Short observation during the rowing competition

2008-08-03T04:35:00.000-07:00

Yesterday we had a group of WHU MBAs visiting for a rowing event and get together. As I had observed in Berlin, the Spanish speaking croud (5 to 6 people) quickly came together. I do understand Spanish fairly well, but have a bit more trouble speaking, which makes me quieter than I would usually be in a conversation in German, Portuguese or English. Besides that me being quieter might be a good thing, It made me ponder that Brazil and Brazilians would be better off if the oficial language was also Spanish. Communication, especially with our neighbours, would be so more simple, with positive effects in all fields.
Brazil stands as the biggest and only Portuguese speaking in Latin America. I wonder if the unique language has some value as a differentiating factor. I am not sure, curious to see what others think.

The maritime career value chain

2008-08-01T10:59:00.000-07:00

Great representation found on the website www.maritimecareers.com.sg, sent to me by a great friend.

Being a shipbuilding engineer (or naval architect), I am always keeping an eye on the industry.

Project office

2008-07-29T13:41:00.000-07:00

Thats us working on the master thesis at the new Mannheim Business School facilities at the Dalberg Platz, N2.

Networking on Accounting through the WBS intranet

2008-07-26T00:05:00.000-07:00

I just followed a discussion on WBS' intranet and wanted to share one piece of advice by my friend Singean. The intranet platform at WBS is, for some reason, the one which students use more effectively. The intranet at Queen's was high quality too and the one at MBS is very functional, although old fashioned (they are changing that, though). Maybe it is because of the big number of Distance Learning students who use the intranet as their main source of interaction. In any case, at WBS the contact between the different master courses is much stronger than at the other schools.
But back to accounting, I am publishing the question which started the discussion and one of the answers to it. I hope that the authors don't mind.

Greetings Everyone,

I was looking for a bit of advice and thought that I would try to reach out to the accountants out there ...

I am doing some consutancy for a small business that has a very healthy turnover and some fairly big clients - unfortunately they have no administration in place and there seems to be a fair amount of loss through the lack of control.

I was wondering if any of you can spare a moment to give some advice about what would be the best accounting package to put them on -

I have been looking at Peach Tree and Quick Books - as it turns out though quick books apparently fails to handle currencies ... has anyone got any suggestions? Please bear in mind I am not an accountant and I may end up having to set the whole thing on my own ..

The company has to :

1 Invoice Clients
2. Pay wages
3. Handle Multiple currencies as the TZ shilling is linked to the dollar and they are interchangeable -
4. Buy/sell inventory

- they are a services company

Thanks in advance

Gian

And my friend Singean's response:

Saw this thread and thought I would throw in my full penny worth too. It sounds to me like you are being pushed back on in a very classic way. Be very careful with any claims that "everything will be okay or nothing can be done until the new software comes". This is a very common excuse for poor performance which conveniently masks any need to improve things in the present. Software is just a tool not a panacea.

The start of controlling is to make sure you sit with people and make sure what they are doing actually makes sense, you don't need to be an accountant or have fancy software to do that. If you are reasonably bright and you still can't understand it then probably something is wrong. You can begin this process now without the software being in place.

Just go and sit at peoples desks and have people explain to you what they do, follow a couple of specific transactions all the way through the system. Tell tale things to look out for is if ever you hear the following: someone says they do something "because it's just like that", or "for historic reasons', or they do it "unofficially" then you need to circle back on the point later as there is a very good chance you have a financial leakage just at that point. I suggest you don't jump on the first instance of suspected leakage you see but instead quietly take a note of it because otherwise you will never get to see what is happening further downstream.

Don't expect to win many buddies doing this as unfortunately you may expect significant resistance and avoidance but if you are patient you will gradually regain control of the business. If you do not regain control first then you can buy the best software in the world and it still won't help you.

Good luck with it.

Singean
FTMBA 08

Starting-up

2008-07-16T23:05:00.000-07:00

At Queen's University I wrote a lot about start-ups. I decided that I would write start-up like this, with the dash. Not startup nor start up. Start-up.
And now I am involved with start-ups again. First for my master thesis at the Heraeus Corporate Development department. We are developing a technology scouting strategy and are naturally looking at start-ups. I am using Yahoo! Pipes and Twitter for a part of the project, let's see if it works.
Then I was contacted by a start-up looking for managerial talent to invite as founding members. It is in the area of social networks, which I find very interesting.
And today I read the following article at VentureHacks which deals with the situation above, so a link is appropriate.

I have a job offer at a startup, am I getting a good deal? Part 1

And all Mannheim MBAs are invited for lunch at EO at 12:30 today.

View Larger Map

Internet and cell phones in Mannheim

2008-07-15T01:12:00.000-07:00

Sandeep, who is planning to start an MBA here in Mannheim soon, sent me this question which I thought I wuld answer on the blog.

From: sandeep jain
Date: Mon, Jul 14, 2008 at 21:24

Hi Fernando

How are you doing?

I am sure you must be at a half way to complete your year end company project.

Fernando had a few questions regarding the Internat and mobile technology in Germany.
How about internet at home (provided by Mannheim) is it free of cost or payable. Is it wireless or we have to arrange for the internet on our own?
Mobile technology. Which is the technology used in germany GSM or CDMA. Are mobile services expensive there? Is it a viable option to use for connecting with family in emergencies?

Thank you .......Sandeep Jain

If you are staying at one of the apartments organized by the Mannheim Business School, like I am, then broadband internet is included. In my case, I have a LAN socket and a very long cable in my apartment, which works very well. In other buildings I hear they have wireless LAN connection. So no worries there.
Furthermore, you have wireless LAN connection all over Campus, either through the university's WLAN or through the b-school's own. Some places in Mannheim also offer free WLAN, like the Star coffee shop on N7.

Germany is GSM country, which is very practical, as you can change operators by simply changing SIM cards, as long as your cell phone is not locked. You can either buy a contract (usually 2 years, gets you a free handset for a fixed monthly price plus extra expenses. You might be able to cancel the contract uppon departing Germany, but you have to make sure of that before signing) or, as I prefer, pay as you go or pre-paid plans.
I am a happy customer of Symio, a pre-paid provider based on the internet. Their plans are simple and the prices are good, so far I am happy, even though there was a great deal of confusion when I decided to change from GPRS SIM card to a UMTS one.
This means, of course, that I use my cell phone for internet on the go: maps, e-mail, twitter, reading, news, train schedules, IM, etc. Works pretty well on my Nokia E61 and the Symio internet price is unbeatable: 0,24€ per MB. That means that my weekly internet bills are usually below 2€, even with daily internet use.
Call prices are 0,09€ per minute any number in Germany. To Symio number it is even cheaper, but I have no idea who of my friends also use Symio. And SMS is also 9 cents.
For international calls, I use Skype Out. Other alternatives are the several call shops available downtown and near the train station. rAtes are just cents per minute, if I am not mistaken.
Now let me put a link in this post and continue our project work.

Heraeus

2008-07-01T14:03:00.000-07:00

Yesterday we started the last leg of the MBA course: the company project and dissertation thesis. I am working with two colleagues or, better said, friedns. I am happy with the choice of project and, more importantly, the choice of teams.
It will be strange to take charge of the next two months after having had our schedules taken care of by our great program manager, Susann. But it is time. Classes were great (some not that great, unfortunately), but I was looking forward to the end of the MBA. I feel that I have already gotten all of what I expected to get in the course and want to move on. The project will be a nice extra bonus, for sure.
I will talk about Heraeus and a bit about the project later on, but I am excited to be able to get to know this company from the inside. The products they produce are all very technical, but I felt like a child in their exhibition yesterday in Hanau, so thrilled I was looking at precious metals, quarz glass, miniature and giant sensors, special lamps, dental implants and titanium pacemaker casings.
It is good to be starting once more.

Until the end of the MBA

2008-07-01T09:28:00.000-07:00

Classes are over!

2008-06-27T09:30:00.000-07:00

Just delivered the last assignment for the GIM class 30 minutes ago.
That means that, apart from the Global Supply Chain Management assignment due on Monday, I am done with MBA classes.
I wish I could continue to have classes indefinetely. I like classes. I like to learn, to ask, to discuss. And I like the feeling of beeing worry-free, as the only thing you are supposed to do is pay attention.
ButI need to find a job and to write a thesis. So it is good to be finally able to concentrate on that from now on.
Pity that this last module was, in my humble opinion, way below the level of other modules, so it wasn't very enjoyable. And I was (am) sick.
They are having a reception with champagne and snacks in the next room, I should join them. But I think that my health won't allow me to drink or eat much. That also the reason I am missing out on the Hazmat Modine concert in Stuttgart in an hour. But I should be fine tomorrow.

A week in review

2008-06-23T13:38:00.000-07:00

Well, actually a bit more than a week, as the picture below was taken two Saturdays ago. I went with 2 other colleagues, one Canadian, one French, to a very small town somewhere in the wine lands around here to a wine and castle festival with some live music. The first band was bad, the second was ok. The festival was much smaller than I expected, but the Weinschorle (whine mixed with - little - sparkling water) was plentyful and cheap. The place was called Wachenheim.

Monday saw us rowing again, as well as Wednesday. I believe that I will be able to post better pictures later during the week, as I cannot take my camera in the boat. On Wednesday I tried to row a single boat for the first time and landed 3 times in the water. Of course. But it was warm, so that wasn't a problem.
Monday was also the day when I discovered that my locked bicycle was stolen from the locked bike garage in the locked apartment building. Really upsetting.

On Tuesday I went to an interesting networking event in Stuttgart organized by the BWcon institution, on the role of business angels in start-up financing.

Thursday was a busy day. Career strategy coaching session at the business school and soccer game watching with barbecue in the same location, in company of the students of the EMAT course. It was also the day I got my push scooter as a replacement for the stolen bike.

Germany won, everybody went to the Wasserturm to commemorate.

Saturday saw me taking the train to Idstein, for a Jazz Festival in a very picturesque town. Was really fun with good company. We even did a small rock climbing stunt which reminded me of Dee's blog: Venture to the top.

Barrelhouse Jazz Band in Idstein.

Sunday saw me for some hours in Mainz, and this is the only view I had from the impressive cathedral.

Today the last MBA course for our class and my sixt in Mannheim started: Global Information Management. It started slow with an analysis of Friedman's "The world is flat" text.
The afternoon was a bit more exciting, with a quick (and I mean quick: 1000 years in 1 hour) review of the world's history based on economic cores and a tentative look on how the world might look like in the next 50 years. I am curious to see how the course progresses and how today's class integrates with the rest of the course's material.

We went to rowing practice again and I spent half an hour in the single boat once more, this time returning safe and dry to land.

And tomorrow I will be the CIO of Volkswagen of America, at least during the case study discussion.

The browser war

2008-06-18T00:50:00.000-07:00

Firefox 3 is out now. And I just came accross this comment on Internet Explorer at one of the websites I use:

What can we say, the divide between Explorer 6 and the rest of the world is becoming gargantuan. Sorry Explorer 6 users, Passpack will work for you, but it’s just never going to be fast for you.

Firefox 3 seems nice. But I have Firefox 2 working now more or less stable, even with a ton of add-ons installed, especially for working better with Gmail.
The questionis: am I ready for Firefox 3??

Plans for tomorrow: meeting angels

2008-06-16T02:38:00.000-07:00

There is a kind of an institute in Stuttgart aimed towards start-up companies which has a series of interesting events for those who want to learn a bit more about the venture capital industry in Germany.

I am going tomorrow to the following event, if everything works out:

bwcon: Business Roundtable „Was macht ein Business Angel? – Unterstützungsansätze für Technologieunternehmen am Beispiel der FUZZY! Informatik AG“

I have this week free, as I am not taking the EC Law course at Mannheim Business School and the activity tomorrow is part of my job search. I hope to learn some and meet interesting professionals, let's see how it goes. But all this has costs:

I will not be able to attend to the company presentation of Deutsche Börse AG at MBS and
I will invest almost €100,00 in the event, which, at the moment, is a considerable sum for a student with a bank loan like me

But it should be worth it. No pain, no gain.

Europameisterschaft

2008-06-14T01:07:00.000-07:00

We had yet again another nice get together at the Villa, this time to watch the soccer games.

TED talks on collaboration

2008-06-13T04:24:00.000-07:00

I have been twittering that I am listening to some of the TED talks on www.ted.com. I had been doing this for a while, but after having classes on Innovation Management with Lib Gibson, a TED participant, at Queen's School of Business, I started watching more often.
The way it works for me is to let the video roll while I am cleaning the apartment or folding clothes. Multitasking.

I just watched a video I wanted to share, because it condenses a lot of what I have been observing in the past 2 zears on and off line. The topic is collaboration, in a comercial and in an altruistic sense. There are great developments going on and great chances to take advantage of, in the most positive sense.

If you got interested in the talks and the topic, check out a short list of videos the people from Nokia Labs, about whom I wrote in an assignment for Lib's class, have put together:

http://betalabs.nokia.com/blog/2008/06/09/ted-talks-the-rise-of-collaboration/

Now let me go back to search for a job in a company who believes in this kind of philosophy.

Creative Commons License

2008-06-11T12:43:00.000-07:00

I just added a Creative Commons License to this blog.
I believe in free content (and this is free content) and I believe in copyright. What I don't believe in is the way copyright, patents and trademarks are often being used.
The aim of all three mechanisms is to foster innovation, to incentivise people to put their creativity into use. Unfortunately, these mechanisms are often being used to do exactly the opposite: suffocate creativity and innovation.
It is there that creative commons enters the picture and hopefully changes the way people think about copyright.

The symbols above tell you that it is ok to use the content found here and even change it. Provided you follow some conditions:

Attribution.
You must attribute the work in the manner specified by the author or licensor (but not in any way that suggests that they endorse you or your use of the work).
Noncommercial.
You may not use this work for commercial purposes.
Share Alike.
If you alter, transform, or build upon this work, you may distribute the resulting work only under the same or similar license to this one

For any reuse or distribution, you must make clear to others the license terms of this work. The best way to do this is with a link to this web page.
Any of the above conditions can be waived if you get permission from the copyright holder. Nothing in this license impairs or restricts the author's moral rights.

The definitions above I have taken from this page:
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.0/de/deed.en

I wish I could be in Montreal on the 26th

2008-06-11T12:22:00.000-07:00

And see this concert:

Pat Bergeson

26 Jun 2008, 20:00
Montreal Jazz Festival

With Annie sellick and the Hot Club of nashville featuring Richard smith, Aron Till and Charlie Chadwick and Pat bergeson Opening for Leonard cohen

I just found out about Pat through the Seydel newsletter. Besides being an extraordinary harmonica player, he is also a great guitar player, guitar being his main instrument. And he is opening for Leonard Cohen, which also should be quite interesting.

But I went to Canada during the wrong season for music festivals, definetely.

First Place for the Seventh Time in a Row for the Business School of the University of Mannheim

2008-06-09T02:13:00.000-07:00

From Mannheim Business School News:

The Handelsblatt magazine “Junge Karriere” attested the Business School of the University of Mannheim a “remarkable distance” to the university in second place. In the estimation of 57.8% of the German HR managers, the best business students are educated in Mannheim. The authors describe the school and the whole university as a “trendsetter in internationality”. They mention the international semester times and the increasing number of exchange programs. “Of course, such distinguished conditions do not remain hidden from HR managers in business.” As a further plus point, the magazine points to the practical orientation of the business courses at Mannheim.

The Handelsblatt ranking is already the second piece of proof in 2008 of the exceptional status enjoyed by the University of Mannheim in the field of Business Administration. A few weeks ago, it had already received the best rating in the ranking of the prestigious German CHE (Centre for Higher Education Development) and was the only institution in the German speaking countries to receive top places in all five categories.

GSC article I wrote published on the BearingPoint blog

2008-06-06T08:10:00.000-07:00

Some of you know that I use to twitter (that is, when its servers are up). And I do comment on the MBA course. And it was exactly one twit on the global supply chain course that got the attention of BearingPoint's Interactive Marketing team in the US. They twittered me back and asked if I was interested in writing an article on GSC. And so I did and you can see the result at the New Thinking BearingPoint blog:

http://newthinking.bearingpoint.com/2008/06/04/global-supply-chain-the-next-frontier/

I guess you will recognize the picture there.

BearingPoint is a company I want to apply for, so I am happy for the contact that I have had with them so far. During the GSC course we had a one day workshop with Sven Martin, a manager working in Switzerland, I have had the chance to talk to other consultants during career fairs and now this online collaboration. Way to go.

Summer ball at the Warwick Business School

2008-06-05T13:29:00.000-07:00

This would be something I would like to be able to take part in. But I am not. So all of you who can go, enjoy!

Join us for the annual SUMMER BALL!!

Saturday 19 July, 7.30pm - late
For tickets please visit www.wbs.ac.uk/go/summerball

The luxurious Lakeside Marquee here at Warwick Business School will provide the perfect backdrop for this Summer Ball, including an evening of cocktails, fine dining, charming company, dancing & more. Following an indulgent culinary experience you can dance the night away until the early hours. The Ball is a black tie event and is open to all members of the WBS community, their friends, colleagues and family.

Comparisson of gross and net salaries in Germany

2008-06-05T02:03:00.000-07:00

I have been checking the site lohnspiegel.de. It has, besides a very complete database of salaries, a tool to calculate the net salary dependent on some variables.
Being single and independent, I am classified as Steuerklasse I, that is, tax category I.
Take a look at the chart below. It shows the monthly net income according to gross yearly salaries. Below the yearly salary you will see the percentage of taxes and other duties in relation to gross salary. Figures in Euro.

Another shipbuilding flashback

2008-06-04T14:46:00.000-07:00

I was taking a look at the pictures I took in 2004 in China, and decided to share this one with you. It was taken on the second day of the sea trials of the Messidor, the ship I helped build. The sea trials are an important event in shipbuilding. It means that the ship is mostly ready and all important systems are tested in real work conditions. It was a fascinating event, lasting more than three days at sea.

New album online: BBQ at the Villa

2008-06-02T02:04:00.000-07:00

Check it out here:
http://picasaweb.google.de/ferbress/080530BBQVilla

Below some preview pics for you.

From 080530 BBQ Villa

080530 BBQ Villa

Fox in the park

2008-06-02T01:34:00.000-07:00

This is the first time I have ever seen a real fox (we don't have them in Brazil, you know? Just lobos guarás...) from this close, so I had to document it, even if the pictures got blurry.
I guess that it must like the park, with the dozens of bunnies living there...

Smells like shipbuilding

2008-05-27T23:20:00.000-07:00

The new Mannheim Business School rooms in N2 still smell a bit after paint. This is a smell I am very familiar with, having spent months inspecting paint jobs in the building of the Messidor bulk carrier (picture)in Nantong, China. This smell actually reminds me of a very interesting phase of my life.
The other smells that evokes similar memories is the smell of steel grinding and welding. But I don't expect to find these smells in the business school

The new MBS Education Center Dalbergplatz

2008-05-26T13:58:00.000-07:00

Here are some pictures of the inside of the premises at Mannheim Business School. These pictures were taken in the third floor, but the fourth floor is set up similarly. Some things still have to be finished, like the wifi, the printing room. But it is good to have air conditioning.

From 080526 New pr...

Trip to Speyer

2008-05-25T07:34:00.000-07:00

Yesterday we went to Speyer, about 20 min by train from Mannheim, where our colleague Marc (who was with be in Canada and lived in the room next to mine) lives.

080524 Speyer

First we walked around the city and Marc showed us the nicest places. Then we spent some hours in a very nice and German restaurant before heading back to Mannheim, arriving after midnight.

Another beer reference

2008-05-25T07:32:00.000-07:00

I myself don't drink beer, but it is always interesting to get such a message from the course coordination:

Due to the size the class will be divided into two groups on Tuesday and Wednesday. While group 1 will have the PC Exercise on Tuesday and the Beer Game on Wednesday, group 2 will have the Beer Game on Tuesday and the PC Exercise on Wednesday.

Mannheim Business School's new Education Center preview

2008-05-25T07:10:00.000-07:00

Starting tomorrow, we will have classes in the new MBS premisses. I went there to check the address today and took these pictures. If the building seems to be distorted, it is, I stitched pictures together.

Note the Biergarten in the lower part of the building. Convenience?

The bad side of the job search

2008-05-21T04:05:00.000-07:00

It is a lot of work. Each application I send out takes up to one hour to be ready. It consists of e-mail, cover letter, CV and additional documents. All bundled up in a pretty PDF document. I try to tailor the applications to each firm, as the fit varies from company to company. Templates work only in a limited sense.
The wait. You have to keep up with the applications you sent out, give follow up calls or send follow up e-mails. Keep track of what worked and what didn't. Find the balance between showing interest and being annoying.
Being turned down. You know you want to work for the company in the position you applied for, or in a similar position. You are sure you can adapt and learn quick to cover for the fields where you could improve to be a better fit for the company. But you cannot always get that across with a set of documents and you get rejected.

At least some companies are polite enough to send you an e-mail giving you their final decision in clear words, like the example below. Others just don't bother. Others, like McKinsey, go the the extra step and give you a personalized feedback, provided you ask for it.
But, in the end, you have to get used to receiving e-mails like the following:

Dear Mr. Bresslau,

Thank you for your letter of application of 14th May.

We are pleased that you are interested in working with us. Your excellent background would certainly benefit many employers.

Although your credentials are definitely impressive, they do not specifically meet our current needs.

We will however keep your CV for future reference.

Thank you once again for your interest and we wish you the best of luck in your employment search.

With best regards,

The good side of the job search

2008-05-21T04:01:00.000-07:00

So far, job search has been going well. I am primarily interested in two areas:

Venture Capital and growth Private Equity
Strategic management consulting, technology and innovation oriented

I have had two interviews so far. One in each area, one in Frankfurt and another over the phone. So far, so good. I am invited for a follow up interview for one of them and am waiting for a decision by the second company. I am also scheduled for another interview with a third company in June.

This is all exciting an I am looking very positively into the future. I am sure that I will get multiple offers and that I hope to have the peace of mind to choose the company which is a better fit in a long term perspective for me.

Opportunity cost

2008-05-19T15:10:00.000-07:00

This is what I call the real opportunity cost of living far away from my family:

Last time I saw Henrique, my nephew, he was a new born baby who had just undergone heart surgery. Now, after another surgery in January, he is really fine, as you all can surely see.
And here is another picture of Henrique which I put online several months ago.
Yes, I really hope I can make it to Brazil after the MBA.
BTW, I was listening to all this through skype, while my sister was filming. I felt strangely close. Technology helps a lot.

First hour of International Finance

2008-05-19T00:38:00.000-07:00

Cool to see more friends from abroad here: Omo, Jake, Valmiki and Andson from Warwick are here.
Then we have some new people I still have to get to know better: Laure, Tom, Hiba.
And we have some old friends showing up again: NPV, WACC, IRR...
Let's see how it goes.

Time zones

2008-05-16T16:41:00.000-07:00

Just figured out that the blog was still in Toronto.
But I changed the time zone to Berlin, publishing times are right now.
The question is: when am I going to change time zones again and which one will be the next?

Good moment for Brazil?

2008-05-16T16:34:00.000-07:00

After spending the whole day dealing with simulation data about Brazil, here are two positive hard facts about my country's economy:

The stock exchange reached it's highest level ever. The Bovespa closed today at 72766 points.
The dollar is at its lowest level since soon after the Real has been floated, nine years ago, at R$ 1,642.

Let's hope this trickles down to better employment levels and standards of living.

Simulation over and it seems we won

2008-05-16T16:05:00.000-07:00

The simulation wasn't as nerve wrecking as I expected it to be. I guess this was because of the very well balanced team I ended up in. And a very beautiful team, as I am sure you all will agree.

The good news is that our group made the most profits selling American tooth paste in Latin America and we won the competition, getting a bottle of Chilean wine as prize. And good marks too, I hope! We didn't have the most sales, but, in the end, the money that ends up in the stockholders' pockets is what counts, right?

Some tips for future participants:

Be clear where you want to start, how and why.
Develop a good idea which countries to enter in the next rounds to have a general strategic direction.
Don't compete on price. Invest in advertisement and promotion, keep an eye on the margin.
Take a closer look at wholesalers and deploy fewer sales people to traditional retail.
Go for big markets. Early on.
Keep number of markets and SKUs low, to make situation review and decision input stay in a manageable time frame. Keep comlexity low.
Make notes for your final report during the simulation.
No real need for laptops. One extra computer per team is more than enough.
Use benchmarks. Compare with the competition.
Don't build up too much capacity at first.

A conservative approach worked for us. But I am curious what would happened if we had gone to all markets at the same time. Or entered one market with all SKUs. Or tried only the web shopping channel.

Thanks, team "Operación latina"!

International Marketing course in Mannheim

2008-05-15T16:09:00.000-07:00

This is going to be a short post. But suffice it to say that I have had another enjoyable week at MBS. It was not an easy week and I am writing although I should be sleeping to prepare for the International Marketing Strategy Simulation tomorrow, but the course has been really good, again. I am happy with my choices, so far.
It is a very high content course, building nicely on the material of Cross-Cultural Management and International Management. We used concepts from both courses often. But I am glad that the lectures' part of the course is over. We had 404 slides in 3 days, but still have to actually discount the time of the 6 case presentations (15 minutes, plus at least 10 minutes discussion each) from the overall discussion time.
Now remains the question of how to review so many slides. And I have to admit, every slide was there for a reason and they were well used, so the unusually high number is justified.
But let me go to sleep. It has been a long day and I have to wake up early tomorrow to do some reading before class.
And some good news: I am scheduling interviews with two other companies, my efforts from last week are paying off.

Another Mannheim scene

2008-05-11T11:25:00.000-07:00

The weather has been great here in Mannheim for the past several weeks, and Mannheim has been a great place to be around and take a stroll to a park from time to time. This is the square at the Wasserturm, which I had seen only from the other side until today.

Looking back at a musical period

2008-05-11T03:03:00.000-07:00

I've played in two bands so far, both in Brazil. Unfortunately, since I got back to Germany, I didn't find bands to play with. So my musical activity has been limited to playing in my room, on the streets and in the corridors of different Business Schools around the globe. I've had the odd jam session of open mic from time to time, too.

I was looking into my music library today and found the crude recordings of some of the concerts of the second band I played with, Bunker 292 Acústico. The band was composed by a singer, a guitar player, another guitar player and myself on the harmonica. The singer and first guitar player were my cousins, and we used only acoustic instruments, which made rehearsing very easy. As a curiosity, all band members were from German decent, and a mix of German and Portuguese during rehearsals was common.

I had great fun playing with them on Sunday afternoons, which encourages me to try to get into a band as soon as possible. I am realistic enough to know that I won't be doing that while the MBA lasts, but I think music will continue to be an important part of my work/life balance (a theme that is very trendy at the moment).

Below you will find one of those recordings, I hope you enjoy it. It is already almost 5 years old and it was one of our first live concerts, so forgive any mistakes and the recording quality. ~~The all~~All band members have gotten much better now, I believe.

Plush

My career week

2008-05-10T01:40:00.000-07:00

The "Business and Corporate Taxation in Europe" was one of the modules that I decided not take here at Mannheim Business School. We have 10 courses to choose at least 6 from. I know it is important to understand taxation mechanisms and strategies, but I figured that, if this becomes important to me one day, I'll know how to learn it on my own.
That meant that the week was class free for me. But not free. I focused on my starting job search, which needs a lot of time and effort to start well. The good thing is that, so far, so good. I have had some really positive responses to applications and conversations I had in the past months and believe that getting a job won't be a problem. Getting THE job though, is another story.

The week and the picture series started in Frankfurt, where I was invited for an initial interview with a PE (Private Equity) firm. The interview went well and it was good to have a feel of the kind of environment that will await me, if, as I intend to, get into Venture Capital or PE. In June we will have the second round, with other partners, so I guess that they liked what they saw.

On Tuesday I went to the excellent Konaktiva career fair in Darmstadt. It is organized by students, but extremely professional and organized.

I especially enjoyed the pannels where they brought 5 companies together, gave each company 5 minutes presentation time and then opened the floor for questions from the audience. A very good way of getting the feel of the companies, especially the smaller ones one doesn't get much info about from the media.
I was lucky and the Tuesday was the consulting day, so I was able to talk to several companies and get relevant recruitment contact information.

And during the fair I met a former colleague of mine from Brazil. He got into the Escola Politécnica during my last year there and came later to Darmstadt to do his double degree in Germany and Brazil. At the time he was here, we did not meet and I thought that he had long ago gone back to Brazil. So it was a surprise to meet him again in Germany. As cliché as it sounds, the world is really a small place.

I was back on Tuesday evening for the recruitment presentation of BASF at MBS. It was a good and interesting presentation and I enjoyed to talk with the global VP of procurement, a very open minded guy.
The rest of the week I invested in getting things done and applying for different companies, after doing the necessary research of the firms. This takes much more time and energy than I expected, and I wasn't really satisfied with my progress. But yesterday morning I had a very productive day, so it compensated some.

On Friday afternoon the whole class was invited to a company visit and fancy dinner in the evening.
The tour started with the very interesting Visitors' Center, a kind of an interactive museum about chemistry and BASF. I had loads of fun and, if time permits, I might go back to see it with more time.
Very nice was their multimedia table pictured below. I noticed that they used multiple media projectors in several installations and who designed these system really had some very nice ideas. Not to mention that the implementation was excellent.

But the dinner afterwards was the important event for those, like me, who are interested in working for the company (BASF has VC and New Business divisions). It was held in the fancy Casino, the company owned restaurant just outside the complex, in Ludwigshafen.

It was a good opportunity to talk to some of the employees at BASF and to some really senior recruiters, with the knowledge that you were pitching to somebody who really new what kind of people they wanted and what positions were available.

And it was not only a fancy dinner, but a really enjoyable one, where I had the opportunity to talk a lot to some of my MBA colleagues, including an American exchange student, in a different setting.
The only pity was that I wasn't able to go to Heidelberg meet a good Brazilian friend and catch the great hildesheimer blues band "B. B. & the Bluesshacks".

But, all in all, it was a good week, with even an offer to work part time as an MBA coach and GMAT trainer for aspiring MBA candidates. I don't know yet if I will be able to make time for it, but, if the pay is good, it will be an interesting way to put some of the knowledge I have gathered in the last year to good use. Let's see how it goes.

The 2008 International Management Class

2008-05-04T11:30:00.000-07:00

Originally posted on May 1st, 2008.
And Dr. Perlitz at the left. It was a good week, I just hope that the exam tomorrow is OK.

Pradeep sent me the picture taken with his camera, and I think the quality is better, so here it is.

My apartment in Mannheim

2008-05-04T04:23:00.000-07:00

I had already taken some pictures of the apartment the day I arrived, but I lost those pictures and the pictures of my last day in Canada with a careless key stroke.
So, after having putting my apartment in order again today morning, I took new ones. I hope this gives prospective Mannheim Business School MBA students a good idea of what kind of accommodations they can expect from MBS here in Mannheim.

080504 apartment

Link:
http://picasaweb.google.de/ferbress/080504Apartment

A day out

2008-05-03T17:38:00.000-07:00

This picture was taken in the park by the River Rhein, today in the evening. We had a barbecue there and, coincidentally, we three had our gray Queens' T-shirts on, I couldn't miss the opportunity.
The day started with a trip to Heidelberg and a boat trip to Neckarsteinach and back.
And, to finish it off, party at night at the Schneckenhof.
It is really good to have weekly subject which end with the exam on the Friday. We have the weekend off. But tomorrow is job search day, nonetheless.

International Management

2008-04-28T22:31:00.000-07:00

The first class of International Management went well. Now the classis much bigger than before and we are having the class in another room. Not as ideal as before, but still good chairs, good desks and a good projector. What else do you need? No power sockets for lap tops, though, and I believe that the students are concentrating more, now.

And the main reason is certainly the professor. Dr. Dr. Perlitz is a very dynamic professor with great experience, both academic and as a consultant, and even lectured for 6 months at COPEAD, in Rio de Janeiro. I have enjoyed the first class and believe that this is going to be a great course. But now I have to read a case and answer the questions below.

Pre-exam lunch on Friday

2008-04-27T13:33:00.000-07:00

This was my study room for the Cross-cultural Management exam on Friday. The weather was nice, but not as warm as I had wished, so I retreated to the class room after a few minutes.

The university building

2008-04-26T23:13:00.000-07:00

This is the building where we have our classes at the Mannheim University. It is truly a castle (or maybe, more adequately, a palace) and is gigantic. The feeling of crossing the main court at midnight is something. A completely different feeling, but also quite interesting, is walking around in the castle during the day, crossing with many students and bicycles.
I am off to Heidelberg today. Later I will pick up another exchange colleague who is arriving for the International Management course next week.
The picture is a stitch of 7 individual photos.

"Graduation Talks Accentuate the Positive"

2008-04-26T04:52:00.000-07:00

A BusinessWeek article for you. I didn't figure out if the writer is of the opinion that the time is good or bad for MBAs. I think the author didn't want to commit. But somewhat interesting, anyway.

The topics of the commencement addresses range from detailed tips for grads about managing their new careers to discussions of economic ideologies and life philosophies to finding the ever-elusive work-life balance.

Busy

2008-04-23T22:38:00.000-07:00

Great news, I am busy again. So, just to make a bit of peace with my publishing conscience, I}ll upload a nice photo of the group chilling last week.

But it has been a good week, so far. The course is OK, the new exchange colleagues really nice, as is the weather, and I have been talking to some recruiter, including a feedback talk with McKinsey, an interview appointment settlement in Frankfurt and a headhunter from overseas.
But now I have to go, pre-class meeting with the presentation group.
Ah, the picture is a stitch of 3 individual images.

The first week of classes in Mannheim

2008-04-20T14:32:00.000-07:00

Tomorrow we are going to see how these weekly course are going to work out. Startin with Cross-Cultural Management, the electives in Mannheim are going to be taught in 5 days, only one week. We will have classes in the mornings and afternoons, the evenings being reserved for readings and team work.
I am a bit anxious about the whole thing. Having courses in only two weeks at Queen's University was already pretty tough, especially when we had double classes in the afternoon, for six long hours in a row. In the Mannheim case, this will be the rule, with the difference that we will have a lunch break inbetween.
Another characteristic of these courses is that you start the course on Monday and write an exam on Friday. I am sure that this will be the perfect system for some people and the worst nightmare possible for others. I hope that I belong to the former grou ;-)

Tomorrow we will also meet several of our colleagues from the partner schools. Today I meet the Queen's group, all are staying here at my apartment building. Three of them are going to take the course tomorrow, plus two ladies from Warwick Business School, who have already arrived also. This will certainly be fun!

Oh yes, and the weather was great today, finally!

MBA Career Fair 2008 - Berlin

2008-04-16T05:38:00.000-07:00

The MBA Career Fair is an event organized by top Business Schools in the German speaking region to present their students to select companies every year. This year we had the participation of Mannheim Business School, HHL, WHU, GISMA and Sankt Gallen, from Switzerland.

As you have read before, we traveled to Berlin one day in advance, last Sunday. We used the afternoon for the very nice visit to the Reichstag building (Parliament) and had a monotonous but very funny and informative lecture on the building itself and the Parliament (Bundestag).

The first picture shows some of the Mannheimers at the dinner we had with all other schools on Sunday evening. It was a pleasant event and the food was nice. I had much fun choosing a random table with people I didn't know and inviting myself to sit. This way I was able to meet some people from the GISMA and Sankt Gallen schools, while most MBAs stayed in tables with their own colleagues.
Another interesting observation I made was that people were eager to find people either from their own country or, at least, speaking the same language. Two groups quickly formed: Russian speakers and Spanish speakers, and I even met Massimo, an Italian who spoke Portuguese very well, surprisingly.

But Monday was the day. It was the day of the fair, the workshops and the interviews. And it all started with a workshop by Johnson & Johnson.
Their workshop was an interesting way of bringing the company's values and culture closer to the candidates. The first part was a short introduction of Johnson & Johnson and a longer explanation about their credo and the 4 pillars it is based on: customers, employees, communities and shareholders. The moderator told us that the order isn't important, but I read employee accounts where they actually think this order, if it were a priority, would be a great way to prioritize the company's values.
After this presentation we were divided into two groups to analyze the decision of a particular manager to close or not to close a particular plant. It was a very short case, only one page and, as expected, very little hard data, which made the groups struggle a bit with coming to a final answer. But it was exactly this lack of data which made the discussion afterwards very interesting, and I found the task of defending the group's conclusion, even though it differed a bit from my own, interesting and actually fun.

The interviews were also mostly quite interesting. The companies had received the CVs of all students of the participating schools for review and invited those they were most interested in for formal interviews.
I was lucky and got 3 interviews. A curious one, and interesting one and an odd one.
The curious one was for a sales role for a manufacturer of vertical transportation solutions. I can certainly see myself as a sales person, although I am not actively looking for such positions. But I certainly will consider the chance, if the interview bears fruit.

The interesting one was for a leadership development program for a fast growing consumer product catalog and on line sales organization. I can see good opportunities for growth and professional development in the company, so am hoping for a contact.

And the odd interview was with a major IT consultancy. Well, I do work with computers and believe that I understand IT technology quite well, but I certainly don't have a background in the area and was very surprised to see myself in their interview list. I went to the interview with an open mind, they might have been seeking people for non-IT areas of their huge company.
It started well: the interviewer told me from the beginning that he had not been able to read my CV in advance and asked me to deliver my pitch. Not knowing what job I was being considered for, I gave him a very generic version of my vita. He quickly came to the conclusion that I didn't have the content he was looking for, and politely told me so. That didn't surprise me, so I took the opportunity to ask for some feedback about the story I delivered.
I have to say that I was amused to hear that he had expected a structured approach focused on his business area and a consulting position. Well, if he had told me such details beforehand, I would have... So I almost had the feeling that, because they were mightily unprepared, we both had lost time. But practice is always good and his feedback was valuable, so I left the room in a good mood.

The last aspect of the fair were the stands in the exhibition space of the hotel. There we had the opportunity to visit the companies' booths, talk to recruiting personnel and get company literature and goodies. Like a normal career fair but, this time, the recruiters were actively interested in MBAs.
The companies also had the possibility to deliver presentations in two different auditoriums and the one I saw, by J&J, was quite good.
So, all in all, it was a good event. It certainly was tiring, especially the travel back to Mannheim - we left Berlin at 21:00 and arrived in Mannheim at 04:30 - but really worthwhile. I did make good contacts with companies and students and had very good opportunities to practice my interview skills, so I am quite content and looking forward to another event in early May.

Berlin

2008-04-15T04:11:00.000-07:00

We went to Berlin on a class trip on Sunday and visited the Reichstag building, where the German parliament, the Bundestag, meets.
It was an interesting visit, followed by a dinner with students from 4 other German MBAs, as a preparation for the Career Fair on Monday, which was quite interesting. More on all that and other pictures later.

Some extra pictures from Mannheim

2008-04-12T11:21:00.000-07:00

I went out today to do some more shopping, this time food and cleaning utensils. I also wanted to take advantage of the weather, which was very nice, sunny at around 15°C. So I walked around the city center and across the bridge to a flea market, 5 km away. It was time well spent.

080412 Markt und Flohmarkt

Capgemini Workshop

2008-04-12T11:12:00.000-07:00

Capgemini came to Mannheim Business School to deliver a Consulting Skills workshop this Friday. It was an invitation event, you had to submit a letter of motivation and your CV to be chosen. I am glad I was one of the 16 participants.
The Capgemini team consisted of 4 people, from all levels, from consultant to principal. They were all very open and friendly and conducted the workshop in a very professional manner, as was to be expected.
The group was divided in 4 teams and each team had one Capgemini consultant as observer and moderator. The feedback they gave us was on spot, but, as a colleague of mine said in the last portion of the event, they were too kind to us.
For example, one of the exercises consisted in proving or disproving a set of assumptions or hypotheses. I did very well in explaining the assumption with relevant data, but didn't really check if the assumption was true to begin with. I talked to one of the consultants later and he confirmed that he had noticed that, but they didn't comment on it when we presented. I guess they don't want to scare any of us away with negative feedback. After all, this was a recruiting event.
I liked the people at Capgemini and am certainly going to apply. I received some encouraging feedback in the end, let's see how it goes.
All in all, the whole day event was well planned, with a good mix of theory and practical exercises, which were well chosen. I certainly learned some, got to know the company a bit better and had fun doing it.

My apartment building in Mannheim

2008-04-08T13:44:00.000-07:00

These are some views of my apartment building. I'll show you the interior after I have brought some order to the post-travel chaos.

The park across the street

2008-04-08T13:39:00.000-07:00

The university's cafeteria. A meal costs around €5 there, without drinks.

The park with the castle, where the university is housed, in the background

I live just across the palace park next to the university. It is a 10 minutes walk and, this time of the year, quite nice. It is quite chilly in the morning, though, but sunny, at least. But I am curious to see if we will have snow again, like, surprisingly, yesterday.

Uni Mannheim Career Fair

2008-04-08T13:33:00.000-07:00

So today was the first day of the Mannheim Career Fair. Comparing to similar events at the engineering school of the University of São Paulo, it was quite small.

In Brazil the event was organized by the junior consultancy company run by students and I helped organize its 8th edition.
The selection of companies was good, though, I must admit. At least for me, interested in Management Consulting and it was really good to do the rounds with my Russian speaking colleagues Viktoria and Tatjana, who were with me in Canada. I found it easier and nicer to talk to the companies' representatives in couples. And the good news is that they really seem interested to hire this year.
In the evening we had a Capgemini employee presenting the company to our class and I liked this activity too. I will take part in a consulting workshop with them on Friday, the whole day.

MBA turns 100 years old

2008-04-08T12:42:00.000-07:00

That's a lot of candles to blow.

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/0fdb78d4-03e5-11dd-b28b-000077b07658.html