Is this two years?

Wow, this really feels strange!

After two years I'm done with my MBA, what a bittersweet feeling (actually more bitter than sweet). On the one hand I am happy to be graduating on the other hand it is very sad to be done and to not be around this incredible group of people everyday!

It has been an amazing time!

I learned a ton, had a lot of fun, accomplished my goals, but most importantly meet so many great people and made wonderful friends!

Ross is indeed a very special place, which I will miss a lot!

I can't thank all of you enough, who made this experience so special!

Now looking forward to the summer and from August being back in Ann Arbor for the next chapter!

Barcelona

It has been a long time I wrote something here, but I do not only have an excuse, I even have a reason!

I spend January to April studying at IESE in Barcelona as part of an exchange program.

Ideally I would now tell you that I was so busy studying, I could not keep this blog updated, but that would not be entirely true. Let's just say that while I was reasonably busy studying and that the five day weekend is not a bad concept!

So really what kept me from spending time here was the city of Barcelona.

What a wonderful place, especially in spring!

Since pictures say more than a thousand words .... (ok, yes I am also a bit lazy!)

Oh yeah, I saw this sports team play.

I was told they play soccer. However, this is not the same game of "soccer" I have seen in stadiums before.

So I am still wondering about that and neither FC Basel fans nor Saturday's game helped.

It has been a wonderful few months in Barcelona, especially since I met a group of great people from IESE and other exchange students from around the world!

I guess there are few places besides an MBA program, where you can spend an evening talking about the Lehman Brothers meltdown with someone who worked directly for the CEO before going to party together.

The time difference between Barcelona (I guess all of Spain really) and northern Europe is still amazing to me: Having dinner until midnight, paying cover in clubs only after 3am, but most stunningly having friends from the US tell me "I have to go to bed now ...". I certainly never fully got used to that and I am not sure if I ever could.

But, I will surely come back and keep trying!

A tough decision to end an awesome 2010

When I started preparing for interviews I had a hard time coming up with a good story about a very tough decision I had to make in the past; while I hope to not be interviewing anymore in the near future, I now have a very good story on this.

After I decided to start my post-MBA career in the US, I was fortunate enough to receive offers from all of the top three consulting firms.

In the end I decided to join BCG in their Detroit office. I am super happy and excited about that!

I need to emphasize though what a tough decision this was. After a great summer and two other very compelling offers at amazing firms I had a very hard time deciding this. Therefore I want to thank everybody within and outside these firms who helped me make this decision! Very much appreciated - I owe you!

I now look forward to an exchange term in Barcelona at IESE. The downside is that my time at Ross is officially over. So it was a bittersweet feeling leaving Ann Arbor for Christmas.

Wish you all a happy 2011 and in case you like Barcelona as much as I do, come visit!

Free iPad from Accenture

Dear Accenture,

as a shareholder and former employee I have a complaint.

At company presentations at business schools you give away free iPads for "good questions".

So, as a employee I did not even get a decent mobile phone. But prospective employees get free iPads? Really? I think I still have this 2 page email about iPhones not being supported! ;-)

As a shareholder I obviously curious what return you make on this "investment". ;-)

An alternative response, that would also be highly appreciated: Do you have any left and can send me one?

Thanks!

P.S.

So what was the winning question?

"What growth prospects does Accenture have?"

REALLY?

The iPad went to a great friend and very smart guy, but that is not even a good question.

As a small hint on the return on investment question above: He pulled his application. ;-)

Remembering Cragin

Today's memorial service for Cragin at school was beautiful.

It is amazing to me, how a group of 500 students, that only recently met, can care so much for one another!

Cragin, you gave so much to this community and helped it become this special place!

I miss you, as we all do!

As Rachel put it: Everyone was funnier, smarter and kinder when you were around!

Machs gut Cragin!

She is Gone

You can shed tears that she is gone,

or you can smile because she lived.

You can close your eyes and pray that she'll come back,

or you can open your eyes and see all she's left.

Your heart can be empty because you can't see her,

or you can be full of the love you shared.

You can turn your back on tomorrow and live yesterday,

or you can be happy tomorrow because of yesterday.

You can remember her only that she is gone,

or you can cherish her memory and let it live on.

You can cry and close your mind,

be empty and turn your back.

Or you can do what she'd want:

smile, open your eyes, love and go on.

~David Harkins

Three vacations + one internship = a great summer

When I came back to Ann Arbor yesterday, it felt like I have been away for quite some time. But, it is great to be back!

Over the summer I interned at Booz & Company. As a consultant you are always very concerned with your work-life-balance, right!?!

To address that I traveled to Las Vegas & National Parks in the US, Austria, and Greece.

Isn't that just about the work-life-balance I can expect as a consultant? ;-)

My internship was great!

I worked on projects in Dublin in Mannheim for Telco and Chemical clients.

But first things first: At the start of the internship I spend one week in New York (ok, fine I admit it was in New Brunswick, NJ) on a training. A lot of fun and a great opportunity to meet the other interns!

The other fun event took place in Berlin (no, it was really in Berlin and not in Potsdam ;-)). All interns were invited to the Booz Soccer Cup.

Maybe one side comment: The intern team won!

That weekend was just wonderful! Great weather, Germany beating (actually humiliating is more accurate) Argentina in the World Cup, meeting old friends in Berlin, and did I mention that we won the Booz Soccer Cup? ;-)

But yes, I also had some work to do. It was intense at times, but almost always fun. I had great job managers, great project teams, a wonderful office in Stuttgart and a great mentor!

Thanks to all of you, who made this an enjoyable internship!

At the end it also ended up being a successful one, with me securing a full-time offer. :-)

Being very concerned with my work-life-balance I went on several vacations after (and partly before) my internship. Instead of writing a lot about it, I think I will just show you some pictures. However one thing I want to point out (after different experiences in the past ;-)), I only lost one Dollar gambling in Las Vegas! :-)

Another highlight of the summer was Miri's and Oli's wedding in Italy.

Congrats again to both of you and all the best for your future!!!

In case anybody is looking for a wedding location in Italy, I have one to recommend ...

Finally I need to thank Lufthansa.

There upgrade yesterday made my flight a lot more enjoyable! :-)

Now, I very much look forward to the start of the semester! Can't believe that I am "almost" done and that now I am an MBA2.

Cragin

I recently lost one of my great friends from Ross!

Cragin, you cannot image how much I will miss you!
On M-Trek you were one of the first friends I made at Michigan and you surely became one of my best friends!
I still cannot believe that we will not get a chance to go to the Oktoberfest together.

I will miss your energy and great attitude - Ross will not be the same without you!

MBA Year 1 - closed by Obama

Hard to believe, but year 1 of my MBA is now over; and I had a blast!

If there is any incoming student, who would like to switch? I am totally up for it!

I believe it was only adequate that it was President Obama who closed the year with his commencement speech in 'the Big House'.

It was great to hear Mr. Obama talk. He indeed is a ridiculously good public speaker!

However, disappointingly his speech was rather political for a commencement.

In case you wanna listen to an outstanding commencement speech: Steve Jobs at Stanford!

I am now very much looking forward to my summer internship in Germany.

But I can't wait to come back in September for part 2 of this amazing experience!

Escaping Michigan Winter

After learning (more) about Operations, Accounting and Finance after the christmas break I spend the following term in China working on MAP (Multidisciplinary Action Project).

As part of a student team of six we spend 5 weeks in Changsha, China working with a NASDAQ-listed automobile company.

First of all I should probably explain where Changsha is:

It is one of these Chinese cities, ignorant westerners like myself have never heard of. Nevertheless more than 6 million people live there.

The weekdays we spend working with our client to improve their operations. That was pretty challenging, since they did not speak English (thankfully two of us spoke Mandarin) and many things tend to be done differently in an environment in which workers are paid less than a dollar per hour and assets are far more important than western performance standards like ROI.

The good news for western manufacturing: China is not there yet. There is still very good reason some products are manufactured in our part of the world.

Apart from the project we spend as much time as possible exploring China.

1. Hong kong is a phenomenal city! (If anybody wants to offer me an expat contract, I will sign on the spot)
2. Every male smokes, anywhere (this includes elevators)
3. There are no traffic rules (I bet the odds and did not have an accident! - arguably the most impressive "achievement" of this trip)
4. Overnight trains to Beijing take forever - ok, 15 hours to be precise
5. Yes, Mr. Stoiber the magnetic train is pretty fast although I did not manage to "board the train station"
6. If you are a white male and ever have a confidence problem; I recommend a trip to (rural) China. You will be a celebrity and girls might scream when you enter places
7. Pollution is horribly bad. I know we all heard that China is polluted, but you can not imagine how bad it is. At night, the whole city of Changsha looks like a smokey club and the sky is only visible after rain showers. I dearly hope that Tom Friedman is right when he argues that "China went green" in 2008!
8. The Chinese media is hilarious. Wanna know why Google left China? Yes, because of the fierce competition. And by the way in case you did not know, Chinese internet censorship is just doing the same thing all other countries are doing. (must be my stupid computer that denied me access to this blog from China!)
9. Ever heard of the brand Kappa? Is does exist in China, but there is also Kobbo: (btw commonplace, there are at least 3 brands imitating Lacoste, Nike, etc.)

So I had a sensational time in China although I have to admit I was happy to come back to the US.

For the great time I have to thank a few people:

CJ, thanks for showing me around Hong kong. Very much look forward to meeting you again in Ann Arbor from August!

Kai, great to see one of the old Galileo friends on the other side of the earth. Thanks & enjoy the rest of your time in HK.

Thanks to our client and my entire team for a great time - and surprisingly few fights! ;-)

Last but not least I need to thank all inhabitants of Hong kong for supporting the German car industry. (The number of Mercedes, BMWs and Audis in Hong kong can only be described as ridiculous - if you think Munich and Stuttgart have a lot; think again.)

Enough said. Some pictures from China:

C.K. Prahalad

On April 16th we lost one of the great management thinkers - C.K. Prahalad.

A huge loss for the University of Michigan and the whole world!

C.K. is widely considered the most creative management thinker of his generation. He fundamentally changed how we think about business strategy ("Core Competence"), economic development ("Fortune at the Bottom of the Pyramid") and innovation ("Co-creation").

I did not have the honor to attend lectures with him, but I was told by second year students and alumni that C.K. fundamentally changed the way they think about business and the world.

The world of management theory has more than its fair share of charlatans, but C.K. Prahalad was the genuine article.

- The Economist

Meatpacking District - the end of internship recruiting

At the beginning of March I was invited to New York to celebrate with the European internship class of Booz & Company. The weekend was a wonderful end to the intense time of internship recruiting.

I guess before start of school I was not aware how competitive internship recruiting in a Top 10 MBA program would be. So the time of internship interviewing was pretty intense.

Fortunately I was able to secure the internship of my choice: A summer at a top strategy consulting firm.

So I will spend 9 weeks with Booz & Company in Germany that I am very excited about. The people from Booz were some of the greatest people I met throughout the recruiting process. It is fair to say that the interviews with Booz were the ones that were most fun for me. I acknowledge that part of it might have been the fact that one of my cases was pricing Wayne Rooney on behave of VFB Stuttgart. The sad part, ManU did not agree to sell for the 27 million Euro I was willing to bid.

During the celebration weekend we all had a blast. It was great to meet employees from Europe and the other interns from across the US. We were located in the Meatpacking District which is the club district in Manhattan in the Standard Hotel. A very cool hotel with a great view of the of Hudson and the Financial District. Very cool was especially that the hotel had a bar at the top of it. Besides the view (of Manhattan) the most impressive thing about the bar was a waitress that was roughly 6-5 tall. Yes indeed some sight as well. ;-)

The hotel had windows to the floor and colleagues on lower levels found notes on their bed that they should be aware that movements are visible through the curtain.

On Friday we spend the afternoon in the Booz Office in New York and had discussions with former interns and current employees. Very impressive: the Booz office has a bar on the 19th floor. So we had cocktails inside the office. I guess fitting considering the name of the firm. ;-)

Friday night we then went for a great dinner and some time in the clubs of Meatpacking District.

On Saturday we then toured the NBC studios in the Rockefeller Center and went on top of it.

The highlight of the weekend was Saturday night were we cooked our own food with ‘slight” assistance of a chef. Besides the fact that it was delicious it was a lot of fun. And I would have never thought I would make my own pasta - ever. But yes, I did!

So while I have been to New York before, this time really blow me away. What a great city. I can’t wait to be back in May for four days of orientation training at the start of my internship.

The sad part of this story is that I have to leave Accenture. (Thomas, I guess your decision to go to McKinsey did not help my case ;-))

I had a great 5 years there, learned a lot and most importantly met countless wonderful people and made many friends! What made it especially difficult was that the day before I had to send in my cancellation I had the most terrific of conversations with an alumni from Ross who is an Accenture partner in London.

So I can only thank all of you and say that I sincerely hope to stay in touch!

I hope my summer in Germany gives me an opportunity to catch up with all of you!

For the great weekend in New York I want to thank all Boozies who have been involved and especially those who flew over from Europe. If the summer is anywhere near as much fun, I certainly made the right choice! I’m definitely very much looking forward to it!

Winter in Michigan

First of all: Winters in Michigan are totally overrated. It took until now for us to get 'real snow'. But to make sure you do not get this the wrong way. I am fine with it not being colder (we typically have between 5 and -5 degrees; and no this is not Fahrenheit) and not snowing more. :-)

So what have I done since Christmas?
Before I get into that I have to thank Lufthansa for upgrading me to Business Class on my last flight to Germany. This is a way of travel I could get used to.

Surely my biggest accomplishment in 2010 so far was me bowling a 166. Since I have no hope to ever improve on this I (moved to tears obviously) immediately declared my retirement from bowling.
As you can image that left me in a void and it took me several weeks to find new goals in my life.

Fortunately my university provided me with one: Learning Chinese!
Mid of March I will fly to China for 5 weeks with 5 classmates to work on a consulting project to improve the productivity of a Chinese car supplier. I am already super excited and can't wait to go there. The fun part will be that, according to our sponsor, nobody there speaks English. That makes my two Chinese speaking team members my new best friends and leads to the necessity for me to at least learn the very very basics of Chinese.
But most impressively: We receive emails from the CEO of this Nasdaq-listed company, apologizing for not always being reachable and if needed we could talk to his fellow board members. Well sure, it is probably more appropriate if I talk to his assistant (if not his janitor), but if he insists... :-)

But there is not only good news. The bad news: I do not graduate this year. So why is this bad? Because the commencement speech for this years class will be given by Barack Obama. Well I still have some time to convince my friends in the graduating class to give me one of their tickets.
This will be some event. He will be speaking in our football stadium.

Another disappointment has been my first NBA game. I went to a Detroit Pistons game against Miami. I expected Detroit to be mediocre at best, but they were horrible, scoring only 65 points. I do not know a ton about Basketball, but I understood that this is a really low score - later I leanred their second lowest ever. As always timing is everything - we surely picked the ideal game. ;-) But as I learned, there is always a trade off. So in that case we got incredibly good tickets way below face value since the team is that bad.

Ah yes, I also study. I currently have classes in Operations, Managerial Accounting and Financial Valuation.
The most impacting class is probably Operations. I now see the whole world through the lense of queues, wait times and inventory. If I am at an airport I wonder what their utilization is at the security check and was tempted to explain to them that with the kind of demand variability they face they needed more excess capacity. Yes, scary indeed.
But an even worst example comes from our prom. We had a huge party at a hotel close to Detroit (no it was not really near Ann Arbor and do not ask why we needed to drive 45 min there). However while there was enough inventory, the bars lacked the necessary capacity to convert that inventory into alcohol in our blood. But fortunately we had enough time to buffer for that. It was a great time and I had a lot of fun with all of my classmates!


Time continues to fly and next week I have already the next set off exams. Then the term is over and we are off to spring break (that reminds me that I should finally figure out what to do that week).
Sadly I only have a couple of classes left with my section this week. Then we will be taking electives from September and I will no longer be in the same group I so much enjoyed having classes with.

Fall B - 2 down: Happy Holidays

Hard to believe, but now my second term Fall B is over!

So what did I learn?

I learned about Marketing, Organizational Behavior, Finance and World Economy.

Really? I need to be more specific?

Ok, so here are some highlights:

1.) I am now an expert on erectile dysfunction drugs

Yes, as part of my marketing class me and my time needed to analyze and improve the marketing campaign of Levitra.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BR_qCt-jRQ0

Yes, indeed we had a lot of fun working on this!

Thanks Erica, Evins, Eric, Ivan and Douglas!

2.) I learned what a marketing problem is:

One my first day at Accenture a guy from the marketing department talked to all new hires about the trouble they are having with Tiger Woods not being number one in golf anymore.

Well, life is full of small challenges.

If the marketing professor asks in class: "To make this easier, who has not slept with Tiger Woods?" you probably know that you have a marketing problem.

The upside?

Accenture made it on Colbert:

http://www.colbertnation.com/the-colbert-report-videos/258581/december-16-2009/accenture-drops-tiger-woods

3.) While enjoyed the Finance lecture very much. I especially liked how Professor Bharath managed to explain stock valuation with the movie "Cast Away".

Yes, the coconuts on the island are like a stock with a beta of below 1. ;-)

(I know, you have to be kind of strange to find this funny, hence I spare you additional details!)

4.) Finance also taught me how to value a Senator seat. So in case I ever have the opportunity to sell a seat in the Bundestag, I now know how to value it.

Yes, Ms. Ypsilanti, in case you still have some political ambitions, just give me a call!

But now enough about academics!

My biggest achievement this term came not in the class room anyways but playing Whirlyball.

What? You do not know what this is? Shame on you!

It is a combination of bumper-cars, basketball and lacrosse.

Sounds weird? YES! Sounds fun? YES!!!

Another highlight, the bachelor party of Marcel!

I will not further comment on what happened that night.

Only so much: as far as I know nobody found a Tiger in his bathroom the next morning.

(Disclaimer: the term "Tiger" is limited to the animal and does not include a formerly popular golfer.)

So to summarize this term in one word: GREAT!

I had another couple of great months!

I wish you all a happy holiday season and hope you get a chance to spend some time with your friends and loved-ones!

In case you get bored:

A fun read: SuperFreakonomics - yes, I am totally sold on economics and markets by now! ;-)

German MBA Conference

I recently spend one weekend in Chicago at the German MBA Conference.
Approximately 40 German MBA students from all over the US came together for a great weekend in the windy city.

First of all I want to thank the organizers from University of Chicago. Great job, we all had a wonderful time.

So what did we actually do there?
Friday night we met in a bar in the Trump Tower. Key learning from this evening came from the president of Siemens Management Consulting. He explained what it means to have an option that is "in the money". While he pushed to get a marriage contract his wife did not agree. Consequently they do not have a marriage contract. But since his wife now earns way more than he does, he possesses "an option that is in the money".
As a side note and to be fair I want to emphasis that he was quick to point out that he does not plan to exercise this option ever.
We had a great time Friday night and it was great to get to know so many fellow German MBA students.


Saturday we had an impressive program at the University of Chicago.
Speakers included Frank Mattern (Managing Partner McKinsey Germany), Dr. Markus Schenck (CFO, Eon) and Martin Schlatter (CMO, Wrigley).
Unfortunately Nobel Prize Winner Gary Becker needed to cancel his participation at the last minute.

And yes, I enjoyed this Saturday way more than you can tell from this picture.

Nevertheless the highlight of Saturday was a Gala Dinner in a Chicago Skyscraper.
What a wonderful thing that there is no recession for McKinsey and they have still money for stuff like this. ;-)
I very funny scene was then when about 20 German MBA Students and suits and ties entered a Chicago Hip-Hop club in which the other guests were at best dressed casual.
Unfortunately I do not have pictures from that night. But it is surely only a bad rumor that this is somehow related to the amount of alcohol consumed by McKinseys' Principals. ;-)

Sunday morning we than drove back to Ann Arbor - just in time for my Finance Assignment.

Fall Break - One down

Yes, hard to believe, but after seven weeks the first term is already over.

What did I accomplish? Well, I am not allowed to disclose my grades. :-p But anyway way more valuable, the comment on our strategy paper: "Well argued!" :-)

Thanks to Ali, Filiz, Elizabeth and Brett. I was a pleasure working with you.

I guess we managed to impress our professor - at least a little.

Next stop: Fall Break!

I had one week off.

Together with 250 students I went to San Francisco. The official part of the trip was visiting companies in Silicon Valley, but way more important, having some fun in San Fran!

With a delay of half a day I arrived there, after Delta Airlines found some "technical issue" and decided to rather cancel my flight and have me wait 6 hours for the next flight.

But it least I arrived on time to meet a German MBA Student from Berkeley, who took me to San Francisco's oldest bar. A great start to a fun week!

The following day we went liquor tasting to "Hangar One". The sign at the entrance left no doubt: Emotional support, this was what we needed after Fall A. ;-)

Needless to say that this wonderful company was founded by a German!

And yes, Felix, not only the alcohol also the glasses were German. ;-)

The same day the Bay Bridge needed to be closed since a cable snapped. (As far as I know it took one week to repair it!) However there is of course no correlation between the incident on the bridge and the liquor.

The following two days were mainly business and networking events. The parts worth mentioning: a great keynote address from a venture capitalist on the economic situation and a company visit at Nvidia, which showed us their latest products.

Unfortunately after two more days, the break was already over. We used those two days to find out that it is possible to sleep with 5 people in one hotel room and that at Halloween San Francisco is even more expensive than usually.

So on Sunday I flew back to Ann Arbor. I even got there on time! Although Delta proactively cancelled my ticket. Why not?!? I guess I was right talking about what a horrible industry the airline industry is.

The next day: First day of Fall B. Classes: Finance, Management Organizations, Marketing and World Economy.

While it took two weeks in Fall A until I felt overwhelmed, it would only take about 2 hours in Fall B to reach this status. Bring it on!

The Quote of Term "Fall A"

Since the term Fall A is almost over (that reminds me of these final exams and these Strategy papers I should take care of :-(), I think it is safe to promote a quote from today to the Quote of the Term. The quote is brought to you by my strategy professor:

"Bonuses are supposed to be for past performance, not for future potential. These are not the Nobel Peace Prize."

Fall A - if you are not overwhelmed you are totally missing the point

I guess so far you get the impression that I do not study too much.

At the beginning of September my first term - Fall A - has started.

Since then I have more studying to do, then I could ever accomplish.

I thought I would know already, what a ridiculous workload looks like. This is a whole different ballgame, as they like to say here.

After I successfully passed the Accounting Exam before the start of classes, I have three mandatory courses left: Strategy, Economics, and Statistics.

Additionally I take one elective in "Management Presentations".

Up to now I have a lot of fun, the classes are interesting and the professors and classmates are great. Did I mention how much work this is already?

The most memorable experience so far, was my first strategy class.

After two minutes our professor calls me:

"Andreas, is the airline industry a good industry?"

For the next minutes I only heard "What else, ..."

What came in handy, was that I had some basic understanding of Porter's five forces.

So yes, Padde, I am really reading all these books. Padde once questioned whether I would really read all these books, or whether I would be running a book retailer.

Back to my strategy class. After a few minutes I got interrupted by a classmate. While I was thankful for the interruption, my professor did not like it and made sure it was understood that he was not happy about it. The next thing I hear: "Andreas, apologies for the interruption, please continue!"

A few more minutes later, he was finally decided to ask somebody else about what Ryanair was successful. However, that did not stop him from coming back to me every time he had a question on the industry structure.

The good news: I did pretty well, and (EVEN BETTER) I will most probably not be cold called again in Strategy this term.

The other classes are more relaxed. Management Presentations is extremely helpful and by fare the best public speaking course I ever had. Economics is great, because frequently I have to think: "Ah, this is why ... "

The scary thing about all this:

It is over in less than 3 weeks.

Oh, I guess this means that I have final exams in less then 3 weeks and I should get back to my books!

But before doing this I share a quote from my professor about the MBA experience:

"If you are not overwhelmed you are totally missing the point!"

If this is the standard, I totally get this MBA thing! :-)

Football - Hail to the Victors in the Big House

So what do I do on Saturdays? I watch College Football.

Is Football big in Ann Arbor?

No it is huge!

The Michigan Stadium, called the Big House, is the second biggest stadium in the US with a capacity of approximately 107,000. Since 1975 the attendance of every home game exceeded 100,000.

(btw Ann Arbor has 115,000 citizens)

On game days, the city is crowded from the early morning, with pre-game parties.

So how is the season going so far?

GREAT - after a bad season last year the team is 4-0 until now.

Especially exiting: A last second victory against Notre Dame two weeks ago.

So me and my classmates are having a lot of fun and plenty of opportunities to sing the Michigan fight song: Hail to the victors!

Next Saturday is the big game against Michigan State University (the local arch rival).

GO BLUE!!!

MBA Games - the downside of diversity

Briefly after the M-treks our never tired MBA2s organized the next great event for us: The MBA Games.

A collection of Sport Events like Soccer, Football, Softball, Volleyball etc. in which the different sections of the MBA program competed against each other.

Unfortunately my section finished last (by a mile :-().
We only managed to win the 4x400m race.

I personally failed miserably in Kickball (sort of Baseball but you kick a ball instead of hitting a baseball) where my section lost the very first game.
For the rest of the day I played Volleyball with five friends from my section. That was a lot of fun and we managed to reach the final.

In the final I realized the downside of diversity! Was ist really necessary to admit a player from the Israel National Volleyball team to the MBA program? Couldn't we have taken another overweight, uncoordinated Consultant or I-banker? ;-)

Well, at least over 100m I did not have to compete with the sprinter from the US national team who is in my class.


Another great day and fun event! THANKS again to the MBA2s for organizing!
The MBA2s also managed to convince several companies to sponsor that event a.o. Proctor & Gamble, IBM and Accenture. Embarrassingly Accenture did not even show up.

RLI - Foundation Session

So after we all came back to Ann Arbor after our wonderful M-Treks all over the world, the first mandatory event of the MBA Program took place:
The Ross Leadership Initiative (RLI) Foundation Session (I don't think it would have been humanly possible to come up with a longer name ;-))

So for six days we discussed about leadership topics like responsibility, integrity, diversity, creativity, and innovation. We practiced improvisation skills with a comedy group from Chicago (Second City). Moreover we listened to the wisdom of Ricardo Salinas, an entrepreneur from Mexico, and of our faculties.
But most fun were team building events like cooking a meal for 100 people.
At least most of these events were fun. Since the cooking took place outside in the pouring rain, I ended up being sick for the better part of the coming week.

But by far most impressive for the speech of Eleanor Josaitis!
The last day of the RLI Foundation Session was dedicated to Corporate Social Responsibility. So we all went to Detroit and got involved in different projects.
One of these projects was overseen by Eleanor, who is one of the founders of "Focus: HOPE" a civil and human rights organization in Detroit.
At the closure of the event she gave a wonderful speech about her work, overcoming obstacles and giving back to others. Many of us (certainly me) had to fight back their tears.

So a great start to my academic life at Ross and a week which certainly gave me a lot to think about!

M-Trek: GuateBelize - Part 2: Belize

After a wonderful time in Guatemala we went on to go to Belize - finally some beach time! :-)

Soon after we departed from our lodge in the jungle in Tikal our bus needed to stop at a construction site. The joke from on of our Trek-Leaders '... they are paving the road as we go ...' was totally accurate as we would find out later.

After standing there for about an hour the queue of vehicles (or rather the driver to be precise) decided to not take this construction that serious after all and continue driving although there was no paved road.

Nevertheless we safely arrived at the border to Belize and did not even lose any luggage that was put on the roof of the bus.

At the border we needed to leave the bus and walk across.

Unfortunately our bus was not allowed to pass since the Belizian authorities figured that they rather have taxis from Belize earn our money as opposed to a bus from Guatemala.

So we got onto Taxis in Belize (I would guess these cars failed any western TUV inspection several decades ago). Interestingly our driver tried to convince us that an air conditioning would be less effective then just opening the windows. As it turned out he was absolutely right. However the fact that his a/c was broken played some part in this.

What I loved about our time in Belize in general: There are hardly any roads. So wherever you go, you take the boat!

So the majority of our time in Belize we spend on the beach, on boats or in the water.

We went snorkeling twice - I loved it! I never really snorkeled before. It was great to swim with a wide variety of fish, with sea turtles and smaller sharks.

I was so distracted by all these animals that my knees experienced how sharp coral reaves really are. Fortunately my blood did not attract any more dangerous animals! ;-)

Almost all of us got really bad sun burn on their backs.

So here is a business opportunity: I used sun screen with factor 80 and reapplied it about every 2 hours. I still got burned.

So if you figure out a way to make factor 800 sun screen: There are certainly some customers for you in Belize!

Besides the sun I also had a hard time getting used to the sheer heat in Belize.

One night a trek leader and I decided t go for a run the next morning. What we did not expect was that running at 9 am meant running at ~40 degrees.

Stubborn as we were we did stick to our 'stupid' idea of going for a run.

We asked one of the locals whether there would be a road we could run on. Latest the following answer explained why we took the boat all the time.

The guy would explain us how the beach would be in better condition, with less holes and more even.

After about a 45 min run, we tried to spend the rest of the day in air conditioned rooms! ;-)

On our second to last day we took the water taxi one final time to Belize City.

From Belize City we would fly back to Detroit the following day.

Since Belize City is a small but very dangerous city we spend the entire evening in the hotel.

I once again tried to prove that I can win money in a casino.

Well, I guess sometimes history repeats itself. I won quite some money early on, but I was not willing to call it a night that early. I guess you can image how it ended.

Fortunately I was disciplined enough to only play with my remaining Belizian Dollars. :-)

Put since pictures say more then a thousand words, I stop writing now!

Some more pictures from Belize:

Well, one think I still need to mention.

A big THANK YOU to our Trek Leaders how put this together during their internships, after the trip to Honduras was cancelled. Thanks for this first highlight of my MBA!

M-Trek: GuateBelize - Part 1: Guatemala

The first highlight of my MBA: 10-day M-Trek to Guatemala and Belize

So what is a M-Trek?

M-Treks are outdoor adventure trips organized by the second year Michigan MBA students for first years.

Which trip did I choose?

I originally choose to go hiking, kayaking, fishing, and snorkeling in Honduras.

Unfortunately due to the coup in Honduras the school did not allow is to go on this trip.

Thanks to the great effort of our leaders we were offered an alternative trip to Guatemala and Belize.

(For those as ignorant as me: Belize is a small country in the Caribbean with approx. 300,000 inhabitants)

Who went there?

14 incoming students and 4 2nd year students from Germany, Israel, India and the US.

Rumors has it that one of the Americans is actually from Finland.

What did we do there?

Via Houston we flew into Guatemala City and took a small bus to Antigua where we spend our first couple of nights.

Looking around Guatemala City I thought, well this world is indeed 'flat'. Along main street Burger King is next to the Mercedes dealer and next to a Bayer factory.

However Antigua is very different. A beautiful small town.

It has a McDonald's, but it is arguably the most beautiful McDonald's in the world.

Having this surrounding all the time I may even become a fan of the golden arches! ;-)

The first morning in Guatemala I found out that German Tourists are really everywhere. Next door they would be watching German TV from 6 am to 8 am.

For the first hand coverage of Usain Bolts incredible new world record over 100 meters, I had to trade two hours of sleep.

But why did they not spend their vacation in Berlin at the Championships instead of ruining my sleep?!?

Inspired by Mr Bolt (and without steroids I might add) we spend our first day hiking up a volcano near Guatemala City.

The two highlights of that hike: Running down a field of old lava and standing right beside glowing new lava.

To run down a gravel field of old lava was a lot of fun and almost like skiing. Too sad they did not have a lift to immediately get up again! ;-)

To watch the glowing lava in the dark, from only a few feet away was sensational!

Thanks to our guide we all arrived safely at the bottom of the mountain, although we climbed down in complete darkness.

The manager kept reminding us to tip our guide, which was even proclaimed by a sign in his office "... we do not pay them very much!".

As it turned out, he did not pay them at all!

On our second day we visited a coffee plantation in Antigua.

Most impressive for someone like me, who does not like coffee:

The coffee was delicious!

Since I never drink it I cannot judge, but my classmates told me that this kind of coffee would be very different (read: better) then the coffee you get at Starbucks.

So I guess although I liked it, it will not change my coffee drinking habits (or lack of them).

Definitely the most memorable experience of the trip was an overnight bus ride from Antigua to Tikal. For western standards the seats in the bus were uncomfortable and it was not possible to recline them without jeopardizing newly formed friendships with people setting behind you. When we got on the bus I thought that was bad - well it got worst! :-)

When boarding the bus we all had to go through a security inspection which seemed reasonable considering that Guatemala City would not be "entirely safe" as we were told. Nevertheless the driver would stop some blocks away from the station just to let some random duds on the bus.

More then compliant with Western standards however, was the Air Condition - at least its ability to produce ridiculously low temperatures which made one classmate put his feet into his backpack. Others slept in their rain gear since the a/c would drop water on the passengers when the bus went around corners.

Unfortunately that water did not reach the trunk. In the trunk a hole got burned into a bag destroying several dresses. (but maybe this started the next fashion trend? - watch out Ed Hardy! ;-))

At the end of the night we (luckily all healthy and with rather more then less friendships) reached our destination: an AIRPORT!!! (I am not kidding!)

Nevertheless we had some fun moments along the way.

One, was a conversation between one tall and one rather small classmate.

Do you play basketball?

No, do you play mini-golf?

After reaching Tikal we immediately went to see the Maya ruins which were extremely impressive and more then worth this bus ride!

Besides these impressive buildings, I still amazed how rather small monkeys are able to make such a big noise. Oliver Kahn (for none soccer people: a German player often compared to a monkey) would be proud of them.

The rest of the day I enjoyed time at the pool and lessons in US college card games.

The next day, we would be heading to Belize.