Hilary goes back to school

What day is it anyway

chiraly — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 04:49:32 +0000

We’ve had a day and a half of lectures – only 3 lecturers but already I’m confused about who said what and what it was all about. I think it’s a function of the jetlag

A fascinating session on the different generations and the power of the communications age and what’s coming next.

And some interesting discussion on why Starbucks failed in Australia.

And then we made a little progress on our group assignment. Still have to decide what I want to do on the individual assignment.

Am a bit stuffed and hoping for a better night’s rest.

Day one at Kellogg

chiraly — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 05:22:48 +0000

Kellogg is a huge executive management school. Today there must have been about 150 people in the building attending different programs.

We met a group doing governance on family businesses – some of them 4th generation. And a group doing a 3 week advanced (post MBA) executive program who were shocked to hear how many of our group are paying their own way.

It’s been a slow start to the course – a morning off, including a personal training session, at their super-equipped gym. And then an afternoon session on motivating teams which was a lot of fun. Mostly because we did a management/production exercise to put a tanogram puzzle together. We thought we hadn’t done that well, taking almost 2 mins to do it after 45 mins of planning. But in fact we creamed it. The fastest ever is 11 seconds, but a lot of teams never finish. We got almost all the key elements right. The only thing we didn’t do was practice, although we discussed it. The team thought it was too simple to practise and so didn’t bother. So we had it all in place in 30 seconds apart from one segment. Which took the rest of the time.

Key lessons from the exercise? We were management and got the production team in early (with 28 mins to go) and let them self-direct once we had transferred the blueprint for the tanogram. Perhaps we could have got them in earlier yet. Allowed for collaboration and a common goal. I was delighted that we did so well, although I had absolutely no idea that we had done well.

Self-awareness? – I feel a bit panicked when given a new task and goal. I need to breathe and realise that there is time. Maintenance is as important as the task. Sometimes I talk over a bit. I did a grand job of describing the tanogram to the person who had to draw it. I was a bit stunned at how articulate I was about it.

Key lessons for me to take away from the lectures?

The team’s reaction is more important than the leader’s action. Focus first on what reaction you want
Make sure your team members have a voice and feel psychologically safe
Goal as a leader should be to do absolutely nothing! Don’t do. Delegate. When the team is effective the leader should get out of the way.

Make a Wish fundraising

chiraly — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 09:22:40 +0000

We decided as a group, for Module 1 to raise funds for a charity. We chose Make a Wish because two of the group had been personally involved in it. Make a Wish fulfils the lifelong dreams of seriously-ill children.

We raised $1,200 at last count.

I’m hoping that it’s going to become a tradition and that we will support a different charity each module. As next module is international we are talking about doing something in China.

Positioning statement

chiraly — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 09:09:37 +0000

Perhaps the most immediately relevant thing we did during the module was to do a segmentation, targeting and positioning statement for a business of our choice. It was long overdue for me to reflect on mine. And while it wasn’t backed up with data, it was helpful to think about where the company sits in clients’ minds viz-a-viz competitors.

Something to take away and work on between modules.

Accounting monopoly

chiraly — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 09:06:01 +0000

It’ll never catch on…

Having to record every transaction in double book-keeping speak on every go.

I began to get mildly nervous every time I went past go because of all the paperwork involved in collecting $2 million and issuing 100,000 shares. Send me to jail instead!

My solemn pledge – I will never again tip the board over during ordinary, run-of-the-mill, family-argument monopoly.

Advice for the uninitiated

chiraly — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 09:01:53 +0000

What advice would I give to someone about to embark on module one…

Read as much of the material as you can before you arrive
Clear the decks so you are not distracted
Work out how you are going to maintain your fitness and energy levels, given the workload and the delicious food
Always take the stairs!
Take yourself lightly
Set some personal objectives for the module and track your performance weekly.

Worked well for me.

Post module 1 reflection

chiraly — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 08:58:27 +0000

How well have I done against the goals I set for myself?

Groundrules

Wow, the last week was much more intense than I thought it would be. Not really because the work was harder, but more because I was tired and didn’t get the time to relax on the 3rd weekend that I hoped I would.

So I broke my groundrule of fully resting on the weekend – instead I tried to read the textbook thinking it was the final push. Perhaps that was a mistake.

But managed a morning walk every morning but one, and kept cheerful and focused on the people more than my personal outcomes.

Despite the utterly marvellous food, I managed to preserve a modicum of restraint. That, coupled with an on-the-fly rule of “stairs 100%, lift 0%”, seemed to work and my clothes are no tighter than when I started.

So while I am tired, all in all, I am really happy with the groundrules and will certainly keep them for the next module. Perhaps with a few variants because it’s the international module.

Community

My syndicate turned out to be marvellous and I am really proud of how it went. We looked after each other and made sure that we all passed with panache (assuming we have passed!). I learnt as much from them in how they approached things – how they each took responsibility for their interaction with the group. There was absolute accountability from each one. And a sense of fun. So that was great. I am grateful to each of them and would be delighted to be in a syndicate with any one of them again.

The group as a whole also went well. The course director said that we were ‘relaxed and serious’ which seems like a contradiction but was true of us as a group. We didn’t seem so serious on the final celebration night drinks dancing wildly at a student bar. Who’dda thunk?

Previous years have been a bit wilder I’ve heard, but this down-to-earth and jokey but focused approach really suited me.

Expanded horizons

The last few weeks have really been about getting focused to get through the material, rather than expanding horizons. It seemed to me that the first module is really about getting everyone to the same base level.

So, rather than being blown away by new stuff, I appreciated the chance to cement some stuff I had already studied briefly – like accounting – and to understand the theory behind some things I had only ever understood superficially – like beta and how to calculate it.

Brainbuzz

Speaking honestly, I have not yet, apart from managing processes, felt massively challenged intellectually by the course. I think this is dependent on how strong your maths is. It made me realise what a strong grounding I got at school. Stuff that I studied decades ago and thought I had forgotten came streaming back without too much trouble. Nice to know it’s still there!

All we need is some Latin in the course and I’ll have some justification for five wasted years.

Blog

Perhaps I was a little over-optimistic on this. Hard to spend a day, listening and writing and reading and then turn around and write a blog at the end of it as well.

Experimental being

How wonderful not to have to do the writing for an assignment as other team members took it on. It was great to focus on the ideas and the content and not the nitty gritty of the grammar.

I thought heading into it that I would be experimenting in terms of the role I took on in the syndicate. But, in fact, I think the greater experimentation came in the role I took on in the group as a whole – organising thank you cards, setting up a weekly group training session, encouraging the group to support a charity during the module. Being the going out ringleader. I don’t think of myself as the social organiser so it was interesting to take that on.

Reflection post-module

During the lecture notes, I tagged a whole heap of things to come back and reflect on. I will find some time to do that. Also, I’m going to go through all of my notes, and perhaps read some of the textbook to cement learnings.

One of the things I’ve started to realise is that I would be ok at running a large team, although I have always shied away from it – that might be something I start to look at in where I take my business.

Fatigue sets in

chiraly — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 12:48:42 +0000

1 day of lectures and 1/2 day of exams to go. We’re all good humoured but tired. The exams you have when you’re not having exams – get 1/2 the questions in advance, prepare the answers and then submit them at the scheded time of the exam. Curious. The other half are open book and to be done in the time for the full time allowance. If I have to do exams then this is the way to do it.

First exams for 17 years

chiraly — Sun, 18 Oct 2009 03:19:43 +0000

While I’ve always had good exam technique, I don’t enjoy them. Since 1992 I have deliberately avoided taking exams. But this time it was unavoidable. While some of the work is assignment based, there are still exams.

Approached them by relabeling them as ‘tests’ as that seemed like a lower hurdle. Then reminded myself that it was only necessary to pass, so no point putting in the extra mile to do well. In this EMBA you cannot do better than a pass. It goes against the grain to put in the bare minimum effort but I’m starting to get the hang of it.

And that I’m used to hitting tight and tough deadlines in my working life – so how is a test really different?

In the event, they really weren’t too hard – open book and just covering the course material. We’ll see when the results come back!

Looking forward to week three

chiraly — Sun, 18 Oct 2009 03:15:34 +0000

For week three – I am a bit fatigued going into it. Week three will be about managing my energy levels and not relying on coffee and food to get me through.

Keeping presence, playfulness and good humour. Contributing to the group while making sure that I get enough rest. Preparing my notes as I go along (loving the OneNote program) so that will be easier to revise the following week.

So I will try to take siestas before I need them rather than when I am already exhausted. I will also try to go to bed a little earlier.

This week we start 3 new subjects so no doubt a bit more neuron-reorganisation.