International Lead Week - Southeast Asia

Each year during winter break students at Goizueta have the opportunity to participate in an International Lead Week. This year we had the chance to choose between four international trips to India, South America, Southeast Asia, and China. I decided to choose the trip to Southeast Asia during which I was able to visit Thailand, Singapore, and Malaysia.
The key goal for these international trips is to expose Goizueta students to international business, cultures, and people. The trip to Southeast Asia was lead by Dr. Phil Zerillo. Dr Z (as he is better known) is a marketing professor that has been guiding students through this part of the world for a number of years. His experience with the cultures and numerous contacts made the trip extremely fun, informative, and valuable.
In Thailand, Dr. Z set up a number of visits to local companies like the Big C International and FlyNow. Each company welcomed us with open arms and provided a behind the scenes look at how business is conducted in Thailand.
We also had the opportunity to visit Thammasat University. Thammasat is Thailand’s oldest English based business degree program. During our visit we heard from two distinguished professors. Dr Ruth Banayanomong who spoke to us about “Logistics and the Thai Economy: the Road Forward for ASEAN”. He provided a great perspective on the challenges faced by Thailand to develop an infrastructure to become the hub for business in Southeast Asia.
Next we heard from William Randall on “Getting Started in Thailand: How to Do Business”. At the exact time he was explaining the laws regarding foreign investment and business ownership in Thailand there was a major announcement by the government changing the rights of foreigners to own businesses in Thailand. As you can imagine, Mr. Randall was worried about how those changes were going to impact his own stake in a marketing business he had developed over a number of years. Talk about being in the middle of history and business.
After Thailand we flew down to Singapore where we had the opportunity to visit the U.S. Embassy and the port of Singapore. At the embassy we were welcomed by ambassador Lavin and provided an overview on the current relationship between the United States and Singapore. Singapore has a very strong government that does a great job in protecting intellectual property for the thousands of international companies that have decided to establish offices in that country. In addition, the government has done a commendable job to limit corruption in government which affects many of the countries in Southeast Asia.
The visit to the port of Singapore was eye-opening. We had the opportunity to go to PSA’s corporate headquarters and gain an understanding of just how quickly the port has grown over the last few decades, and how it has become the second busiest port in the world. As a quick side note, PSA provides port operation for the port of Singapore and a number of port facilities around the globe. PSA relies on very large information systems to manage the complexity of scheduling over 60, 000 containers per day at just the Port of Singapore.
The last leg of our trip took us on a bus ride from Singapore, through half of Malaysia, to the city of Kuala Lumpur. While in Kuala Lumpur we had the opportunity to visit the Petronas Towers. The towers are truly a work of art, especially at night. Until 2003 the Petronas Towers were the tallest buildings on earth. The distinct honor of the tallest building on earth is now held by Taipei 101 in Taiwan. As a quick trivia fact, the Petronas towers are still considered the world’s tallest twin towers.
Malaysia was a fascinating country to visit also because of the strong influence of the religion of Islam on the government, culture, and architecture. Having lived all of my life in predominantly Christian countries (Mexico and U.S), I enjoyed learning more about their religion and way of life.
To wrap it up, I would like to add that we had ample time to visit, socialize and partake in local culture of our choice during the trip. I was also very fortunate to have had the opportunity to meet a number of students outside of my current MBA Class of 2008 during the trip. I develop friendships with students from the MBA Class of 2007 and the One Year MBA’s that are now part of that class. I would encourage anyone that decides to attend Goizueta to sign up for the International Lead Week experience.

Bernie Traywick
Goizueta Business School
MBA Class of 2008

International LEAD weeks..

Well, today was the first day back at school after the long winter break.. and one main topic of discussion was the international LEAD weeks which quite a few students went on..
I was on the group that went to China - 32 Goizuetans on a fascinating two and a half week long trip that originated in Hong Kong, continued to Xi'an or Yangshuo, then on to Shanghai and finally culminated in Beijing. During this trip we had the oppurtunity to not only work on real-life projects with Shanghai-based firms, learn much about the enigma that is Chinese culture, visit world famous historical sites and bargain vehemently for trinkets in crowded street markets, but to also get to know some of our classmates much better. There is nothing that brings people closer than sitting around a small table giving each other moral support as we try exotic dishes like fried bees dipped in honey, bamboo worms and other more random unindentifiable creatures..

Although the other groups traveling to South East Asia, India and South America each had their own share of fun and exciting stories to relate, the one thing that was evident in the interaction of everyone at school was how happy we all were to see each other again. Only today did I realize just how much I missed the handshakes, hugs and giving each other a hard time that has become an integral part of my life and just how important my Goizueta family is to me..

Aditya Rao
MBA 2008
Goizueta Business School

Spring Semester...

I have had a great break so far - I went home to Maine for the holidays, I traveled some, visited friends and relatives, and of course, kept working on the internship search. It's been really good to have some time off for a while, but I am definitely ready to get back into the swing of things and start the spring semester.

Before the spring semester starts, though, I have a few other activities to look forward to. Next week will be the beginning of our spring semester Lead Week. I wasn't able to go on any of the International Lead Weeks, but I am looking forward to my Atlanta-based course. There were several options to choose from, but I will be taking the Syndicated Data course in which we will learn about different ways to analyze marketing data and draw conclusions and make predictions. The other activity I am looking forward to starting next week is the Goizueta Marketing Strategy Consultancy (GMSC). I will be working on a semester-long consulting project with 6 of my classmates. We have a real world client with a real world issue to solve, which is very exciting. I think this opportunity will really help me prepare for the management consulting position that I am hoping for.

I also have been spending a lot of time preparing for case interviews with consulting firms. It's that time of year, and we are all deep into our summer internship search. It's a lot of extra work, but I'm hoping it will pay off. That's all for now - I'll check in later...

Ben
MBA 08

We are FAMILY!

In a recent Organization & Management class, a core course for first-year MBA students, the topic of discussion was Organizational Culture.

At the beginning of class, we were all asked to go to the chalkboard and write the one word that we felt described the Goizueta culture.

Overwhelmingly, the word written by over half of the class: FAMILY.

How did this happen??

"Family" is not one of Goizueta's seven core values; that would be too easy. Have we all been brainwashed? Of course not!

The small class size of the full-time MBA program is one major factor. My incoming class of 150 students is one big family. To be realistic, as in most families, there are certainly times when issues may arise, but also like most family members, students are committed to the long-term success of the class. Problems are quickly resolved, and everyone once again gets along.

This commitment to helping each other succeed has no bounds - whether studying for tests in class, starting a new club, or preparing for the next job interview. (I have personally been helped in all three. For example, roughly one-third of my class - including me - is seeking a summer internship at a consulting firm, and interviews for these positions are heavily based on solving cases. Preparation for these case interviews is critical, and rather than shying away from other students who are competing for the same internships, my classmates are pro-active in setting up sessions for us to practice cases with each other, and even with second-year students who have recently succeeded in earning these consulting internships and full-time positions. This level of involvement and access to second-year students is also unique to Goizueta.)

Goizueta students, as most business school students, are competitive by nature. But at Goizueta, our motto is, "You win. I win. Goizueta wins." ... and we live by that.

Each incoming class also has a theme. "Family" is quite clear in the theme for my Class of 2008:

"We can go anywhere, as long as we go ... TOGETHER."

Amar
MBA '08

Accessibility of the Professors

I came to Business School quite bright eyed, looking to switch careers. What sold me on Goizueta was the ability to create your own path. One can lay his/her own foundation as well as a unique legacy.

We have very career-focused clubs here at Goizueta and it was to my dismay back in September to learn that the Entrepreneurship and Venture Capital Club had been previously dissolved. A result of a subtle, yet impacting uprising and the hard work of many individuals, the EVCC has now been rechartered. A critical goal of EVCC v2.0 is to sustain the goals and activities over a longer period than just the 2 years us full timers are around.

One of our initial tasks was to loop in our professors who teach the classes germane to our club and who can take a vested interest in our activities and career goals. We were able to schedule a dinner with the Entrepreneurship and Venture Capital professors on campus and created a strong atmosphere for our club to thrive. The professors were generous with their time resulting in interaction with our students for approximately 3 hours. We achieved many goals from this dinner, but the key being a strong rapport with our professors.

Goizueta professors are as busy as expected, often teaching day and night classes, some working on external activities. However, they are pleased to spend time with students in various capacities - professional advising, answering questions about classroom material or even non-business school related banter. If students put in the time, the professors are willing to match that amount of time to guide us. It is comforting that we have this support structure and knowledge base at our disposal.

Vivek Bhatia
MBA 08

NYC Marketing Trek

Goizueta has a fantastic network of alumni in New York City. I just returned from our Marketing Trek where we met with contacts at companies such as Estee Lauder, Bayer, L'Oreal, American Express, and MTV Networks.

Each fall, first-year MBA's are granted Corporate Networking Days (excused from regular classes for three days) to allow time for company visits and informational interviewing. Imagine what an opportunity it was to have three consecutive "free days" dedicated to learning directly from professionals, across several industries, and in my function of interest! I talked to marketing experts at all levels, and I feel more empowered than ever to jump start my dream career.

Amy Hibler
MBA'08

Sky diving

I am afraid of falling.

This is different than a fear of heights. I can easily get on a plane or be on top of a tall building as long as I am surrounded by glass or have a high railing. But when you put me on the edge of a cliff I tend to freak out. During orientation, our dean told us about the Goizueta tradition of skydiving, he even showed a video of his experience which I could barely watch as I saw him fall out the aircraft into nothingness. This is how we are supposed to embrace the core value of Courage.

Knowing that I hated even the thought of the experience, I knew there would be no other time that I would be surrounded by such supportive people again and that was the only way I would be able to do it. I grabbed one of my friends and ran up to the dean's office where we signed up together.

About 3 weeks passed and I had almost forgotten about my commitment until my friend reminded me the night before. I had a few drinks that night. We woke up at 6 and four of us made the 1.5 hour journey in early morning silence. When we arrived we had to wait several hours for the fog to clear while more Goizuetans started arriving. During this time it still hadn't hit me that I was going skydiving. It only hit me when the sky finally cleared and our names showed up on the ready board. It was time to get suited up!

As my trainer helped me into the harness I noticed my breathing quicken. Some of my fellow Goizuetans joked around with me to keep my mind off of what I was doing and the next thing I knew I was in the airplane being interviewed by the person who would film my jump. The plane ride was not bad, just a plane ride with someone strapped to your back and a big clear window in the back of the plane that could open up.

And open up it freaking did!!! All of a sudden people were putting on goggles and they rolled up the door exposing a giant hole in the side of the plane. Then several single jumpers started flinging themselves out as I watched in horror as their little bodies flew away and became very, very small, very, very quickly. I was breathing heavily and could not stop screaming, "OH MY GOD! OH MY GOD!" This was going to happen.

My trainer told me to kneel down so he could walk over the door since we were attached - the request to kneel down sounded earily like an execution. He waddled us over to the door and my videographer stepped outside, hanging on to a little handle. I was sure I was going to be the first fatality, not from falling, but from a heart attack. I cringed as we got to the edge and then he leaned forward and we started falling.

TERROR. TERROR. TERROR.

I thought it would initially feel like falling and then feel more like floating. No. It felt like horrible, terrifying falling the ENTIRE TIME. I screamed for awhile and then clenched my teeth in an effort to smile at the videographer who, like some surreal pixie, was floating in front of me supported by an unseen hand. "Please, please let the chute open and PLEASE let me stay attached to my trainer!!!" My worst fear was that the chute would open, my trainer would be yanked up to a stop, and I would disconnect and continue falling to my death. I was imagining how sad my mother would be, how horrible it would be for my friends when suddenly I jerked upward like a little doll and it was quiet. We were floating and I had made it.

After we landed I could not stop shaking for an hour and had a hard time catching my breath. Even later that evening when I put on the movie, my heart and breath quickened as I watched myself do the unthinkable.

Although I am still deathly afraid of falling and do NOT think the experience was "fun" as most everyone else does, I am proud that I pushed myself to do it and know that there is no way I could have done it without the support of my classmates. This is what I love most about Goizueta, everyone is committed to help you breakthrough your boundaries and help you achieve what you thought was impossible. Thanks to everyone who helped me make it through!

Ben Eugrin
2-year full-time MBA
Class of 2008