First Year Over!

My last exam of my first year was completed a few hours ago and I am now officially done with my first year of my MBA. As you may have noticed, the frequency of my posts have diminished over the past month as the workload peaked. For those of you keeping score my first year at Merage consisted of:

Pre-Quarter Residential
-Intro to Strategy
-Team Dynamics
Quarter 1:
-Corporate Accounting
-IT Strategy
-Statistics
-Project Management
Quarter 2:
-Corporate Finance
-Managerial Accounting
-Marketing
-Organizational Behavior
Quarter 3:
-Management Science
-Strategy
-Operational Management
-Investments
-New Product Development

In my opinion, the course load is incredibly diverse. I feel like I have just a pile of information crammed into my head and it is ready to explode. It is hard to take stock and realize how much I have learned because it is going to take a long time for all this information to settle in my head.
For those curious, there are dramatic differences between law and business school. Law school teaches you more of a methodology of analyzing problems, critical analysis skills, than topical information. There is very little practical learning at law school. Classes generally consisted of a mid-term and final or the lovely 100% final; absolutely no real world application of the lessons. I have no clue why law school takes 3 years. You really learn all you need to know in your first year and the actual understanding about specific laws is gained from practical experience (I was shocked after three years of law school that I really did not know the steps involved in incorporating a company - but I learned pretty quickly in the real world).
Business school gives you a diverse set of tools to tackle a wide variety of business problems from the very specific (techniques to optimize a call center) to the very general (developing corporate strategy and leading teams). Business school forces you to learn about working in teams and applying your knowledge in numerous projects for actual businesses and case studies. Exams generally represent less than 50% of your final mark. The fact that business school can cram this breadth of learning into 2 years in impressive; probably their focus on efficiency - not a law strong point.
I think my preference of learning environments is showing. Anyways, over the next couple days I hope to catch up on my posts.

Oh How We Are Torn...

It has been a difficult period for us transplanted Canadians. Imagine being unable to see any games of the pursuit for Lord Stanley's Cup, then being thrust into NBC's coverage of the finals and seeing the horrible conflict between our two homes. Ontario vs. California, The Senators vs. The Ducks - oh can we really root for the Canadian team when the team from our backyard is their opponent? Yeah, its not hard. And it does make the series much more interesting. Too bad Ottawa has been mailing it in.

Lindsey Finishes Her Half-Marathon!

Everyone should congratulate Lindsey for completing her half- marathon. She and her friend, Tammy, trained real hard (as often as three times per week) and completed the 13.1 mile trek in just over 2 hours. For those imperial-measurement handicapped, 13.1 miles is about 21 kilometres! For those in London, imagine running from White Oaks Mall up to the UWO gate at Richmond Street and then running back! I got tired just watching them.

$5 Sake Bombs

Last Thursday, Lindsey and I joined some Meragers for $5 Sake Bombs and $5 sushi rolls at Laguna Beach's Mosun. This must be one of the best deals in Orange County on a Thursday night. The sushi is really great and the Sake Bombs can get you in trouble. For those who don't know, a Sake Bomb is essentially a shot of sake suspended over a small glass of beer with chopsticks. You pound the table causing the shot to drop into the beer which you then chug. Mosun gives you a flask of 3 shots of warm sake and a can of Sopporo beer for the $5!

Busy Finishing Up Quarter

Posts have been slow because the final quarter has been busier than expected (and I think the attrition of the tough 2nd quarter is impacting me). I am busy juggling numerous projects and extra-curricular activities. Making things difficult is that one class, Business Strategy, is taking up about 50% of my time. As it is strategy and the teacher is a big "Built to Last" fan, he is a believer is stretch goals (BEHAGS for those who speak the lingo). Therefore, it should not be a surprise he is dumping a ton of work on us. The projects are interesting (too bad I do not have more time to enjoy them). The most recent was the evaluation of a real life acquisition opportunity. It walked through anticipating the target's expectations, understanding our financing capabilities (our max price), evaluating the cost/benefits of potential valuations, and valuing the long term value of the different prices to the company's value. It was a very helpful exercise for anyone who could find themselves valuing a new opportunity for their business.

There is other good news for Merage. Internships are starting to come more quickly in the month of May and Merage students have scored some high profile positions. 3 Merage students have accepted positions in IBM's Deep Blue program; a high profile internship for MBA to develop a new product for IBM. The program only offers 24 positions and Merage scored 3 of them! That is 1/8th of Deep Blue is Merage! This is really impressive when you consider that only one student from MIT is in the program. These kind of successes are the true building blocks of Merage's growing reputation.

Arcade Fire in San Diego

While Steph was visiting, all of us went down to the Spreckles Theatre in San Diego to see the Arcade Fire. The Arcade Fire are an up and coming band from Montreal, Canada who are really gaining alot of much deserved publicity worldwide. In my opinion, this is the best band in world right now. They have found a unique sound and not afraid to explore it.

The concert didn't showcase a band as much as an orchestra. The five band members are joined by two violinists, two horns men, and a jack-of-all-trades. Their stage looks like a cluttering of instrument stations and megaphones. There is a church organ, multiple keyboards, an xylophone, a Bass, an accordion and a number of other instruments whose names I do not know. Aside from lead singer Win Butler, the remaining band member rotate through the instruments with the enthusiasm of kindergarten children attacking pots and pans; sometimes switching instrument stations mid-song. No instrument is sacred, even the drummer switches out for some songs. These multiple instruments combined with the bands enthusiasm create a dynamic environment that can not help but infect everyone in the room (I even had a man who looked no less than 60 yrs old stomping, clapping and dancing to the music).

As we had the privilege of recently seeing another great young band, TV On the Radio, I think it would be beneficial to explain how they are different. Both bands are incredibly talented and have a wonderful sense of sound. Where they diverge is that TVOtR are driven by the art. They are very serious and dedicated to their craft. This creates some amazingly technically proficient music. By comparison, Arcade Fire, while they are definitely artists, are more dedicated to the passion or feeling of the song. They use their emotion to dictate where the song will go creating some very unexpected twists and turns. For both bands, it is their incredible sense of how to put it all together that makes them stand out from most bands today.

The result is a memorable experience that does not compare to any other concert that I have ever attended. I credit the Arcade Fire for doing it their own way. They leave nothing on the table - so to speak. What I mean is that during their set they played every great song they had in order to create a memorable core show. The downside is that they played two brief encores of "lesser" songs - almost allowing the audience wind down. I, a person who is not a big fan of the pomposity of encores, really liked the strategy because that core show was unbelievable. This is one show that I would love to see over and over.

Another Canadian Visit

Lindsey was very excited to see her friend, Stephanie, come visit from April 24 -29. They started out in style by heading directly to shop, wine, and dine in Beverly Hills and West Hollywood. I have never seen an exhibition of such power shopping in my life. Everyday - the whole day - they attacked Rodeo Drive, Robinson Ave, Fashion Island, South Coast Plaza, Irvine Spectrum and the shops of Laguna enriching the poor struggling people of Rodeo Drive and Orange County. During one of the best weather weeks that we've had in awhile, they spent most of it in malls!? When they finally decided to hit the beach on the last day it was overcast. Luckily there were plenty of shops in the area.
Lindsey had fun, but she was pretty tired by the end of the week. We have no more planned visits until next year, but we will be heading back to Canada this summer for my sister's wedding.