We are the winner …
We are the winner of the AGSM-MBS-Cup! :)
Actually, we lost the touch footy – as half of the team never played that before we had a trial run on Thursday night and somehow learned the rules … nevertheless, we suddenly played different rules on Friday which confused half of the team and on the other hands, the girls from the AGSM-team play in the AGSM-Rugby-Team … I guess that tells everything – it was a really rough game but our team stayed professionally on the level of TOUCH-rugby and did not tackle!
We also lost the beach volleyball but we won the golf and the (not counting) poker game on Friday. We also won the Tennis first thing Saturday morning so it was all about the soccer game.
Actually, I also played in the soccer game for the sake of the girls … even tough it was definitely not due to my performance (I just ran around to confuse the other team ;) we finally won 5-3 after being 0-2 behind! :) That was a fantastic game!!
So, overall the Cup went to MBS this year! However, we are also looking forward to the next one in Sydney in February next year.
The whole AGSM-MBS experience was ended by a great, exclusive dinner in the Fish Bowl of the Melbourne Aquarium! We had a great time! :)
The International Food Festival & ...
Hi everyone,
This week was yet another extremely busy one.
But finally the mid-term exams are over. Econ (economics) went really well, I’m satisfied with 93% of marks and I have a very good feeling for the finance mid-term on Wednesday night. Now we are heading in big steps through a lot of more syndicate assignments towards the final exams in the first week of December. Of course we celebrated finishing mid-terms over at the pub…
Yesterday we had our “International Food Festival” in the MBS courtyard. Free food from all over the world … yummy! We had dishes from Peru, Chile, UK, Poland, India, Indonesia, China, Japan, Korea, Catalonia,…
And we definitely earned it… someone talked me into playing in the MBS-touch footy team in the AGSM-MBS Cup even tough I never ever held a football in my hands …
What is the AGSM-MBS Cup?
My business school (MBS) is competing in diverse disciplines against the Australian Graduate School of Management (AGSM) from Sydney. We are playing golf, beach volleyball, soccer, touch footy, and poker.
What is touch footy?
This is a type of rugby without tackling, instead – to stop the other team – you have to touch the person with the ball (it’s one of these oval ones …) Probably half of the team (including myself) never played that before so we had an hour practice yesterday before the food festival. We tried to learn the rules (I just do what I’m told to ;). It will be a quite hard game today, I’m quite sore although I tried to do everything to avoid it. But I haven’t been running so much in a long time and also I didn’t play any team sports in years. It’s going to be a mixed game (i.e. at least 2 girls have to be at the ground at any time). Even tough we’re allowed to substitute it will be quite hard for the girls as we’re only 3 playing!
Let you know how it went! Keep fingers crossed! :)
B.
My MBA Program
Melbourne Business School - aka MBS (as seen in September 2006)
I always write only about my leisure time activities but you might wanna know what’s up in my academic life as well… I don’t know whether I told you but I got an exemption for D&D (Data and Decisions is a statistics course which I was able to wave due to my “undergraduate degree”)
I’m currently taking five courses
- Marketing (with the part time students on Monday evenings ... Mondays are very long)
- Managerial Economics (visiting Professor from NYU Stern)
- Managing People for High Performance (aka MPfHP)
- Accounting for Managers
- Financial Management
This term is really a quantitative one … especially if you go for the usual program which includes D&D instead of Marketing.
I so far enjoy my courses though it’s very, very hard work … currently I work only for the sake of getting things done rather than to “learn” something. I thought it will be a lot of work but this exceeds my expectations by far …
Usually, the courses are graded by a mixture of:
- Class participation
- Individual assignments (case write ups, marketing projects, …)
- Syndicate (or group) assignments
- Mid-term and final exams
For next week I have to work on a syndicate assignment for Accounting (nearly done), an individual assignment for Marketing (a positioning statement for a personal electronics product – due on Monday, not yet started, probably choose ASUS notebooks …), another syndicate assignment for Finance (not yet started), and of course the ongoing class prep (case write prep for Marketing, MPfHP & Accounting - non yet started) plus around 7 chapters in several books (not yet started), …
You see, I can’t complain about not enough work to do … =;)
At least ,my past work experience as a consultant made me quite resistent regarding tough deadlines and working as close as possible to the deadlines ;)
MBS Courtyard
The fridge story continuous ...
You won’t believe it … I managed to have the fridge technician coming in today and he fixed my fridge.
After nearly 3 weeks without a working fridge I’m very happy to be able to live like a “normal” human now … I just mention very quick that I had some big fights with Whirlpool Customer Service (again) but finally I had the mobile number of the technician and was able to coordinate with him personally and that worked: he told me yesterday that it will be Friday around lunch time but he calls in 30mins before … When he called today (really around lunch time) I left my syndicate meeting - jumped on my bike and rode home – met him – got the fridge fixed – and rode back to uni … too easy! :)
Hope that's it about my fridge ... keep fingers crossed!
The Melbournian Weather
To be honest, the Melbournian weather is weird. One day hot, the next cold, and always it’s very windy. I was told that you could have four seasons within a day in Melbourne and “if you don’t like the weather, wait 10 minutes” (it’ll change) …
Yesterday it was the hottest day in October in Melbourne ever … 36°C! And just two days ago I still used the heater and it cooled down to just 7°C at night. Last night it didn’t cool down at all. I slept with windows opened – a bad mistake! But – anyway – the weekend is supposed to be cold again, forecasts promise just 8°C for the nights …
My new Bike
It seems to be also the week of new things … on Sunday the hat, on Thursday a bike. Finally, after nearly three weeks in my apartment I got the bike … and I’m very happy with it and my new won mobility ...
On Sunday there is the famous “Around the Bay in a Day” race around Melbourne Bay – either 250km, 100km, or 42km. Part of the class is participating and I’d love too but I’m after two months definitely out of training ... but I’m sure there are coming more races up as we move towards summer with big steps …
Patton & Shannon's Wedding
Patton and Shannon’s wedding was a special event. We were told to meet our colleague Ameel and his wife Nadia at Federation Square at 2pm (and don’t be late or you’ll miss the whole event). They will then have an envelope which holds instructions how to reach the secret location … So far so good … we were sent by tram to the Docklands, to Pier C02. Patton and Shannon were already there cruising on a boat and the actual ceremony took place on the boat while we were waiting at the pier. A little while later the boat docked on at the pier and we boarded for the reception, also on the boat. The next two hours we were cruising around Melbourne Bay. Unfortunately, it was quite cold and also very windy, so all the great ladies’ hats (and the all the guests as well) stayed inside the captain’s room. Nevertheless, we had a great afternoon - thank you for the invitation!
My new Hat
Hey mates,
A lot happened that week (also a reason for not posting within the last week) but I think I’ll break it up into several entries …
As I mentioned in an earlier post I was invited to a wedding on Sunday. We were told upfront that the bride likes events where women wear hats … so, of course I didn’t have anything else to do than to buy one – not only for the wedding but also for the Melbourne Cup (horse races) in early November. And – of course – I did buy the hat just in time, about half an hour before we met…
I was at one of the big department stores in Melbourne’s Bourke Street. They have hundreds of hats there and I tried at least half of them ;) I finally narrowed down my choice to two and ended up buying this one:
And – good choice – I didn’t know that my colleague Nadja bought that one that was the second one in my closer choice …
All the best
B.
What a great day!
Today we got started with our organizational project for our MPfHP class … that’s actually the only interesting thing in that class. However, we are asked to visit an organization of our choice and do a small consulting project for them regarding their team structure, team effectiveness and/or solve an organizational issue they face.
As our team is truly international (Chile, Korea, Hong Kong, US/Indonesia, Austria) we don’t have any contacts into the Australian business world. Therefore, we asked our lecturer to provide us with a project from an MBS alumni. She made a contact for us with another lecturer who made contact with the Victorian Institute of Sports for whom he already conducted several project in different sports departments. We finally work now for Gymnastics Victoria and will solve an issue about the organizational structure there. We got a briefing from the executive director of GV and she also showed us round in their state-to-the-art training facility for Australian/Victorian high performance athletes in gymnastics. It’s pretty amazing to see all those kids doing things we never were, are, or will be able to do … GV shares this gymnasium with the NICA (National Institute for Circus Arts). There are people juggling, acrobats as well as aerialists (Trapezkünstler), … very amazing.
This meeting went very well but that was the only thing that worked well today …
First, I thought the Whirlpool technician is coming in to repair my fridge – I called already two days ago to make sure, they are not coming in the afternoon when I won’t be in because of our meeting. Even tough they usually give you anyway only morning (8-12) or afternoon (12-4) appointments and I agreed with the technician on a morning appointment on Tuesday already, Whirlpool customer services was not able to confirm that two days ago. However, I called this morning again and the chat went as follows:
I explained that I’m not at home in the afternoon between 12 & 4 and therefore want to make sure the technician is either coming before 12 or after 4.
Whirlpool: The technician will come in the afternoon
Me: But then after 4pm.
Whirlpool: No, I guess he will come earlier; he works only till 4.30pm
Me: But I’m not at home before 4 (and I knew already that this repair will take about 1 hour)
Whirlpool: I guess it will be before that …
Me: Do you understand me? I’m not at home at that time …
and so on ...
The technician was supposed to call me before he comes in – no, no one called today – I will write a letter of complaint to Whirlpool because currently I’m really furious because my fridge is not working since a week now …
And, as if that wasn’t enough, a bird (I guess a sea gull) ruined my favourite Australian jacket on our way to the initial meeting with our client …
What a great day!
Grand Final Party
In Australia, everything circles around the footie (Football Ozzie Rules). At least at this time of the year… and yesterday was the Grand Final 2006 – the Sydney Swans vs. the West Coast Eagles! It was truly a grand Grand Final. An excellent game which was finally decided in the last quarter. The West Coast Eagles won with only one point difference (85:84). Some see it as the revenge from last year when the same two teams were playing in the Grand Final 2005 and the Swans won by 4 points against the Eagles.
As you all know I usually don’t follow sports on TV … but as mentioned above – you can’t avoid the footie here in Melb. ;) Originally it was the Victorian Football League but the change it to the Australian Football League (AFL) shortly. It was a big disappointment that – again – there was no Victorian team in the grand final.
I was yesterday invited to the great Grand Final Party at Robinette & Bob’s. So, I made a pavlova (again ;) on Friday night and made my way to Wheelers Hill after finishing the make-up class for MPfHP (Managing People: there was no lecture in week 1 and we had to come for a make-up class yesterday … and my group had also a case to present which actually went very well (and it’s done now :) – so, no chance to skip class)
Had a great afternoon and a really exciting Grand Final game! Thank you very much, Robinette and Bob! Looking forward to go to the MCG next season and see a footie game live! :)
The Devil Wears Prada
Thursday – Ladies' night! :)
Unfortunately, Robinette who wanted to join in for the movie was ill and therefore not coming with us, but Nadja, Nadia, Elissa, and myself had a great evening going to the pictures and seeing “The Devil Wears Prada” on its starting day in Oz.
This movie is definitely worth watching! :)
Engagement-and-Relax-from-WOM-Party
Had a cool party last week Saturday. Fede (Argentina) and his fiancé Virginia made lovely pizza for all of us at Vincent’s (Belgium) place. We celebrated our first engagement party. Patton and Shannon from California got engaged that Saturday – wedding to follow soon (next Sunday)! World of Management aka WOM was the intensive overview we got in the first two weeks and we were all very happy to have finished our first exam in the program and tried at the party to relax from the hard studies ;)
