Week Nine - A roller coaster

After nine weeks of eating food I wouldn’t have touched once upon a time not so long ago, I finally gave in... No more slap stick Anglicised curry and boiled potatoes or fried chicken pieces, heated together for a few minutes and had with sliced bread; no more baked beans out of a tin and toast; no. Tonight, I cooked up for myself a proper Desi dinner. Chicken marinated for hours in mouth watering spices, cooked with Kolhapuri masala, had with Basmati rice prepared just right. Ummmm... the aroma and taste still lingers as I am typing this...

The week started with the usual… studies, studies and more studies… but on Wednesday 29 November we, Green Stream Learning Team 1, presented our Strategic Marketing Success story on Procter and Gamble. Remember I told you about it last week? The presentation was great, and Stephen Carver – the same who took Self Presentation sessions with us in week four – actually said ours was the best he had seen in this term! Coming from him, sure feels good.

Then on Thursday we had the introductory session for Project Management – remember I told you about this subject having its written assessment in the next term? We do the sessions this term, after term end exams… which are on 11 and 12 December. The difficult part is we will be all mixed and re-split into streams and learning teams… my membership of Green Stream and Green Stream Learning Team 1 is likely to last only for the next week. Even if some of us stay back in Green Stream, we will get partnered with different fellow course mates. All of us are upset about dispersing, we have just begun to instinctively anticipate and expect each other, and now this. We all had lunch together at the CMDC on Thursday 30 November… anyways, more on that later…

With exams closing in on us we are focusing on revising all the topics covered, but have to submit two assessed reports early next week and work on an assessed presentation. Those have to be done, so does the revision. Fun, isn’t it?

That’s what an MBA course is all about… lots of academic stuff to do, limited time, loads of pressure, plus family commitments, co-curricular stuff, your own things, friends, sports... The same applies for your career post MBA too. Just in case you are considering doing an MBA because you feel like it, or think it would look good on your CV, consider if you are really prepared for what is in store. I did my research before I decided, I would advise you to do the same. Even a half decent place will ask you to commit 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. The real good places like Cranfield will demand – nay, squeeze out of you – 48 hours a day, 730 days a year. Now you begin to understand the rationale behind Work Hard Play Harder – you have to play harder simply because the time left for playing is so limited. Like it? Welcome to the party!