First week of First Quarter

It started again. We are done with first week of classes. The beauty of Kelley MBA is that you can customize it to your interests. IN my case I am taking the following courses in the first seven weeks. We will be done with these 4 courses in the first seven weeks and will take another 4 in the next seven.

1. Marketing Performance and Analysis
2. Firm in the capital markets
3. Managerial Accounting
4. Management Consulting

As you can see, they are as diverse as it can be. I most likely will not major in any function though I will take more courses in Finance. Finance is the strongest at Kelley. Man, the professors are awesome.

Along with the courses come the assignments. We have two assignments due next Wednesday and the schedule over the coming weeks be no different.

Now, coming to the important aspect: Internship (is it?). We have bid for companies that come for 4 weeks starting Jan-22. Some companies gave their shortlist also. I got one ding and am waiting for the other firms to come out with the results. We give so much importance to internship as if it is the essence of MBA. I agree that it is an important art of MBA but not the essence. We are paying $35,000 per year. If you take 200 working days, it comes to $175 per day, which is equivalent to $87 per class. That is I am paying ONE dollar for every minute I sit in the class.

I used to think that I need to do some research (not to the level of Ph.D) and learn about various problems that today's corporations face. I did not do much till now. So, I am shifting gears again.

I took a self-assignment of studying some of the Mergers and Acquisitions and write here about my learnings from them. As many as 70% mergers fail to create the expected value. You know what the main issue is? The cultural differences in the workforce, confusion and insecurity. There has been a helluva of activity recently in M&As and it's high time that we learn something about their successes or failures. For this purpose, I am going to take the Merger of HP and Compaq. Many people argue that it did not deliver the synergies it was supposed to or the talked about. I will post my learning here. If you would like to read them here are the articles:

The HP-Compaq Merger - Knowledge@Wharton
HP-Compaq: Rush to Judgment - CFO.com
HP: Why Effective Governance and Ownership Matters - INSEAD Research
HP-Compaq: A Battle for the Heart and Soul of a Company - INSEAD Research
Lessons from HP and Compaq - Stanford Research

I duly respect the copyright of the above documents and give the due credit their respective publishers. You may need to register for Knowledge@Wharton but it is free and takes just a minute.

Finally, There is an interesting article on Starbucks in NY times. Read it for a lot of insight and fun. Curing what Ails Starbucks.
We may have created a good past, but, now, it is not as good as it used to be or the definition of good has changed. CEOs and Chairmans should learn this and lead the businesses with that in mind. That is the essence of the article but the narration is awesome.

Good luck guys and see you guys next week.