Friday, September 10, 2004
The first three weeks at Darden have been completely exhausting. Absolutely no time to spare.
I had barely settled in when classes started. The apartment was still a mess with lots of boxes remaining to be unpacked.
The first week was supposed to be a light week with everyone getting introduced to the case method, socials, etc. Due to recruiters starting their manhunt ever earlier, Darden decided to incorporate their "self-awareness" program (so one can zoom in on careers they want to pursue in lieu of pursuing I-banking, consulting, etc all at the same time). Though the purpose was benign, it ended up being more of a chore than anything else. But overall, I'm sure I gained some insight into myself.
The Learning Teams are not announced till the 3rd day of classes. So all of us had to wait till Wednesday afternoon to learn who were going to be paired with. I am lucky to have some good team mates..a portfolio manager, a CPA, a web developer, a consultant, a pension fund manager, and an engineer.
Classes start at 8:00 am and end at 1:10 pm. Learning Teams usually meet from 8 pm to 11 pm or 7 pm to 10 pm. Mine decided for the latter. So one less hour to study. We get our cases for the next week in our mailboxes every Friday afternoon.
The second week was when all hell broke loose. 3 cases a day !!! Are you kidding me?? Barely got the time to finish lunch and reading up on the cases before my learning team met. Wow. This meant that I was at school from 7:45 am till 10 pm!!!! Accounting classes started to give me the creeps even though I've taken courses. Gradually my amnesia melted away and I feel I am okay.
Week three has been full of club signing ups and free lunches. A second year student told us that we won't have to worry about lunches this semester due to companies and clubs continuously having presentations/briefings during lunchtime.
As for the classes, I've noticed that Organizational Behavior (OB) generally has the lengthiest cases and I frankly still don't know if I am learning much. I guess getting the thought process correct is good enough. I now find Business & the Political Environment (BPE) to be the toughest since Macroeconomics has always been very confusing to me. With some effort this weekend, I intend to catch up. Quantitative analysis (QA) is something I need to open my mind to. With my technical background, spreadsheets have been a breeze....But this has also been my downfall. When something is right up your alley, you tend to have some fixed and strong opinions about it. And with that comes a tendency to stand by your analysis no matter what. Something I'm making an effort in is having an open mind during the analysis.
As if all this was not enough, companies have already started pouring onto the campus. Next week a bunch of I-Banks are coming in and hogging the remaining free time we have. 1:30 pm to 2:30 pm for the afternoon presentations, and 6:30 pm to 7:45 pm for the second. We have decided to move our meeting times to 8 pm in light of that.
First Coffee (a Darden tradition where everyone meets up in the hall for free coffee after the first class) are also being sponsored everyday.
I've figured that the only way to keep up with all the happenings is to get a headstart on Saturday and read up on some of the cases. (There goes the remaining day !!!!!!!!!) :-)
I had barely settled in when classes started. The apartment was still a mess with lots of boxes remaining to be unpacked.
The first week was supposed to be a light week with everyone getting introduced to the case method, socials, etc. Due to recruiters starting their manhunt ever earlier, Darden decided to incorporate their "self-awareness" program (so one can zoom in on careers they want to pursue in lieu of pursuing I-banking, consulting, etc all at the same time). Though the purpose was benign, it ended up being more of a chore than anything else. But overall, I'm sure I gained some insight into myself.
The Learning Teams are not announced till the 3rd day of classes. So all of us had to wait till Wednesday afternoon to learn who were going to be paired with. I am lucky to have some good team mates..a portfolio manager, a CPA, a web developer, a consultant, a pension fund manager, and an engineer.
Classes start at 8:00 am and end at 1:10 pm. Learning Teams usually meet from 8 pm to 11 pm or 7 pm to 10 pm. Mine decided for the latter. So one less hour to study. We get our cases for the next week in our mailboxes every Friday afternoon.
The second week was when all hell broke loose. 3 cases a day !!! Are you kidding me?? Barely got the time to finish lunch and reading up on the cases before my learning team met. Wow. This meant that I was at school from 7:45 am till 10 pm!!!! Accounting classes started to give me the creeps even though I've taken courses. Gradually my amnesia melted away and I feel I am okay.
Week three has been full of club signing ups and free lunches. A second year student told us that we won't have to worry about lunches this semester due to companies and clubs continuously having presentations/briefings during lunchtime.
As for the classes, I've noticed that Organizational Behavior (OB) generally has the lengthiest cases and I frankly still don't know if I am learning much. I guess getting the thought process correct is good enough. I now find Business & the Political Environment (BPE) to be the toughest since Macroeconomics has always been very confusing to me. With some effort this weekend, I intend to catch up. Quantitative analysis (QA) is something I need to open my mind to. With my technical background, spreadsheets have been a breeze....But this has also been my downfall. When something is right up your alley, you tend to have some fixed and strong opinions about it. And with that comes a tendency to stand by your analysis no matter what. Something I'm making an effort in is having an open mind during the analysis.
As if all this was not enough, companies have already started pouring onto the campus. Next week a bunch of I-Banks are coming in and hogging the remaining free time we have. 1:30 pm to 2:30 pm for the afternoon presentations, and 6:30 pm to 7:45 pm for the second. We have decided to move our meeting times to 8 pm in light of that.
First Coffee (a Darden tradition where everyone meets up in the hall for free coffee after the first class) are also being sponsored everyday.
I've figured that the only way to keep up with all the happenings is to get a headstart on Saturday and read up on some of the cases. (There goes the remaining day !!!!!!!!!) :-)
