Admitted!

Wow, after a long day year-end meeting & a quite disappointing late dinner @ a rather wooloo place, I am delighted to receive the email offer from Said Business School! Though without scholarship at this moment :-) Cheer On & Carry On!

Dr. Reynolds:-0

It was 11:45 GMT, I ringed Dr. Reynold's office on time and he immediately picked it up & greeted me "Hello, Mr. Tang! Your essays were quite interesting. I will take about 20 mins for questions and you will have 10 mins to ask." The interview started off warmly & quickly.

1. Why the career transition & what your past experience had to do with the current position? (this is a very specific question as I can see he read through my entire application package).

2. What're the challenges in your current job, especially the unique persepctives of doing business in China?

3. Why you want to make another transition after MBA? What's your motivation & preparation?
4. How will you contribute to the Said Business School?

5. What books you have read on social entrepreneurship? (this is the strength of SBS)

6. Any question about the course & the program?

I asked a few questions and we ended sharp at 12:15 GMT. I personally found it was a very efficient & effective interview though it was conducted on the phone. The communication has been quite smooth thanks to the good quality of VoIP card. (remember to choose a good one if you have to call out. Yes, they do ask interviewees to call the interviewer at the assigned time & number for about 30 mins).

Guess being British gentlemen & gentlewomen, they just don't know how to stop the other party if he/she kept talking when the interviewer calls. Smart way to cut cost...

Good luck to all the interviewees & many thanks to the alumni who have shared so many insightful personal advices with me, by phone, online or face-to-face. It's a small but strong community (at least, from my experiences)!

the Tour, the Exam, the Interview...

Probably last visting to MBA tours and had a good chat with IMD alumni Glenn. Also met up with IE alumni Arnd.

2 months, 2 applications.

Take a break, prepare for the exam & the interview! Look forward to the real tour:-)

Progress Report

I got the phone interview invitation from Said and will be conducted in early Dec. Interesting they won't call me but leave me the number to contact. Not sure whether it's for cost-cutting or a gesture of courtesy.

My 2nd application are almost done. I'm still fine-tuning the essays & short questions. Friday, 2nd visit to iNsEaD & Sunday the world MBA tour. How time flies:-)

2nd Parcel - Real Madrid!

Finaly posted out the 2nd parcel while still waiting for the feedback from the 1st one. Hope to finish the 2nd application within the next 7-10 days. Carry On!

a Counting...

1個月，2個月，爲了1個夢想，期盼1次重逢！
1 months, 2 months, chasing a dream, dreaming a reunion!

Expecting... Expediting!

Finally got the acknowledgement of round 1 application being received though it was actually a few days later, the benifits of flexible small schools:-)

Surprised to hear from CD that someone stayed in the U.S. for 5 years has got the early decision offer from CBS without any interview, really fast consider the submission date was Oct 14.

I need to expedite on the rest applications since I am so greedy to reserve a few more options for myself...Cheers!

168 days - things I've learnt so far

Doing vs. Saying, Be Consistent, Responsibility, Maturity, Privacy, Friends & Friendship, Kidding...

1st package 小试牛刀 & 双键合璧

Finally sent out my first package to Said, a lot of help from a friend of mine. Thanks & I will continue to work on the 2 essays:-P

Stanford GSB - Die Luft der Freiheit weht

General Management, Personalized Curriculum, Stategic Size & Collabrative Culture - 3 main features of Stanford GSB's MBA program with one of the lowest acceptance rate in the world. 4 energetic alumni showed up, ranging from a 96 graduate who's now in Citi, a 94 graduate Joe (ABC) who was also alumnus of West Point Military but now has his own investment firm in Singapore? a 05 graduate John local scholar or double scholar (Cornell's bachelor - MAS & Stanford's MBA - PM's office), a mainland Chinese 06 graduate forrest who just married his classmate who's a Temasek scholar last Sunday. Forrest Li is now working with MTV Networks Asia:-P Thanks to Joe's referral?

370 per year, now 24,000 alumni, 100+ chapters worldwide. It's obvious that Stanford is quite different from the rest besides its extreme comptetiveness in terms of admission. It's always on the innovative edge with one of the highest faculty / student ratio 1:6. But I guess what I appreciate most about it is the "soul-searching" essay question which is really inspiring: "What do you value most in life & Why?"

I'm not sure whether I'll apply this school, but it'll definitely be a very worthy try.

Die Luft der Freiheit weht (German for "The wind of freedom blows")!

P.S. just read an inspirational bio of U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice @ Wikimedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Condoleezza_Rice

a fair MBA fair

I took a half-day off & had the chance to meet up with Smith, BU, Owen & IE for either evaluative or informative interview. One is really disappointing but all have been benificial to my future application.

Also heard the beautiful Cindy from Hass shared her insights on essays writing & interive (be it blind or alumni, etc.). "Be Genuine, Be Specific & Be Outstanding"!

It's intereting to see how each school / program promote themselves. The most creative & comprehensive brochures come from inSeaD in a very handy size. PSU's brochure also look quite impressive though it's basically a regional school. But at least we can see they're serious about it & deeply driven to improve.

I spotted HEC-Paris' 16-month program which seems to be quite unique & solid. Coincidentally, their marketing or BDM is also an American who works for a European biz-school, same as inSeaD Singapore's Gopika who happened to be an alumna from close rival IMD. What a small & smash world!

What else? Thanks to CBS' reception @ the American Club & I attended the firt half and later joined St. Gallen HSG-MBA's 1st ever cocktail reception in a very cosy ballroom at the nearby Orchard Hotel. Extremely friendly staff & alumni, passionate staff Marie who's a master from LSE & migrated to Switzerland from her hometown Germany. That's just a glimpse of how international a European MBA can be, from its faculty, staff all the way to alumni:-)

Good luck to all, especially those who're on their ways to home after a long long Asia tour!

iMD & SAiD

Wow, finally received two posted brochures from the above mentioned instituions. 1 disappointing, 1 inspiring! I really love the butterfly covered SAiD brochure with its bold yet beautiful colours used through the latest brochure. However, IMD doesn't seem to be very interested to attract potential students through this way. Anyway, students there are supposed to be more matured:-P

Just enjoyed the video production of Oxford MBA sent together with the brochure. Well done! Daytime - modern business school setting & facility for team work. Nighttime, historical colledge environment for solititude & soul resting. Plus a strong focus on entrepreneurship & finance, it looks very promising! Though I know brochure is just part of the MBA campaign, if this young schoool can do it so well, they might perform even better to improve their always fast-climbing ranking.

AS iT'S SAiD, it's a good choice!
BTW, tonight CBS & HSG info session @ Orchard*-*

Surprise!

from Economist: http://www.economist.com/displaystory.cfm?story_id=7911221

The balance of economic power in the world is changing. Good
IF ECONOMISTS have a tendency to trust their figures too much, politicians often pay numbers too little attention; and they do so at their peril. Napoleon dismissed Britain as a nation of shopkeepers, but its emerging might as a trading power helped fight him off. In the cold war Western strategists probably spent too much time worrying about the Soviet Union's military clout, and not enough analysing its commercial frailties. Economics does not determine history, but it does provide the backbeat. And something dramatic has been happening to the numbers recently.

As our survey this week points out, the emerging world now accounts for over half of global economic output, measured in purchasing-power parity (which allows for lower prices in poorer countries). Many economists prefer to measure GDP using current exchange rates (which put the emerging world's proportion closer to 30%). But even on this basis the newcomers accounted for well over half of the growth in global output last year. And a barrage of statistics shows economic power shifting away from the “developed” economies (basically North America, western Europe, Japan and Australasia) towards emerging ones, especially in Asia. Developing countries chew up over half of the world's energy and hold most of its foreign-exchange reserves. Their share of exports has jumped from 20% in 1970 to 43% today. And, although Africa still lags behind, the growth is fairly broadly spread: they may be the most talked about, yet Brazil, Russia, India and China account for only two-fifths of emerging-world output.

No social or economic change this big takes place without friction. The most obvious sign is the uproar about jobs being “outsourced” to India and China. The howls will get louder as globalisation affects ever-richer voters. But there are wider ramifications too. In Asia China's rise has helped push Japan and India closer to the United States, and South Korea further away from it. The once-poor world is scouring the earth for mineral rights, trying to buy Californian oil firms, accounting for ever more carbon emissions and making its weight felt in international negotiations on everything from trade to proliferation to the secretary-generalship of the United Nations.

An idea whose time has come, again
There are weaknesses in some of the growth stories. China's population is ageing and India's schools are rotten. Perhaps the emerging world won't continue to motor along at nearly three times the rich world's pace. Maybe it will take a little longer than 2040 to fulfil Goldman Sachs's prediction that the world's ten biggest economies, using market exchange rates, will include Brazil, Russia, Mexico, India and China. But these are arguments about when, not whether, change will happen. And things could speed up: even the rosiest predictions underestimated Asia's ability to recover from its 1997 financial crisis.

This shift is not as extraordinary as it first seems. A historical perspective shows it to be the restoration of the old order. After all, China and India were the world's biggest economies until the mid-19th century, when technology and a spirit of freedom enabled the West to leap ahead. Nor should it be regarded as frightening. The West, as well as hundreds of millions of people in developing countries, has benefited from emerging-world growth. Globalisation is not a zero-sum game: Mexicans, Koreans and Poles are not growing at the expense of Americans, Japanese and Germans. Developing countries already buy half the combined exports of America, Japan and the euro area. As they get richer they will buy more. The world is on course for its fastest-ever decade of growth in GDP per head, which has been powering ahead at an annual rate of 3.2% since 2000—far faster than during the great period of globalisation that ended with the first world war.

Somme where, over the rainbow
If that comparison raises spectres, so it should. A century ago Edwardian globalists were predicting ever more peace and prosperity—only to see those dreams blown apart on the fields of Flanders. The momentum behind globalisation is considerable; but pushing trade barriers lower depends on political will. It is doubtful that any American president would follow the example of the Chinese emperor Qianlong, who announced in 1793 that the then economic superpower had no interest in “foreign manufactures”, setting his country on the road to two centuries of impoverishment. But there are a few worrying omens in the air, notably the collapse of the Doha round of trade talks.

Protectionism and xenophobia should be fought wherever they spring up. But it is also worth acknowledging that these bumptious new economic powers have made the world more complicated for Western policymakers. For instance, although they have helped keep inflation and interest rates down, they have also encouraged asset prices to bubble up. They have allowed America to finance its massive current-account deficit with apparent impunity. Righting these imbalances will be tricky, even if the strength of emerging economies makes the world less dependent on America.

But the two main challenges for the West are long-term political ones. One has to do with accepting that there will be some Western victims of globalisation. Adding 1.5 billion people to the global labour force has boosted the return to capital and richly rewarded rich Westerners; but in Germany, Japan and the United States, real wages for the median worker have barely budged. None of this is an excuse for protectionism—unless you want to make everybody poorer. But there may be fiercer debates, even in America, about using the tax and benefits system to redistribute more of the winnings.

The other challenge has to do with geopolitics. As the balance of economic power in the world changes, mustn't the balance of political power change too?
In time, perhaps. But economic power is not the same as political power. Most developing countries are still military pipsqueaks: China does not yet own a single aircraft-carrier, and its defence budget is less than the annual increase in America's. Nor in political terms is there such a thing as an “emerging block”: no alliance of interests brings all these very different countries together in the way that history and culture have united America and Europe. In Asia, for example, the rise of China is balanced by the rise of India, which America is striving to turn into a strategic partner. But there is also plainly a need to fiddle with some of the global political architecture. The IMF will tinker with the power structure of the fund at its annual meeting next week. Others should follow. The UN Security Council—whose permanent members include Britain and France but exclude Japan, India and Brazil—has long looked outdated and will soon look absurd. Similarly, it does not make much sense for the G7, supposedly the world's main economic club, to discuss currencies when China, which holds the largest official reserves, is not a member.

Making such adjustments will no doubt be awkward. But these are the problems of success. A world in which most people enjoy prosperity and opportunity is surely better than one in which 80% are mired in economic stagnation. Celebrate the riches that globalisation has brought—and be prepared to defend the economic liberalisation that underpins it.

emails flying before the tour

the MBA tour is coming to town next week. a lot of emails flying around. managed to make appointments with IE. BU says they don't normally interview before application completed but I am yet to find convincing reasons to apply it besides the bold brochure & alumni Martin Luther King Jr. Hope to see more schools coming though I've already known said is not coming.

IE's response is very fast & warm, liked it! Carry on!

Top 5 - What do they care?

Review of AdCom panel （Wednesday, August 02, 2006）转自一美国MBA申请者Blog
……I went to a UPenn Alumni Club event with members of the admissions committees at Harvard, Stanford, Wharton, Kellogg, and MIT. Most of the answers were pretty standard, but I did find a few interesting tidbits.

They polled the audience in the beginning to get an idea of work experience (most people were applying with 3 - 5 years of experience), whether or not people had significant others that would join them at school (only about 10 -15 people!!!), and how many had already taken the GMAT (just under half).Each member of the panel spoke about a different part of the admission process.

General comments - they really do read the entire package. They all agreed that they never look at stats and then just put you in the reject pile. At least two people will read your package (including all essays).

Kellogg Rep - GMAT and Transcripts
Want to demonstrate you can handle rigor of program. Will understand a lower quant score if you were an English lit major. Everything taken in context of the overall package.
AdCom is looking for improvement and trends.

MIT Rep - Work experience and recommendations
Average is 4 - 5 years of work experience, more or less years is fine but make sure you goals are clear and the "why now" comes out in your essays
Being sincere will help you to differentiate yourself if you are in a common group (e.g., consultants). Be sure to show the impact you've had and let your passion come through.
Write about your accomplishments, not your tasks
Recommendations should highlight your strengths; best way to make sure that happens - get someone who knows you well to write the recommendation

Stanford Rep - Extracurriculars
Cover extracurriculars in college through current time; try to focus on leadership, scope of responsibility, size of organization and what kinds of activities that organization does, impact you've had. Non-leadership positions can be valuable too - sometimes you made an impact as a team. Attaining a certain level of achievement (e.g., All-American) also shows your dedication and self-sacrifice. They look at context. Understand that if you are working crazy banking hours and flying every week for work as a consultant that it would be hard to get involved. However, it is therefore even more impressive if you have managed to do that.

HBS Rep - Essays
Essays are the heart of the application. Will help if you see it as an opportunity rather than a chore. Chance to distinguish yourself. Make the AdCom excited to get to know you (they'll want to see you for an interview!) Ask your reviewers to think about whether this is you when they read your essays

Wharton Rep - Interviews
Gain insight into passions, career path, why you want/need an MBA
Rehearse your story and do your homework on the school - just don't get to the point where it's just recitation and not a conversation

Every school does its interview process differently - make sure you understand it for each. After this general discussion, there were prepared and open Q&A. Here are some things I found interesting:

All schools except Kellogg were very open to younger applications, particularly women (this stems from realizing that women often want to go to school earlier because they do include family planning in their career). Kellogg didn't say they were against younger applicants, but I guess they really value work experience.

All schools are really trying to get more women. They pointed out that law and med school has reached a 50/50 representation while b-schools still hover around 30%. (as a side note, MIT has clearly been proactive about this. I got a letter in the mail from the school highlighting their focus on recruiting and training women in business).
Optional essays are truly optional.

If you come from a non-traditional background, that's great b/c it represents diversity. But, you may have to do a bit more explaining about what you do so AdCom can understand.

Types of classes: Kellogg - variety, MIT - variety, Stanford - case, experiential (a few lecture), HBS - 80% case, rest are experiential (50% of their students do field studies in 2nd year), Wharton - mix of case and lecture
……

Fear of Flying - Welcome Onboard by Veritas Airways

http://www.economist.com/displaystory.cfm?story_id=7884654

Welcome aboard
Sep 7th 2006From The Economist print edition
In-flight announcements are not entirely truthful. What might an honest one sound like?

“GOOD morning, ladies and gentlemen. We are delighted to welcome you aboard Veritas Airways, the airline that tells it like it is. Please ensure that your seat belt is fastened, your seat back is upright and your tray-table is stowed. At Veritas Airways, your safety is our first priority. Actually, that is not quite true: if it were, our seats would be rear-facing, like those in military aircraft, since they are safer in the event of an emergency landing. But then hardly anybody would buy our tickets and we would go bust.

The flight attendants are now pointing out the emergency exits. This is the part of the announcement that you might want to pay attention to. So stop your sudoku for a minute and listen: knowing in advance where the exits are makes a dramatic difference to your chances of survival if we have to evacuate the aircraft. Also, please keep your seat belt fastened when seated, even if the seat-belt light is not illuminated. This is to protect you from the risk of clear-air turbulence, a rare but extremely nasty form of disturbance that can cause severe injury. Imagine the heavy food trolleys jumping into the air and bashing into the overhead lockers, and you will have some idea of how nasty it can be. We don't want to scare you. Still, keep that seat belt fastened all the same.

Your life-jacket can be found under your seat, but please do not remove it now. In fact, do not bother to look for it at all. In the event of a landing on water, an unprecedented miracle will have occurred, because in the history of aviation the number of wide-bodied aircraft that have made successful landings on water is zero. This aircraft is equipped with inflatable slides that detach to form life rafts, not that it makes any difference. Please remove high-heeled shoes before using the slides. We might as well add that space helmets and anti-gravity belts should also be removed, since even to mention the use of the slides as rafts is to enter the realm of science fiction.

Please switch off all mobile phones, since they can interfere with the aircraft's navigation systems. At least, that's what you've always been told. The real reason to switch them off is because they interfere with mobile networks on the ground, but somehow that doesn't sound quite so good. On most flights a few mobile phones are left on by mistake, so if they were really dangerous we would not allow them on board at all, if you think about it. We will have to come clean about this next year, when we introduce in-flight calling across the Veritas fleet. At that point the prospect of taking a cut of the sky-high calling charges will miraculously cause our safety concerns about mobile phones to evaporate.

On channel 11 of our in-flight entertainment system you will find a video consisting of abstract imagery and a new-age soundtrack, with a voice-over explaining some exercises you can do to reduce the risk of deep-vein thrombosis. We are aware that this video is tedious, but it is not meant to be fun. It is meant to limit our liability in the event of lawsuits.

Once we have reached cruising altitude you will be offered a light meal and a choice of beverages—a word that sounds so much better than just saying ‘drinks’, don't you think? The purpose of these refreshments is partly to keep you in your seats where you cannot do yourselves or anyone else any harm. Please consume alcohol in moderate quantities so that you become mildly sedated but not rowdy. That said, we can always turn the cabin air-quality down a notch or two to help ensure that you are sufficiently drowsy.

After take-off, the most dangerous part of the flight, the captain will say a few words that will either be so quiet that you will not be able to hear them, or so loud that they could wake the dead. So please sit back, relax and enjoy the flight. We appreciate that you have a choice of airlines and we thank you for choosing Veritas, a member of an incomprehensible alliance of obscure foreign outfits, most of which you have never heard of. Cabin crew, please make sure we have remembered to close the doors. Sorry, I mean: ‘Doors to automatic and cross-check’. Thank you for flying Veritas.”

2 weeks

So many happenings in the past 2 weeks. my friend has got a just nice GMAT score, congratulations! Been to Wharton's reception held at BCG office. A crowd of 30-40, an alumni couple (very interesting background, but not going to share here personal details). I was a bit late so didn't catch the name of the male admin officer. Nothing much exciting & he sounded a bit cocky, maybe it's just my wrong perception or lack of interest. One thing for sure, they don't quite bother such a small place like Singapore & this basically one-man-show was not well prepared. They even forgot to open up the refreshments afterwards. What a waste!

BTW, I've also been doing some interesting projects for L.A.!

Feedback from SG & LD

About two weeks ago, I sent out email enquiry to both Insead & SAiD. Within a week, I got a quite comprehensive but not-so-warm reply from SG. Yesterday, had a nice phone conversation with Ginny from SAiD followed by her very detailed & personal reply. I guess the difference is probably Insead had a much bigger applicant pool (several thousands / batch, 2 batches / year) than SAiD (about 800 / year). Later saw SAiD's latest brochure, very cool design & unique concept, can't help ordering 1 print copy:-) At the same time, requested from IMD, Kellogg also. Tried to make an appointment with IE for 1-to-1 interview during the MBA tour, yet to get the details. Cheers!

Who Holds Tomorrow?

Haven't touched this blog for a long long time, 1st blog - May last year, 2nd blog - Jan this year, now 2006 is about to enter the last triplicate. Where does my future head? What I really want to do? What satisfies me & fulfils my purpose?

Currently, I focus on realigning my working attitude & applying for MBA programs. Give myself 4-5 weeks for the 1st try which is SAiD - Sep 28 to finish the draft, just one month before their deadline of round 1:-) But there're several things I need to sort out during this period of time, besides a P.S. which should be applicable for all schools, of course with changes here & there, finding suitable recommenders, hope my friend will also get a handsome GMAT score, etc. In between, I will attend a couple of info sessions, Sep 6 Wharton, hopefully Stanford will also come to town soon. Plan well, live well.

Let's see how...as it's SAiD or rather sung, I don't know where my future heads but I do konw who holds tomorrow!

Shalom

苹果Apple vs. Cola可乐

商业周刊大幅报道纽约大学（5万学生）宣布取消所有的可口可乐自动贩卖机，起因是两年前哥伦比亚工厂的劳工被披露人权问题……很难想象这事情是如何关联的吧？请阅读吧：
BIGGER PROBLEMS? Hancock says CKC (Campus Kick-off Cola) is still hopeful that Coca-Cola will address its concerns and institute "a new and transparent human-rights policy." Tannenbaum says the university will lift the ban if Coke agrees to an investigation as proposed. Coca-Cola's University Commission has been at a standstill since early November. The five student representatives who resigned in protest have not yet rejoined. "We need to make a decision about how to proceed," says Scott Nova, executive director of the WRC, who sits on the commission. "That will happen relatively soon." A Coca-Cola representative says the company is willing and open to further discuss the issue. But Coke may find itself in a bigger predicament as time passes. In the two years since the NYU campaign began, allegations that Coca-Cola permitted human-rights abuses and environmental degradation in countries like India, Ghana, Turkey, Indonesia, and Guatemala have gained media attention and support on college campuses in particular. Three weeks after NYU announced its ban, the University of Michigan followed suit, citing questionable behavior by the company in India and Colombia. Coca-Cola says it's developing a global workplace-rights policy that it will adopt at the end of the first quarter of 2006.

PR NIGHTMARE. The cost of losing a customer like NYU, which doesn't have an exclusive contract with Coca-Cola, is difficult to gauge. (An NYU spokesperson didn't know the value of its business with Coke.) But the public-relations hit of losing such a trend-setting school might make any executive wince. "Just like Coca-Cola, NYU is a brand. We're a dream school, the school of [TV series] Felicity, and we make news," says Hancock. Soon Cadbury Schweppes (CSG ) brand RC Cola will replace Coke and Minute Maid in NYU's vending machines and dining halls. Will the preferences and buying behavior of NYU students follow? "Coca-Cola better pay attention to these students," says Tannenbaum. "They're going to be [its] consumers for the next 40 years."