Today’s entry is written by Julia Neubauer.

Our class spent much of the first four months of the MBA program in the auditorium, sitting through hours and hours of Accounting, Economics, Finance, Strategy, Organizational Behavior and so on. We pulled all-nighters during our Integrative Exercise, spent many late nights discussing start-up project work, often walked home past midnight and were back in class before 8am.

Given the hectic MBA schedule, I have asked myself what gets us through the days. Of course, it’s the adrenaline and the collective enthusiasm. However, there is something else that helps us beat the fatigue: caffeine! People come running to class at 7:58am, just in time to get their espresso before a four-hour session. Our MBA class crowd-funded a Nespresso machine in order to have access to high-quality coffee in the dungeons. Two of the most popular spots on campus are the coffee shop and the foyer of the MBA building with its coffee machines. You see, the evidence is overwhelming: coffee really does make the MBA world go round!

As a coffee lover, I have fully embraced the caffeinated IMD way of life. When I found out last month that my ICP team would be working with a coffee company, I could barely contain my excitement! My teammates reacted in a similar way and we all eagerly awaited our first client meeting. At the meeting, we got to know our “ICP partners” and received further details on the project scope and complexity. This is when we realized the challenge ahead of us! Given the extremely short project duration, we went straight to work and started scheduling tasks. With classes still ongoing, we struggled to manage our time and often found ourselves working late to meet expectations. Needless to say, it was caffeine that made it all possible!

Finally, when the ICP was officially kicked off last Monday, our team was already spread out all over Europe doing market visits. We had the privilege of getting to know our company’s key account managers in Switzerland, Germany, France, Portugal, Spain and the UK. In addition, we met clients and relevant stakeholders, gained valuable market insights and collected an abundance of information. Many of us saw traveling as a much appreciated change of routine. How refreshing to experience a glimpse of corporate life after four months in the auditorium!

Following a very long weekend consolidating information and working on our recommendations, we presented our interim findings to the client yesterday. Our hard work paid off – we received positive feedback from our client, along with coffee makers for all of us! Needless to say, we are now more motivated (caffeinated?) than ever to work on the second part of our ICP, and are back in the dungeons developing our phase two project plan…

Yours truly,

The Caffeinatos.

Today's entry is written by Tal Eisenberg from ICP group 14.

As we grow-up we find it harder and harder to put ourselves in an imaginary world, a world where everything is completely different from the world we currently live in. While children dare to dream and imagine, as adults we bear the “responsibility” to remain focused with our feet on the ground.

We are currently working on an amazing journey where as part of our International Consulting Project (ICP) our client has provided us with the great opportunity to dare and imagine, not for the fun of it, but as part of our clientcorporate strategy! “Simple task”: “IMD’s MBA team, could you please provide us with your point of view on how the Air Transportation industry will look like in 20 years?”

You probably ask yourself why we need to think about an imaginary world as part of corporate strategy. The reason for that is that as you imagine and put your thoughts in writing, articulating them, prioritizing them and determining their probability to occur in the distant future, is the way corporations reduce ambiguity and uncertainty about their future operations. More certainty, less ambiguity, a clear long term vision, all reduce corporate risk to lose its market dominance and provide its shareholders with a feeling of secureness, sleeping well every night. 

This is exactly why we came to IMD, no, not to help shareholders to sleep better, but to acquire the required skills to handle the complexity of an executive role. A research done by Elliott Jaques, Gillian Stamp and BIOSS, explored how our capacity to deal with more and more complexity increases as we gain more experience with complex situations. According to the research, what makes a project complex is the number of variables you need to manage, the interdependence between the variables, the volatility of the variables and the ambiguity of the variables.

So, how can a team of engineers, lawyer and economist from Israel, Finland, Egypt, Brazil, Argentina and Poland, with no specific experience in the Air Transportation industry, bring added value? Diversity! The diversity of our professions and cultures brings fresh and out of the box ideas that can assist our client in its innovation process. How did we do it? Using the Deep Dive method, an innovation process originated in IMD:

Using the Deep Dive methodology is a major part of our ICP project and by using this technique we will be further prepared for the challenges facing us in the “life after IMD”. We will face a world of uncertainty in which each one of us should always imagine not only 5 years ahead, but also bear the responsibility to imagine the world in 30 years. By doing so, we ensure the sustainability of our organizations and the world we shall hand over to our children when time comes…

Wish us luck,
Tal

Team members: Krzysztof Bialkowski (Polish), Tal Eisenberg (Israeli/British), Tomas Gerges (Egyptian/American), Ronald Gomes (Brazilian), Henri Soila (Finnish), Salvador Stoppani (Argentinean/Italian)

At the beginning of last week, the prospect of 4 weeks of unstructured time loomed appealingly ahead of us. We thought that with a 2-day weekend and no classes in the week after, the freedom we would have was unlimited, especially in comparison to the tightly structured weeks of class we'd been going through up till then.

One week later, I can safely say that the notion of "unstructured" time is definitely a myth. In fact, even though we've been largely left to our own devices in our self-managed ICP teams, the pace has been even more intense than when we were attending class. Before, we at least had the regular coffee breaks to refresh ourselves and chat; but now, often we're so deeply engrossed in our ICP work that we could carry on for hours without emerging from our study rooms. It's all thanks to the IMD restaurant and the Social Committee that we managed to catch up with classmates from other groups at lunchtime and Friday evening's party. Many of the groups have been meeting in the dungeons late into the night or even over the weekend, over and above a full day's work.

We've had exactly 5 working days to prepare for our first round of faculty and client presentations, which are on-going today and tomorrow. During this period, we had to map out the structure and business system of our respective industries. To take us from learning about new sectors virtually from scratch to being able to draw some preliminary conclusions and recommendations to our clients hasn't been an easy journey, especially given that we only had one short week to get there. In some cases, our ICPs have even prompted lifestyle changes - like the way I've been drinking several cups of hot tea every day since my project kick-off!

It was quite astounding to see that even with the leeway we've been given, everyone has still buckled down to unprecedented levels of drive and discipline to complete our ICP presentations and our second Leadership paper which was due on Sunday night. Even the group in Venezuela, whom we sent-off last Tuesday night with drinks at MGM, has sent us photo evidence of them hard at work on the ICP presentation. Tonight will no exception for me, as my group prepares for a long evening in advance of our client meeting tomorrow, even after waking up extra early to meet our project director at 7:30 am. To all my classmates, wishing you all the best for your presentations, and safe travels for those going out to their markets this week!

Yours,

Hwei-Yi

Saturday morning. It’s grey and dreary outside, one of those mornings where three coffee’s down and I am still not fully awake. It took about an hour for me to get out of bed but I finally hauled myself out from under the blankets and into the shower. I decided to go to school; with a to do list filled with 2 blogs to write, a leadership paper to finish and tickets and hotels to book for my trip on Monday to Berlin I thought it would be the smartest idea. If I stayed at home the distractions would be too great. So now I’ve parked myself in my study room, with my favorite radio station playing on the pc, and am slowly working my way through the items.

You might think it’s the worst possible way to spend your Saturday but actually it’s not. There’s always a very chilled atmosphere in the dungeons in the weekends. You’re never alone; right now there are plenty of others working away at their first ICP deliverables due on Monday, going for their PDE (therapy session) or reflecting on their levels of trust and ability to be vulnerable for their second Leadership paper due on Sunday. Half of them are dressed in sweats or the nearest thing to a pj’s which is still deemed acceptable to wear in public. I can’t blame them. Going to school in your flip-flops is one of the perks of student life, a break from the monkey suite. And around lunchtime there are always a few people who scan the study rooms to see if anyone else is hungry or if they can pick something up for others on their supermarket run.

The fact that it’s horrible weather outside does help. Yesterday there wasn’t a cloud in the sky and the temperature was in the high twenties, so being in the dungeons felt like pure punishment. But the social committee gave us something to look forward to, organizing outside drinks in the afternoon. It was especially nice as so many people are out and about right now, with travel schedules for their ICP’s, that it gave us a perfect opportunity to catch up with each other again.

I’ve never lived in a village, but I am guessing that our life here at IMD is a bit like that. You know everyone, from the butcher to the sheriff, you watch our for your neighbors house when they are gone and you keep an eye on all the comings and goings. Saturday mornings in the dungeons is like walking out of your house in your morning gown and slippers to pick up the news paper. As you do so you wave hallo to the passer byes and have a brief conversation with your neighbor over the fence, about the weather or to hear latest gossip. And when the exchanging of courtesies is done, you each return to your house to go on with daily life.

So on that note I wish you a happy Saturday; it’s time for me to get back to my “household chores”. Good day Nora Betty.   

Joan

After an exciting initial meeting with the VP of strategy planning, our team rushed back to our study room to design a strategy for a leading global dermatology company to secure their leadership position in the next ten years. We split into sub-teams, some team members spent their time developing hypotheses and some team members started to analyze thousands of pages of published data from different databases. The clock shows that it is 11pm now, however, everybody is engaged and nobody wants to leave. We knew that in 4 short weeks we would present in front of the CEO at the company’s board meeting.

"Alopecia Areata, Telogen Effluvium, Folliculitis and Carbuncles, am I going to understand all these things in 4 weeks’ time? ", I asked myself. Unlike the GMAT questions which intended to include some very technical words to increase the difficulty, I am responsible to have a fair understanding on those diseases and develop strategies to deliver business success by helping people to treat and recover from those diseases. Giving that my undergrad was in fashion and I’ve never worked outside the fashion industry , I believe it is normal that "give up" has flashed across my mind. At this moment, I finally understand why the MBA office put such emphasis on the leadership class discussing inner-strength and resilience last Friday. At first it seems the most difficult task is not understanding technical terms, but now I see the real challenge is to learn to understand my own defence mechanisms and prevent it affecting my growth in this project and life beyond IMD.

When we were stuck and had no idea how to progress, we called our project director, a faculty member who has tremendous experience in strategy and has done a lot of projects with pharmaceutical companies. 10 mins later, he appeared in our study room and started to breakdown the task and try to help us to connect our preliminary findings in a clear logical flow. Meanwhile, we saw our economics professor pass-by, so we grabbed him to join our discussion. The two professors started to share their opinions and debated key issues, a lot of new ideas were generated. We felt more confident after the discussion and with 3 weeks to go, we truly feel that we will bring some new perspectives to our client. I am already looking forward to our visit to the client's office tomorrow to present them our preliminary storyboard.

Team Members: Marcus Tung (China), Thibaut Girard (France), May Chang (China), Khayyam Farzaliyev (Azerbaijan), Angelos Diatsintos (Greece), Hemera Beretta Grande (Australia/Switzerland)]]>Modi, AmanSat, 12 May 2012 02:20:33 GMThttp://blogs.imd.ch/mba/archive/2012/05/10/carbon-bs.aspx/mba/archive/2012/05/10/carbon-bs.aspx

Life is exciting at IMD. Best is to say “beware of what you wish for”. When we were still in class, I kept wondering when the ICP would start and hoped that my 18hr long days would be shortened. But guess what, it was my naivety, the days have just got longer. It doesn’t matter how much I complain about my long days, I am really excited about my ICP project and especially about my team. We are working for a major chemical company with $60 billion of sales per annum to define their strategy to enter global carbon fibre composite market. It’s one of the most ambitious ICP projects so far for 2012.

In the past couple of weeks I’ve had a few occasions which have brought out the Dutchy side of me again. Queensday was coming up, which is a national holiday on April 30th on which we celebrate the birthday of the Queen. Well, actually it’s her mothers birthday but it was kept on April 30th because Queen Beatrix’s birthday is in January which doesn’t make for a great outdoor festival. A normal Queensday constitutes of street parties, festivals, flea markets and food stalls in each town and city in the Netherlands. Especially Amsterdam explodes into a massive sea of partying people on the streets and canals. With the 4 Dutchies we tried to organize some form of a celebration, but unfortunately with the marathon and other activities going on we didn’t manage to pull something together. On the day itself we did dress up in orange, our national color, and treat the class to some orange drinks and snacks. Some of our classmates had even donned themselves in orange as well, to show their support on a day where we would be plagued with text messages and pictures from our partying friends back home whilst we were stuck in class.

We also got the opportunity to work together on the country analysis we had to do for Economics. You could do it with a bigger group and pick another country but we decided to “go Dutch”. It was so much fun and it was refreshing to, just for once, not have to have your cultural antenna on. Geert Hofstede would have been proud of us, how we displayed our typical lack of (respect for) hierarchy, individualism and short-term results orientation. There was no holding back on opinions, with each of us freely telling the other what we thought they should do, ending up in a healthy discussion with a good level of humor and the occasional mocking of others. Nothing personal, of course. Less talk, more action was the motto. Add a bit of Andre Hazes music in the background and it made for an enjoyable experience. Now we just have to wait and see if our smooth cooperation delivered the desired result!

We are of course not the only Dutch at IMD so we met up with the Dutchies amongst the staff and faculty. We started off with a lunch together where the idea was sprung to organize a Dutch “borrel” (drinks) together. Naturally this requires a lot of planning so last night we met up for dinner where we, in typical Dutch style, put our agenda’s together and came up with a date somewhere towards end of August. Not to worry, this just gives us more time to have even more preparatory drinks and dinners! The logistics behind getting bitterballen, haring and Dutch klederdracht to Switzerland naturally requires a lot of planning.

One of the Dutch staff members said last night that when you live abroad, you almost become more Dutch. I think she’s right. I’ve added more things to my “typical Dutch” list, just because I don’t see them here. A prime example is when I walk home on a warm evening; in the Netherlands half of the population would be sat outside on a terrace, balcony or in a park until late in the evening as soon as the sun was out. In Switzerland, however, it is deadly quiet with hardly a soul on the streets. Shame. And then of course there is the food. To end this blog on a cliché; what I miss is Dutch milk and Dutch cheese. There is milk and cheese here, but it’s just not the same!

Groetjes, Joan 

Team members: Ines Silva (Portuguese), Gabrielle Ortais (French), Chris Song (Korean), Saswat Panigrahi (Canadian), Diego Magnus (Brazilian/Italian), Julie Garg (American)

Sometimes an employment services company needs help servicing its own employees. This is why Careerplus Group decided it would benefit from an ICP with IMD.

Careerplus Group is a Switzerland-based placement agency that helps client companies find talented employees for their open positions in anything from accounting to human resources. The company is successful in its domain but wants to grow aggressively in the coming few years. It also understands that its employees (mostly recruiters) are its biggest asset. Ensuring a challenging and rewarding work environment for them is key to the ultimate success of the company. These are the two objectives Careerplus brought to the Numero Uno team (Team 1), with the mandate to devise the company’s strategy for the next 5 years and beyond. We are working with our faculty Project Director Suzanne de Janasz, and have some unbeatable expertise within the Numero Uno team for this project: our teammate Chris owns a headhunting firm in Korea called Peternet (he can explain the reason behind the name).

Unlike in previous years where MBA participants had 2 months to work on an ICP, we only really have 3 weeks for this project: today 7 May till 30 May. We got a bit of a head start back in April when all ICP teams were allocated an afternoon for an initial meeting with the client. With Careerplus there was a real energy in the room, as our clients showed a very entrepreneurial mindset and were thrilled to be working with us. But back then we were still juggling classes, projects, and sessions with IMD’s own employment services (also known as Career Services).

Our first full-time ICP day has just ended, and we already have a client-agreed project scope, deliverables and methodology. In just one week we must present to the client our first deliverable, a survey of the Swiss employment services industry! On 30 May we have to present the other two deliverables: a clear analysis of where Careerplus stands competitively, and a set of strategic recommendations that Careerplus can follow to achieve their growth targets. Until then there will be lots of desk research, number-crunching, meetings and interviews with Careerplus, its competitors, its clients, and the candidates it places. While there may be some travel to countries within Europe where the client may consider expanding, most of our work will remain Lausanne-based. We tried hard to convince Careerplus that a study of market opportunities in Fiji was very important, but somehow they keep saying “not now”. We will keep working on it!