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Nature of Markets

Summer Term MBA Classes are Near to Close

June 18, 2010

in GWU School of Business,MBA experience

Have not been able to post lately due to the overwhelming amount of work in business school. As much as I prefer qualititative over the quantitative classes, in terms of time it is not really easier. In quants it takes me a lot of time to comprehend the concepts and their application. In qualititative classes it takes no less time to do research and write papers. I have a tendency to get caught up in research to make sure I cover all the bases in a comprehensive way. Sometimes I spend hours in research to write just one paragraph. So staying up till wee hours of the morning has been way too common occasion for me in the last three weeks.


I mentioned before that this summer term both classes I have are non-quants: Business and Public Policy and Nature of Markets, aka Introduction to Marketing. In both classes we have to do case studies. All marketing cases are group assignments, and we have to crank out a case a week. There is some levereging in that, because we have divvied up the cases within the group, but still we have one final case to not just write a paper, but also do a class presentation.

In Business and Public Policy I wrote two cases so far and there is one final group project. I got maximum possible points on the first one about PR crisis in Toyota recalls. The second one was done in a more hop scotch manner,  so I am waiting to see by how much I missed the mark. Our group project and presentation is shaping up quite nicely so far, so I hope it will give us above average grade overall.

This Saturday I have a “chain-group-meating” in the afternoon. First for marketing, then piggy backed on it – for Public Policy. It’s going to be at least five hours total. I am not sure if I am more concerned about “brain freeze” or “brain meltdown” as a result of that. :-)

The only consolation is that it is going to be over next week. After final presentations we will still have a take-home exam in marketing. But next weekend it is going to be done at any rate. Can’t wait for a summer break and vacation. GWU School of Business is offering two summer modules, but I opted to have a little break and take vacation instead of the second module. I will have total 18 credits by the end of this module, so I am pretty much on schedule with the program. To make up fot this little summer lull I have already registered for 9, instead of my usual 7.5 credits in Fall term. But it’s is to early to fret about that yet.

I will update my status with the Summer term once I am done with it. For now, back to studies.

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Nature of Markets – Introduction to Marketing

May 20, 2010

in GWU School of Business,MBA experience

Tonight I had my second class that I am taking in this Summer Term at part-time MBA program at GWSB. I have been looking forward to this course and it seems that my high expectations will be met in this class. I have long been interested in marketing and I really expect to learn a lot from the course. Professor is very knowledgeable and explains concepts very clearly. That’s a big plus.

Frankly, pretty much all of the professors I have had so far during my first year of MBA program at George Washington University have been very good in terms of knowing their subject matter cold. However, not all of them were equally good in the department of teaching.


That’s why I cannot stop raving about ratemyprofessors.com  . After the first module in fall and my less than idyllic experience with Financial Accounting, I have always been checking out ratings of professors on that website before signing up for any of my classes. So far it proved to be very helpful. I actually had to re-arrange some of my classes or postpone taking at least one class to later time when it will be taught by another professor on a couple of occasions after checking the ratings. And I managed to steer clear from the classes where the instructor was TBA at the time of my sign up. This flexibility of selecting even your core courses is a great benefit of a part-time MBA at GWSB which I came to appreciate greatly.

As for Marketing, we have five business cases to work on in the course of the remaining five weeks of the class, so it is going to be quite intensive reading/writing term. Especially because my other class in Business and Public Policy is also heavy on write ups. In both classes we have been arbitrarily assigned to groups by the instructors, and almost all cases we work on will be group projects.

I have “tough love” with group projects. If everyone in the group is pulling their share, it’s mostly fun. But with even one free-rider in the group it can turn into the major source of frustration. I had both types of experience in my MBA program and had a post about group projects. That one explains why I am in “love-hate” relationship with group projects. You can not look up your group mates on some sort of ratemyclassmates.com, and even if you could, having arbitrary group assignments would make it useless. Well, I will have to live with that and make do with whoever comes my way. I guess I am not all sugar myself for some of my classmates either :-)

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