We had to pull an all-nighter. The three of us sat through from 10:30 in the night to 9:30 on the next morning when we finally decided to break for breakfast. As I worked on the slides, there were moments when I just fell asleep for a few seconds before I returned, glad that my teammates didn’t notice or that would be embarrassing. The crack of dawn is the most difficult time. Past 7 AM, the briskness of the day sets in and it feels like a new day with new energy. Looking back, I’m glad that we pulled through and not give in to the temporary craving for sleep.
I’ve developed a liking for this kind of mission-mode work. Where you decide to deprioritize every other thing in your life and focus on just one thing with a couple of other people. For one, I don’t have to make many decisions every hour. Despite the hard couple of days, the exhilaration from having done a good job is unmatched.
We fulfilled our submission, now it’s just left to the evaluators. Working with a team that shares common goals, where the people are genuinely nice, and every minute spent is immensely productive is an experience to cherish.
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The course will expect you to not only be physically present, but mentally alert as well. So, please have a good night sleep before each class, and grab a bite before class if you usually tend to feel hungry 😉
That was the email from our professor. Today we had our first class of the Business Dynamics course, one of the most awaited courses this term. The application of systems thinking and modeling is among the foremost objective.
The interesting thing is that we have a young husband-wife team taking our class. It excites me to be part of this unique situation. They are almost perfect complements for each other – one, a slightly subdued intellectual and the other, a bundle of energy who can attract and hold attention with his talking.
The scenario: 1960s in Romania, the birthrates are as low as 15 per 1000. Romania’s dictator has hired you as a consultant to solves this problem and increase the birth rates.
We started by identifying the problems, then the class suggested a variety of solutions, and we tried to guess what Romania would’ve done. Advertising, ban abortion, incentives. They worked for a year, the birth rate shot up, but it then fell steeply in the subsequent years. We discussed the reasons for this.
This then brought us to mental models. We make decisions based on certain assumed boundaries and often follow an open loop thinking. We don’t account for the fact that our decisions affect the environment which then impacts our goals.
Here’s a sneak peek: John Sternman’s Business Dynamics Class at MIT
And of course, I have a film reference. I’m pleased when I do so. I had one for the situation we were dealing with in Romania. I had a watched a film 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days that portrays the courage and the friendship of Romanian college students as one of them had to have an illegal abortion. Having watched this film, I was able to relate to the situation better. It is a validation of my belief that good films are a great way to gain exposure to the diverse world around us.
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I opted to be the observer in the last negotiation class. The theme of the class was about packaging deals that aim at creating maximum value. The negotiation was between the executives of two firms aimed at signing a contract. The most interesting observation was that they eschewed going for the option that’d have benefited both (they do not know this) for fear of having lower bargaining power in the negotiation. That’s where they missed the opportunity to create value.
In the product brand management class, we explored brand polarization and the various care strategies for lovers and haters. The little web and thinking activities that our professor enlists us for in class is fascinating. I did not take a liking to this method initially but now I’ve become a fan of it. Today it was Tripadvisor’s List of top 10 restaurants in Tapei, Maggi’s comeback, Ryan Air and many more.
At the end of the class, the professor played the promotional videos of Fazer, a top Finnish candy brand: Fazer Angry Birds Sweets
The contents of the video titillated my sweet tooth. As we discussed Fazer’s innovative idea of setting up candy parks for people to visit, the professor surprised us by taking out a real box of Fazer candies: Marianne – a peppermint crust filled with dark chocolate. We discussed the packaging of the candy box, and how such items have to be packaged so that the unboxing/opening is an experience. Christmassy-red stripes packaging brought me the feeling of festive joy.
THE DIARY OF A B-SCHOOLER 