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The exam week is upon us and even though I was well prepared today, the nerves are always there.

Those chilling words “and you may now turn over your papers and begin” echoed around the (different) basketball court (again) as a few hundred of us got our heads down and calculators out.

The exam format was such that there was a multiple choice, two long numerical questions and an essay question to answer in the time.  Counterintuitively, by far the most difficult section is always the multiple choice.  The reason for this are that you can only be right or wrong (no method marks!), there is little time (only 3mins on average) and because, the lecturers are super worried about people saying it is easy, I recon make it super tricky.

For example:

Which of the following statements is true?
a) The beta of a simple portfolio consisting of only two assets does not
depend on the correlation coefficient between the returns of the assets.
b) According to the CAPM, firms with the same beta will earn the same
expected return, irrespective of how large or small the firms are.
c) Other things being equal, the higher the covariance between the returns
of an asset and the returns of the market, the higher the asset’s beta.
d) All of the above.
e) None of the above.

or

The MacDonald family are considering the following retirement plan: for the next 30
years, they will pay a fixed amount each month into a fund. Thereafter, they will
withdraw £2,500 each month for the following 20 years. If the fund earns a return of
6% per annum, how much (approximately) must they pay into the fund each month
for the first 30 years to finance their withdrawals for the remaining 20 years?
a) £347
b) £363
c) £755
d) £935
e) None of the above.

It is those killer choices at the end ‘All/None of the above’ that make questions like this so tricky.  Rather like the GMAT for those reading this who have been through that boot camp of a test.

Happily I think the exam went well regardless so now have my head down for the next three, that are all in quick succession Wednesday through Thursday.

The inspiring yet ultimately tragic story of Andrew McAuley.

At the begining of 2007 he set off from Australia for New Zealand in a Kayak.  The 1600km trip took in some of the worst weather the sea could generate, storms and swells of over 30ft.  The irony here is that he survived the big waves and the mental challenge to capsize and drown in relatively calm waters.  After 30 odd days spent in his kayak he got to within 30km and within sight of land.  Rescue crews found the kayak but not him.  Most of the footage from the film was recovered from one memory card on one camera that he took.  You see total range of emotion. A link to the blog is here.

The cloud as it is often referred too, is not something light and fluffy, but simply lots of computers connected together on an industrial scale.  They are supported by very real infrastructure (advanced air conditioning, high security, massive diesel back-up generators) and are only set to grow in number in the future, as more and more software delivery is moved off PC’s and onto web-based interfaces.

“without risk there is no profit”

This is an interesting argument and one that does stack-up.  The other interesting perspective is how Risk is typically always seen as a negative, yet profit is clearly positive.  The Strategic Advantage class today was on Risk and Risk Management.  This is something I am very familiar with from Vehicle Dynamics where you are often testing and developing vehicles, at their absolute limits, and where they are, more often than not, far from highly finished examples of automotive creation – some of the beasts created when I worked at Aston Martin and at Jaguar were just that!  I have always found myself to be comfortable with higher levels of risk (racing, snowboarding etc) so it was good to hear the positive side of risk too for a change.

“people don’t resist change, they resist being changed”

Change Management had another great lecture on Monday.  I was in discussion with some of my colleagues and we just can’t understand why it is not a core module (unlike the modelling module where the general consensus is that it should definitely be an elective!)  Everything in business life is changing all the time, even if this week we were being asked to consider managing stability i.e. to not always assume that change is necessary.  Companies are made up of people, of individuals and just assuming that the implementation of a change is trivial, however important the specific change is from your perspective, is to be grossly underestimating the task at hand.  Companies are set up to operate efficiently within known parameters and so changing the status quo is often a challenge, especially if influential people are comfortable with things as they are (influential people does not just mean someone more senior either!)

Perhaps implementing change will be easier in this period of recession, as there is a higher fear of losing jobs, but even then people won’t be pushed around.  Having the right approach will be key, especially in companies where there is already “change fatigue.”  It is a slight shame therefore that only 12 of the 80 students are sitting change management this term; I am glad I am one however.

Yesterday we had a number of fascinating lectures from people involved in the public sector. If I am honest, this is not somewhere I have ever considered before but now have a much better appreciation of the sector and a more positive view. There are some people earning some serious money, in a flexible working environment, not limited by location and challenged with making a positive difference to the immediate world and environment around them. Very interesting actually and I have a much greater understanding than before. It is probably still not for me but now I know some more people to contact should I need to know more. After all the public sector is recruiting.

This is an article that might be good to read for those worried about the value of the MBA and making that investment – especially in a recession.

It feels like meetings meetings meetings this week so far.  I honestly haven’t stopped from when I got in at 7.30am (yeah still not adjusted to “student” timetabling!) on Monday.  Marketing on Monday involved a highly intensive final group project simulation to review, critique and recommend a new marketing strategy to the board, Management of Change involved an OD simulation in vertical and horizontal teams using practising techniques for change management that overran by an hour, followed immediately by a very interesting lecture by the head of strategy research at BT, talking about Enterprise 2.0.

Today my team presented on Enron in our Strategy lecture – no mean feat as it could get immensely detailed, followed by the Dean presenting on the upcoming rankings, a Student Liaison committee meeting (yes your views do get an airing – actions to follow), and then Modelling and PoM!

In all that melee of activity however, I was kindly recommended to watch this lecture on Managing Innovation.  A great speaker, Rebecca is clearly on top of her subject and passionate about the future.

Truly inspiring and definitely strikes a cord with me; so a recommended watch!

Sadly it seems that cohurt are not quite as happy about the quality of the lecturing being received this term as last.  Maybe it is just different but a significant disparity appears to exist between modules, according to the general feeling I am getting over coffee and in syndicate meetings.  It is still early in the term so there is time for things to improve.

The new term has brought another great chance to get inspired to be awesome by Nick Bates.  The key to sucess in these times is to remain positive and Nick is superb at developing your self-awareness and confidence.  Developing a clear vision but also ensuring one remains rounded and well read.

As ever, there are the cynics in the group who either don’t attend his lectuers or simply don’t buy into what he says.  Whether that is through pride or for other reasons I am not sure but I guess different things suite different people.  His sessions certainly are not filled with wordy lauguage so that can’t be the reason.

Our ‘home work’ for this week is quite funny though, develop your Flirting101 !!

Ever wondered how to find your favourite city?? Try this link

A great family time Christmas and I hope everyone is taking some time out from study (or work!) and enjoying themselves for a few days.

Thought I would share something a little different; a picture of the beach where we went on Honeymoon earlier this year – one piece of spam I did not mind receiving!

Nick Bates’ presentation principals course yesterday was, in his language, awesome! It is really quite easy to get carried away with things and I can see the sceptisim some people have of him, but hey, if you don’t change what you’re doing, how can you expect the world to change around you?

I have always been fairly ok with presentations in the past, but now I have really investigated what makes a good one; needless to say it isn’t super fancy PowerPoint – rather unfortunately too as am pretty ok with that software! Less is more … and remember the spikes, they work!

Fireworks kicking off everywhere tonight so enjoy if you are out and about this weekend.