Singapore on the Horizon

This post will probably apply more to prospective MBAs. "One School, Two Campuses" - part of INSEAD's brand. INSEAD comprises one campus in Fontainebleau, one in Singapore, and depending on how you do the accounting, various modest research centers scattered across the globe, though strangely, nary an office in the USA.
You'd think that a student could freely change campuses to suit his development and career needs subject only to course offering schedule. However in practice, there's scarcity. And where there's scarcity, either a central body has to allocate the scarce resources, or you set up a market. True to b-school form, INSEAD chooses the latter. By contrast, my undergraduate institution used a randomized lottery system to allocate dormitory rooms.
Here's how INSEAD's worked this year - they will probably use something similar in following years. INSEAD has 5 2-month academic periods, just like quarters or semesters, only shorter and much more stressful. 200 "points" are allocated to each student. They can use these points to bid on any combination of course electives and campus exchange. The minimum successfully allocated bid becomes the amount deducted from all bidders' point accounts. Most students I know bid a combination of their maximum allocation of 200 points across two or three periods' worth of exchange. Period 5 during France's winter understandably shows the highest demand.
So as you can see from my bids, I successfully pushed for Singapore during Periods 3, 4, and 5 (We are just finishing P1 now, entering P2), betting all 200 of my points. Because of the minimum-successful-bid deduction, 115 point still remain. Having just received the bid results yesterday, I must now buy a plane ticket and arrange housing - which brings me to the second topic for this week's post: Time.
Time management is a force that unceasingly breathes down everyone's neck. We even learn about something called "time abuse" and "time abusers". A time abuser is clinically defined as "every one of us". The first step to reconciliation with these difficulties is accepting that "you can't do everything". It hurts, many of us try to, taking on new responsibilities as we find we have a modicum of free time. None of us wants to miss out on anything. (The "senior class", called P3's, have gotten so used to this that you can't get them to commit to *anything* - they're completely maxed out, and if free time develops, they wish to cherish it).
Time management is a source of stress. During January and part of February, the biggest time sink outside of school work was French registration, car, and insurance, and being unstructured required the most effort to plan. By contrast, academics are already largely pre-scheduled and structured, so it doesn't stress me out to progress in them. Now, let's look at my to-do list:
1) Pay my speeding ticket (done!)
2) Write this blog post (in progress!)
3) Provide status update to the class in my capacity as IT rep (whew, there goes my school anonymity - but if another student couldn't figure out who's writing this by this point, they shouldn't be at this school . . .)
4) Plan period break trip (way behind on this - many students are going to Morocco, and I'm beginning to think I should have joined them.
5) Buy ticket to Singapore.
6) Set up residence in Singapore.
7) Execute errands associated with my company
8) Continue career development via networking and internship applications.
There are more, especially with respect to my company, I'm just not showing. Notice the lack of academics in the to-do list - unless there's a particular project or paper coming to a head, they won't show up, because I treat it as the default activity to execute during almost all other free time. This is arguably unhealthy, as perhaps the default activity should be heavy socializing (ie. as one has time). I sneak it in during some evenings, but in this I fall far short of my peers. It probably deserves more priority. We were taught a four-quadrant approach to prioritization which the gurus of time-management will recognize immediately - I think it's time to exercise it. Successful implementation of that method is probably even more valuable than all of the courses combined.

INSEAD Week 5

The focus of the past week has been for financial services industry presentations. These have taken place in the evenings after classes, with successive sets of representatives from Barclay’s Capital, Nomura, Credit Suisse, Deutsche Bank, Morgan Stanley, Citibank, and the venerable Goldman Sachs. From the presentations I attended, I noted on average 40 people attending each presentation and networking/drinks event that always follows. However the Goldman Sachs presentation saw some 150 people show up, easily half of the Fontainebleau class. The hiring drive on the part of banks in general is much greater than last year, it seems the directors of the planet’s financial resources are making up for lost time from 2008-9.
Attached photo is the audience during the Goldman presentation. I found the Goldmanites (I have no idea what they call themselves) to uniformly speak in very hushed tones, even when addressing the full amphitheater – as if to implicitly advertise the emphasis they place on discretion with clients’ information. By comparison, Morgan Stanley who presented right afterwards were very lively and animated, showcasing their culture in direct contrast to the Goldmanites. Most of the other bank presentations I saw fell somewhere in between in terms of energy shown during the presentation.
The schedule at INSEAD is becoming increasingly rigorous. Courses alone wouldn’t stress me out, but add them to personal administration with respect to localizing/registering in France, and job searching activities and all of a sudden the 1-year MBA becomes much more challenging in practice than it sounded. The school’s Career Services is truly a machine, and the hiring process particularly with respect to financial firms is extremely regimented. In contrast to the intended order behind this approach, all parties (banks, school, and students) universally agree that the only way to actually *get* an internship with a bank is to network relentlessly with alums and friends who currently work for them. Because otherwise, the banks don’t have any way of differentiating among the hordes of similarly highly qualified CVs they receive.
This weekend saw an American themed party in one of the biggest chateau residences featuring frat-style drinking games and people dressed in football jersies. Americans, like every nationality, are a minority on the campus. Kind of funny to look in on how others perceive your culture. Actually, I felt honored that there were enough salient aspects of American culture that it would be even possible to have an American themed party. Cheers!