|
|
||
 | The International Fountain at the Seattle Center. Seattle, WA October 12, 2004 |
|
| Apple | Cool | Disney | Entertainment | Fitness | Geek | Microsoft | Politics | Seattle Storm | Transit | Travel | UW MBA | ||
November 19, 2007You're A ... Program Manager?On Saturday, I participated in a panel at the UW Business School with two other alums, talking to prospective MBAs about b-school in general, the UW in particular, career options and experiences for MBAs, and so on. (Fun fact: this group will be the MBA class of 2010, which makes me feel fantastically old. Yikes.) When we got to the part where I talked about what I do for a living, I saw a few furrowed brows - people 'get' that I work for Microsoft (and work on the Mac), but they didn't really understand a) what the heck a "Program Manager" is, b) what that job is all about, and c) what the heck an MBA is doing in the role. In fairness, Program Management isn't a typical career track for MBA types. And, as it happens, I've been having this conversation - or flavors of it - with friends of late, many of whom want to know just what the heck it is that I do in my job, and how it differs from Product Planning. Hence, this post. When I started in Planning as an MBA intern, I typed up a quickie essay ("You're A Product ... Planner?") to explain what I was doing with my summer: Put succinctly, planners help guide product evolution. ... We generate new ideas, identify trends, keep an eye on competitive products, and try to help provide thought leadership on products. We are, in effect, the "voice" of the customer. As a Planner, it was my job to help the product team figure out what they should be building. In day-to-day terms, this meant tons of travel and customer research - in-person visits, focus groups, customer councils, surveys, you name it. Planners spend a lot of time in the field, trying to getting a sense of what's going on in the market. Planners work with people in the product team (e.g., Program Managers, Developers, Testers, Designers), as well as the marketing department (e.g. Product Managers) and executive groups to help get the people who build the product aligned around what the customer wants to buy. Planning is a job with lots of strategy, market-segmentation, analysis and number-crunching. In other words, it's a classic MBA gig. For me, moving into Program Management meant taking a step forward; rather than working with the product team to define requirements, I work on the product team, designing features, writing specifications, and trying to build a product that customers will love. At a high level, Program Managers do two big things: they write specifications that govern how the product will look, work and behave, and they manage the schedule to ensure that all the various parts of the team are working in a coherent, consistent, rational way. Probably the best definition I've ever seen of what a Program Manager is/does comes from Jim McCarthy, author of (the excellent) "Dynamics of Software Development": Program Managers are the team members who perform the following functions: So, yes, Virginia, Program Management isn't a typical MBA job. In fact, a lot of my PM peers around the company tend to be fairly technical folks with CS degrees. Truthfully, as a lifelong geek, the technology side is really interesting; one of the best things about working at Microsoft is that you get to work with a lot of advanced stuff (and, being a Mac developer, I get to work with a lot of advanced Apple stuff). But at the same time, tech doesn't exist in a vacuum; customers don't buy technologies, they buy products, and if you want someone to buy your product, you better be doing something with that product that they find interesting or valuable. And you know something? An MBA can be an awfully useful thing for figuring out what those "interesting" or "valuable" things might be. Which, I daresay, is a Good Thing. I like to think that my geekiness made me a better Planner, and I'd like to think that my MBA will make me a better Program Manager. Does that help? Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated November 19, 2007 12:01 PM. March 13, 2006"Is The MBA Overrated?"The latest issue of BusinessWeek has a great article titled, "Is the MBA Overrated?" that asks ... well, it's pretty obvious what it asks. And the answer, with so many of these things, is 'it depends'. The basic finding of the article is that (stop the presses!) an MBA is not necessary to run a company on the S&P 100. Turns out that an MBA - even an Ivy-league one - is not a prerequisite to being CEO. Instead, the value of the degree seems to collapse into one thing: Headhunters say that while an MBA may help land a first job after graduation, the career benefits from that moment on are almost nonexistent. "In the pure Darwinian world we live in, pedigrees mean nothing," says Peter D. Crist, chairman of Crist Associates, a Hinsdale (Ill.) executive search firm. "It's instinct, it's hard work, and it's raw intelligence." Exactly. I get pinged semi-regularly from folks who are considering an MBA, and a few of them have notions that an MBA is the key to the executive washroom. Nope, nada, ain't gonna happen. Your MBA is the skills you learn, the people you meet, and the access to recruiters you get while in school. After that, the degree just looks good on your wall. (But hey - if you still want fame, fortune, and access to hot members of the opposite sex ... I'd try the music business.) Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated March 13, 2006 10:52 PM. February 25, 20062006 UW C4C AuctionFriday night was the annual UW Business School "Challenge For Charity" auction. If you're an alum of the UWBS, it's one of those can't-miss events: it's fun, it's prestigious, it benefits two great charities (Special Olympics and the Boys & Girls Club), and it's a great chance to see long-lost classmates. (The social aspect is actually a little overwhelming - I didn't get a chance to bid on any of the silent auction items because I was too busy catching up with people I'd not seen for the last nine months!) Fortunately, I did score a great item in the live auction - poker with Messrs. Turner & Forehand. Ben Lower, Keith Vaitkus, Andy Boyer (and, hopefully, Chris Howard - if we can twist his arm) will be taking these guys for everything they've got ... while chomping on cigars and swilling martinis. Awesome. The fundraising goal was $150,000, and it looks like we beat it - the unofficial total of $147,000 was announced before the evening was over. I'm willing to bet we'll be around $155K when all is said and done. What's astounding about this number is that it's nearly 50% higher than what we did last year. Way to go, Class of 2006! UPDATE, September 4, 2006: One or more of the original hyperlinks on this page expired, and has been dereferenced. The hyperlinked text is now underlined. Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated February 25, 2006 10:13 PM. February 10, 2006Making The CaseI just wanted to give a shout out (and some seriously good karma) to the UW MBA Class of 2006'ers who are participating in the Wake Forest Case Competition down in Winston-Salem, NC. Wake Forest kicked off yesterday, and is an intense, three-day-long, sleep-is-for-the-weak session where MBAs from all over the country come to battle one another with their Marketing Fu. (There can be only one.) It's a big, big deal - lots of hard work, national attention. Our team this year has a blog, and is updating regularly. Go UW! You're making us all proud. Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated February 10, 2006 8:53 AM. January 26, 2006The High Price Of Higher EdIt's "application season" for business schools, which means a lot of folks are evaluating and applying to different MBA programs across the country. As such, I've received a number of e-mails recently from folks that are considering the UW, and are looking for more information about it. So as I was browsing the Seattle PI this morning, an article headline caught my eye ("Huge college loans eating up salaries") that's all about how taking on too much student debt can screw up your life: This combination of forces has the potential to create a new class of working poor -- those who have fallen behind before they've had a chance to get ahead. These are secret strugglers. They aren't counted anywhere, and no one is sure how large their ranks are, although anecdotal evidence would suggest they are increasing. They don't necessarily look, act or identify themselves as financially challenged. They are rich in education, but they've leveraged their futures for the privilege. I've written before about how expensive MBA educations can be, and, for those of you who are applying right now, I would advise you to be conservative with your financial projections. Yes, having an MBA can help you get a higher-paying job. But the MBA is not a guarantee of a swank job and corner office, and, indeed, many people get MBAs to do something that's more enriching to their soul or intellect than their bank account. The more you owe in loans, the less flexibility you have when it comes to choosing your job, company, or part of the country you want to live in. Incidentally, and this PI article is part of a larger series they're running on the working poor here in King County. I'd missed a lot of it the first time 'round - it's fascinating (and depressing). Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated January 26, 2006 12:47 PM. November 13, 2005"MBAs Open Doors"The Seattle Times has an article today, "MBAs Open Doors" that talks about the value of an MBA to people who want to change or improve their careers: It's the MBA (master's in business administration), an advanced degree that for decades has been considered de rigueur for many business-management positions but has been criticized as being too focused on theory rather than the real world. I've written before about why I got my MBA, and I've (clearly) found it to be a wonderful, worthwhile investment. I'm bullish on business degrees in general, because I've seen a lot of folks come in to the UW with one set of skills, and leave with a career that enables them to go a completely different direction. Anyhow - it's worth a read (or at least a scan). Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated November 13, 2005 2:28 PM. October 22, 2005"MBAlmer: Fake News For Real MBAs"The Fall 2005 issue of "Business" (the official magazine of the UW Business School) has an article about the MBAlmer - a spoof newspaper that we started in the Spring quarter of my first year in b-school: It began, appropriately enough, with the surreptitious passing of notes in the back of class. Feeling uninspired one day, Gavin Shearer (MBA 2005) and Chris Meyer (MBA 2005) traded invented headlines—some satiric, some sophomoric—affectionately lampooning friends and favorite profs. The in-jokes got out, and soon someone suggested culling them into a fake online newspaper, a local version of The Onion. You can read the entire article here. (PDF) Look, it's incredibly gratifying when you can be part of something that catches fire with people. But in the case of the MBAlmer, I had a lot of help. Aside from owing a spiritual debt of gratitude to The Onion, the original genesis of the newspaper was a spoof that was dreamt up by classmate Flavio Kaplan. It had just been announced that Dean Gupta was leaving us for USC, and I was hanging out in the MBA lounge. Flavio, tapping away on his laptop, looked up at me and said, "Gavin! You know how to build Web pages, right?" (Uh, sure!) Flavio was trying to wrap a Seattle Times look-and-feel around a fake news article. The gag was simple: we'd hired USC's former dean in retribution for USC hiring Gupta. I was totally in to it, of course, and the two of us quickly whipped up this little gem ("UW Business School To Hire Former USC Dean") and sent it out to the MBA mailing list. Response was positive. And the seed was planted. From there, the "Business" article is pretty accurate. Chris Meyer and I were cracking each other up during a very slow Operations class one day, and it was all downhill from there. It's really, really important to point out that the MBAlmer was (and is, now more than ever) a team sport. Cintra wrote articles; Marnie and Joanne were forced to sit through thousands of iterations of the same crappy joke as we tested and tested; poor Mike Liu and Arkan Kayihan ('05 and '06 class presidents, respectively) were terrificly good sports, as were the members of the Program Office and faculty. Everyone liked the joke. And now, of course, the paper is under the safe control of 2006 funnyman Andy Boyer. It's a pretty "inside baseball" spoof, but seems to translate well to other MBA programs. If you're interested in reading the MBAlmer, you can get the current issue here. Archives are available, too - first issue, second issue, third issue. And remember: MBAlmer is a satire. Please read responsibly. (And big thanks to "Business" writer Ed Kromer, who sent me a few free copies of the issue for my scrapbook. You rock, Ed!) Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated October 22, 2005 12:36 PM. September 20, 2005My Diploma's Here!Hot on the heels of my post about Casey's new job, I got this from him in e-mail: Hey, Gav, just got my MBA diploma in the mail today. It's sure shaping up to be an excellent week. Sure enough, mine's here, too. Right on! Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated September 20, 2005 8:24 PM. June 30, 2005Cintra Pollack: Wrapping Things UpCintra's second-to-last column for BusinessWeek ("Wrapping Things Up") is now online: "It finally happened. I didn't think it was possible. No, I didn't land a job (but more on that topic later). I made Dean's List last quarter! Somehow, despite working 20 hours per week at the tech transfer office, taking 18 credits and fretting over completing my business plan in time for competitions, I did better last quarter than I have before in B-school." Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated June 30, 2005 8:56 AM. June 24, 2005I'm Officially DoneCasey e-mailed me this morning to let me know that our degrees have been officially posted. So I logged in to MyUW, and sho' 'nuff:  So that's it, then. (Wow.) Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated June 24, 2005 12:45 PM. It's A Small World, After AllLast fall, I took a Direct Marketing class taught by Elizabeth Stearns (if you're going to UW and you're taking marketing, it's don't-miss). The course is largely case-driven, but we did have a book on CRM called "The Customer Differential Now, Prof. Stearns doesn't like Amazon.com very much. In fact, she loves to tell a story about how Amazon caused her no end of trouble by making decisions about where (and how fast) to ship product without consulting her. (I should also point out that Elizabeth is a terrific sport; we lampooned her a bit in the second issue of the MBAlmer, and she loved it.) So imagine my delight when I got a notice yesterday that my "Customer Differential" book had sold on Amazon Marketplace... ...to Elizabeth Stearns, University of Washington Business School. No, really. I'm not kidding. (I'm half-tempted to send it Priority Mail just to mess with her.) Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated June 24, 2005 9:10 AM. June 12, 2005Graduation SpeechThis is the text of the speech I delivered at last night's UW Business School graduation ceremony in Meany Hall: "I know we have parents and families in the audience tonight, and many of them have suspected that we’ve been goofing off here at school. However, I am here to tell you, that, while we do play hard, we’ve accomplished a lot. Since we started in September 2003, the Class of 2005 has spent more than 300 days in classes, taken at least 25 different subjects, and invested more than 1,000 hours simply attending lectures. (Although admittedly, that number is a little lower for Mike Dietzman.) Of course, that 1000 hours is just lecture time, which is the tip of the iceberg. It doesn’t count the other time we spent studying for classes, meeting with our teams, writing reports and preparing presentations, getting involved with clubs, working with our career coaches, attending networking and speaker events, and, of course, looking for internships, and later, jobs. Despite these intense commitments, we have succeeded, and we succeeded with style. The Class of 2005:
On the personal side, we ran marathons, traveled to Argentina, China, and Japan, studied abroad in Paris and Manchester, had a few engagements and weddings, and we even welcomed five babies into the world. In short - we are an extraordinary group, and we’ve done extraordinary things. Be proud. However. Talking about the five new kids in our class should remind us that we have not, by any stretch, done this on our own. I mean – Ed, Mike, Sean, Yongki and Dan – you guys are talented, but I’m confident your wives had a pretty big role to play bringing your kids into the world. Sitting here tonight are the spouses, partners and significant others of the people in our program. These people have showered us with love and support as we’ve been on this journey. I’m talking about tiptoeing around the apartment so we could get some quiet study time ... always being willing to meet our new "MBA Friends" ... dealing with the endless business school chatter about projects and professors and blah blah blah... and coming to our TGs, formal parties, and get-togethers, always with a smile. There’s the million little things, too – the small kindnesses, like doing our dishes, folding our clothes, massaging a sore neck after a long day, or picking up the kids from day care. I know I speak for the entire class of 2005 when I say we simply could not have done this without you. Please join me in thanking them. Lately, I’ve been asking people about their favorite business school memories. Universally, people have said their best memories were ones where they got to work with, learn from, or be around other people in our class. This makes total sense to me, because my favorite memory comes from PRIME week. Now, I know most of you here tonight weren’t there, so – you have to imagine. Classes haven’t started yet. We’re just two days in to our weeklong MBA orientation, and everything is new. We’re jittery, a little scared of one another. And all 113 of us are in the Boeing Auditorium, when Dan Poston, the Program Director, stands up in the front of the room and asks us for a volunteer. Finally, one of our classmates, Brian, raises his hand. Dan calls him down to the front of the auditorium and says, "Tell everyone your name, and what you’d like to do after you graduate." Well, as it turns out, Brian wants to work for a Port. So then Dan turns to all of us and says, "Now, who here can help Brian?" And this is the amazing thing. Slowly, a number of hands go up. And then a few more. And then a few more. Someone knows someone at the Port of Tacoma. Someone else’s dad is good friends with a VP of a shipping company. And on it goes, and on and on, and suddenly we are all smiling and nodding and realizing that the very thing that we all hoped to get from the program ... ... is really each other. This is the University of Washington MBA program. Good, smart people, working together and helping each other. I love it because it demonstrates how invested we are in one another’s success. In that room, on that day, we worked together. Mechanical engineers and music majors and marketing geeks and former Anderson consultants all stepped forward to help one of our own.For the last two years, our class has continued what we started that day, be it:
And here we are, June 11, and we’re coming across the finish line together. We won as a team. That is who we are, and that is what we stand for. Our class can expect very interesting and exciting lives. We’re all re-launching our careers, taking steps in new directions. This is only going to accelerate as we each get more experience, more resources, and more wisdom about who we are and who we want to be. I fully expect that we’ll surprise one another over the next 5, 10, 20, 40 years. As people take their second or third job, get married, move to foreign countries, look for new challenges, the news will be interesting and surprising, and I’m eager to hear it. For example:
So come what may, we must stick together. Dennis is off to Japan, Lily to Taiwan, and Brian O’ Brien to Spain. John Sousa’s going to San Francisco, and Flavio to San Diego. But our class has more communications technologies at our disposal than any MBA class in history. So, everyone - John Bernie has put together a Yahoo group for us. Get on it. Patrick Chinnavaso has built a spreadsheet with everyone’s contact data. Make sure you’re on that, too. And, from time to time, check in. Send out a note to the mailing list, or reach out to someone you’re wondering about. Don’t be shy. Because wherever you go in your life, and whatever you choose to do, please know that we will always have this experience in common. It will always be true that we went to business school together ... graduated business school together ...and the University of Washington business school is about succeeding together. Thank you all for two of the best years of my life. And, Marnie? Happy Birthday. Good night." Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated June 12, 2005 7:13 AM. June 11, 2005JittersFive hours to graduation, and I'm all nervous and jumpy. The speech is baked, I've rehearsed it to death, I feel fine about it ... but I'm still just feeling scattered, unfocused. I'm off for a run. I gotta burn some of this energy before tonight. Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated June 11, 2005 1:48 PM. June 1, 2005No More Pencils, No More BooksI'm done with graduate school! Jo and I delivered our final project in Database Marketing this morning, which officially exhausted all my scholastic requirements under the MBA program. My afternoon was spent selling a few books back to the bookstore, picking up graduation paraphernalia (cap n' gown), having lunch, and making a phone call or two. The afternoon brought my final class (New Product Development) in which I had no obligations (other than not being an asshat while my classmates ran through their final projects). A few seconds ago, the last preso wrapped. ... and it all ended. So, yeah. Graduation is 10 days from now, but that's a formality (admittedly, a "formality" where I have to talk in front of 500 people, but...). All that matters is that I pass all my classes with a 2.7 or better. (And I could be skeptical about my grades, but I strongly suspect that they're not a problem.) A bookend: in August of 2002, I took a week-long motorcycle trip with my father. We rode the width of Washington, stopping at the Grand Coulee Dam and at a small plot of land where he was building a house in Spokane. We headed down into Idaho (yes, we rode coasters at Silverwood), and Eastern Oregon. I had a lot of time to think on that trip, and good company to talk to. It was then that I figured out business school was something I, really, really wanted to do. Fast-forward 33 months. Summer of 2005 is here. (Thanks, Dad.) Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated June 1, 2005 4:59 PM. May 29, 2005Data Analyzin'After an exceptionally pleasant run (and coffee at Zoka) with Jeff this morning, I returned home, grabbed a shower, and parked my butt in front of the Vaio for some analysis work on my Database Marketing project. I'm going to be here most of the day. I know that only stats geeks are supposed to like SPSS, but, as a marketing person, I find formulating the "right" query akin to learning the secret words that open Ali Baba's cave - magical, and not just a little bit tingly-excited feeling. Jo and I have invested a lot of time scrubbing, re-coding and summarizing our data sources, which is paying off by allowing us to quickly, easily and (hopefully) accurately answer some substantive questions about our clients' business. Let me give you an example. One maxim of marketing is 'know thy customer' so I started my analysis by asking, "OK, who's buying?" A quick flick of the wrist to an SPSS menu (Analyzye -> Descriptive Statistics -> Frequencies), a drag-and-drop of the relevant variables (rc_gender, rc_state, rc_country, has_title) and I can quickly see:
These statistics are tantalizing. Now I want to know how the customer base breaks down based on their number of orders (how many people just ordered once? twice? more than twice?), as well as the average revenue per customer across the customer base. Then I can take those two pieces of data and rank the customer base into deciles, with the highest-spending customers in the first decile, the second-highest group in the second, and so on. Now what do we see? It gets better. How well, for example, does our ability to predict a repeat order from a given customer correlate with their presence on our mailing list? Or their state? This stuff is truly, truly fascinating. I wish our data source were better (richer), but we've got enough here to make some good marketing recommendations. Our presentation is Wednesday. (What a great way to end graduate school!) Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated May 29, 2005 2:55 PM. May 28, 2005ENTRE Is Done!Another one down. I just submitted the final exam for my Entrepreneurship class, leaving me with a single, final deliverable (the Database Marketing Project) for my entire MBA. Focus, focus, focus... Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated May 28, 2005 3:14 PM. PI: 50 percent of MBA grads found jobs in 2005Encouraging information about the job market: "For newly minted business school graduates, this was the most successful job-hunting year since 2001, a new survey says." (Thanks to Mary for the link!) Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated May 28, 2005 2:06 PM. May 27, 2005PI: UW business competition a good startup in itselfMy friend (and fellow UW MBA) Cintra took third in the the UW Business Plan competition this week. The PI has a story about it this morning: "With $100,000 in total prize money at stake, the UW business plan competition is one of the most lucrative in the country. At least three former winners are still in business -- including Giant Campus, LiveMeter and NanoString Technologies. In fact, NanoString -- the 2003 winner -- closed an $8 million round of venture capital financing earlier this year." Way to go, C! And big props as well to 1st place winner Atheroson, and 2nd place winner Therapeutic Monitoring Systems! Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated May 27, 2005 9:21 AM. May 25, 2005One Day LeftNPD is done. The paper's turned in, and Jo did a great job on the in-class presentation. The next time I step foot on campus is Wednesday, June 1 - a week from today. I've got a paper/presentation for Database Marketing; NPD will be more presentations from classmates. And that's ... it. Graduate school's over. (The plan is to go to Finn's at 5:20 sharp.) Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated May 25, 2005 5:15 PM. May 24, 2005Two To GoI have just two days of class remaining - tomorrow and next Wednesday. Last night saw the end of my ENTRE class. Our team delivered our paper, with Sam and Flavio doing the in-class presentation. Prof. Stenehjem had arranged for two of his friends from the VC community to attend class, listen, and critique our pitches. They seemed to like our idea. (In fact, Sam is following up with one of them and seeing if there's something there. Go, Sam!) Tomorrow is New Product Development, and again the delivery of the paper/presentation one-two punch. The paper - in all its sprawling, no-detail-too-small, no-financial-sensitivity-too-trivial, 30-page glory - is actually a good piece of scholarship. We're happy with it. I feel like the end should be more frazzled or frenetic, but, oddly, it's not. Hm. Good teammates make the difference, neh? Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated May 24, 2005 11:11 AM. May 22, 2005Sunday: All Campus, All The TimeI have three days of classes remaining: tomorrow, Wednesday, and Wednesday, June 1. And I've got deliverables on each one of them. Tomorrow is our paper/presentation for ENTRE, and Wednesday is the paper/presentation for New Product Development. Thus, I'm spending pretty much all of today (like, until 10 PM) on campus in team meetings, where we hammer out the final aspects of our projects, polish the prose, and basically get things ready for prime time. The projects have become much more interesting as the quarter progressed. NPD, in particular, has been planned to a level of detail that's forced us to deal with all sorts of niggling (but fascinating) questions about manufacturing, marketing, competition, and so on. I don't know that our product would really be successful (it's hard to make a dollar and a cent in the music business, which is where we play), but our assumptions are good. And in a class like this one, the planning effort is the point. OK. Off to Greenlake for a run with Jeff. Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated May 22, 2005 7:42 AM. May 18, 2005Why The MBA?"Why get an MBA?" I have been asked this question a countless number of times over the last couple years. The first person that asked it was, naturally, me ("self, why do you want to go to graduate school?"). After I felt like I had figured out what it was all about, I started sharing my answer with others. Eventually, I shared it with the UW admissions office (in essay form, and during in-person interview). They (apparently) liked what I had to say, and now that I've been here (and am soon to leave), I am getting it from whole new constituencies - admits, prospective students, people I meet at weddings. In fact, I've been asked this question so often that it struck me I should put it down somewhere and see if it can't help other people decide for themselves if the b-school experience might be right for them. Hence: this essay. My intent here is to share a little something about my background, the thinking that brought me here, and how I feel like it's all worked out. If you find this useful, I'd love to hear about it. NOTE: I've written elsewhere about how business school is a hard sell; it focuses more on the economics of going to school, and what you have to give up to participate in a program like this one. If you haven't seen that yet, you might want to check it out. About Me Following the Verio deal, my partners and I started a Web development company ("Media Access Internet Solutions"). We moved down to Belllevue, Washington (just East of Seattle) and started growing the business. We enjoyed good success for a few years, but got caught in the economic collapse of late 2000 and early 2001. We transitioned a number of our clients to another Web firm downtown, and I went to work for them for a year or so. I left in summer 2002. What I Wanted
Culture Matters So I shopped around to find programs that were more aligned with my values and had the right "feel". Everyone knows the "feel" when they find it, and two people can have wildly divergent reactions to the same program. The UW, for instance, is very much about collaboration and teamwork, and has a strong cultural belief that success is not zero-sum. That fits me to a "T", but I know some people who find this approach to be touchy-feely, Seattle-squishy, passive-aggressive, and repellent. That's OK; find the program that suits your style. Remember, you're going to be devoting two years of your life to your program, so throwing down with people you respect is very important. "The Credential" Some people believe that the MBA will be some automatic ticket to riches and power. Those people are wrong. The MBA program can't make you somebody different than you are. It just makes you, YOU, but with a graduate degree. It's doesn't make you smarter or funnier or harder-working; rather, MBA programs tend to select people based on those criteria, and then give them an environment to try new things out. My very good friend John (also an MBA) gave me a wonderful piece of advice before I decided to go to school. He said, "The value of your MBA is not in that first job you get out of college. That job is meaningful, but it's not important. Instead, the MBA has the biggest impact when you're three years in to that first job, and are looking around for the next job. Suddenly, you'll find doors open for you that weren't there before. That's not the MBA, though - that's your hard work, smarts, and good performance on the job, plus the MBA. Having the MBA makes it easier for people who like you to justify to their higher-ups why they should spend money on you. It does not, however, get you anything automatically." I think this is incredibly meaningful advice (in the movie version of my life, John will undoubtedly be played by Morgan Freeman), and it's been confirmed by stories that I've heard from others. In all cases, "the MBA" as the piece of paper, does nothing except cover some chipped paint on the wall of your living room. Rather, "the MBA", as the sum of the skills you've got and the people you've met, synthesizes when exposed to your hard work and creativity, and becomes something more. That is the "value of the MBA" - the experience you have while going through the program, the people you meet, and the opportunities it may afford you later in your life. Should You Go? Admissions essays ask these kinds of questions for a reason: they matter. If you come to a program expecting that it will just convey knowledge to your head and cash to your pocket, well, you're in for a rude surprise. If, on the other hand, you have a good sense of yourself, what you want, and why the MBA will help you get there, then these programs can open doors in a way that's truly magical. Final Thoughts I've become a big proponent of MBA programs. They're excellent at helping people reinvent themselves, whether you're a finance admin whose inner marketer needs to be let out, a recovering engineer that wants to work for Starbucks in Thailand, or an ex-Amazon.com employee who's eager to hone her skills at a hedge fund. These programs give smart people a real opportunity to find new sides of themselves and change course in their lives. We're not given too many chances like that in life. And, if that sounds like you - well, maybe you ought to apply. (And if you want to know more about the UW, let me know. Seriously.) Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated May 18, 2005 9:12 PM. May 17, 2005June 1 Is Back OnThis school scheduling thing is getting weirder. As of last night, my ENTRE class is now no longer going to have its final session during the extended-overtime June 6 slot. Instead, our last class will be May 23, at which point the final will be distributed ... and is due on Friday, May 27. So we still have the final, but it looks like I'll be done on June 1 after all! (Yes!) All this back-and-forth is enough to give a guy whiplash, but I'm coming to expect it. With so many projects and papers due in the next two weeks, these kinds of curveballs have to come from somewhere. (Oh, and Cintra (who reads these pages from time to time) informed me yesterday that "does not have senioritis" which means, presumably, that she's the last one to fall to the disease. My apologies for implying that I was Last Man Standing in that department.) Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated May 17, 2005 8:37 PM. May 14, 2005Three Weeks Left. (Sort Of)I'm in Olympia. Richard and I are both working in the lobby of the Best Western, because the hotel has free WiFi in "public areas" - but curiously, not in the rooms themselves. I have plenty of work to do, so it looks like I'll be getting a front-row seat as all my fellow half marathoners check in over the next few hours. (The run is at 8 AM tomorrow. I'm feeling really, really positive about it.) Anyhow. There are three weeks left in the quarter. Classes end on Friday, June 3, and finals happen the following week. As I've written in previous posts, my classes were slated to wrap up on Wednesday, June 1, at which point I'd be a free man (I have no finals, just final projects). That was true ... until this last Monday, when Dr. Stenehjem announced that our once-forfeited class (the one that was originally slated for Monday, May 30 - Memorial Day) has now been resurrected and will happen on Monday, June 6. Oh, and we now have a final. Which will be passed out that day. So much for the original countdown, huh? Despite this late-in-the-game switcheroo, I have to confess that I don't much care. I officially came down with a raging case of senioirits last week, which, I think makes me the last remaining member of the Class of 2005 to contract the disease ("One of us! One of us!"). It's like a switch flipped in my head or something - come what may, I'm done with graduate school on June 11 (my "Countdown" Widget is reporting '28 days, 01 hours, 28 minutes'), and it just seems like a lot of things simply don't matter anymore. I'm trying to fight the overwhelming urge to slack off, but I gotta say that it's tough. (It's also not helping that many of my classmates have an, "Eh? So what?" mood these days. Pretty soon we'll all be scheduling a Senior Skip Day or something, I just know it.) My final project for ENTRE is due on Monday, the 23rd (the team met Friday; we're on target). My final project for NPD is due Wednesday, the 25th (our team's draft is evolving, and coming along fine). My final project for Database Marketing is due June 1 (we cracked a big-time data analysis piece last week, thanks to the magic of Pivot Tables. The rest of the analysis happens this week). And, of course, my newly-found final gets handed out June 6. Between now and then, I have a few chapters to read ... but that's it. No, really. That's it. UPDATE, June 2, 2007: One or more of the original hyperlinks on this page expired, and has been dereferenced. The hyperlinked text is now underlined. Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated May 14, 2005 5:32 PM. May 11, 2005The Envelope, Please...I have been selected to be the Student Speaker at the MBA Graduation ceremony this year. I'm surprised, flattered, and a little bit floored. I've written before about the other, fantastic candidates who were up for the job; they're top-notch people, and this easily could have gone to any of them. I'm sure the terror will sink in soon enough, when I remember that my folks will be there, along with the folks (and grandfolks) of all my classmates. Along with uncles, aunts, friends of the respective families, and so on. (Plus, I'm the warm-up act for John Stanton at Western Wireless.) I've got a month to put it all together. But in the meantime - WOW! Thanks for the vote of confidence, everybody. I won't let you down. UPDATE, September 4, 2006: One or more of the original hyperlinks on this page expired, and has been dereferenced. The hyperlinked text is now underlined. Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated May 11, 2005 1:38 PM. May 9, 2005FedEx: Pirates = MBAs!
Those with good memories will remember the recent, MBA-themed entry in this campaign. (Think FedEx is trying to say something about MBA's here?) *grin* UPDATE, September 4, 2006: One or more of the original hyperlinks on this page expired, and has been dereferenced. The hyperlinked text is now underlined. Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated May 9, 2005 3:21 PM. May 8, 2005Renewable Energy Tour
As it happens, my friend Ian Wooofenden is really in to renewable energy (Ian's passion is also his work - he is the Senior Editor of Home Power magazine). He lives off the grid (solar and wind power only, thank you very much) on Guemes Island, and conducts workshops during the year to help people understand and build these kinds of systems for themselves. As a result, Guemes Island (and Skagit county at large) has become a real hotbed for renewable-minded folks. This includes the off-the-gridders, of course, but also folks who like to throw a couple of solar panels on their roof, tie in to the public utility, and then sell power back to Puget Sound Energy most of the year. Many of these folks have also invested in other kinds of sustainable building, such as rainwater collection systems, radiant flooring, and low-volume, variable-power hot water heater systems. Yesterday, Ian was kind enough to lead about 30 of us in Net Impact through several of these installations all over Guemes. It's fascinating stuff. We did it last year (the first time, ever), and I am pleased to report that it's every bit as interesting the second time through. Given the group enthusiasm for the tour, I suspect this may be a Net Impact staple long after I graduate. Let's hope so. UPDATE: I forgot to mention that one of the houses (and, I think, the coolest part of the tour) has its own Web site. You can get design notes, photos, and all kinds of great information. Big, big thanks to Matthew for opening his home (and his data!) to all of us yesterday. UPDATE, February 12, 2007: One or more of the original hyperlinks on this page expired, and has been dereferenced. The hyperlinked text is now underlined. Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated May 8, 2005 3:49 PM. May 6, 2005Now, THAT's Talent!Tonight was one of our TGs at the business school, but with a twist - it also featured the annual talent show. First-year student Keith Pranghofer took the lead in putting the event together, assembling a stage, microphones, video projector and studio amplification. It was a total gas. We had about ten acts. They ranged from dance (Elise did a jazz routine) to Shakespeare (Mike did the opening from Richard III) to the physical (Micall did a jump-rope bit). We also had a few musical acts, including Program Director(!) Dan Poston doing two (!) musical numbers, one set to "If I Were A Rich Man" from Fiddler On The Roof. Excellent. For my part, Keith and Aaron Katzman and I did a comedy skit called "2001 Bowling" (basically, three guys bowling to Strauss' "Also Sprach Zarathustra"). I also did accompaniment with Mark Showalter and Rebecca Lovell on a song set to Steve Miller Band's "Rock n' Me" (refrain: "You got your MBA, baby!"). It was a total blast. Thanks to everyone who did an act, and big thanks to Keith for putting it all together. Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated May 6, 2005 9:36 PM. May 4, 200528 Days LaterThe last class of my entire MBA program will be the 3:30 - 5:20 session of New Product Development, on Wednesday, June 1. That's exactly four weeks from right now. I ordered my cap and gown yesterday, and also put in an order for a pair of parking passes so my folks can put their vehicles on campus during Graduation without fear of being towed. As luck would have it, I pick up my cap and gown (and, I presume, the parking passes) on June 1 as well. It's all converging. So I went to a party this last Saturday night (post-wedding) at my friend Rebecca's house. It was wall-to-wall with MBAs, representing a good mix of first and second years. I had been at the house less than five minutes before I'd been asked by at least seven first-years whether "I was excited to be getting out." Honestly? I'm trying not to think about it. I get a little sad when I think about the program ending. I've been going to school with some of the finest people I've ever met, working on some incredibly interesting stuff and having a terrific time. We're a very tight group, but I know that the MBA experience as we've known it is coming to an end. Exciting? Yes. But there's also a sense of loss. On the other hand, if I think about the job waiting for me at Microsoft, I get pumped. Product planning is a blast, and my team is full of astoundingly cool people (Jeff, Ravi, Bernardo - this means you) doing astoundingly cool things. Getting excited about Microsoft, however, tends to deprecate my appreciation of the last bit of this experience, and makes school seem surreal and fake. The happy medium, I'm finding, is to think about my summer vacation. I'm going to Cedar Point to ride roller coasters, taking a motorcycle trip with my father, and doing a lot of hanging out. Those things, for the moment, are keeping me sane. Four weeks. Wow. UPDATE, May 13, 2006: One or more of the original hyperlinks on this page expired, and has been dereferenced. The hyperlinked text is now underlined. UPDATE, December 31, 2006: One or more of the original hyperlinks on this page expired, and has been dereferenced. The hyperlinked text is now underlined. Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated May 4, 2005 4:28 PM. April 28, 2005Graduation Speakin'The Class of 2005 is currently trying to select a student speaker for graduation. The process is long and involved (hey, we're MBAs! We loooove complexity!), but the selection process has finally winnowed things down to four primary candidates: Danika Dreslin, Mark Sullivan, Cintra Pollack, and me. Today, each of us gave a quick, five-minute speech to a room of fellow students on why we want to be the graduation speaker. It was a little surreal, giving a talk about why you want to give a talk, but, for each of us, the words seemed to flow just fine. I must say that I am very happy to have a) been nominated, b) made it this far in the process, and c) be among this group of extraordinary people. As I said in my talk, each of the other candidates has really brought something special to the program and made great contributions - Cintra, with her work on honor council and her BusinessWeek column; Danika, by pouring her heart and energy into Women In Business, transforming it into one of the best clubs we've got; and Mark, who organizes the weekly "Pub Club", but also works his guts out in the Program Office, acting as a Student Ambassador, helping new and prospective students understand our culture and unique fit. Now that the speeches are over, the class will vote for the speaker sometime next week. While I'd (clearly) love to do it, I would also most certainly look forward to watching any of these three other folks bring their approach and perspective to the event. Today's speeches made me glad. No matter who gets the nod, the class made some great choices. Good luck, folks. Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated April 28, 2005 4:13 PM. April 26, 2005One Afternoon. No IM. Lots Of Recoding.Owing to an amusing mix-up between my new building manager, the Comcast guy, and call forwarding, I am still cable-Internet free. (Thank you, again, Mr. "linksys"). In some ways, this is OK, because I'm up to my neck in work for Database Marketing right now. The source, tab-delimited files I received are requiring a fair bit of massaging in Excel before I can import them in to SPSS. Without the recoding, there's no good way for SPSS to be able to make meaningful interpretations about what's what - SPSS would have a hard time understanding that "03/20/2001 13:07" is, in fact, a date (20th of March, 2001 at 1:07 PM) instead of some random sequence of letters. It's time-consuming, painstaking, and not a little bit boring. However, it's important stuff. And I know that if I had blazing fast Internet access, I'd find myself with an irresistible temptation to IM and e-mail with people as a distraction. Ah, well. Back to it. Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated April 26, 2005 3:08 PM. April 23, 2005Preview DayLet's say that, despite the trend, you want to go to business school. After you've been accepted to the UW, our admissions team hosts a series of "Preview Days" - basically, day-long events that give prospective students an opportunity to come to campus, meet current students, ask questions, and mingle. For many folks, this is their second campus visit (following on an open house when they were originally figuring out where to apply); for others, this is their first time. To help people meet one another, we usually synch Preview Days with TGs. Yesterday was a Preview Day, and I spent about an hour or so on a "Student Q&A" panel with one other second year and four first-years. The questions were pretty normal; some hits include:
On the internship question, a number of people were interested in "informational interviews", which is the process of getting out in the community and talking to people so you can find out about a job, company, or industry. Informationals are critical to the internship process, because they provide a way of getting the data you need to make smart decisions about where to focus your energies. As part of my internship search, I did informational interviews with Real, Amazon, Adobe, Microsoft, Apple, and Intuit, among others. Anyhow. I did a presentation on informational interviewing for the incoming class of 2006 during PRIME, and put together a PDF with some of the slide highlights. Some preview day folks wanted the link, and I'm happy to provide it. You can get it here (72k PDF). Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated April 23, 2005 7:35 AM. April 14, 2005Plastic: Where Have All The MBA Candidates Gone?Plastic has a thread on "Where Have All The MBA Candidates Gone?" in response to an article in BusinessWeek Online. Applications to the top business schools are down (30% since '98, according to BW), and the business school industry - faculty, staff, program offices, etc. - are starting to freak out. What to do? Business school is a hard sell. It's a two-year commitment, coming for most people at a time when their careers are just starting to get traction. Average age of the UW Class of 2005 is 28 years old, which means our folks have, generally, about 6 years of work experience. That's a few promotions, a few merit raises, and, generally, a salaried (not hourly) job. As memory serves, the average incoming salary for our class was about $55,000 a year. So you're going to put your budding career on hold for two years. That means you're losing both forward job momentum and the wages you'd have earned while working. On top of that, you're going to need to pay tuition/fees/books, cover your living expenses, and have some kind of cushion in case your job search doesn't go swiftly. Add it all up (or just take a look at the page on the UW server): Foregone wages: $55,000 x 2 = $110,000 So, your rough cost to do business school is $169,482. If you go to a school like Stanford, you're going to spend close to $40k a year on tuition alone. If you're living in an expensive metropolitan area like New York, your living expenses will go up. And if you don't like Top Ramen, you might want to figure more like $20,000 in living expenses so you can go out once in a while. Ten thousand here and there, and pretty soon we're talking real money. A friend of mine at Kellogg was talking about amortizing his loans over 20 years, in order to make his cash flow more manageable. As a point of reference, my folks bought their first house on a 20-year note. Back in the go-go '80s, when people believed the degree was an immediate ticket to a six-figure salary and opulent retirement at the age of 40, a lot of those concerns were less relevant, seen as the price of entry to an exclusive club where, once admitted, cash would not be a problem, anyway. Party on. But looking at how the UW Class of 2004 did, it's pretty clear that the variance in salaries is high, and the chances of placement are less than 100%. (And we've got the best placement scores in the world for two months after graduation!) Is all this giving prospective applicants pause? You bet. Let's say that you're making $55,000 a year right now, and you're thinking "MBA." If you're in Seattle, the mean MBA starting salary is $75K. So the MBA is going to give you a $20,000 "pop" in your wages. Taxes will take between 25% and 28% of that, so you're left with about $15,000 a year in new income. If it cost you $169,482 to go to school, then you'll pay it all off in 11.3 years (barring interest on your loan, promotions you get, raises, inflation, yadda yadda. This is for illustration only. Maybe I'll link in a spreasheet when I have more free time.) Like I say - prospective applicants aren't stupid. If the degree looks like it's more trouble than it's worth, they're going to find other ways to spend their time and money to improve their lot in life. Don't get me wrong: I think the MBA is a fantastic thing. I don't feel - ever - that my time would have been better spent doing "something else" for the last two years. Of course, my circumstances are pretty particular and specific: I came in knowing what I wanted out of the program, what I wanted to do after graduation, why I wanted to do it, and what I needed to do to make sure I got it. (And I've also been very, very lucky.) So I'm in the minority. And, as near as I can tell, most of my classmates at UW are also in a minority. None of us are after "big money" - we all want the degree because we think it will be helpful in our lives, whether we want to work for T-Mobile, Amazon, or a small, renewable-energy nonprofit. But are there enough of us minorities to sustain the current infrastructure? Honestly, I doubt it. I suspect small, boutique programs like UW will be fine, but the larger, 900-person programs are going to have to start finding ways of making the MBA relevant - and accessible - to larger groups of people, or face dramatic change. UPDATE, January 1, 2006: One or more of the original hyperlinks on this page expired, and has been dereferenced. The hyperlinked text is now underlined. Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated April 14, 2005 7:21 PM. April 12, 2005Winter '05 Dean's ListThe Dean's list for Winter 2005 (UW NetID required) came out this morning, and I'm on it. Whoo-hoo! Dean's list students "met all three of the following criteria: completed at least 12 credits, were in the top 10% of their class, and had a quarterly GPA of at least 3.7." I may be happy, but Mary, for one, is unimpressed: "Unless the Dean is going to buy you dinner or something, what's the point? At least Santa brings presents when you're on his list." I may have to talk to Jiambalvo about that one. Anyhow, it feels great. Congrats to everyone who made it (Jen, Cintra, Marnie, Casey, Deets - that means you!) Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated April 12, 2005 12:04 PM. April 7, 2005We Have A Dean!It's official: we have a new dean. Dr. James ("Jim") Jiambalvo, professor of Accounting (and all-around nice guy) has been named Dean of the University of Washington Business School. I took my Managerial Accounting class from Jim last Spring as part of the core. This is a good choice. Jim's been heavily involved in the program for as long as I can remember, and has deep contacts in the local business community. He's personable, friendly, smart as hell and passionate about the UW. He also faces some stiff challenges. Our school is now Top 20, but we're aiming higher. So Dr. Jiambalvo will need to both support what's working while figuring out how to keep things evolving and improving. I suspect that his major project will be to turbocharge our $100M capital campaign and get our new building under way. A telling phrase from the press release: "A primary goal, he said, will be to raise funds for a new business school complex..." I bet. If you haven't seen the sketches, check 'em out: they're gorgeous. Nice work, Jim! UPDATE, July 4, 2006: One or more of the original hyperlinks on this page expired, and has been dereferenced. The hyperlinked text is now underlined. Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated April 7, 2005 4:24 PM. April 3, 2005ZokaJeff turned me on to Zoka Coffee after a run at Greenlake a few weeks ago; he thinks it's "the best cup of coffee in the city" and I have to say I agree with him. Their Americanos are about the most flavorful, wonderful things you can imagine. (And Zoka has "cool factor" - the Delicious Monster guys frequent the one north of the U Village.) So this morning, Jo and Dietzman and I needed to meet to go over our Database Marketing homework. Surprisingly, nobody wanted to meet on campus, so I suggested Zoka. Rave reviews all around about the brew, and appreciation of the free WiFi. We may have found our new hangout. The not-on-your-life-am-I-stepping-foot-on-campus-on-a-Sunday thing makes me wonder, though - are we hitting burnout already? We're only one week in to the quarter, and ... Hmmm.... Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated April 3, 2005 10:45 PM. April 1, 2005Rise Of The Creative QuarterWho knew the last quarter of business school was going to be so much fun? I can't believe my good luck. Each of my three classes is doing something super-interesting and engaging, and each has a quarter-long project that's going to allow for some real creativity. My New Product Development class, for example, is all about conceiving of, prototyping, and delivering a new product that "addresses opportunities presented by baby-boom demographics." (That's a pretty wide field, as you can imagine.) Similarly, my Developing Business Models For Emerging Technologies class has us evaluating a bunch of real, uncommercialized tech (the instructor works for Battelle) and then finding ways to build businesses around them. We present our pitches to some VCs at the end of the quarter. And finally, my Database Marketing class has us finding a set of data that we can use to explore and look for insights about customers, buying patterns, and the like. In each case, I get to work with cool people, on cool problems, while bringing ideas and energy to bear on some funky issues. It's a fascinating, fun (and fitting) synthesis of what I've been doing for the last two years. (It sure beats the hell out of reading Harvard cases!) Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated April 1, 2005 4:33 PM. March 30, 2005Graduation App: FiledIt's official: I just filed notice with the UW that I intend to graduate at the end of Spring quarter. Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated March 30, 2005 8:17 PM. Climbing The ChartsOn Monday, US News And World Report will post their national rankings of business schools for 2004/05. And, on Monday, it will come out that the University of Washington is ranked 18th. We're officially a Top 20 school. Holy crap! All the students found out this morning, during one of our "coffee break" sessions in the lounge. Turns out that the folks at Barnes & Noble goofed and put the new issue on the shelves, which a) hacked off US News & World Report and b) gave us permission to go ahead and talk about it (the cow had left the barn, so to speak.) We were 27th last year, and 35th the year before that. To climb 17 slots in just two years is astounding, and it's a testament to our stellar faculty, all the folks in the program office, our career center, and the Dean's office. From what I understand, the big improvements came through placement (we're #1 in the world in student placement) and a dramatic improvement in our reputation among recruiters. Truly, this is a big deal. My usual pride in this program is swelled-to-bursting right now. Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated March 30, 2005 11:52 AM. March 29, 2005Ship Date: June 1, 2005So I'm getting out of the program a little earlier than expected. According to the UW, the last day of instruction is June 3, which is then followed by a week for finals. Graduation for the MBA program happens on Saturday, June 11. In my case, however, none of my classes have final exams. Instead, I've got three different quarter-long projects, each of which requires both a written report and an in-class presentation on the last day of class. That means I'll be done, finished, out the door on Wednesday, June 1. Which is two months from Friday. Yikes! Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated March 29, 2005 2:06 PM. March 28, 2005Cintra's Latest Is OnlineSpeaking of Cintra (and her impending rule-worldiness): her latest for BusinessWeek, "Academics, the Placement Process, and More" has hit the stands. Choice quote: "Now when people ask me what I am up to, I enthusiastically (perhaps not proudly yet, but at least without embarrassment) offer that I am enrolled in the UW Business School, and I graduate in June. Even (and I say this affectionately) the hippie/commie faction of my family has supported my transition to the "dark side."" Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated March 28, 2005 2:03 PM. March 27, 2005Once More Into The Breach, Dear Friends...Back to class tomorrow. Database Marketing begins at 8:30 AM, and is the kickoff for a fun-filled Monday, clocking in with 13 hours on campus. My last class, "Business Models For Emerging Technologies" ends at 9:30. In the evening. (Yes, it's my own damn fault. I designed my schedule.) I wish I had something truly interesting or insightful to say about the impending arrival of my last quarter in business school. And truthfully, it does feel a little surreal and overwhelming, like something is being lost or changed or ... I don't know. Words fail. I've been kicking around an essay, "Why An MBA?" that makes the case for (or, in some cases, against) getting the degree. It's not ready to see the light of day (yet), but one of the big points that I stress is that the strength of any MBA program is its people, pure and simple. The credential might attract you, the curriculum might keep you, but the real value of this experience is getting to know a hundred or so truly extraordinary individuals. So, with that in mind, I'm cognizant of the fact that this last quarter is the last time I'm going to see my classmates in one place. Everyone is careening off into their own career arcs (Exhibit A: Casey signed with WaMu over the break - go Casey!), and, as spring arrives, the job search winds down (or, for some, intensifies), we are all in the process of transforming from a class back into our own, ambitious, driven, hard-charging individual selves. And, while I'm excited to see what all the individuals are going to be up to, I still feel a pang. (I'll also bet $100 that Cintra is going to be running the world in very short order.) Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated March 27, 2005 7:44 PM. March 11, 2005That's All She WroteThe "integration" assignment is done, and I'm off to deliver it to Dr. Reynolds' mailbox. Of the 2,000 words we were allotted, my bit clocked in at 1,994. The quarter is over! Of the six quarters in my MBA, there's just one left. (Showtime starts on March 28, but that's a good two weeks from now.) In the meantime, there's some beer to be consumed with good friends. Tonight. Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated March 11, 2005 4:37 PM. Gone In 60 SecondsThe Ethics final is done! Karpoff gave us two hours; I was in and out in 45 minutes. Classes are over. Finals are over. It's a sunny, beautiful day in Seattle - and yet one paper remains (dammit!) Off to work on it... Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated March 11, 2005 1:43 PM. March 9, 2005Two Down, One To GoFinance is done! And I just finished my QMETH final. Which means I'm "all Ethics, all the time" between now and Friday. If I can finish this crazy "Integration" assignment by the time of the final on Friday, I can turn both in at once and be done with it. Word processor, ho! Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated March 9, 2005 10:18 PM. Status ReportIt's Wednesday morning ... how's it all coming together? Pretty well, actually: That due-Monday QMETH? Turned in. The due-Tuesday Brand Audit paper/presentation? Turned in, and the presentation went off well. Check. The crazy, due-today Ethics paper? Turned in yesterday (thanks, Cintra!). Check check. My due-tomorrow Finance homework? Finishing it now (actually, finishing once I finish blogging, but that's a fine technical point). The Friday Ethics final is what it is. I've got time set aside on Thursday and Friday to bake that puppy. In the meantime, I've been working on the QMETH take-home final (some down, more to go). I'll crack the Ethics "Integration" assignment later tonight. Back to it. Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated March 9, 2005 9:10 AM. March 6, 2005Sprinting Over The Finish LineSorry for the dry spell in posting. It's been nutty around here. The Quarter That Would Not End is finally coming to a close. And, in keeping with the character I've come to associate with Winter '05, I have something due each and every day. Consider: Monday: My last QMETH problem set is due. The take-home final will be distributed in class. Tuesday: Our Brand Management team delivers both a 20-page paper and 20-minute presentation about our Brand Audit of Patagonia - what we did, what we found, what we recommend and why. (This is consuming most of my today and tomorrow). Wednesday: Team paper due for Ethics. Thursday: Final deliverable for Entrepreneurial Finance - like most of the work for this class, it's an analysis of one of the cases, expressed in a memo format. Friday: Final exam in Ethics. The last two "dangling" commitments are an Integration assignment for Ethics and the QMETH take-home final. Both are formally due on Monday, the 14, but I'm going to do my best to get them front-loaded into this week and off my radar. Nothing would make me happier than to be free, clear, and finished on Saturday. Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated March 6, 2005 9:06 AM. March 1, 2005Transfer Of PowertechConnect met to elect its new officers for the 2005/6 school year last week. Elections for MBAA were held in mid-February. Last night was my last-ever MBAA meeting. Today, Marketing Club met to elect its new officers. This leaves Student Support Network as my last 'official' MBA club gig, and we'll be transferring those roles early next quarter. I say, again - it's all ending. Spring quarter is shaping up to be completely, totally, and utterly surreal. In the span of a few short weeks, we second-years are being transformed from the program's movers and shakers - the folks that get things done - to being spectators. Onlookers. Tourists. So we'll be around for a final 12 weeks, but our roles are vastly reduced, our attention increasingly focused on the job search (admittedly, not in my case) or on reconnecting with our families and friends outside the program. Compounding this sense of impending disconnection is my spring quarter academic schedule. This quarter, I had five classes and 18 credits, and was on campus a minimum of four days a week. Next quarter, I have just three classes (12 credits), and will be on campus just two days a week (Monday and Wednesday). My normal, every-other-Friday gig putting on TGs has been handed off to the lovely, talented and capable Rebecca Lovell. Why do I feel less like I'm graduating, and more like I'm retiring? Ah, well. This quarter still has a lot of life and spark in it. I've got something due every single day next week, from presentations to problem sets. Can't drop out of hyperdrive just yet. Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated March 1, 2005 9:35 PM. February 26, 2005Break A Leg, Jen!My friend (and fellow 2005 UW MBA) Jen Carter is trying out for The Apprentice this morning in Tacoma. She's got a guaranteed interview (she won a radio call-in show earlier in the week) so she knows they'll talk to her. Actually, I think she's a shoo-in. Jen's got this quirky thing about her where stuff like this works out. All the evidence is anecdotal, but here's a good one: back in 2003, she and her husband Ben won a contest from "Evening Magazine" (Registration required) and were married. On television. Martha better watch out. Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated February 26, 2005 9:41 AM. We Did It!As of last (but not yet final - numbers are still coming in) count, last night's C4C auction raised more than $110,000 for Special Olympics of Washington and Boys & Girls Club of King County, beating our projection of $100,000. Wow! Take a bow, everybody! Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated February 26, 2005 7:28 AM. February 25, 2005Puttin' On The RitzMary and I are getting dressed up for tonight's Challenge For Charity Auction at the Grand Hyatt. C4C is a club in the business school that contributes money and hours to two local charities - Special Olympics of Washington and Boys & Girls Clubs of King County. C4C is also a competition, held between business schools on the West coast. We compete with Berkeley, Stanford, UC Davis, UCLA, USC, and UC Irvine. The winner in per-capital dollars and hours (with a small nudge for athletic performance at a "sports weekend" at Stanford in April) wins the Golden Briefcase. UW has held on to the Golden Briefcase for the last 5 years. We're aiming for a 6th. This auction is the centerpiece of our fundraising efforts. We've got everything from a Bay Area Getaway to an Orlando "Roller Coaster and Rockets" trip to firearms training with the Seattle Police Department to a backstage tour of Tom Douglas' restaurants. Some of my best friends in the program are officers in C4C, and they've really busted their humps to make this event spectacular. So - Jo, Marnie, Andy, Sam, Nathan, Meredith and Kurt - thank you. Very, very, very much. With luck, we'll hit our goal of raising $100,000. Wish us luck! UPDATE, July 4, 2006: One or more of the original hyperlinks on this page expired, and has been dereferenced. The hyperlinked text is now underlined. Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated February 25, 2005 4:06 PM. 80%As of right now, two weeks remain in the quarter. I'm at the 80% mark. Yesterday was nutty. I turned in a paper for Ethics (and a case for Finance) and then wrapped up my day with a meeting with my Brand Management team. Our survey closed at 4 PM Pacific, and we needed to get together to look at preliminary results, determine a timeline for the next 12 days (the stuff's all due on March 8), and then hash out responsibilities for analysis, report writing, and presenting. So now begins the winding down - the taking of finals, the writing of reports, the final turn-in of homework assignments. It's going to be crazy, but not unmanageable. And then - final quarter! Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated February 25, 2005 2:47 PM. February 24, 2005Ever Wondered About Airline Prices?
Our Spreadsheet Modeling class is doing a lot of simulation right now, using Crystal Ball (and Excel) to forecast values for various problems. It's interesting stuff. One of the simulations we're working with has to do with airline "overbooking" - computing the optimal overbooking quantity for a specific airline route, given demand forecasts, reimbursement costs, customer-satisfaction costs, fixed operation costs, and whatnot. Anyhow, all the spreadsheet kung fu reminded me of this hysterical ad from the (fictional) "Sky High Airlines" (Alaska Air) about the "super computer" they use to set their prices... 1.66 MB, QuickTime required. Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated February 24, 2005 2:45 PM. February 18, 2005"Yeah, Uh ... I Don't Do Shipping."
From time to time, people will ask me what my single biggest concern was about going to business school. And my usual response is, "Have you seen the FedEx ad?" (QuickTime required.) Basically, I was afraid that I'd be going to school with that guy ("Tom"). I've worked with him, know people that work with him, have seen him in virtually every company I've ever consulted for or worked with. Nobody likes him. For good reason. (I'm pleased to report that UW is Tom-free.) Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated February 18, 2005 4:12 PM. The Final CountdownIt's all ending. I registered for my Spring quarter classes today, which means that I'm a short hop from being done with grad school. Spring classes end June 3, finals week ends the 10th, and I walk with my classmates through graduation on the 11th. I'm taking pretty much all marketing, all the time - Advertising & Promotion, Database Marketing, and New Product Development. Bing, bang, boom. The real world awaits. UPDATE, May 13, 2006: One or more of the original hyperlinks on this page expired, and has been dereferenced. The hyperlinked text is now underlined. Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated February 18, 2005 1:03 PM. February 7, 2005Flash! Ah-haaaa! Savior Of The Universe!We've got a team debate in Ethics tomorrow morning, and I'm reviewing/tweaking the text of the arguments for the folks on our squad. It's what I term "headphone work" - I need to put on the headphones, turn on my music (usually Chicane), and tune out the world. However, today I put the iPod on shuffle and tuned in to a random playlist. As luck would have it, Queen's "Flash" (the title track from the 1980 Sam Jones football-player-goes-to-space-and-saves-the-world flick) came on and now I cannot get it out of my head. ("Flash! Flash, I love you! But we only have 14 hours to save the Earth!") How can Kant compete with that? I mean, come on. Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated February 7, 2005 8:52 PM. February 4, 2005Coffee With Orin
Three UW MBAs from the class of 2005 - myself, Tara McFadden, and Rich Albrecht - are recipients of the Orin Smith Endowed MBA Fellowship. It's an incredible feeling to be recognized for your work and contribution. It's even more incredible when you get a call one day that asks if you'd be free to "come in and chat" with your donor. Especially when your donor is the CEO of one of the highest-profile brands (in this case, Starbucks) in the world. And so, I found myself at Starbucks Intergalactic HQ at 8:30 AM this last Wednesday, perched on a sofa in Orin's office. Rich, Tara, Orin and I were all having coffee (natch) and just ... chatting. Surreal. (I know I got to go to BillG's place, but honestly - this was just as cool). Let's start with the basics right up front: Starbucks headquarters really kicks ass. If you imagine the decor and feel of your typical Starbucks retail store and blow it out to five or six floors inside a renovated office building, you've got a good idea of what it feels like. Lots of natural light, skylights, windows. Blond hardwood floors, spare metal railings. Art everywhere. Lots of nooks and crannies and couches.The vibe is unbelievably creative and stimulating. And yeah, there's a coffee machine frickin' everywhere. Orin is an amazingly down-to-earth guy. The four of us chatted about business (economy in general; Starbucks in particular), MBAs in general, the value of good people, the power of creativity, and Starbucks' various projects (in particular, I wanted to chat about their Hear Music project). Here's the thing that impressed me the most. Of the senior executives I've met in my life (both through the MBA program and as a working professional), I've been consistently impressed by how human, humble, and holistic these people are. Jeff Raikes talked a lot about the need to give back to the community; Orin talked with great passion about how important culture is, and how it's key to find not just good people, but the right good people and then do well by them. (Starbucks, for instance, is one of the few companies that pay benefits to part-time workers.) I didn't feel like I was being snowed. Instead, I felt energized, and really optimistic. Success in business doesn't mean being a bastard, or a tough negotiator, or someone who screams at his/her people. Instead, success comes from being interested in your people and your community. It's encouraging, you know? I thought we'd be in and out of his office in an hour, but we would up staying for a good 90+ minutes. And then (wait for it) - parting gifts! Seriously. Cute little Starbucks bag with a pound of coffee in it and a Starbucks mug with the logo on one side and the phrase, "I Had A Coffee Break With Orin Smith" on the back. No fooling. Check the photo, above. (Of course, he has to get rid of all of them before he leaves in March, right?) Just kidding. Orin, if you're out there: thanks. For everything. Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated February 4, 2005 9:03 PM. January 30, 200540%Four weeks of the quarter have now passed, which puts us at the 40% mark. It's all just craziness. I get asked a lot by friends and family about business school, and what it's really like. I often tell them that Mary is a much better barometer of my schedule than I am - she's the one that notices when I'm home late, up early, or seemingly preoccupied with some deadline. What's disconcerting to me at the moment is how Back-to-the-future-esque it all seems. I honestly don't remember working this hard since my first quarter of b-school (which is kind of like boot camp, but with longer hair and spreadsheets). Shouldn't things be slowing down? Shouldn't senioritis be settling in? Shouldn't my fellow 2005'ers be putting up our feet in class and heckling? Aren't we, after all, "outta here"? Seems not. Our midterms are in the past, but the team projects are still ongoing. A 2-credit, all-day Negotiations class kicked off on Saturday, and will resume on this coming Friday (and Saturday). In the meantime, there's enough reading and homework to kill an ox. Mock interviews are ongoing (Microsoft is here tomorrow for internship interviews, so I've been busy prepping 1st years), and then we start transitioning our MBAA offices to the next generation. I'll try to blog a bit more in the next few days. Just as soon as I remember to breathe. Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated January 30, 2005 11:23 PM. December 13, 2004Done!After far, far too much Lemon Diet Coke (my stimulant of choice for test-taking and late-night paper-writing), I baked the Market Research final tonight. Our team put our project on ice earlier today. And Marnie has the presentation piece well in hand. The quarter is over. I'll be on campus tomorrow to turn in my final (and the report), and also to hear other teams present their research. Then I'm off to Microsoft to catch the second half of an all-day Planning off-site. (We're still trying to figure out how to get me in the building, what with me not having a badge any more and all.) I'd love to put some very insightful thing on my blog right now, talking about Achievement or Accomplishment or The Thrill Of Being Done(tm) or some damn thing. But frankly, I'm still a little punchy and unsure about everything. I'm going to be having that creeping sense that something ... isn't .... being .... done ... for the next day or three. Which means I'm likely to be jumpy and a little on-edge until the weekend (off to Spokane!), and THEN I'll get hit with the flood of relief. In the meantime, I'm gonna spend some time with my girl. Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated December 13, 2004 7:57 PM. December 10, 2004Close, But No CigarYesterday was my last day of classes for this quarter ... and, for that matter, 2004. As of right now, I have just three things to deliver, all by Tuesday. The first is my take-home final for Project Management (doin' it tomorrow). The second is my take-home final for Market Research (doin' it Sunday). And the third is the report/conclusions from my Market Research team project (in progress now). I'd love to say that the conclusion of classes has brought me some terrific sense of relief - but it's just not true. Yet. I think things will start sinking in only after it's all done, turned in, and out of my hands. Until then, I still have that vague, niggling sense of dread that I'm missing something... Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated December 10, 2004 10:28 PM. December 6, 2004Love On The RunI've still got my head down with finals and final projects. My Management Audit was delivered today, and the final for that class is due Thursday. The Project Management final will be available tomorrow, and is due on Monday. Which leaves Market Research, the paper for which I'm banging on tonight (team meeting tomorrow at 10:30 AM!), and whose final is due a week from tomorrow. It's all writing, all the time around this place. I don't know about most of my classmates, but the right music is absolutely critical when I need to get my creative groove on. I have a thing for techno/trance stuff (London Internet powerhouse XTC Radio is a staple of my iTunes playlist), but I've also fallen in love with Chicane. Their album, "Behind The Sun I mention this because iTMS doesn't carry much Chicane, but recently added three tracks from their new "Love On The Run" EP. I bought the thing today, and have put the Radio Edit (the first track) on infinite loop. So, so, so good ... OK. Back to Word, Excel and SPSS. Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated December 6, 2004 5:20 PM. December 2, 2004Searching For Bobby FischerThe UWBS is in the market for a new Dean. Our previous Dean, Yash Gupta, was seduced by the sirens at USC last April. Yash's legacy is astounding. During his five-year reign as head of the school our rankings shot up, we started a $100M capital campaign for a new building, and both the curriculum and focus of the school sharpened dramatically. USC are quite fortunate. Following Dean Gupta's departure, Vance Roley stepped in as the Acting Dean. Vance, however, has just announced that he has taken the position as Dean at the University of Hawaii Business School. Leaving us, once again, without. (Feel free to insert your own Murphy-Brown-revolving-secretary joke here.) Our search is in high gear. Today, tomorrow, and for parts of next week we're having candidates for the position come to campus for interviews. I participated in the student panel interview today, and came away impressed. The candidates we're talking to are capable, interesting men and women who have distinct strengths and weaknesses. They're also entering a school in transition. We have gone from being a Top 50 school to a Top 30 school, and soon we'll be a Top 20 school. We have the building project under way (we just started the design phase, which means we'll likely be complete in 2009). We are gaining more national attention and respect (for instance, we won last year's national venture capital competition, and we've won the Golden Briefcase for each of the last five years of the Challenge For Charity). Our next Dean will need to find out how to keep doing the good stuff, while trimming and improving those areas that need help. And, given that Deans tend to last for about five years or so, we need to be realistic about what this candidate can do by 2010. In that timeframe, UWBS will be a Top 20 school, looking to be consistently Top 15. So let me ask you: what do you ask a candidate for this job? For me, I'm curious about how to keep the school's small size while also attracting national firms; keeping the flavor of the program while still being able to build a deserved reputation. We're the dominant regional school for Washington, Oregon and Idaho; we've got excellent high-tech, biotech, and entrepreneurship programs. So. Vision is important. How do we be a Top 20 school without being "just another Top 20 school?" The next candidate forum is tomorrow at 8:30 AM. Should be interesting. Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated December 2, 2004 11:23 PM. November 21, 2004Apply YourselfGetting admitted to business school is an involved, complicated process. From the 30,000 foot level, it's easily digestible: take a standardized test (the GMAT), assemble your transcripts, get two or more letters of recommendation, and write a few essays. Cut a check for the application fee ($35 - $350, depending on your school). Repeat as necessary. In practice, this is a grueling, nasty exercise. Letters of recommendation don't come when promised. Transcripts get lost in the mail. You're sick as a dog when your GMAT test date rolls around (or your score is disappointing), so you take it again. And then ... the essays. It's like staring at the void. Business admissions school essays are famous for giving people enough rope to hang themselves. The core UW essay ("Why are you pursuing an MBA?") is only 750 words ... but they have to be the RIGHT 750 words. I did several complete rewrites of the thing, each time trying to find the hook, the idea, the frame for expressing myself. I eventually found my voice, and it went from there, but it was time-consuming, nerve-wracking. Anxiety central. I'm getting flashbacks to my application because I'm reading essays for the incoming class of 2007. The Program Office solicits current second-year students to read essays and give feedback along a number of axes - fit with the culture, quantitative ability, applicant background, goals, vision. Since I'm graduating in six months, I won't be in class with anyone who walks in the door in September. It's a good system. But as I sit and read these packets, I'm remembering that feeling of being outside this whole process - wanting to go to school, hoping to get in. There's this feeling of life being out of control, and important stuff being totally out of your hands. Life is on hold, because it's hard to make plans for the future if you don't know where you're going to be. I remember December 2002 to January 2003 as one of the longest periods of my life. So, UW applicants - whoever you are - I feel for you. And I'm reading as fast as I can. =) Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated November 21, 2004 7:44 PM. November 19, 2004Pay It ForwardYesterday morning was the Annual Scholarship Breakfast for the business school. It's an event where scholarship recipients (both undergrads and MBAs) get to meet their benefactors and learn a little more about them. The event features three speakers - an undergraduate, an MBA, and the keynote. I've been incredibly grateful for the help I've received in this program. Last year I was the recipient of the Neal & Jan Dempsey Endowed MBA Fellowship; this year, I was granted the Orin Smith Endowed MBA fellowship. It's hard to describe how wonderful it feels to get a scholarship. It's easy to focus on the cash value of an award as some kind of metric, but, in my opinion, that totally misses the point. Scholarships for $1,000 feel every bit as good as those for $5,000 or $10,000. The value of a scholarship is the expression of faith by a stranger: someone, out there, thinks you're a good bet. They believe you can do great things. And they're willing to throw down with you and give you a boost. So, when the Program Office asked me last month if I would be willing to be the MBA speaker, of course I said yes. The text of my speech was as follows. "Good morning. When I talk with my fellow MBAs about why they came to school here, virtually all of them come back to the same themes: Seattle's natural beauty, the friendliness of our people, the open and warm culture. In short, people love the UW because of its special community. Now, when I hear the word "community," the mental image I get, and, I assume, that many of you get, is one of friends and associates. People you have class with, people you see every day. People you know you can count on if you need a favor, if things get harried. People who can count on you for a laugh, advice, companionship. In my opinion, it is these interpersonal bonds - not the academics - that form the true value of higher education. Our community at the University of Washington is broad and deep. It spans centuries. The UW itself was founded November 4, 1861, which means that two weeks ago, today, we turned 143 years old. Our business school is the second oldest on the West Coast. We were founded in 1917. Before some of the people in this very room graduate, our school will be just ten years short of a century. This long tradition of community and excellence means we have, literally, generations of people keeping an eye out for us. It is this community that we are here today to thank. In this room, right here and now, are community members who have extended a hand to its newest members: us. These people have invested their time, hope, faith, and, of course, their money in our futures. They know we are going to be the standard-bearers of the business community of 2010, 2020, 2040, and beyond. Clearly, we have entered the business school community among the warmth of friends. Being welcomed in this way also means we are being held to different, higher standards. And as we go through our educations, it's important to remember them. Ask yourself: If I had to stand in front of my scholarship benefactor and discuss my conduct in school, how would that conversation go? Am I stretching myself? Driving myself? Scaring myself with something outside my comfort zone? Am I willing to fail, and to learn from it? Am I helping others? Am I putting myself out there, actively trying to make the UW a better place? Or am I content to simply be a passive member of the community, going with the flow, turning in acceptable grades and simply getting by? Speaking personally, these questions have been helpful, a guiding light and an occasional kick in the pants when I've had a bad day or a setback; when I've had a triumph or an hard-fought win; when I've seen someone else in need of a hand; when I've been asked to take on that one extra project for the good of the program, the good of a person, or because it was the right thing to do. Sometimes it's not easy to dig deep for that extra energy, for the courage to put yourself out there, or for the patience to keep working through difficulty. However, we were selected to be scholarship recipients because we are exactly the kind of people who will remember how wonderful it feels to get patient, unexpected help. To be welcomed into a community, and shown kindness by a stranger. In closing, I'd ask two things. First, before you leave here today, acknowledge that a hand has been extended to you. In return, extend yours. Find three different benefactors who have come here today, shake their hand, look them in the eye, and say thank you. Second, it is critical that each of us acknowledge that our community must be constantly renewed in order to thrive. Later tonight, sit down with your calendar. Make an appointment with yourself for five years from today, Wednesday, November 18, 2009. On that day, take stock of your life and your resources. Things will be different. You'll have an income. School loans will look a lot more manageable. Life will be more settled. On that day, see if you have the ability to help the community. Maybe you can offer your time and expertise by mentoring students. Maybe you can return to campus to share the benefits of your experience through a talk, presentation, or speech. Maybe you can assist in securing internships or job interviews at your company. Or maybe, just maybe, you'll be in a position to start a scholarship of your own. No matter the form, no matter the size, your help will be appreciated by the community just as you, yourself, appreciate help today. Welcome to the University of Washington Business School community. Personally, I'm proud to be here. Thank you." Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated November 19, 2004 8:49 AM. Whew!Sorry for the radio silence. It's been an intense week, and I've had, literally, NO time to do much of anything except focus on the tasks that absolutely, positively, no-bones-about-it had to get done right now. The good news is that it's all behind me. We launched our survey for Market Research class (if you want to take it, please feel free) and pulled off a terrific networking night for the Marketing and techConnect clubs. In between, there were cases for Project Management, some write-ups, a handful of mock interviews. (Oh, and the usual reading.) Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated November 19, 2004 8:29 AM. November 5, 2004The Redcoats Are Coming! The Redcoats Are Coming!Microsoft is coming to campus on Monday to interview second-years for full-time positions after graduation. I spent a good chunk of my yesterday doing mock interviews with classmates over at the career center. It's exhausting, but rewarding. And totally, totally necessary. I've written before about the Microsoft Interview process, and it's a bear. (And, c'mon, you know you have tough inteviews when people write books about it Interviewing is a skill. And, like all skills, practice is required. Preparation is essential to success. I don't care how smart, verbose or charming you are - if you walk in to an interview unprepared, the interviewer will know. They will know. I didn't believe this until I started doing interviews on the other side of the table. At one point, I remember asking a generic, guaranteed-to-be-in-the-interview question (e.g., "Why do you want to work at Microsoft?") and seeing the interviewee go, "uh..." and I just thought: "Oh, my God! She's making this up right here and now!" Fakers get found out. So how do you prep for an interview? Fortunately, it's not that hard. Just stick to the basics and do them well:
Once you stitch all your stuff together, rehearse your answers to the standard interview questions (heck, say them out loud in front of a mirror if you have to. It helps. Trust me - I've done it). Don't ever, ever, ever, ever walk in to an interview and "try out" a new answer to a question. It will come off badly. Other than that -- game on! Interviewing becomes more fun the more you do it. The trick is to keep your head up and go for the gusto. Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated November 5, 2004 6:18 PM. October 26, 2004MBAA Storming-Norming-PerformingWe, the officers of the MBA Association, got together tonight for a Norming meeting, moderated by management professor Chad Higgins. There were 16 of us: the "Core 4" (President, Executive Vice President, Secretary, Treasurer), the 9 vice presidents (yours truly is on that list), and the 3 first-year section reps. This meeting was more of a hey-we're-back-in-the-saddle-and-we-should-touch-base kind of thing, as opposed to the last session we did. That one was in April, shortly after our election to our positions; it was more like that moment from The Candidate where Robert Redford says, "What do we do now?" I decided to write about the session because, as an ad-hoc chronicler of All Things UWMBA, it seems appropriate. Student government does a lot of good in this place. The MBAA is, effectively, glue. We act as the "stuff" between the students, faculty, staff, career center, alumni, community, and other parties. The Core 4 take care of coordinating activities; the nine vice-presidents have specific domains of activity where we Get Things Done. My role is Vice President, Internal Student Affairs. It's a high-falutin', resume-paddin' title, given that my real mandate is to build the MBA community and identity. Broadly, there are three buckets of responsibilities that fall under my office:
I have a counterpart, Matt Minas, who is the VP of External Student Affairs. There's folks in Academic Affairs, Alumni Affairs, Community Relations, you name it. MBAA offices tend to grow organically as the program becomes more established and diverse. MBAA basically offers the resources (like a checkbook) and structure for each class to make its mark. We have the Rolodex with the b-school contacts, established relationships, permits, etc. I mean, yeah, it's possible that each incoming class would grow this kind of competence on its own, but it's real unlikely. Basically, MBAA is a way of institutionalizing all the good stuff that makes things go. What's super-refreshing about my peers in MBAA, too, is how non-Student-Government-y they all are. You know those kids who ran student government in Junior High or High School? (Think Tracy Flick in Election.) They're not here. Our President, Mike Liu, is a hard-working guy who really puts himself out there to make the program go. Devi Weier, EVP, is a low-key, get-it-done woman who is great at juggling lots of different interests without pissing anyone off. No one is toting around a copy of Robert's Rules Of Order; instead, people are volunteering to do this or that (borrowing from Cory Doctorow, MBAA is an adhocracy) to the limit of their free time. It's very, very cool to be involved with such great people. I can only hope to replicate the experience in my post-scholastic professional life. Which - truthfully - will be tough to do. UPDATE, June 3, 2005: One or more of the original hyperlinks on this page expired, and has been dereferenced. The hyperlinked text is now underlined. UPDATE, December 31, 2006: One or more of the original hyperlinks on this page expired, and has been dereferenced. The hyperlinked text is now underlined. Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated October 26, 2004 9:50 PM. October 21, 2004The Enemy Of My Enemy Is... ?My friend, Kellogg second-year, and fellow Microsoft MBA intern Elaine Chen has given me a good scolding in IM tonight about my "implication that programs as large as Kellogg's can't support the same type of attitude that Mr. Terry has. I think that Kellogg's warm and fuzzy reputation is well earned." Basically, she feels that I was dissing larger programs. Nothing could be further from the truth. I'm up on small programs, true, but that's a) not a damnation of larger programs, and b) just my humble $0.02. So, dear readers, please consider this an apology. If you're at a larger-than-the-UW program and you love the personal attention, I in no way meant to disparage you. I apologize. (And remember: Elaine's got your back!) Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated October 21, 2004 10:18 PM. October 20, 2004Is It Over?I bid for my Winter quarter classes tonight. And suddenly, I feel like business school is almost over. When I started this program (was it just a year ago?), the MBA seemed to be this long, dark tunnel with a small light at the end of it. Now, 12 months and three weeks later, I feel like I'm being kicked out of a house party just as it's starting to get good. The classes I'm trying to score for next quarter are:
All of this stuff is going to be super-interesting, and there's even more interesting stuff to come in the Spring. The problem I face is finding the classes I most want to take, not the classes I'd like to take. Prioritization uber alles. Time for a three-year MBA, maybe? There are other signs that things are wrapping up. MBAA elections are just about three months away - at that point, the Class of '06 will step up and pick their officers for the 2005/2006 academic year. There's a lot of talk among my fellow '05ers about putting things in order for the hand-off, such as documenting our jobs, recording phone numbers of industry contacts, letting first years "job shadow" us, you name it. Some people are checking out, too - folks got offers right after their internships, so they don't have to deal with the job search process. Others are rapidly revising resumes and doing the Networking Thing. I feel, at some level, that something special is slipping away right in front of my eyes. It's the damndest thing. A metaphor for life, perhaps? (Enjoy it while you can?) Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated October 20, 2004 9:07 PM. October 19, 2004Time On Terry's CouchI often get the question, "Why do you like UW?" The list of answers is pretty long, but one of them can be expressed in three words: Terry. Mitchell's. Couch. I spent some time on Terry's couch today. It's not much to look at - a lime-green, armless, fabric-covered 1960s number. Comfy enough. But the great thing about Terry's couch is, well, Terry. Terry (aka. Dr. Mitchell) is pretty interesting. He's been teaching at the UW since 1969; his 35 years at the school have guaranteed him a corner office and a great reputation. He's this lean, wiry guy who is in to basketball, scientific inquiry, his daughters (and recent grandchild), student happiness, and making the world a better place. Not necessarily in that order. I was on Terry's couch because he'd asked me to be there. Actually, he asked everybody. Terry is teaching my management class, ("Managing High Involvement Employees"), and one of his requests of the students is to "swing by my office and chat sometime." He wants to meet students, learn about us as people, see what makes us tick, see where he can lend a hand. "I've been in this town a long, long time, and I know a strange assortment of people" he said, "Sometimes, I come to find out that a student's dream is just a phone call or an e-mail away from coming true. So we have these little chats. I love making those calls when I can." MBA program brochures talk about this kind of thing all the time - "personal attention", "great rapport with faculty", yadda yadda. I don't doubt that other programs really walk the talk, and that's cool. However, it really exists here. There's just 115 of us in my year, and a mere 100 in the class of 2006. Contrast that with 900 (!) in the Class of 2005 at Harvard, or about 700 at Kellogg. It might be the same, but I kind of suspect that time on Terry's couch is a little harder to come by when you have seven (or nine) times the people in your program. Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated October 19, 2004 10:44 PM. October 16, 2004Deja Vu All Over AgainI'm taking a Market Research class this quarter. It's an experience I began looking forward to, intently, after my Microsoft stint this summer. Since I spent 12 weeks of my life dipping my toe in the commercial market research process, I have been eager to get the academic perspective. In particular, I've been hoping that the material I will learn this quarter will both audit/correct my past mistakes (pointing out what I did wrong or incompletely) and also help take my understanding of the subject farther. So far, I haven't been disappointed. 40% of the grade in this class revolves around a real-world research project. Our team (Me, Marnie, Jo, Casey and Danika) has been charged with:
We have a lot of latitude on the organization we choose and the problem we research. We need to check in with Dr. MacLachlan from time to time to ensure that we're making the best possible decisions. What is giving me major, major deja vu is that this process is almost identical to the one I went through with Microsoft. In the span of a summer I was asked to a) think about a problem, b) formulate a hypothesis, c) test the hypothesis, d) analyze the results and e) make those results useful to the product teams. From a learning standpoint, this is truly ideal - I am going to be actively comparing the academic approach to the problem to the real-world, down-and-dirty approach I took in Redmond. Of course, at Microsoft I had three months, one topic, vendors, resources, and a budget. Here I have eight weeks, no budget, no vendors, sparse resources, and other classes competing for my time. The good news? My team is composed of some of the smartest people I know. Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated October 16, 2004 8:35 PM. October 6, 2004The Second-Year EdgeThe class of '06 is starting to look a little spooked. There's a tightness around they eyes, a quickness in the walk to the library, and a general, heavy sigh when flipping the pages in the coursepack. I'm starting to see used-up highlighters, discarded, in the trash cans in the lounge. The workload is mounting. I was chatting with a first year in the lounge this afternoon. He asked me, "What, exactly, is the difference between your first and second year?" (Subtext: "Does this craziness ever let up?") Yes and no. The workload does not, in fact, go away. Graduate-level classes are graduate-level classes. You're expected to do the work that's been given to you. On the other hand, three things change from Year One to Year Two. Those three things add up to a big, big difference. First, you get to pick your classes. Your second year is all electives, all the time. That means you're likely self-selecting into classes where you have competence, or at least keen interest. Hence, if you're not a quant geek, you're not going to take Martha's stats class. That takes some stress off. Second, your ability to learn is better. Taking case-driven classes for a year helps you spot what is - and is not - important in record time. You're able to wield a highlighter like a rapier, pink and green slashes on a sea of black and white. This ability to read and process information is very helpful in the real world. Third, and finally, your toolbox is bigger. Let me explain. We got thrown a homework assignment in Monday's Project Management class. It was a casual thing, sort of a hand-waving, "oh, yeah, problem set #1 is on the Web site. Due Wednesday." With such a gentle, no-big-whoop introduction, you might be tempted to believe that the assignment was a simple little affair. You'd be wrong. The set relied heavily on work from Finance class (Winter quarter 2004) and Quantitative Methods (Spring quarter 2004). We've all had the summer off, and here's this hybrid assignment involving decision trees, NPV, and Excel Kung Fu. We got through it, of course, but the point is that being a second year simply means your toolbox is better equipped. You're not learning new concepts as much as building on top of (and, in some ways, extending) skills you've already acquired. (Of course, this also means that if you didn't pay attention in your first year, your second year might be a little rough.) So. The first year is all about building the foundation, and the second year is all about building the house. Make sense? Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated October 6, 2004 6:10 PM. October 3, 2004The New BatchIn October of 2002, I came to the UW for a campus visit. I was thinking of coming to business school, but wasn't sure whether a) the MBA was right for me (I knew a lot of MBAs who were (are?), basically, bastards, and I wasn't too keen on going to Bastard Academy if that's what it was all about), or b) the UW was the right school for me (I knew I wanted to be on the West coast, so I was also actively considering Hass and Stanford). There were lots of things about UW that convinced me to come here, but the sense of community among its students was a huge swing vote. Community manifests itself in a myriad number of ways, but UWBS institutionalizes through a few key practices and norms. One thing we do is a biweekly, Friday-afternoon beer bash in the lounge. We call them TGs (the etymology of the name is long. Don't ask.). I remember that day pretty clearly, but the one, over-riding impression I had from my fellow potentials (and the current crop of students, of whom I was in awe ... after all, they'd got in, and I still had to sit for the (gasp!) GMAT) was that they were, all of them, My People. There's a level of candor that comes after two swallows of your second beer, and it's at that moment you get to know a little something real about the person in front of you. Life operates in circles. These days, part of my duties in the MBAA is to be That Guy who puts together TGs. This means I pick dates, get the keg, yadda yadda, but it also means I have a front-row seat when it comes to observing incoming potential students. As well as the (new) class of 2006. So ... Friday was the first TG of the quarter. And the class of '06? They're a pretty cool group. It's a little early to tell about the class personality (every class has one - ours certainly does), but, in general, they seem very relaxed, laid back, capable, competent, and clear-eyed about their prospects. They're eager to get out and meet with businesspeople, learn about the world. They don't seem to take grades too seriously. They do seem to like other people. There's a sense of humor, a sense of self-awareness. In short, they seem to have the right stuff. I'll know more as the weeks unfold (and the classic first-quarter tension builds), but my hat is off, once again to the UWBS admission folks. They know exactly what they're looking for, and they've managed to capture it. Way to go, guys. Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated October 3, 2004 11:10 PM. September 29, 2004End Of The BeginningMy Direct Marketing class ended yesterday. Going in to it, several people had warned me that "block mode" classes (and particularly those taught by Stearns) were an intense experience. I don't know that I was fully prepared for just HOW intense it was going to be. Most UW business school classes are two hours long. A "full load" is 16 credits, so that breaks down to 2 classes a day, 2 hours each, 4 days a week, 10 weeks a quarter. In contrast, Direct Marketing was 8 hours of instruction per day, for 7 days - 4 plus 3, with a weeklong break in the middle. Homework assigned on one day is usually due the next morning, and it often includes a presentation to the class in addition to the written component. So you leave class around 6 PM, fatigued and in need of pizza, and you have to be in class at 8:30 the next morning with your original, well-written insights (and Keynote deck) ready to rock and roll. Oh, and, you know - be sure to do the reading, too. My team was amazing (if you can ever work with Casey, Todd, Jo, Marnie or Deets - do so). It takes very special, focused, even-tempered people to be able to work cohesively at 4 AM, without bickering, on a solution that not everyone is 100% sure about. In fact, our final project (the one we turned in yesterday) kept us on campus until 4:19 AM on the morning it was due. No one cracked, and some really good stuff got generated pretty late in the game. The project was a HBS case called "Passion For Learning." Our mission was to develop business objectives, evaluate the current case options, develop options of our own, pick an option to run with, develop that option, and then explain how we would test our theories to see which was the best. Effectively, we were encouraged to be managers of this business, parachuted in to help the current owner figure out what to do. A lot of what we did involved the creation of personas, which was fun, creative, and gave me serious Microsoft flashbacks. =) The good news is that Stearns loved (raved about) our work. And, like I say, it's done, and we're through it. Regular classes start today at 1:30 with a Project Management class. Slower pace, ho! Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated September 29, 2004 10:34 AM. September 28, 2004The First CircleAstutue readers will check the time of this post (12:46 AM, Tuesday, 28 September). I should point out that we are holed up in Balmer Hall 305, elbow-deep in the "Passion For Learning" case. It's due, you know, in 8 hours and 14 minutes. (Now 13.) Dante defines the first circle of hell as "Afflicted by melancholy; desire without hope." Sounds about right. This class needs to be over. UPDATE, September 10, 2005: One or more of the original hyperlinks on this page expired, and has been dereferenced. The hyperlinked text is now underlined. Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated September 28, 2004 12:46 AM. September 20, 2004Cutting The MustardThe first insight of my second year concerns priorities. Specifically: ya gotta have 'em, or the program will run right over you. Year One of business school has an underlying anxiety. It's a real low-level thing, omnipresent, a sense of dread that The Worst Is Yet To Come. You get strange nightmares about forgetting to prep a case or do your part of a team paper. Time distorts - weeks feel like months, then feel like days or hours. Part of this psychological terror is due to the density and difficulty of the coursework, and part of it is impostor syndrome. The net effect is that most first-year students work like dogs to prove to themselves that they can cut it. By the time Year Two rolls around, your perspective has shifted. Not only have you successfully come through a grueling year of academics (translation: you can cut it), but you've also gone out into the work world and done an internship (translation: you can get a job). Once you know you're capable, then needs shift. Suddenly, it's not enough to survive. The next logical step is to find ways of making the program, and the experience of going through it, something that's personal to you. So as I sat in Stearns' classroom and absorbed Direct Marketing, intravenously, for the last four days, a few things clicked in my head.
So, put simply, the program means something much different to me today than it did a year ago. I no longer feel that it's about adjusting myself to something outside me; rather, I'm more interested in cherry-picking those things that will enhance the life I want to lead while attending school. It's a subtle difference, but it's really, really fundamental. Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated September 20, 2004 11:37 PM. September 16, 2004Back In The SaddleGod, it's good to be back. My first day as a second-year MBA kicked off today with Elizabeth Stearns' Direct Marketing class. Officially, the UW starts on the 30th. Our group is taking this class in "block mode," which is an intensive six days of instruction (8+ hours per day) spread out over two weeks. There's about 40 of us; a lot of these folks are a real sight for sore eyes. I hadn't realized just how much I'd missed everyone over the summer. Part of the assignment for the first day was to bring a piece of direct mail (don't call it "junk" in Stearns' presence or Bad Things Happen) that we thought was "interesting." My contribution is a tacky MBNA credit card offer sent to "Alumni and supporters of Western Washington University." What's remarkable about the piece is that it's about the fifteen-bajillionth piece of crap that I've received in the mail as a "valued Western alum." Basically, the school sold my name to anyone and everyone it could. Anyone wanna guess how inclined I am to give to the alumni association when they come knocking? Exactly. The school made a few bucks by selling my name; that's all they'll ever get. Period. Way to play the short game, guys. A long day. Class ran until quarter to six, and, aside from a small dinner break, our small group was on campus until just before 10 PM taking care of the assignment for tomorrow. And I've still got four chapters to read before the fireworks start at 8:30 AM. I'm off to catch the bus. Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated September 16, 2004 9:50 PM. August 22, 2004Business 2.0 Likes The UW!Business 2.0's September issue is out, offering a rating the "Top 25 Business Schools" in the country: "Quit worrying. If you're choosing among the 25 schools in this guide, you're going to get a great education. These schools attract the best of the best: The professors are top-notch, and the students are superachievers." I was thrilled to see that the UW made the list; they say we're "...like an earthier, more regional Stanford." I know rankings don't matter, but at the same time it feels great to see the program getting some of the recognition it deserves. I love UWBS. UPDATE, August 5, 2007: One or more of the original hyperlinks on this page expired, and has been dereferenced. The hyperlinked text is now underlined. Posted by Gavin Shearer. Last updated August 22, 2004 4:24 PM. |
". Sadly, the book isn't very good - it's really about three chapters of material, blown out to 200 pages. So I put my copy on Amazon Marketplace a few weeks ago, and priced it to move.
FedEx is running a hysterically funny new ad (3.5 MB, 
One of the clubs I belong to at UW is Net Impact. NI is concerned with issues of socially responsible business, sustainability, renewable energy, and other matters. Given the left-leaning, progressive liberal types that Seattle is known to attract, Net Impact has found itself with a large student membership.
