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| The Baker Library houses the biggest collection of business-related materials |
- a lecture on how to read/discuss cases
- campus tour
- administrative overview
- opening dinner
Living Groups
I have pretty a small room that measures about 15x5 meters. It has a single bed on one side and a huge study area on the other (to remind you that you are here to study). It also has a small private bath.
The participants are arranged in what is known as a Living Groups composed of about 9-10 individuals from different disciplines, nationalities, industries and gender. I think I am the youngest in my group. Each living group is assigned to a particular living area that has its own case discussion / conference table, pantry and living room. The rooms are built adjacent to this living area.
But what is so awesome about my room is that I have a wonderful view of the river. I was told that every morning brightly colored ducks would wade and swim on it (anyone care for balut?).
Across the river is Harvard Square, the general area where I lived the last couple of nights. It's only about 15 minutes walking distance away. I'll probably do that over the weekend when I go to mass.
Reading / Discussing Cases
The major activity of interest for me personally was the Reading / Discussing Cases lecture done by a Harvard Faculty, Mr. Bill Ellet, who authored a book on the subject. Not knowing who he was, I had the privilege of engaging him in a conversation during the pre-session coffee break.
His approach is very easy and intuitive and is premised on two core points
- The human mind knows instinctively what is important and what is not - use it to your advantage. His example was meeting a grizzly bear face-to-face in the wild. The brain processes information in a split-second, concludes that it is dangerous and will therefore prompt you to make a decision.
- Being busy executives, we have so much experience sifting through facts and data in order to arrive at a conclusion. It's no different with case studies. Case studies are narratives of information / data, some useful some not. It's up to the reader to draw his conclusions. So don't read it like a book for contrary to what Paula Abdul says, it has no beginning nor an end.
I'll be trying his approach in a few minutes and see if it works for me. By the way, did I tell you that by the time this course is over, we would have read, analyzed and discussed more than 200 case studies. That's like 3 cases a day. So sleepless night here I come.
Harvard Business School Tour
Any orientation program will not be complete without a tour of the 33-acre Havard Business School campus. Our guide told us that the HBS campus was donated by a certain Mr. Baker in the 1920's at what was then probably a significant amount of USD5M. Harvard Business School itself was founded in 1908. Today Mr. Tata of India, an AMP alumnus is erecting the new home of HBS' Executive Education program at a vacant lot next door, the 36th building in campus, at an astronomical cost of USD55M. All the buildings on campus are named after very rich benefactors who either donated money or had these buildings constructed for Harvard.
Oh and did I tell you that I now have an official hbs.edu email address that I can use forever. Obviously, it was meant to (a) establish a communication route between AMP participants, AMP graduates, who are bestowed HBS alumni status and the HBS administration; and (b) to impress the outside world. I haven't quite figured out what to use it for so I guess I'll use it when I fill up mailers in department stores and Internet subscriptions to house all my junk mail - just kidding of course.
Let me leave you with some photos I took during the tour. In the meantime, it's back to the case study for me - my first in HBS.
