Dinner: a required part of the MBA learning experience

So I always knew your education extends outside the classroom, but I never stopped to think how far it would go.

So I grew up in middle America, small town, public high-school, the whole nine yards.  Growing up I new maybe a dozen people who weren't your corn-bread, apple pie white people types.  My family was very progressive and always fostered experiences that put me outside my "cultural comfort zone", but being around people from different backgrounds was still an uncommon event.  

As I got older and moved off to college, my world opened up to different cultures; I now knew and interacted with individuals from all over the globe, but these people were mere acquaintances, not really close friends.  You learn about these different cultures, but you don't really get to know the people and how their backgrounds shape who they are and how they approach life. 

Fast forward to business school and now the tables have turned. I'm immersed in other cultures, Asian, European, Indian, Latin.  Everywhere I go, every group I'm in, I get to spend tremendous amounts of time with people whose lives have been so different from mine a times it seems we're from different planets.  You learn so much seeing how others approach problems, how they phrase answers, how they resolve conflicts.  You begin to realize that you've viewed life through this cultural lens, and, lo and behold, there are better ways of looking at things.  There are better ways at approaching problems.  For those of us who can see these differences and learn from them, you start to realize there's a lot more out there that you just don't know. 

What brought this all into perspective for me was a dinner we had at my house last weekend. My wife and I had over 4 of our closest friends; we ate, we told stories, we had a great time.  About halfway through the night I'm sitting there and I realize in our group of 6 we have 4 different nationalities and several different religions.  Yet, we're sitting around a table that must look like something from a UN meeting, and we're talking about the same issues, laughing at the same jokes. I had more in common with these 6 people than I have in common with friends of mine from back home.  You realize for all our differences, we're basically the same people, but, we have so much to learn from each other.  

The first book we all read for Owen was "The world is Flat" by Thomas Friedman.  Yes, Thomas, it is very, very, flat, and through it's flattening you can now see that what you thought you knew before is but a sliver of the world we live in now. 

Comments

[Sharran Srivatsaa]

Remember I am an "international" student!

[Scottie]

If you were awed by Friedman's Flat, please consider extending your knowledge of globalization with
www.mkpress.com/flat
watch
www.mkpress.com/flatoverview.html

Best wished for your continued success,
--scottie