OwenBloggers: Nat

Change of Plans... Germany and Africa

Congratulations to the outgoing class of 2008!  I am glad to see that OwenBloggers will continue to operate.  Thanks to the original founders for your hard work over the last two years.

I thought it was about time that I posted an alum's update 1-year out from graduation.

Recently, the MBA Enterprise Corps provided me with the chance to work as a business transformation specialists to the US Africa Command (AFRICOM) at the Department of Defense. The position is based in Stuttgart, Germany with a likelihood of traveling throughout Africa. In this role, I will seek to coordinate a collaboration and communication strategy with the Department of Defense, the State Department, USAID, along with some NGOs and consulting firms.  My current employer, Accenture, was generous enough to grant me a leave of absence during this year-long placement.

The new command will help focus the Department of Defense's resources in the support of existing U.S. initiatives that assist African nations and regional economic communities. I hope to use this opportunity to apply the bottom-up empowerment model we all learned from Muhammad Yunus and in our trips to India and Bangladesh with Project Pyramid at Owen. My personal and professional interests are deeply rooted in international business (with a socially responsible twist) and I see the MBA Enterprise Corps as a perfect fit.  Ideally, I would like to take my experience with AFRICOM back to Accenture to improve the corporation's existing international development program. 

Right now, I am enjoying some time off in Colorado -- playing golf and fly fishing before moving overseas...

 

Sovereign Wealth Funds in Development

I was fortunate enough to join the 2008 Project Pyramid class to Bangladesh this year as an Owen alum. Not many MBA programs offer a subsidized trip to study social entrepreneurship alongside a Nobel Prize winner at the Grameen headquarters in Dhaka. I hope the prospective students are taking note because this will be your initiative to design for next year.

While attempting to return to the throws of the working world… I still managed to keep in touch with several of our local Bangladeshi contacts from the trip. Ifty Islam, is a managing partner at Asian Tiger Capital and one of our prestigious panel speakers in Dhaka (along with an economist from the UN). Ifty is an 18-year Wall Street veteran and a regular contributor to the Bangladeshi paper called the Daily Star: www.thedailystar.net/story.php?nid=25343

Some of his recent articles are around brining sovereign wealth funds (SWFs) into development economics. For countries like Bangladesh, the SWFs could be a tremendous source of foreign direct investment and long-term capital growth projects. Investors might find some double digit growth and diversify away from the global markets. At the same time, these SWFs can pass on valuable knowledge capital to developing economies without the political conditionality of direct aid. Countries like China are heavily involved with their state owned enterprises (SOEs) in development of Africa but why not move their SWFs?

I still think that Yunus’ concepts and visions of social business hold the most potential for massive poverty alleviation.

www.modernghana.com/news/160559/1/Stanbic-receives-$55bn-equity-investment

http://mubasshir.blogspot.com/2008_03_01_archive.html

www.rgemonitor.com/blog/economonitor/245844

World Class Conference

 

I was never more proud to be associated with Vanderbilt than I was this past weekend. The 2007 NetImpact conference in Nashville was my third conference and I continue to be inspired and amazed by the quality of the attendees and speakers. Maybe I bring a little favoritism as an Owen graduate but I personally thought this weekend was one of the best. The classes of 2008 and 2009 clearly produced a groundbreaking event for Vanderbilt and Nashville. On top of it all, we were able to impress our northern visitors with the November Nashville weather.  The student volunteers and the design team must have put in countless hours and late nights preparing for the conference.

One crowd that might be overlooked at this event is the Owen Bloggers group. The bloggers made NetImpact history with their live documentation during the conference. We even had video coverage of the keynote speakers and some personal interviews. Thanks to all of you student writers for letting me read about the other panels on my plane ride home.

My highlight for the weekend was the chance to get lunch with Jessica Flannery from Kiva.org. Jessica speaks every year at NetImpact and has one of the most moving life stories out there. If she can not inspire the individual to understand their potential for change then no one can.

Thank you for a spectacular weekend and it was nice to see those Owen students can still throw a world class party!

Re-entry: Five months out from graduation…

 

Life is rough on the outside.

No more class, tailgating, the Stage, or journeying around the world and meeting Nobel Peace Prize winners. Back to reality after business school.  But not before spending three glorious months traveling through Asia and staying with old friends and coworkers.  Asia was followed by some therapeutic fly-fishing across the Rocky Mountains.  All of this is now over. I returned (reluctantly) to the east coast.

As much as I would like to tell the world about my past two months on the job… the HR department specifically prohibits me from telling you any details on a blog. No, I do not work for the CIA or any government entity. Just company policy.

I can tell you about my miserable relocation process from Colorado to Washington, DC...

Just one week into my city life, my new apartment flooded and I had to move again (only to be raided by the SWAT team at another complex). Last night, a computer glitch locked me in the tunnels of the Metro for 2 hours and this morning I found my car impounded. Welcome to the city.

DC is a fantastic place with so much opportunity for an MBA. I managed to meet up with a small group of fellow Owen alumni from my class and everyone seemed to be enjoying their jobs. Many were also wishing they were back at Vanderbilt.

Glad to see Owen is gearing up for the Net Impact Conference. I hope the second years will forgive us someday for just dropping that event on you. Maybe someone will pick up ONE Vanderbilt, Project Pyramid, and the GBA to succeed where I have failed while a student at Owen.

Good luck to the new students and keep up the blogs. We alumni do read them.

Regrets at Mod IV

One of my many regrets over the last two years at Owen is never taking a healthcare class. Every MBA who goes through Owen should take at least one healthcare course. It is too massive an industry and too great an opportunity to meet with some of the leaders in this field.

I dropped in a few courses with Congressman Cooper and I recently completed a PR campaign for ParadigmHealth but I still feel like I missed the boat on this part.  I am only now beginning to see how complex healthcare is in America and what dire need there is for business talent and innovation. 

Many of the healthcare courses are taught by working professionals like Michael Burcham or Paul Keckley who are accessible and have offices upstairs.  If you read Hwee's blog you will begin to see the excitement around this industry.  The healthcare MBA is a fascinating concept that I hope will truly set Owen apart from every other top school.

Between now and the start of school...Santorini

Thanks Isaac for passing along the AOA question.

 

Advice for the summer and internship search:

I took a month off in the summer before Owen and cashed in on some company frequent flier miles with a trip to Greece. This travel was a perfect way to prepare for the work ahead in that first year of school. I was tan, relaxed, and had a few good pictures to show to my orientation team. Before classes started I had about five to six internship leads and I thought I was in good shape. To my surprise, they all fell through and I was scrambling in March to find an internship. By pure chance it all worked out nicely and I found an incredible opportunity in Shanghai for the summer. I still say it never hurts to have as many “back-up” jobs in your bag as you can. Not just leads but real job prospects that are more developed. Owen may have some solid placement statistics but (as I found) you can’t just sit back and expect the companies to come to you.

To those of you scrambling right now for an internship… yes there is time.

 

More random advice from a 2^nd year:

Make sure you do not take too many classes in Mod IV for the following reasons…

 

Global Warming: The average temperature for Nashville over the past 22 days is 77 degrees

Global Food Festival: (see pictures- I only wish I was from Dubai)

Marketing Madness: (a marketing competition at kegs)

Chili Cook-off: (Dean Bradford is famous for his chili)

Owen Thunder Festival: (MBA tailgate at the Pepsi 300 NASCAR race)

Owen Follies: (People actually record and photograph all the stupid things you do over the year)

The Owen Cup: (Annual golf tournament between the 1^st years and 2^nd years)

Capitalist Ball: (Our formal MBA gala)

Fly fishing: The Caney Fork has some of the best fly fishing of the year

Graduation/Summer: Is right around the corner

Homeward Bound

 

We made the absolute most of our 12 hour layover in Dubai on the trip home.  My classmates and I spent the morning playing football and swimming on the beach and the afternoon carving turns in the snow at Ski Dubai.  I am a native of Colorado and have been skiing the Rocky Mountains for 24 years but Dubai has a fantastic indoor ski resort.  

 

The journey through Dubai and India is finished but it was probably the most exciting and educational two weeks I have had at business school.  The visit to SKS Microfinance, ISB and the Habitat experience has given me significant insight into the Bottom of the Pyramid.  My personal view is that this trip provided some nice groundwork for the next four years of international trips.  Perhaps all this work might yield a breakthrough down the road in global poverty alleviation.  Until then, it is back to school to finish the semester.

Habitat for India

The India travels took us to a little town about four hours from Hyderabad called Khammam.  We decided to do a little community service and volunteered for a two day project with Habitat for Humanity.  My original thought is that this type of project would bring us into even closer contact with the bottom of the pyramid market we are studying in this course.  I had no idea how insightful and rewarding our excursion would become.

The backbreaking work of digging a base foundation with limited tools gave us plenty of time to become local celebrities with the village children.  We were the only Americans to ever work with Habitat in this town so our presence was monumental in the villagers eyes.  Every time we stood in one place for too long the crowds of curious people would build and create a scene.

 

The two families we assisted ended up being women recipients of SKS loans.  Our trip had come full circle.  We learned that the women are under tremendous pressure to build up savings to last them through the construction period of their homes.  Unlike with a microfinacne loan, the home is not necessarily going to provide a family with more income.  Too bad we do not have a model that combines the assets of affordable housing and seeks to create a sustaining income.  Regardless, I was deeply impressed with the quality and impact of the Habitat for Humanity program in Khammam. 

The CEO of Habitat for Humanity in India also made a visit to our site.

 

 

Indian School of Business

The Owen/Divinity squad spend the day at the Indian School of Business (ISB) in Hyderabad.  Let my pictures speak for themselves because I can not begin to describe this palace of academia.  I felt like I was no longer in India.  We were completely removed from the horns, trash and rubble of the outlying neighborhoods.  It is hard to believe that a place like this exists when the roads, sewage systems, and general utilities are barely functional in the same location.

 

 

ISB is a top global MBA program and partners with elite schools like Wharton, LSB, and Kellogg.  Our speaker was very proud to point out how India sent two teams to the Innovation Challenge Case Competition at Thunderbird in 2006.  Ironically, we had Bana Shomali in the room from Owen who actually won the competition last year.  Our next speaker began talking about a group called "Net Impact" and I modestly informed him that Vanderbilt was the host of the annual Net Impact conference in 2007.  Owen may barely make the top 50 schools but it seems like we are still competitive with global schools like ISB.

We then sat through a fascinating meeting with the director of the Center of Entrepreneurship.  He provided the team with some great background on the business challenges and opportunities in India.

Our next stop was with the University of Hyderabad and a presentation by a friend of mine from the graduate faculty.  I hope to one day develop the relationship with Vanderbilt to build an exchange or Bottom of the Pyramid class with the University.

The other highlight of the day was being hit by a motorcycle but I managed to survive with little injury.  Not sure about the other guy...

MBAs on tour- India

 

The India team successfully completed a rigorous weekend of tours to get a better feel for Hyderabad and the culture.  Our visits included the Golconda Fort, Charminar, Qutb Shahi Tombs, the Salarjung museum and an evening with the Buddha in lake Hussain Sagar.

 

 

 

Our work started today with SKS Microfinance on a rural site visit.  We split into two busloads and traveled to a remote village outside of Hyderabad.  At the village, we sat through a loan meeting with the village women who are the clients of SKS.  The women welcomed us into their circle of 36 to witness the loan distribution from SKS.  The public meeting is the magic behind microfinance as it builds repayment accountability in an almost ritualistic setting.  I included pictures of the buffalo one lady purchased and a cement mixer that was the result of another loan.  They use the cement mixer to make and sell bricks to pay off the loan and generate more revenue. 

 

 

Tomorrow we head for the Indian School of Business to meet with the director of the Center for Entrepreneurship.  We hope to discuss some common interests and maybe even make some breakthroughs in our projects.