Gong xi fa cai

​Happy New Year everyone! What an interesting week of activities it’s been for us at IMD…..so much has happened that I find it hard to talk about just one thing…so let me try to give you a run-down of some interesting events or at least my highlights for the week

Tuesday - MBA Roundtable - Facing Globalization: A Chaotic Transition to Uncertainty?. This event organized by The Evian Group, encourages us IMD MBA students to think about our global responsibility as leaders. We had the opportunity to hear from IMD MBA 2012 students who bravely ventured to Bangladesh to see how the country has promoted Social and Economic Inclusion and to understand the socio-economic factors that are fuelling the rapid growth. We then heard from Bangladeshi entrepreneurs who in their businesses were able to combine corporate social responsibility along with profitable business by focusing on the development of underprivileged citizens and segments of society. For the first time, many of us saw how the private sector can truly make a difference without jeopardizing profitability and shareholder agendas. We also got to hear from Peter Wuffli (Chairman of the IMD Foundation and Supervisory Board, former Chairman and CEO of UBS) about his experience and efforts to help develop companies and ventures that promote social inclusion and development.

Thursday – Entrepreneurship – Prof.Benoit had a treat for us in the form of a“surprise” guest speaker - Martin Velasco, Entrepreneur & Business Angel. Mr.Velasco not only spoke about his experience as an entrepreneur and investor but also about the importance of actually contributing to a bigger cause as an entrepreneur and in his case, the cause of Healthcare.

Saturday – HIGHLIGHT OF THE WEEK!!! - My Chinese classmates stole the show. The class was dressed in a sea of red to celebrate the Chinese new year and at 8am we danced to Gangnam style and enjoyed the lovely personalized messages, greeting cards and candy our classmates had left for each of us at our desks. The festivities continued after class into the evening with a class dinner, karaoke, pubbing and of course no party can come to a close without us dancing our stress away until 4am!

Oh wait and did I tell you, that apart from the above, we also had 8 hours of classes everyday and an average of 2 case studies to read, 2 hours of group work most days, individual assingments, fitness, etc…..and yes, we find the time to sleep too….

I’m told it’s going to get busier and more intense but with interesting weeks and fun classmates, I say bring it on!

Best regards,

Vikas Menon​