Week 5 Hilary

This week was dominated by the Oxford/Cambridge MBA recruitment fair which took place on Thursday (see below). It is little wonder then that my (now) well established work routine was thrown a little by taking a day off. In addition, a finance assignment seemed to dominate my every waking moment. I don't normally talk about specific papers on this blog, however this one absorbed me completely. We were tasked with valuing a company that was to be spun off from its parent. That is to say, value an initial public offering (IPO). What a task! Lets just say that I spent a considerable length of time on it and instead of my normal 'hand it in a day or so early', only managed to finish this evening (deadline is 11pm tonight).

Of course the standard 2 weekly strategy assignments also managed to get slotted in somewhere in between.

This week the river was red-flagged until Friday which meant that most training was either in the erg room or in the Iffley Road Tank Room (an indoor boat). Today however we discovered that we had been inadvertently entered into a race and seeing as it meant valuable river time, attacked it with gusto. The result was probably better than expected and we managed to hold off the St Peter's boat all the way to the end, however as I keep saying, we have an rather large amount of work to do to be competitive at Torpids. Never-the-less, I really enjoy the whole rowing scene and would go out on the water regardless of of our standard.

High-Tech Panel Discussion

On Monday, the school hosted a panel discussion on the high-tech sector. It was attended by representatives from Google, Adobe, Ofcom, IBM, PRTM and offered an interesting insight into the fast moving nature of both software and hardware developments.

Tech Mahindra

My good friend Pawan arranged for Tech Mahindra to come in on Wednesday to discuss their MBA intake programme for this year. It seems that they (so like the other Indian IT companies) are expanding at an incredible rate and are thus taking on staff very very quickly. They came in to discuss the opportunities for September and seem very keen on taking on a few Oxford MBAs.

Oxford/Cambridge Recruiting Fair

This was a great event, this year hosted by Judge Business School, Cambidge. It attended by 27 companies in total, including: KPMG, IBM, Accenture, Capgemini, Amazon, Johnson & Johnson, Fitch Ratings, PRTM, Roland Berger, Deloitte, Ocado, London Asia Capital, TTP Group, Tech Mahindra, Cognizant, Convergys, Altran, Fidelity and a host of others. As usual, this event was a good way to gather more information on the culture and practices of the company (I believe that you can tell a lot by the person that the company chooses to attend these things) and I spent several hours chatting with their respected representatives.

I also managed to get some time to have a tour of some of the colleges in Cambridge as well as having a walk around the town. The main event was closed by a buffet reception and a select few of us then joined some of the Cambridge MBAs for a pint or three in their locals. It was a good day.

Me in Trinity College Cambridge

For those that have seen the film Chariots of Fire, one scene recreates a race in which the runners attempt to run round the perimeter of the Great Court at Trinity College Cambridge in the time it takes the clock to double strike the hour at midday. In the film one sees the runners run through the cloisters pictured above. I have since found out that the scene was actually filmed in Eton College...

The Chapel at Kings College Cambridge

Templeton Valentine Ball
On Friday Templeton hosted a Valentine Ball, to which it seemed that most of the MBAs and their partners attended. Templeton is reputed to have the best food of all the Oxford Colleges and they did not let them-selves down for this party. Following the food there was a party in the JCR (Junior Common Room) where we danced the night away.

Andrea and Akiko Pawan and Mahima at the after-party

Dinner at the Di Martinos

On Saturday, Bruno and his wife Rosie hosted an intimate dinner for 7 at their home. Also present were Eric, Christina and Julie. The food was out of this world and we were treated to a series of Latin American specialities (Bruno and Rosie...you guys can really cook!). As expected the MBAs present spent the beginning of the evening in a corner talking about the finance assignment, however as the delicious food was served we pulled ourselves out of our self-inflicted pain and enjoyed a wonderful evening together.

The week to come...

Week 6 looks like its going to be another busy one. Projects on a famous retailer, Hybrid cars, an Indian 'emerging giant' and further progress into the EP are on the cards. And its only 3 weeks until the end of lectures for this term! Last year's class weren't wrong when they said that Hilary was a tough term...