Ricky’s Online Business Blog

This is the original version of my article sent to be published in MBA Edge Quarterly magazine April 2011 issue. The edited version published in magazine might be a little different. Your feedback is much welcome.

It was 5pm as Amin and his soldiers marched into the jungle. The weather was warm and their heart was worried. They were sent into the forest to fight against the guerrila force who had stole a prized treasure. Guided by a compass, they nevertheless boldly trekked the jungle towards the coordinates given. There they expected to encounter the enemy to complete the mission.

But they were not the only squad going after the treasure. There were also other millitants vying for the prize. Amin needed to compete with these forces to reach the destination, and even engage them in fight if necessary. The reward was bountiful, for they would earn money for each rival soldier killed. But for each own soldier downed by their foe, Amin had to pay ransom to redeem the life of a dead member. Keeping enough cash was important to keep the enterprise afloat and pay for expenses as they arose.

Staying alert against any attack on the way, Amin and team each held a bomb in one hand, while carrying a bag of weapons and food supplies in the other. But the terrain was just too challenging, and not all team members were fit enough to hike up and down for hours. By 8pm everyone was hungry and worn out. So they stopped and started campfire to cook dinner with rice and water bought.

Unfortunately, as they relaxed their guard, bombs started to fly across the trees. They had been ambushed! Three members got killed in the dark. They smelt badly as stinky water spread around their bodies. Fortunately they managed to bomb a few opponents too. Money exchanged hands and the mission went on. Unless the treasure was recovered by any team, the jungle fight would go on and on. Nobody would be allowed to walk out of the jungle, even if it meant continuing until the next morning.

Well, the weapons were as fake as water bombs, and the killings did not really happen. But the enthusiasm was real and team spirit was high. This was a corporate strategy simulation camp informally called “war game” by one business school for its MBA students. The participants were grouped into “companies” in the war game and required to earn money by winning games and competitions, the jungle war being only one of the many activities. The company with the most cash at the end would emerge as the winner.

Though Amin’s company did not win, they learned a lot in the process. They undertook many tasks over four days and three nights. These could be as simple as building bridge across the River Kway, designing the most efficient process to pass balls around, and performing role-play on stage. But some activities could be as challenging as building a raft, rowing it in the open sea towards a goal post. They even overcame their water phobia by swimming 300 metres in the waters back to the beach, and of course, brought out their fighting spirit bombing enemies at midnight in the jungle.

Critical success factors facing these challenges included strategy, leadership, creativitiy, confidence, communication, teamwork, delegation, trust, crisis management, motivation, and even behaviour correction. But on top of these common lessons in team building activities, participants also got to experience and apply on the battlefield many theories they learned in their MBA class including competitive and cooperative strategies, theory of constraints, entrepreneurship, business process reengineering, financial management and even blue ocean strategy.

Read on here…

I’ve been asked to write a testimonial for MyPEC training, a simulated on-the-job training I went through with a group of MBA students. I think I might as well post it here so that my friends and other coursemates know what I’d been through missing in action in the period from November 2010 to January 2011

In November 2010, at the start of my fifth semester in MBA, I was among 30 students selected to join MyPEC training. We were sent to work full-time in a virtual company two days a week for three months. The company sells office stationery to “customers” (other virtual companies in Malaysia and throughout the world).

First I became the head of department in purchasing where I learned to negotiate with “suppliers” (yet other virtual companies) in order to buy office supplies at the best price and quality. Being new to purchasing and quite an accommodating person, initially I found it hard to be tough and assertive negotiating for best terms. Anyway I learned a few tricks and my team managed to pass the test to minimize the costs and bring in more profit to the company.

Few weeks later, I got rotated to the production and planning control department where I assisted my team leader to come up with new and creative products for the company. Designing and working on physical products was not my cup of tea, and I found myself quite reluctant in the new department. But I managed to come out of my comfort zone to do a job I was not familiar with.

Another few weeks later, all trainees formed groups and we broke into 5 new virtual companies. I helped form a company selling shipping boxes. Together with other founding members in the company, we completed the registration process to register a Sdn Bhd company, produced a business plan, pitched our business idea to investors and bankers, got funds in and started selling our products.

As COO of the new company, I was in charge of operations aspects including purchasing and inventory control. Again I was involved in negotiating and purchasing. But this time I was not so lucky as the suppliers stood firm and kept raising their prices. I offended quite some people and made a few mistakes. One of the most important lessons learned was to manage my emotions and stay cool and positive even under stress.

The company went well and we presented quite a handsome profit to our investors at the end of training. Thanks to the job rotation in former company and helping to oversee the operations of the second company, I had learned to appreciate the overall business process of a trading company. Needless to say, I learned the importance of teamwork and soft skills like negotiation and communication too.

The training had opened my eyes as it’s my first time experiencing such realistic and practical training. Although the suppliers, customers, products and money were all virtual, we all worked hard as if they were all real. The training provider was very successful in creating the simulated environment.

I recommend the training to all students without working experience to feel how it is like to apply what we study in business course to real life situations.  I also recommend it even to those with working experience because it enhances our understanding of the overall business flow of a company and helps us to see all departments and appreciate all inside and outside stakeholders with a helicopter view.

I thank MyPEC Sdn Bhd for providing such a novel kind of training in Malaysia, and the coaches who taught, advised, encouraged, challenged and even scolded us in performing our job. Some people were not nice to deal with. But it was meant to simulate the real life anyway.

I also thank my business school, Graduate School of Management (GSM) in UPM, for allowing me into the training, though it was initially meant for my junior batch. The training should be continued in the university, and in fact should be introduced to many other business schools as well.

This is the original version of my article sent to be published in MBA Edge Quarterly magazine October 2010 issue. The edited version published in magazine might be a little different. Your feedback is much welcome.

Continued from previous…

Understanding these diverse backgrounds of students, together with the values and behaviors that they bring to an MBA course could help us to understand and work with one other more harmoniously in our MBA study. Not appreciating these differences might bring to culture shock and even conflicts for certain students.  Imagine Rocky attends an executive MBA class consisting of senior managers and business people. He can get bored and lost following their discussion on obviously topics unrelated to exam. Now imagine Dato’ Muni joins a class of fresh graduates. He can easily get disillusioned by the lack of culture for learning and sharing.

Talking about learning, a learning-oriented student should have no problem identifying and appreciating the practical value of what is being learned in the course, especially if he or she has had some working experience. Take the theory of constraints in operations management. Dato’ Muni should be able to apply immediately in his business to identify the bottlenecks limiting the sales of his company, and so do something about it.

Also, consider the Big Five personality trait theory, career-minded Lisa can immediately use it to assess her own personality in terms of openness, conscientiousness, extroversion, agreeableness and neuroticism to discover her strengths and weaknesses, and the kind of work most suitable for her, in order to chart a career strategy for herself.

As for Rocky, studying the marketing concept can immediately unravel the secret of finding his love.  Consider what Peter Drucker says about marketing,

“There will always, one can assume, be need for some selling. But the aim of marketing is to make selling superfluous. The aim of marketing is to know and understand the customer so well that the product or service fits him and sells itself. Ideally, marketing should result in a customer who is ready to buy. All that should be needed then is to make the product or service available.”

Consider applying this in Rocky’s situation,

“There will always, one can assume, be need for some courting. But the aim of marketing is to make courting superfluous. The aim of marketing is to know and understand the guy/girl so well that you fit the target and sell yourself. Ideally, marketing should result in a target who is ready to accept your proposal. All that should be needed then is to make you available!”

Trust me, in MBA, there is just SOo much to learn!

Ricky Soo consists of both a business person and a working person inside. He thinks that no matter what our aim for MBA is, by no means go for it in full force. There will be heavy workloads and peer pressure to sway us away from our desire. But let’s not be transformed by the pattern of the crowd, but keep reminding and motivating our self to strain forward towards our goal post. Ricky can be followed at http://www.rickysoo.com

This is the original version of my article sent to be published in MBA Edge Quarterly magazine October 2010 issue. The edited version published in magazine might be a little different. Your feedback is much welcome.

Continued from previous…

The personal stories of Dato’ Muni, Lisa and Rocky tell us why people choose to embark on an MBA journey. The reasons people buy this brand called MBA appear to be very diverse, depending on whether they are business people, working people, or fresh graduates. Even within these same category of students, one may not assume all others take MBA having the same reason he or she has. We all have different motives in doing the same thing.

For business people like Dato’ Muni, they do not need MBA for the purpose of getting a job. Having been in business, they know a paper qualification does not speak of the whole person, if it speaks anything about the person at all. They want to excel in their study in MBA but are not too obsessed with getting A for all subjects. To them, they know the difference between grade A and grade B is not significant. What they value most are the practical knowledge learned, useful insights gained, ideas inspired, skills acquired, character developed, teamwork and leadership training undergone, and friends made during their MBA study. But they can become disinterested when the subject matter gets too academic and theoretical that they do not see practical value in learning it.

For working people like Lisa, MBA offers a solution to their career advancement. Many of them face dilemma whether to invest money in MBA education, or buying a house or a new car. Many of them need to choose between devoting quality time to their spouse and family, or spending endless hours everyday going through reading materials, doing assignments, attending group discussion, and preparing for presentation. But for those who decide to forgo valuable time and money for an MBA are likely to have strong utilitarian view of the course and expect high payoffs in future. To quote a few business jargons, they must have, though unknowingly, gone through benefit-cost analysis, calculated the returns on investment (ROI), checked the net present value (NPV), and justified spending one or two years going through taxing schedules with high enough consumer utility in taking the course.

For fresh graduates like Rocky, an MBA is likely another course of study same as those they have gone through in the past 15 years or so. For some of them, for the first time in life they have a real choice to study a course they are really interested in. For others, they study MBA because they have heard it is a good qualification for job market, or their close friends are doing it. To be frank, not all of them know why they are in the course. They may not really know what they might get out of the course, and what to expect after they graduate from MBA.

Because of the different reasons and motives people choose to study MBA course, the values they regard highly also differ from one another. It follows that their expectations and behaviours are also quite different. A business person values most in learning, knowledge, practicality, self-development, training, experience, sharing, discussion, brainstorming, networking, recognition and even the self-actualization they may get out of the course.

I personally know of customers who were already successful in business but studied MBA for the sake of challenging their potentials. Sometimes their behaviours can be quite strange to the rest of us. For example, it is OK for them to take longer than normal duration to finish the course in order to learn as much as they can from each subject. They may self-study a subject more than what is covered for the sake of learning. They may purposely choose to take up assignments and research areas according to their interest, no matter how tough and challenging they may be. They may write up an assignment much more than what is expected by lecturer. They may be the most outspoken ones in class asking questions and sharing ideas, though some areas are not directly related to what will come out in exam.

Whereas, a working person values most in utility, payoffs, speed, effectiveness and efficiency. Most of them have to juggle life between work, family and studies. For them, the years spent in MBA could be the most hectic years they will ever have in life. As such, they cannot afford to study a subject as extensively and leisurely as do the business people. They need to finish the whole course in the fastest time at the lowest costs in terms of time and effort. They can do very well and pass the course with flying colors. But they are not likely to spend too much effort in any one thing that they work on.

For the fresh graduates, doing an one-year MBA course is like doing one extra year in university after their final year as undergraduates. They are likely to use the same study methods they been trained in to tackle an MBA course. Due to the very exam-oriented culture in our education system, these students are very exam-oriented too in MBA study. They value tips for exam questions more than learning a new thing in business. They value studying more than learning, memorizing points more than appreciating business concepts.

Due to lack of working experience, they might know what is being taught without really understanding it, or they might understand it without really appreciating it or knowing how to apply it for practical use. Anyway, these do not matter. What matters most is that they get good grade in examination, something they have been trained well as professional students. For them, examination is a time they cram everything into their head for the big test. But after examination, it is a time of unlearning and releasing all that in the head, so that they may have space to put in another subject or other more entertaining things in life. Some of them may not be really interested in what they study. To them, MBA is just one final stage they need to finish up before being freed from study life into working life, thinking it is a better world out there working than studying. As such, some of them can consider MBA quite a waste of time.

Of course, we cannot stereotype all business people, working people and fresh graduates as having all the same characteristics respectively as above. There are many exceptions. For example, in my own MBA course, the best presenter I have seen so far happens to be a fresh graduate. However, examining more closely, this classmate actually has some working experience as a part-time DJ, whose job has trained him to do well in presentations . Therefore, not all fresh graduates are totally fresh as we may think.

Read on here…