Working hard, Hardly working

Hey peoples

Long time no see, right? Not that anyone cares though. For the last two weeks we`ve been pretty busy with procrastinating, we even bought an American football and started training in order to go pro next year. All jokes aside, our studies have really kicked off now and we`re still trying to juggle with the fact that attendance is pretty much mandatory, especially since I do not plan on selling my kidney in order to finance the books we need for the courses.

Most of this blog post will cover the courses we`re on and towards the end we`ll probably talk a little sports. This is also a pretty long blog post, so brace yourselves, walls of text are coming.

LET THE GAMES BEGIN!

Le serious business segment mandated by Aalto BIZ, aimed at any and all future le serious business school students heading for HEC (Buttherestofyouarestillwelcometoreadit)

Logistics – Now, seeing as I`ve always been a huge fan of FedEx, I thought this course would totally be my thing. So far, so good, even though I have to admit that most of the areas covered thus far has pretty much been stuff I already know… (TuTa, spring 2012, never forget). I don`t think logistics really needs much of an explanation, so moving on!

Economic Problems & Policy Analysis – Ok so I`m a finance major. Now I like to think there are two kinds of finance majors, those who know what supply and demand is, and those who don`t give a shit. I`d like to think I`m somewhere in between. I`ve always been interested in the qualitative nature of economic theories rather than the quantitative interpretation and, so far, this course has given a lot of thought on the qualitative side of economics and how politics and especially the forming of so called political platforms drive real world economic decision such as the redistribution of wealth and how they might end up causing deadweight loss and thus, for example, reduce total welfare.

Organizational Behavior – Now, since most of my bachelor`s courses have focused on finance, I have never been able to grab some psychology courses, a subject that I am very keen on. So I finally go out and enroll on one, and let me say this, I`M ON FIRE BABY! Memorizin` n` applyin` psych theories on real world work place cases baby, you ain`t got nothing on me! Needless to say, moving on…

Consumer Behavior – Hey, Mo` psychology, Mo` betta. This course has been the most “eye-opening” so far. By using different proven psychological / data gathering methods, we are able to see what consumers really respond to in terms of advertising, product placement etc. Moreover, even though the results of the study of consumer behavior might be common-sense to some people, some parts of the field still amaze me, such as tracking the eye movements of consumers to see what part of an advertisement catches their attention. I could write about this for ages, but I won`t.

The most valuable thing Ville learned: A marketing course can actually be fascinating and make sense as long as it stays near the applications in day-to-day business.

Strategic Management in Organizations – At first, I thought this course name was one of those, where professors put fancy business words in a hat, shuffle them and pick them out by random, such as “Creative sustainability in strategic corporate social responsibility”. Now, let me just say that I was proven wrong. The course itself is basically the teachings of Michael Porter. Now what makes the course interesting is not the endless memorizing of different lists of management theories (KRHM Aalto University of Economics, really!?), it is the fact that the course comprises of a simulation where we get to apply these theories to a company we manage in a simulated reality. The group with the highest stock price in the end wins. Now, being a finance student, I already came up with the best strategy for this game, some window dressing for reputational reasons and then just reverse-split the stock in the end. VICTORY WILL BE OURS!
The most valuable thing Ville learned: The professor prefers Colombian coffee.

Management skills

For a guy who was watched almost all seasons of the Apprentice (both US and Finnish variants) this one was an easy pick for me. After all, being a CSO (Chief Something Officer) in some sort of company, working in perhaps a field of business (even a sector) has been a life-long dream of mine. Jokes aside, this course is easily the most interesting one I have at HEC. The professor has made a career at L’oréal, is a hockey fan and provides actual insights stemming from a couple of decades of managing people. Has my utmost respect for telling things as they are, even though it might not be pretty to hear(e.g. telling us all that we pretty much suck for not being familiar with some of the most famous authors in the field of management science). The lectures are heavily conversation based but that keeps things interesting, it’s also fun to hear about the management cultures in other countries from the other students. Exercises range from written group cases to individual oral presentations and role play. Also a great pick for general career tips and tricks. 5/5, would recommend.

Most valuable thing learned: things WILL go to hell at some point of your career and text books won’t prepare you for it.

Int’l economic environment
I’m not a big fan of the course so far. If watching graphs upon graphs while facing the wall (the classroom sucks) and listening to socialists give their opinions on the world is your piece of cake, by all means, take this course. The course has one major assignment, a 25 page report on a country of your choice, which is actually the best thing about the course, as it gives you a chance to learn about a foreign country in more detail.

Most valuable thing learned: People who don’t share my political views are stupid.'

Int’l financial management

Nothing special really, the name says it all. Has interesting stuff for both those with a finance background and those who really don’t give a fudge about CAPM. A pretty cool professor, though the poor guy doesn’t always seem to grasp elementary school mathematics. No assignments, a mid-term and a final exam. A traditional read-the-book course.

The most valuable thing learned: In North America, making a reasonable contribution to the class discussion can actually result in getting compliments from the professor after class. Dat culture shock.

Ok that does it for our studies so far, now if some of you are wondering why none of this makes any sense, don`t worry, we usually make no sense whatsoever. Now, it’s time for some…

Sports Baby!

Football feat. Budweiser

Since the last time, a lot has happened in terms of sports. We went to see the University of Montreal football team, the Carabins, play against some team I don’t even remember anymore. To be honest, I don’t even remember the final score of the game, the only thing I do remember is that it was probably one of the best sporting events I’ve seen in my entire life. “CANADA HAS NOTHING ON U.S. COLLEGE FOOTBALL”, yeah I know, but still the atmosphere was incredible. It was like a party mixed with sports, where whenever the home team guys even touched the ball, the crowd went nuts. The only slightly annoying thing was this guy sitting in the row behind us honking some goddamn vuvuzela from hell all the time (not an euphemism, he literally had a this cheap-ass looking horn that made the worst noise)

Cheerleaders photo-bombed by the refs

Between the college football games, practicing throwing a football and watching Tom Brady tribute videos, I think the football fan in me is starting to emerge. 

Now for the king of sports, hockey!

Pre-season has started, and I’m over the moon. The New Jersey Devils managed to beat the New York Rangers, which is always the best feeling in the world regardless if it’s a pre-season game, a regular season game or the freaking eastern conference final (which, when I last checked, we won beat the rangers 4-2)
We also got our first experience from the famous Bell Centre, where the Canadiens squared off with…. wait for it…..the Canadiens! It was a red vs. white charity game, where the Montréal Canadiens team was split and they played against each other. It was an ok hockey game, nothing really special though, since it lacked almost all the intensity that makes for an excellent hockey game. Nonetheless, the atmosphere looked promising and we are looking forward to the 17^th of October so as to see an actual regular season game in person!

Montréal Canadiens (Too many men on the ice anybody?)

In the meantime, see you at Chez Serge for the season opener against Toronto on October 1^st!

Mandatory picture of our new beer pong table