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Blog, Campus Living, Clubs, Happenings, The NANYANG MBA

End-of-Midterms Celebration

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By Bodi Yuhico, Philippines

Most of us from the Nanyang MBA Class of 2012-2013 completed our final midterm test one Sunday morning. When the clock struck 12 noon, it was a symbolic moment for the entire cohort for three reasons:

1)     The end of the midterm exams

2)     The end of the first half of Trimester 1

3)     The beginning of the ExCo’s first social activity for the batch!

Filled with much gusto and excitement, our ragged group of some 50 MBA participants moved from LT27A to our own place, The NANYANG MBA lounge. There were a lot of foods: from sushi to sandwiches to pastries. As we entered the lounge, we noticed not only food, but also the projector was set up with the newly bought karaoke (that famous Japanese contribution for “sing-along” ) machine.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

To kick things off on the right mood, Andy Kim, President of the Nanyang MBA Student Executive Council, thanked everyone for coming, and then proceeded to serenade the batch with his rendition of ‘Uptown Girl’. Not bad for a singing prexy!

 

 

 

 

 

 

We also wished and sang happy birthday songs to the September celebrants: Indonesian Satria Krisnandi, Peter Ho, Indian Sunny Arora, and Canadian Jake Hason. Sadly, the lovely French Florence Roncalez wasn’t able to join!

 

 

 

 

 

 

And so, with all that done, it was time to mingle! With Filipino John Rae facilitating the karaoke machine with aspiring singers, the rest of the group of full-timers and part-timers spent time  socializing.

It was indeed the end of the first half of the trimester, and for many participants,  it felt it went by so fast. It ended on a day usually reserved for rest(Sunday), a day typically considered in some cultures as the end of the week, and in some cultures as the start of the week. And that, in essence, was what the End of Midterms Celebration symbolized: the end of the midterms and the first half of the semester, and yet the start of many other new firsts.

Congratulations to a job well done to everyone in the cohort making the ExCo’s first social activity a success! And looking forward to more!

Blog, Clubs

Preparing to be a consultant – a Management and Consulting Club Event

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by Vida Zhou Dan, VP for Communications, Chinese, Nanyang MBA Participant, Intake 2011

Consulting as a profession is among the most popular choice by MBA students. While everyone is enthusiastic in pursuing this career, a lot of anxieties or worries about being able to snare a job assignment in this industry prevail, despite the numerous case studies we already did at Nanyang. To address these concerns, the Management Consulting Club organised an event earlier this year to help us, club members, to understand more the intricacies of becoming a management consultant and prepare ourselves to be one. Preparedness they say is the key!

Nanyang MBA Alumnus, Italian Angelo Polimeno from Delta Partners
Angelo Polimeno, Nanyang MBA Alumnus, generously shared his experience and knowledge in consulting during the Management & Consulting Club Event

We invited one of our own as our guest speaker, an alumnus who now works as a consultant of Delta Partners, a leading consulting firm, after completing his Nanyang MBA in 2010. We were glad to welcome Italian Mr Angelo Polimeno, formerly based in Italy and is now based in Singapore, yet he travels extensively across continents for consulting assignments.

“As a Nanyang MBA alumnus, I completely understand what you are all going through as I have been in your shoes.  Do feel free to ask me questions on these cases we are going to discuss. I will do my best to help as much as I can to show you how to handle the various ‘challenges’ that these cases pose” were Angelo’s opening lines. His introduction made us feel more comfortable to really dig into knowing more about this industry from a practitioner’s point of view.

During the session, Angelo also demonstrated two case studies and coached us on how to deal with these different situations. We eagerly took part in the interactive discussion – from practice details to structural thinking methods, and more. It was a lively session worth doing as Angelo gamely and generously shared his experience and knowledge with us.

After the event, some 20 of us who attended, felt that we should continue to cultivate more of our skills by ‘doing’ more and more case studies, to prepare us to tackle the challenges posed by real life scenarios which consultants must face. Preparedness is key – and this is more emphasized after the event. We were further enlightened and inspired to pursue our aspirations to become a consultant one day.

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‘Get to the Point’ – speaking in style in public

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By Ramya Krishna, Indian, Nanyang-Waseda Double MBA, Intake 2011

Don’t we all want to be good speakers?

We all want to impress, influence and motivate our teams, clients, each and every person we meet. How, then, do we get there? How do we train and practice?

Like everybody else, I had a plethora of the similar never ending questions.

‘Get- to- the- Point’ is a public speaking workshop by Eric Feng, a well-known public speaking coach for CEO’s in Asia. The workshop was organised by The NANYANG MBA Women In Business Club (WIB) and it was a perfect venue for us to learn some great tips. The event was conducted right after our mid-trimester holidays at Nanyang’s other campus, NTU One-North Campus in Buona Vista, so it was a refreshing start for most of us.

Contrary to what you might expect in sessions like these, we had lots of fun.  Yes, absolute fun.

Now, you all wonder why all the learning in the world isn’t the same… Below are a series of photographs captured during the various activities, showcasing on how interactive, and ‘fun’ the workshop was for all of us – we learnt about our capabilities and how to maximize these, with Eric coaching us on how to become effective public speakers.

Eric Feng
Eric Feng in action

Continue reading ‘Get to the Point’ – speaking in style in public →

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Social Ventures – improving lives of the less fortunate in a sustainable manner –a new career path for MBAs?

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By Nyan Kyaw, Myanmar, Nanyang MBA Intake 2011

When we look at the traditional career path and aspiration of an MBA holder, it is to move into high paying lucrative careers such as consulting, banking and finance, marketing and so on. But lately, there has been a rising interest in another industry, a relatively new industry and that is, social ventures or enterprises.

The NANYANG MBA Students with Ms Thilma Komaling Banyuputro (1st row, 5th from left) - (left to right, 1st row) Myanmar Nyan Kyaw, American Samir Mowla, Indonesian Wahyu Widianti, Chinese Zhou Dan, Ms Thilma, MBA Office Management Grace Wee and Charlotte Kong; (left to right, 2nd row) Indonesian Djoko Tanto Wijoyo, and Vietnamese Vu Manh Tran Hung.

Unlike charities, the focus of social ventures is not to provide hand outs, but with a combination of business acumen, social consciousness and some creativity. Social ventures seek to improve the lives of the less fortunate in a sustainable manner.

With that in mind, Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) Club of The NANYANG MBA invited Ms Thilma Komaling Banyuputro, a social enterprise development consultant who has given up her successful career in petroleum industry to pursue her life calling – to share some of her experiences working for a social venture. The event was an intimate setting for an exchange of life-changing experiences and ideas among 10 like-minded peers.

What I have noticed is most people working in the social venture do not set out planning to work for a social venture, but they are moved by a certain event in their lives which compels them to do so. For Thilma, the turning point was the series of earthquakes in Aceh. After seeing the disasters and the tragedies on the news, she realized it is her life’s calling to help the less fortunate in any manner that she could.

As one of our fellow Nanyang MBA peer, Indonesian Wahyu Widianti shared her realization from the talk: “Follow your heart and your passion. The energy coming from the passion is very powerful for you to do many great things for the community.” And this was what Thilma actually did – being moved by her passion to help those who are less fortunate and in need.

Over the next 2 years, Thilma spent her life juggling between career and volunteering for charities and social ventures. Finally, she took the plunge and devoted her life solely on social ventures. Currently, she is working for Rumah, a low cost mobile phone carrier in Indonesia. The aim of the venture is to provide poor families in the rural areas of Indonesia with access to mobile phones and also create jobs. Continue reading Social Ventures – improving lives of the less fortunate in a sustainable manner –a new career path for MBAs? →

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One-on-one coaching with veteran Career Coach on banking & finance careers

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By: Akhil Mehta, Indian, Nanyang MBA participant, Intake 2011

As an active club, we regularly organize events for our members and this time, we wanted to get into the groove and prepare for the next stage of our lives – post MBA careers. Thus, our Banking and Finance Club invited veteran recruitment consultant and career coach, Ms Anita Sim, Executive Director at Euro Group – a leading top tier organization providing services in the property development, marketing and search business areas, to give club members a deeper insight of the various career tracks in the said domain.  Dubbed as an interactive “Career Coaching” session, the club members actively posed questions to Ms Sim who willingly engaged us and provided deeper insights into different career streams in the banking and finance sector.  Ms Sim presented a wide perspective on the emerging trends in the economy and recruitment space for aspiring banking and finance professionals like us.
After the talk, each club member and attendee had the opportunity to have a brief yet intense one-on-one discussion with coach Anita, where she provided individual feedback in terms of the suggested career path based on prior work experience, education background and areas of interest. This ‘one on one coaching’ was the highlight of the event. All the attendees gained new perspectives and insights on their career paths, and advise on how to improve on strengths, and work on weaknesses. A couple of the attendees mentioned that it was a meaningful session as we have understood clearly the future career path we wish to pursue, and the challenges we are about to face as we move along after completing the MBA programme.

Banking and Finance club during the workshop.

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Women in Business: An Entrepreneur's Story – "From Networking to Business Alliances"

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Blog by: Kwa Hwee Lay, Clarie & Filda Citra Yusgiantoro, Singaporean and Indonesian, respectively; Nanyang MBA participants, Intake 2011

The NANYANG MBA Women in Business (WIB) Club held a talk cum workshop “An Entrepreneur’s Story”. We had the honor of welcoming one of Indonesia’s distinguished female entrepreneurs, founder and CEO of Mobiliari Media Group, Ms Millie Stephanie. Mobiliari (PT Mobiliari Stephindo) is a media company that counts Indonesia Tatler and Forbes Indonesia among its many publications. Ms Millie fostered a lively discussion of her experiences as an entrepreneur with a group 10 WIB club members, and the only thorn among the roses, our German colleague, Justus Kaiser (in picture below, 5th from left).

 

Continue reading Women in Business: An Entrepreneur's Story – "From Networking to Business Alliances" →

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Tiger Beer– Singapore’s very own world-class brew dazzles

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By Simon Mathies, German, The NANYANG MBA Participant Intake 2011

To be considered to be the best, one has to put in the finest of all ingredients. Just like pursuing our aspirations to be the best in our chosen field after our studies, we chose to do The NANYANG MBA, considered to be one of the World’s Top MBA programmes. The same goes for Tiger Beer, which has come a long way since 1932.  “A lot goes into every bottle of Tiger. The finest malt, hops and yeast. Taste-testing over 10 samples of quality of water everyday. Over 200 quality checks. All part of a strict brewing process that takes over 500 hours.” This Singapore concoction has gone a long way – it has garnered over 40 international awards, winning drinkers in major cities all over the world. So how do they do that? And that is what we Nanyang MBA students found out in our visit to its headquarters in Singapore.

Organized by the Wine, Liqueur and Beer Appreciation Club, the trip to the Asia Pacific Breweries (APB), maker of Tiger Beer, we (10 Nanyang MBA students) were warmly welcomed by APB staff and were introduced to the brewing process through an enjoyable multi-media presentation. Afterwards, we got to know the different ‘fine’ ingredients needed to make this award winning beer. After a short confidential advice to protect APB’s unique ‘art of brewing’, we entered the ‘sacred halls’ of the brewery. Inside, club members saw the highly sophisticated and automated process and the enormous polished kettles and pipe works. Even more impressing was the bottling/packaging plant. Though we may have some initial idea on how the preparations are done, but to see the actual process is simply amazing.

After the guided tour, is the part each and everyone is waiting for – to enjoy the various tastes of the different brands licensed by APB in their own Tavern located next to the factory. There is probably no better way to have a fresh tasteful Tiger right inside the brewery itself! Jane Wang, our Chinese peer, summed up our experience – “During the Tiger Brewery trip, we visited the factory and were briefed the process of producing draft beer, we took a nice group picture with the “tiger” statue in front of the factory, we were offered to drink 4 kinds of different draft beer as much as we can (drink all you can, that’s right!). We chatted and played games in the bar next to the factory while drinking the freshly-made beer.”

Enjoying the beer with friends –Jane, yours truly Simon, Ralph and Eric

Continue reading Tiger Beer– Singapore’s very own world-class brew dazzles →

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Understanding the financial and banking industry

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Talk organized by Banking and Finance (B&F) Club

By Akhil Mehta and Raghav Sharma, Indians, Nanyang MBA Participants, Intake 2011

 

The 2011-2012 Banking & Finance Club kicked off its first event in the last quarter of 2011 with a seminar on an overview of the Banking industry.

As it was a Tuesday night, and to make it more apt for our topic in ‘banking’, we had the event held right in the middle of the financial district of Singapore, Raffles Place, at a cozy coffee shop.  Ms. Anita Sim, the Executive Director of Euro Group, a leading top tier organization providing services in the property development, marketing and search business areas was the guest speaker for the day.  A dynamic and highly experienced industry veteran, Ms. Sim gave the fourteen (14) club members who attended a crash course on the various aspects of the banking industry, and the career choices available.

Throughout the course of the night, Ms Sim touched on many aspects of the banking industry, sparing no efforts to explain acronyms, warned us of pitfalls and shared precious insights on how to get a foot in the door in this buoyant industry. Aware that some of us have no prior experience in this field, Ms. Sim was thorough yet concise to bring her points across, to let us understand the job nature of various positions, and which of the top banks in the field to look for in different areas.

After the short but sweet session, all of us quickly introduced ourselves to Ms Sim so that she can know each of us better and give more tailored advice individually.

It was a wonderful and eye-opening experience for most of us as we look forward to meet Ms. Sim in the near future for more tips and insights to prepare us in our job search, and getting our dream jobs in the industry.

About The Banking and Finance (B&F) Club: The B&F Club serves its members to equip them with the necessary information to make informed decisions to pursue a career in this industry. It aspires to bring updated information about this ever changing landscape of the industry and needs of future financial professionals to ensure that its members will have the necessary skills to compete. For more information about the club, click here.

“The event was very helpful as we not only talked about various aspects of Investment Banking and Asset Management industry but also discussed the implications of current economic scenario. Ms Sim also took time to discuss in brief, the basic profile of each member, which we found very useful when we search for jobs soon.”  – Raghav Sharma, one of the authors, 3rd from left, together with his classmates from Mexico (Manuel), Japan (Harutaka-san), and India (Kabeer) [left to right], during the pre-term activities of The NANYANG MBA.

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Consulting as a Profession – Are you up for it?

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Derrick Tee, Malaysian, The NANYANG MBA Participant, Intake 2011

It has been a while yet the date, 16th December 2011, still lingers in my head. It was on that day that I officially became a ‘full time’ MBA candidate in Nanyang Business School. I was a part time MBA participant when I started my MBA studies, but decided to switch to full time due to various reasons, specifically to complete the programme faster. I have taken the plunge to leave my current employer and focus on my business studies.

Derrick_Tee As I was considering to make a career in management consulting,  I attended the talk ‘Consulting as a Profession’ by Right Management, global leader in talent and career management workforce solutions within ManpowerGroup – and the talk came at a better time. Frank Ribuot the Asia Pacific Senior Vice President for Right Management was the guest speaker for the day. Many of us in the 2011 cohort aspire to make a career in the consulting industry. However, according to Frank, “the glamour, the hype and most importantly, the hard work that comes with it may not be everyone’s cup of tea.” Continue reading Consulting as a Profession – Are you up for it? →

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Women in Business Club launched – a first in Nanyang Business School

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by Clarie Kwa, Singaporean, Co-chair of WIB club and Current Nanyang MBA Participant, Intake 2011

Last  September, The NANYANG MBA Women in Business (WIB) club was launched at the Nanyang Business School’s  One-North campus in Buona Vista, located near the town area. Twenty (20)  women – MBA students and friends, attended the inauguration of this first women-centric club with the theme centered on ‘Carpe Diem’, a popular Latin phrase translated as ‘to seize the day’.

Being the founding members, we were extremely privileged to have the support of not just the school, but also our networks. Dr Siri Chutikamoltham, Senior Teaching Fellow and Director for Banking and Finance of Nanyang Business School,  gave us the honor of giving the welcome speech. Our keynote speakers were corporate executives:  Ms Cheong Pik May, Group Director of Integrated Healthcare Information Systems, and Mr. Soon Loo, CEO and President for Elevation Group and Director for Indiabulls Property Management Trustee Pte Ltd (IPIT).

As the event progressed, the speakers made it clear that a support system would be vital. As Dr Siri put it very aptly, the WIB club is a forum for sharing and support. Girlfriends can always be relied on. Pik May recommended having a good team throughout one’s career. She continued to propose the importance of family and marriage. In fact, marriage can be a source of stability for one working in a competitive working environment.  Pik May made a clear distinction between balancing both roles equally and juggling these roles and responsibilities. Many mistook a work-life balance as an equilibrium in which both aspects are in equal proportions. However, it is really a juggling act where neither aspect should be allowed to fall through.

It was a very fruitful evening for everyone. We learned about the challenges and joys of being a woman- balancing studies and personal/family life. As Minyu, one of our Singaporean classmates, reflects, “I think the common challenge is time management. It is sometimes tiring to juggle between studies and work, and also leaving some time for our family and friends. Personally, I think it is important to get some ‘alone’ time so that we take time off to reflect and refocus and prioritize items which are important and close to our hearts. Of course, there is also the warmth and help from family, friends and company that makes these challenges less taunting and more manageable.” Apart from discoveries and reflections that Minyu took away that night, she also made meaningful network among her classmates and the speakers, “The WIB inauguration was a great start for the first women club in The NANYANG MBA! During this event, I got to meet more female students who are keen to make a difference to their own lives and others. The speakers also shared very interesting self experiences and how they have made it thus far. It definitely motivated me to be an inspiration to another one day. In short, it was a very fulfilling night!”

The event concluded with a toast in the splendor of “Yum Seng” (a Chinese tradition of toasting). New friendships were formed. Contacts were exchanged. Most importantly, everyone went home, with something close to their heart to muse.