Philly Day 1 and 2....

So I finally made it to Philly. Flew in from Atlanta on the first flight out without any incidents.

I tried to check in to my hotel, but there were no rooms available when I arrived. Being from out of town, Wharton put me up at the Inn on the Penn instead of the SCC. Apparently, if you are local to Philadelphia, or coming in from New York or D.C. you get put up at the SCC. If you are not, you get housed at the Inn. I guess if you really wanted to guarantee yourself a room, you could try to get a reservation for Saturday night and stay over. Since I couldn't check in, I just checked my bags and headed over to the SCC lobby where we were supposed to sign in at the hospitality desk. When you sign in, you get your Penn card and SCC id card which you are supposed to wear around you neck at all times. The Penn card has your picture on it. The reason I mention it is that when you are asked to send in pictures, keep in mind that it will be used for your Penncard for the next two years, and also the facebook. So its probably worthwhile to send in a nice studio photo from work, or get a haircut and ask somebody to take a nice passport type picture of your face.

After signing in and getting your id, you get a brief tour of the campus and the SCC along with your fellow classmates (broken up into smaller groups). This provided me with the first opportunity to start meeting some of my other classmates. Afterwards, there is food served in one the lobby areas at the SCC where you get to mingle with other classmates and in some cases their spouses. I enjoyed this time as I got a chance to chat it up with alot of nice folks and start putting names to faces.

Orientation started at about 12:30. Everyone (spouses included), went to one of the amphitheaters where we heard from the administration, some of the professors, and some current and past students. The amphitheater seating assignment was by alphabetical order. At our seats, we recieved our wharton name plates, and a wharton school bag with some goodies like course packs and a student handbook/facebook

Following the presentations there was a brief break. When we returned, a couple of the professors did a community building activity that was designed to introduce you to your pre-assigned study group. This was a good activity as it had a lecture feel to it and there was some good discussion. We also went around the room introducing ourselves and giving a brief description. During this time, I think the spouses went off and did some sort of organized activity (philly trolley tour?).

We wrapped up just before dinner time and headed for the dining room. Dinner was good. It provided a chance to meet some more classmates. After dinner, some of the folks headed to the bar for some informal schmoozing and mingling. I went back to the hotel to check in. They finally had a room ready. The rooms are nice and the hotel is just across the street from Huntsman Hall...so I cannot complain. The good thing about wharton is that they take care of all the logistics, food included. And the food is good. After I checked in and freshened up a bit, I headed back to the SCC where I met up with some of the folks who had gone to the bar. This was a good setting to socialize some more because people had loosened up a little bit and with a little help from the likes of Sam Adams, the conversations were flowing. I didn't stay too late, but stayed later than I had planned because it started to rain. Once the rain let up a little bit, a fellow classmate and I headed back to the hotel.

Day 2 started early with optional math camp. Since I had done the pre-math CD that was sent, I didn't feel I needed the math camp. But I went anyways because I had heard the guy who teaches it, Dr. John Siler, is quite a character (and walking, breathing WEMBA history since he's taught every wemba class since it started). The rest of the day consisted of classes, where we got right down to business. I was glad I had already completed all the accounting reading and homework. The prof moved fast, and I felt that I was able to follow along like a champ. I like both of the professors for the classes. They were very professional and very entertaining. Tonight, during dinner, I am meeting up with my study group to review some of our assignments that are due this week, including one tomorrow.

Thatss all for now. I'll try to post later this week if I can.

As far as what I am reading this week, as you can guess, cases and homework. And what I watched recently was Spiderman 3 on Friday night. It was entertaining. We had originally intended on Pirates of the Caribbean, journey to the end of the world, but it was sold out.

Hitting the books hard....

The clock is ticking and the countdown to Philly has begun. School starts next weekend (memorial day weekend...how nice!). I am working to wrap up all the pre-reading and assignments in time. The last week or so, I have focused on the management class and the financial accounting homework. Accounting is done. Surprisingly, I have endured the accounting work better than I expected. I was a little worried about this course being an engineer and all. In addition, I have not taken an accounting course since high school (eons ago). I am focusing on the pre-math and Managerial economics this week.

A lot has happened school wise since the last time I posted, I received my Wharton buddy call. Basically, a current Wharton MBA students calls to welcome you to the school and offers a chance to ask questions. I had a good discussion with my Wharton buddy and he offered to get together before school started. I am trying to get together with him sometime this week.

I also met a fellow Wharton mba exec admit last week at a local watering hole. Coincidentally, he lives a few minutes away from my house. How weird is that? Anyhow, it was good to meet somebody from my class and compare notes, motivations and plans etc.

I also started to go through the Wharton facebook. I sent in my picture and added brief bio. I also got a chance to see some of my other classmate's pics and their bios. We have a pretty diverse class any way you slice it, by age, industry, nationalities. On a gender basis it seems like its predominantly male. Seems like at least 75% males judging by the facebook. But the facebook is not complete so that may not be reflective of reality.

Finally, I completed a brief survey sent to me from Wharton by email the other day. Basically, they wanted to know why I chose Wharton over other schools. My top three reasons for choosing Wharton were brand name, format/logistics, and the high admission standards. As mentioned in a previous post, I looked at many schools but ultimately chose 2, Emory and Wharton. I ultimately chose Wharton because of it strong brand name globally. If I knew for certain that I would stay in the southeast, Emory would have made more sense for me. But I consider myself mobile when it comes to my career, so I wanted a strong global brand name.

I will try to report from Wharton when I am there next week. In addition to the play by play from the front lines, I am thinking about other topics to write abou in the near term (not necessarily next week) that may be of interest to those looking at exec mba programs. From what I have seen most programs start anywhere from January to June. With application deadlines starting as early as summer. So if you are thinking about applying for next year, I would start sending away for those brochures right now and start thinking about which schools. If you are planning to go to a more competitive school, you will also need to plot an application strategy. I will share my thoughts on application strategies, based on my experience and preparation during my application follow up post soon.

What I'm reading:Stickney and Weil's Financial Accounting Text



What I'm listening to: not much lately

Google in -- McKinsey Out....Universum MBA employer ranking

Google is doing some amazing things... in many ways. Recently, Universum, an employer brand consulting firm, released their Employer Survey - MBA edition, where Google ranked as the top choice employer by MBAs. What is striking about Google's placing in this survey is that as recently as two years ago, in 2005, they did not even make the top 100! Appearingly, these surveys seem to reflect current trends. I recall a few years back when names like DELL, Intel, and AOL topped the lists. MBAs sure are a fickle bunch. Which then begs the question: What do MBA's value in an employer?

Rounding out the top 10 this year
1. Google
2. McKinsey & Company
3. Goldman Sachs
4. Bain & Company
5. Boston Consulting Group
6. Apple
7. Microsoft
8. General Electric
9. Nike
10. Bank of America

You can see the full 100 list here.

And some historical data here.

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What I'm reading: MBA Jungle on the MBA employer rankings

What I'm listening to: La vida loca (see upper right hand corner ;-))

Two down....more to go

Got started on the pre-reading and homework that are due the first week of classes. Courses this first term are financial accounting, managerial economics and management. The breadth of material seems lightest this first term relative to the other terms. The remaining terms have more courses. It will be interesting to see whether this has any effect on workload. I doubt it.

So far, I have completed half the accounting homework, which is basically an intro to financial accounting. I must say, it was not as menial as I was anticipating. The content for the intro is a software CD that comes with a mini-textbook. The software is pretty easy to use and the content straightforward. Next up is the assigned reading from the course text and the related problems.

In addition to accounting, I have also started the reading and case studies for the management class. The reading is similar to the stuff I read in organizational behavior and organizational design courses in undergrad but there is a lot more of it. I'm hoping to get through it all but I am going to focus on the important stuff first. In order of priority, case studies, reading assignments, and then the suggested articles. There is a lot of reading (about 600 pages, no joke) to be completed for the first week so I try to pace myself without getting too bored or caught up in the details. The good thing about this course is that the syllabus has been sent out and it described the assignments that will be due throughout the term. I will probably be able to get through a few drafts the papers that need to be submitted before schools starts.

What I have not yet started is the reading for the managerial economics (mgec) and the business math primer (math intro) course. I am going to leave the mgec stuff for last for no particular reason, although I plan to start skimming through some of it. Now that I have the accounting intro out of the way, I will get started on the math intro. This is presented as a audio course with notes and homework. I have already looked at it and I am guessing its about 15-20 hours of work to get through, consisting of mostly statistics and other business number crunching tasks.

My goal is to get all of the required homework completed by the time school starts plus any extra stuff like getting papers drafted and reading ahead etc.

I have also started to go through some of the online resources from the Wharton internet account. I am glad that Wharton decided to give us access as early as possible. I find it convenient to be able to browse through the available resources. Basically what I've seen consists of message boards for the different classes, clubs and activities. I've also seen course listings, faculty and Wharton directory listing, online access to wsj, businessweek, FT, NYT etc.

On another note, it looks like I will not be able to attend the NYC reception as I would have liked. So, I will have to wait until the end of May to meet my classmates in person.

Also decided to add a new section to my commentary. What I'm reading and what I'm listening to. This is for anyone who may be reading or listening to the same and care to comment.

What I'm reading: Warren Buffett's Letters To Berkshire Shareholders

What I'm listening to: The Welch Way podcast from bweek