I've been loath to add a blog entry lately. The reality is, I just have not had time. During, my typical day I was getting up a little early to do some reading or homework (I work better in the morning). Then it was off to the office for some mayhem. Get home, have dinner with my family, play with my kids, put my kids to sleep. Talk to my wife. Then maybe read for a little bit if I didn't doze off to sleep first. The reason? We had our first mid-term and a management paper due this past weekend. The midterm was accounting, and the paper was for the management class. I think I did alright in both. But then again...we will see. A tip for those who are planning to attend next year. Try to get ahead in accounting...if you can do all the reading and the text book problems before you arrive on campus, you should be in great shape going in. And fight like hell to stay ahead. If you are really keen, you should also be able to hash out a rough draft on the management paper before school starts.
Overall, I'm feeling pretty good about school. To be honest, I feel energized when I get back from classes. When I am not in class I feel like I'm living this parallel life that moves a little faster than the rest of my life. The net effect is that I feel the personal growth that is happening. One of my favorite things about the weekends I am in schools is the conversations that I have with my fellow classmates. The variety and experience of the people in the class is refreshing. On the other hand, I sometimes wonder if its just a reflection of the monotony that can occur naturally in a career where you work in the same industry, same products, at only 2 different companies for the last 10+ years. Yeah. Thats probably it. All kidding aside, I enjoy meeting the different folks I get to see every two weeks.
What I'm reading. Cases, cases, and more cases...not much in terms of joy reading for fun lately. Although, I did get the latest Wired Magazine today in the mail. will dig in to that soon.
What I'm playing: Mario Party 8 for the Nintendo Wii (Awesome console by the way). Need to unwind somehow. Plus it gets me daughter points with my 8 year old.
Monday, June 25, 2007
Wednesday, June 6, 2007
Wall Street Journal Saga....
I wanted to take a little break from the bschool discussion to talk about another business topic that has caught my interest recently. Namely, the Wall Street Journal soap opera that is playing out. The main story line is that in early May, it became publicly known that Rupert Murdoch's News Corp. was offering $60 a share for the WSJ's parent, Dow Jones Co. This was a significant premium, greater than 60%, over the stock price up to that point. The initial response from the controlling shareholders, the Bancroft family, was rebuff. There was no interest in selling the company. However, since then, it appears that the discussion has heated up a bit, and the acquisition may happen yet. There are numerous subplots to liven things up a bit as well.
I think Rupert Murdoch is very shrewd in making a play for WSJ. Clearly he recognizes the brand value of the premier name in business reporting, especially when considered in the context of the Fox Business Channel that is going to launch sometime this year. The WSJ Brand would bring instant credibility to Fox's business channel. Fox's competition in the market for business news tv channel is CNBC. Having the WSJ as a crown jewel behind the Fox Business Channel has got to be making CNBC ad sales VPs nervous.
Murdoch's timing on the deal is impeccable. Newspaper stocks are in the doldrums, and Dow Jones and Co. in particular is at multiyear lows. Even if the deal does not work out, he's already made a bit of a splash for his Fox Business Channel. Most of the Dow Jones shareholders have to be loving this offer. The question is, will there be another offer in the works or do they take this one? And that is where some of the subplots come in.
Yesterday, there was an AP release that indicated that a Dow Jones union representing workers was reaching out to potential investors seeking alternatives to Murdoch's bid. The unions motivations of course, are driven by fears of Murdoch meddling with the current structure of the company and potentially restructuring (read layoffs). Some of the investors that were named were Ron Burkle and Warren Buffet of Berkshire Hathaway. I don't know Burkle, but I thought the Buffet angle was curious. Buffet already owns a couple of newspapers, the Buffalo News (outright ownership), and the Washington Post (I think about 20% ownership), through Berkshire. Berkshire also owns one of the major wire services used by newspapers, Business Wire. So clearly, Buffet likes the newspaper business. However, he has also recognized the deteriorating economics of the newspaper business as more and more readers move to the Internet for their news. I doubt Buffet will make a bid for the WSJ. He likes to buy stocks cheap, and a 60% premium on a stock he could have had a month ago is not cheap. It is also not Buffet's style to compete for a property. I think Buffet likes to buy stuff nobody else is buying, with long term prospects for stability and profitability. I don't think either of those things can be said about the WSJ. Lastly, the value that WSJ would bring to Berkshire's media portfolio does not come close to what it could do to Murdochs' portfolio. Clearly there is more in it for Murdoch than there is for Buffet on a comparative basis. Nonetheless, it does bring up the question about what other alternative bidders may step up. Anybody remember GE's Jack Welch looking to get into the newspaper business not to long ago. Wait a minute, wasn't Jack Welch the CEO of GE, which owns NBC, which owns CNBC? hmmmmmm.
There are a few other subplots as well that are interesting. Apparently the buyout bid has gotten mixed reactions from the Bancroft family, who are the controlling shareholders. On a plane ride I was reading a great article about the infighting between the "younger" faction who wants to take the money and run, and the "older" faction who wants to hold on to their dividends. The article appeared in...you guessed it...the Wall Street Journal.
To add to the family bickering, an influential ex-board member and the ex-chairman of Dow Jones, have publicly come out against the deal.
There was also an alleged crime associated with the buyout from News Corp. Apparently, there was a couple in Hong Kong, who may have been aware of the pending offer, and traded on the information. They made a lot of money, on the order of a few million dollars. They are being investigated.
I think this might be another nail in the coffin for the newspaper business who are being attacked from all sides (thank you Craig's list, Monster.com and others). It'll be interesting to see how this all plays out.
What I'm reading: Dow Jones Confirms Receipt of Unsolicited Acquisition Proposal
What I watched: Pirates of the Caribbean
P.S. I finally saw Pirates of the Caribbean this weekend. (Was that Keith Richards making a cameo?) While I found it entertaining to watch, don't ask me what it was about. There were too many plot twists for me to follow. Or maybe my brain was just mush from bootcamp. I would rate it a 7 out of 1o.
I think Rupert Murdoch is very shrewd in making a play for WSJ. Clearly he recognizes the brand value of the premier name in business reporting, especially when considered in the context of the Fox Business Channel that is going to launch sometime this year. The WSJ Brand would bring instant credibility to Fox's business channel. Fox's competition in the market for business news tv channel is CNBC. Having the WSJ as a crown jewel behind the Fox Business Channel has got to be making CNBC ad sales VPs nervous.
Murdoch's timing on the deal is impeccable. Newspaper stocks are in the doldrums, and Dow Jones and Co. in particular is at multiyear lows. Even if the deal does not work out, he's already made a bit of a splash for his Fox Business Channel. Most of the Dow Jones shareholders have to be loving this offer. The question is, will there be another offer in the works or do they take this one? And that is where some of the subplots come in.
Yesterday, there was an AP release that indicated that a Dow Jones union representing workers was reaching out to potential investors seeking alternatives to Murdoch's bid. The unions motivations of course, are driven by fears of Murdoch meddling with the current structure of the company and potentially restructuring (read layoffs). Some of the investors that were named were Ron Burkle and Warren Buffet of Berkshire Hathaway. I don't know Burkle, but I thought the Buffet angle was curious. Buffet already owns a couple of newspapers, the Buffalo News (outright ownership), and the Washington Post (I think about 20% ownership), through Berkshire. Berkshire also owns one of the major wire services used by newspapers, Business Wire. So clearly, Buffet likes the newspaper business. However, he has also recognized the deteriorating economics of the newspaper business as more and more readers move to the Internet for their news. I doubt Buffet will make a bid for the WSJ. He likes to buy stocks cheap, and a 60% premium on a stock he could have had a month ago is not cheap. It is also not Buffet's style to compete for a property. I think Buffet likes to buy stuff nobody else is buying, with long term prospects for stability and profitability. I don't think either of those things can be said about the WSJ. Lastly, the value that WSJ would bring to Berkshire's media portfolio does not come close to what it could do to Murdochs' portfolio. Clearly there is more in it for Murdoch than there is for Buffet on a comparative basis. Nonetheless, it does bring up the question about what other alternative bidders may step up. Anybody remember GE's Jack Welch looking to get into the newspaper business not to long ago. Wait a minute, wasn't Jack Welch the CEO of GE, which owns NBC, which owns CNBC? hmmmmmm.
There are a few other subplots as well that are interesting. Apparently the buyout bid has gotten mixed reactions from the Bancroft family, who are the controlling shareholders. On a plane ride I was reading a great article about the infighting between the "younger" faction who wants to take the money and run, and the "older" faction who wants to hold on to their dividends. The article appeared in...you guessed it...the Wall Street Journal.
To add to the family bickering, an influential ex-board member and the ex-chairman of Dow Jones, have publicly come out against the deal.
There was also an alleged crime associated with the buyout from News Corp. Apparently, there was a couple in Hong Kong, who may have been aware of the pending offer, and traded on the information. They made a lot of money, on the order of a few million dollars. They are being investigated.
I think this might be another nail in the coffin for the newspaper business who are being attacked from all sides (thank you Craig's list, Monster.com and others). It'll be interesting to see how this all plays out.
What I'm reading: Dow Jones Confirms Receipt of Unsolicited Acquisition Proposal
What I watched: Pirates of the Caribbean
P.S. I finally saw Pirates of the Caribbean this weekend. (Was that Keith Richards making a cameo?) While I found it entertaining to watch, don't ask me what it was about. There were too many plot twists for me to follow. Or maybe my brain was just mush from bootcamp. I would rate it a 7 out of 1o.
Friday, June 1, 2007
Wharton Bootcamp - week in review
Bootcamp in philly officially ended today. All the students I spoke to felt very happy with the way things went. I can say that for me personally the first week definitely met my expectations. There is a lot to say so I will discuss each topic in turn.
Courses:
The first semester consists of 3 courses. Financial Accounting, Managerial Economics, and Management of people. Some of the accounting and finance types chose to waive the accounting course. Those that waived accounting take a business law course this semester and get to take an additional elective later on. I am happy with the courses. Econ and accounting are fairly quantitative, while the management of people course focuses more on the softskills. Overall, the courses are very well organized. The bulkpacks provided by Wharton are well done. In a typical day, classes started at 7:30am with an optional math camp by prof John Siler. Math camp was usually followed by another course lasting from 9:00 to 12:00pm. At noon we broke for lunch for an hour. Classes reconvened at 1:00pm and lasted through till 4:00pm in the afternoon. During some evenings there are additional classes or review sessions. On one evening there was a session to discuss group dynamics. Another evening, there was a session to review econ. Note that for econ, accounting and management, the classes are divided into two sections. The math camp is optional and I was not planning to attend. But my wharton buddy had advised that I attend at least one of the classes to get a taste of the Jack Siler's performance. I ended up going to every session. The man is a wharton classic. These session ended at 9:00 or 9:30 depending on the day. Jack covered some high school math like exponents, factorials, polynomial and exponential functions and then moved into some college calculus with derivatives, double derivatives, and partial derivatives. Towards the end he covered counting theory and some probability. Accounting was accounting. The first week was spent understanding the basics of financial statements like the balance sheet, income statements, and statement of cash flows. I got the impression that as we move further into the course, we will cover each of these statements in more detail. The management of people course is interesting. There is a lot of reading to do in this course and then the material is discussed in class. The interesting thing is that we are graded on participation, so a large majority of the class is compelled to chime in. Talking to some folks, there are mixed feelings about this approach. Some people felt the comments are somewhat forced at times. People expressing comments to get their 2 cents worth. There is some debate however, that not all the comments are conducive to the discussion. Professor McDuffie, however, does do a good job though of bouncing the "beach ball" around to keep the conversation flowing. There is a major project to do for this course. The FAP or field applications project which is worth a good bit. This project is completed in study teams. The course also uses the case method to apply some of the theory that is taught. Microeconomics is a treat. Not necessarily the course, but the professor. David Crawford is an interesting guy. If take his course, you'll know what I mean. He covers a lot of material and he moves fast. The first week alone, we covered the basics of demand and supply curves, market equilibrium, the mechanics of supply and demand curves, production analysis, currency and international trade effects on supply and demand. This course has the potential to challenge those that have not done math in a while. My challenge will be a little different. I follow the math with no problems, but its the context and content that is new. Still, I am enjoying the course so far.
Professors
Overall, I am impressed with the professors. They are all very well organized, prompt and enthusiastic about the material they cover.
We have three courses and five professors this semester. Professor Siler runs the math camp during the first week. As indicated previously, the man is entertaining to watch. Don't get me wrong though, he knows his stuff. Its just that his teaching method is very unique for the material he covers. His approach is good however. I think a lot of the non-math folks appreciate the simplification and context he provides to otherwise mundane math topics. Professor McDuffie teaches the management class. The man is a true professional. He is a very approachable likable guy who enjoys what he does and brings that enthusiasm to the classroom. He is able to draw the class into discussions and motivates students to express their opinions in a relaxed atmosphere. Accounting is covered by Prof. Bishop Lane. She knows the material like the back of her hand. Clearly she must have taught the course a number of times. Yet she brought a great deal of energy to the class every day. She is a very approachable person outside the classroom environment as well. This is true for all the professors I met. Prof. David Crawford is a hoot. Prof. Crawford teaches the econ class. A tall, older, burly man with a forceful voice, he definitely brings a presence to the classroom. He has a gift of using very expressive and colorful language without coming off as offensive. The funniest part however, is trying to determine what his tshirt will say on a given day. On the first day, he wore one that said ...well...I won't ruin it for him. I'm sure its part of his gimmick. Lastly, but certainly not least, there is Prof. Kuriloff. Prof Kuriloff does not teach a particular course per se. But he advises on working in effective groups. In particular study groups. He was the one guy that threw me off during the week at bootcamp. I don't mean this in a negative way. What I mean to say is that I did not expect Wharton lend emphasis to group dynamics in such a formal manner. Prof Kuriloff clearly knows his stuff when it comes to working in teams. The whole study team thing was one I was leery of coming into this program. However, what I found is that the activities and guidance that Kuriloff provides, sets the tone for effective team work. The most notable factor about Kuriloff is that he has a very human touch. He cares about people and uses his expertise to make sure that the teams will be successful. He also is a safety net that students can turn to if the team thing starts to derail.
Food
Excellent. The food is catered in the SCC dining room. All I can say is that it rocks. The wharton folks do take care of us when it comes to the culinary needs of mba students. Breakfast, lunch, and dinner were provided everyday during the week. The food itself was very well done. Great menus and presentation. The catering staff is unbelievably prompt and attentive. In addition to the three meals, there is a small coffee area outside the program offices, close to the classrooms that is stacked with coffee obviously, but also other beverages such as tea, water, sodas, juice etc. This area is refilled constantly throughout the day, so there is never a shortage of beverages to keep you hydrated and caffeinated. There were a couple of very nice touches as well. I had written about the nice dinner on Sunday night. On Wednesday night, there was a barbecue in the courtyard of the SCC. This was a nice touch as it also provided an opportunity to schmooze and mingle with other classmates, the administration, and even the profs who came out It is not uncommon to see the professors in the dining rooms during mealtimes.
Facilities
If you have never been to Penn before, the location of the school is in the part of town known as University City. This is about a 5-10 minute cab ride from downtown philly. The locale has the typical vibrant feel of a large campus.
As previously mentioned, my lodging facilities were at the Inn on the Penn. This was true of most of the long distance commuters. Everybody else, including the DC, NJ, and NY crowd, stayed at the SCC. The Inn at the Penn is nice. However, I personally did not spend a lot of time there other than going to the room at night to sleep. I am not sure about the quality of the SCC, but I did not hear any complaints about them from any of my peers. Most of the time was spent at Huntsman hall or the SCC. Quite a few evenings were spent at the SCC bar on the 5th floor. Since it was all WEMBA students, the bar had a cozy touch to it.
The campus itself is very nice. Locust walk is very picturesque. Huntsman hall, where we spend most of our time, is a very nice, modern facility. All the classes are in the same building and generally on the same floor, although we did have to go to the lower floor on occasion. No big deal. Both the SCC and the Inn on the Penn are only a minute or two away from Huntsman hall. Since I commute, I do not know about the parking facilities. I do recall that they have parking on-campus for about $25/day.
Logistics and Administration
Each class is assigned a class manager that is part of the administration. Ours is Diane. She is basically a project manager that makes sure everything is running smoothly and everybody is where they are supposed to be. Diane kicks butt. She was extremely responsive to a couple of request that I had made. Overall communication between the class and the admin office is handled via communiques. Each student has a folder to check at various times during the day to get any updates or announcements.
I cannot say enough nice things about the staff. Clearly, they are very proud of the program and they do their utmost to keep the program top notch. At all times, I felt the classes and organization of school events was well organized. I did not ever get the impression that anybody was "winging it".
Howard Kaufold has done a good job building the team.
Study Teams
As I previously mentioned, this was the one area I was leery of coming into the program. Study teams are pre-arranged by the time you arrive on campus. Each student is provided a handbook which contains the names of the members of his or her study team. I was impressed by Wharton's emphasis on building a group dynamic and scheduling team building activities that helped foster and accelerate team bonding. By the end of the week, I felt I understood each of the members of my team better both on a personal level and professional level. I think, that as a team, we were able to establish a level of trust with on another that will help us start working together efficiently.
Thats all for now. Off to do some homework.
Courses:
The first semester consists of 3 courses. Financial Accounting, Managerial Economics, and Management of people. Some of the accounting and finance types chose to waive the accounting course. Those that waived accounting take a business law course this semester and get to take an additional elective later on. I am happy with the courses. Econ and accounting are fairly quantitative, while the management of people course focuses more on the softskills. Overall, the courses are very well organized. The bulkpacks provided by Wharton are well done. In a typical day, classes started at 7:30am with an optional math camp by prof John Siler. Math camp was usually followed by another course lasting from 9:00 to 12:00pm. At noon we broke for lunch for an hour. Classes reconvened at 1:00pm and lasted through till 4:00pm in the afternoon. During some evenings there are additional classes or review sessions. On one evening there was a session to discuss group dynamics. Another evening, there was a session to review econ. Note that for econ, accounting and management, the classes are divided into two sections. The math camp is optional and I was not planning to attend. But my wharton buddy had advised that I attend at least one of the classes to get a taste of the Jack Siler's performance. I ended up going to every session. The man is a wharton classic. These session ended at 9:00 or 9:30 depending on the day. Jack covered some high school math like exponents, factorials, polynomial and exponential functions and then moved into some college calculus with derivatives, double derivatives, and partial derivatives. Towards the end he covered counting theory and some probability. Accounting was accounting. The first week was spent understanding the basics of financial statements like the balance sheet, income statements, and statement of cash flows. I got the impression that as we move further into the course, we will cover each of these statements in more detail. The management of people course is interesting. There is a lot of reading to do in this course and then the material is discussed in class. The interesting thing is that we are graded on participation, so a large majority of the class is compelled to chime in. Talking to some folks, there are mixed feelings about this approach. Some people felt the comments are somewhat forced at times. People expressing comments to get their 2 cents worth. There is some debate however, that not all the comments are conducive to the discussion. Professor McDuffie, however, does do a good job though of bouncing the "beach ball" around to keep the conversation flowing. There is a major project to do for this course. The FAP or field applications project which is worth a good bit. This project is completed in study teams. The course also uses the case method to apply some of the theory that is taught. Microeconomics is a treat. Not necessarily the course, but the professor. David Crawford is an interesting guy. If take his course, you'll know what I mean. He covers a lot of material and he moves fast. The first week alone, we covered the basics of demand and supply curves, market equilibrium, the mechanics of supply and demand curves, production analysis, currency and international trade effects on supply and demand. This course has the potential to challenge those that have not done math in a while. My challenge will be a little different. I follow the math with no problems, but its the context and content that is new. Still, I am enjoying the course so far.
Professors
Overall, I am impressed with the professors. They are all very well organized, prompt and enthusiastic about the material they cover.
We have three courses and five professors this semester. Professor Siler runs the math camp during the first week. As indicated previously, the man is entertaining to watch. Don't get me wrong though, he knows his stuff. Its just that his teaching method is very unique for the material he covers. His approach is good however. I think a lot of the non-math folks appreciate the simplification and context he provides to otherwise mundane math topics. Professor McDuffie teaches the management class. The man is a true professional. He is a very approachable likable guy who enjoys what he does and brings that enthusiasm to the classroom. He is able to draw the class into discussions and motivates students to express their opinions in a relaxed atmosphere. Accounting is covered by Prof. Bishop Lane. She knows the material like the back of her hand. Clearly she must have taught the course a number of times. Yet she brought a great deal of energy to the class every day. She is a very approachable person outside the classroom environment as well. This is true for all the professors I met. Prof. David Crawford is a hoot. Prof. Crawford teaches the econ class. A tall, older, burly man with a forceful voice, he definitely brings a presence to the classroom. He has a gift of using very expressive and colorful language without coming off as offensive. The funniest part however, is trying to determine what his tshirt will say on a given day. On the first day, he wore one that said ...well...I won't ruin it for him. I'm sure its part of his gimmick. Lastly, but certainly not least, there is Prof. Kuriloff. Prof Kuriloff does not teach a particular course per se. But he advises on working in effective groups. In particular study groups. He was the one guy that threw me off during the week at bootcamp. I don't mean this in a negative way. What I mean to say is that I did not expect Wharton lend emphasis to group dynamics in such a formal manner. Prof Kuriloff clearly knows his stuff when it comes to working in teams. The whole study team thing was one I was leery of coming into this program. However, what I found is that the activities and guidance that Kuriloff provides, sets the tone for effective team work. The most notable factor about Kuriloff is that he has a very human touch. He cares about people and uses his expertise to make sure that the teams will be successful. He also is a safety net that students can turn to if the team thing starts to derail.
Food
Excellent. The food is catered in the SCC dining room. All I can say is that it rocks. The wharton folks do take care of us when it comes to the culinary needs of mba students. Breakfast, lunch, and dinner were provided everyday during the week. The food itself was very well done. Great menus and presentation. The catering staff is unbelievably prompt and attentive. In addition to the three meals, there is a small coffee area outside the program offices, close to the classrooms that is stacked with coffee obviously, but also other beverages such as tea, water, sodas, juice etc. This area is refilled constantly throughout the day, so there is never a shortage of beverages to keep you hydrated and caffeinated. There were a couple of very nice touches as well. I had written about the nice dinner on Sunday night. On Wednesday night, there was a barbecue in the courtyard of the SCC. This was a nice touch as it also provided an opportunity to schmooze and mingle with other classmates, the administration, and even the profs who came out It is not uncommon to see the professors in the dining rooms during mealtimes.
Facilities
If you have never been to Penn before, the location of the school is in the part of town known as University City. This is about a 5-10 minute cab ride from downtown philly. The locale has the typical vibrant feel of a large campus.
As previously mentioned, my lodging facilities were at the Inn on the Penn. This was true of most of the long distance commuters. Everybody else, including the DC, NJ, and NY crowd, stayed at the SCC. The Inn at the Penn is nice. However, I personally did not spend a lot of time there other than going to the room at night to sleep. I am not sure about the quality of the SCC, but I did not hear any complaints about them from any of my peers. Most of the time was spent at Huntsman hall or the SCC. Quite a few evenings were spent at the SCC bar on the 5th floor. Since it was all WEMBA students, the bar had a cozy touch to it.
The campus itself is very nice. Locust walk is very picturesque. Huntsman hall, where we spend most of our time, is a very nice, modern facility. All the classes are in the same building and generally on the same floor, although we did have to go to the lower floor on occasion. No big deal. Both the SCC and the Inn on the Penn are only a minute or two away from Huntsman hall. Since I commute, I do not know about the parking facilities. I do recall that they have parking on-campus for about $25/day.
Logistics and Administration
Each class is assigned a class manager that is part of the administration. Ours is Diane. She is basically a project manager that makes sure everything is running smoothly and everybody is where they are supposed to be. Diane kicks butt. She was extremely responsive to a couple of request that I had made. Overall communication between the class and the admin office is handled via communiques. Each student has a folder to check at various times during the day to get any updates or announcements.
I cannot say enough nice things about the staff. Clearly, they are very proud of the program and they do their utmost to keep the program top notch. At all times, I felt the classes and organization of school events was well organized. I did not ever get the impression that anybody was "winging it".
Howard Kaufold has done a good job building the team.
Study Teams
As I previously mentioned, this was the one area I was leery of coming into the program. Study teams are pre-arranged by the time you arrive on campus. Each student is provided a handbook which contains the names of the members of his or her study team. I was impressed by Wharton's emphasis on building a group dynamic and scheduling team building activities that helped foster and accelerate team bonding. By the end of the week, I felt I understood each of the members of my team better both on a personal level and professional level. I think, that as a team, we were able to establish a level of trust with on another that will help us start working together efficiently.
Thats all for now. Off to do some homework.
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