Jenny Kwan, MBA '09

Famous!

13-Apr-08 - My name in lights!!  Well, not quite.  In print at least :-)  Here's the online link to the FT article talking about China Lab.  The print version was published Monday April 13th, we were on page 13 of the front section.  I even got a message from a distant friend who randomly spotted it!

Job hunt

2-Apr-08 - MBA student seeking employment.  Just a summer job really.  But definitely a big reason I haven't been writing so much here lately is this distraction of finding gainful employment in additional to the rest of the Sloan-load. 

It hasn't really helped that the last few months I've kind of changed what I'm looking for but it is really great that I'm getting clarity on some issues. e.g. Location is important - I really don't want to live in the middle of the USA, and I'd rather head to Asia sooner rather than later; that it's all about the impact that I'm having and that energy is important to me but not critical - especially if it means not working for a huge hulking bureaucratic company; and the fact that I really do want to work with interesting and smart people!

Still looking!  Watch this space...

China Lab!

31-Mar-08 - Spring break is when Sloanies jet all over the world - this year included >250 heading to Japan and others to Brazil, Korea, Ghana, Israel, India ad Saudi Arabia among others (no doubt I missed a couple!).  I headed to China for the inaugural China Lab program.

It was a really great experience and very different to the research project I did in January.  The definite highlight was working with and getting to know some of our Chinese counterparts in international MBA programs around China.  I went to Kunming in the Yunnan Province, just a few hours from the Vietnamese border.  It's called the Spring City and the temperate weather was a really nice break from the cold of Boston!

The company we are working with is a first generation family run business.  We had 'fun' (a little confusing at the time!) putting together the puzzle of what the super-ambitious CEO was saying in comparison to what everyone else described the business as.  It was a really great practical learning experience and insight into Chinese business culture.

The last weekend a lot of us gathered in Beijing to be tourists for a day before heading back home to H2 out of the brand new beautiful Beijing airport.

H1 whizzes by

14-Mar-08 - So, I've been remiss in updating my blog again - H1 has gone by in a flash, I don't believe we're already half way through the second semester!

So what are the highlights of Spring 08 so far?  Although inevitably wishing I could take many more than the 54 credit limit (for the learning, not the workload!) I've got some great courses this semester.  Some really great professors and project based courses and I'm working with some really great teams.  I seem to be gravitating towards taking mostly entrepreneurship and economics focused courses which I personally find most interesting.

Because of my project heavy courseload I'm a lot lighter on extracurricular activities than during the Core - I decided to drop the extracurricular SEID project I wanted to work on but I'm still involved in leadership positions in SEID and Net Impact and helped organise the MIT Energy Conference (wow!) - there's always more than enough going on to keep busy!