Though it doesn’t have the reputation of New York, London or Hong Kong, Berlin is a fascinating place to study business. What happens here makes waves across global political and financial spectrums (look no further than Germany’s role today in helping to craft a bailout for Greece). But where Berlin is unmatchable is its history and how irony has, in the span of 20 short years, transformed the city from the seat of government for the model East German communist state into the vibrant capital of one of the most powerful democratic economies in the world.

Sunday is the perfect day to watch this irony in action, as Flohmärkte (German for flea markets) sprout up all across Berlin. Here you can buy all sorts of hand-made trinkets and wares imported from exotic lands – in this regard, no different than the stores open on other days of the week. However, where these flea markets really stand out is that it is a huge outlet for products produced in the former East Germany. Now, a shallow capitalist might wonder about how something produced under a command economy could even come close in value and quality to a product of efficient and competitive free markets. But the communist product is free of one significant limitation: cost. Central planners acted as the “invisible hands” of their economies, pushing around resources and goods. In some areas, their decisions resulted in sub-optimal products – case in point: compare an old East German Trabant to a West German Mercedes. But in areas such as optics for photography and ceramic tablewares, which somehow were treated very generously by economic decision makers, they were given whatever resources they wanted to make the best product possible, regardless of cost, efficiency, or consumer requirements. It is thanks to this economic backwardness that these communist East German products have far outlasted their Western counterparts and, again due to irony, have become among the most sought after jewels of the capitalist Flohmärkte.

Below are some pictures of the flea markets at Arkonaplatz and its larger cousin at Mauerpark.

Sometime ago, I came across this website called BusinessBecause (www.businessbecause.com), a business schools and business students networking site. At that time, this website was still at its infancy. Today, more schools and students are joining and networking.

As ESMT MBA blog just started, I thought it is also timely that I promote the school to the world via parallel blogging on BusinessBecause site. I published two of my articles from ESMT MBA blog there. I think it is a good opportunity for ESMT MBA students to join the site and start promoting the school. Being the largest class today, with 40 students, 21 nationalities and 240 years of cumulative experience, we have a lot more to share. Furthermore, we should actively promote and sell the school to the world through our one-year experience here. The question I often get asked is “Why Germany/Berlin?”. After 2 months here, I knew I made the right decision. Now, we should bring the ESMT choice to the rest of the world.

Those who have not registered, please do so. Let the world know ESMT.

Finally the grass is visible on campus. The white layers have disappeared and the temperatures have risen to more pleasant levels. It is a bit windy today accompanied by occasional droplets of rain. Unlike a lot of people I like the rains. I love the smell of the earth when it rains and adore how everything suddenly feels so fresh. The downside is I feel like sitting at the window with an ipod and staring at it continuously. But with the second module steadily gaining momentum once again my life seems full of care and I have no time to stand and stare.

This weekend was great though. No pressing concerns with no immediate readings planned. I spent it accumulating some furniture for my appartment and generally wandering around the streets of this beautiful city. As with whatever free time I get I am programmed by default to head to Alexanderplatz and have an extra long chilli dog at Burger King and figure out the rest of the day from there. But with the snow melted it was a different Alexanderplatz I saw this weekend. So I just wandered around there and had a few coffees sitting at the tables outside the cafes. This simple pleasure was impossible a week ago when the weather was not so forgiving. So it felt nice and was the perfect remedy for the exhaustion blues I was facing.

So far today has been good. We had a Managerial Accounting class and the course seems quite interesting and very applicable. The rearranged seating arrangement means that I now sit in the first row, something I have never done before in my life. I might be tiny by European standards but was considered tall in India. So I always had to sit in the last rows to avoid blocking the view for my classmates. Its good in a way since it makes me focus more. Its a version of the Hawthorne effect which we studied in Decision Making. This means that human beings act differently when they are aware that they are being observed. In the first row I feel like I am right under the Professor’s nose so I automatically focus more which should definitely help my cause.

So thats that and I am looking forward to the remaining courses in this module which I am sure will be challenging but will also help me to learn more about different perspectives of business administration. I also feel that I am finally finding my feet in the course now and am thus more motivated to learn than ever before. Its a welcome feeling.

Hello everyone !!!

Hope you all gain back your energy for Module 2. And thank my second best friend, Murat, for the wonderful movie “Hangover.” It is definitely one of the most original movie of Hollywood these days. I abandoned by hobby of watching movie a long time ago due to my perception that Hollywood ran out of ideas. But now I will consider changing my mind.

I am ready for the Module 2 and I figure out what I am looking for during the MBA experience. I hope to learn the hard skills, i.e. business knowledge from professors and industry knowledge from classmates. I also hope to learn soft skills from group problem solving during classroom case discussion, and group work during team projects. So the combination of hard skills and soft skills will practically be a great learning experience. And I am thrilled to imagine myself in December knowing that I will be much more matured technically and professionally.

I hope, like me, you all have a framework of what you are actively looking for from the MBA program. And I hope it is not GPA Though it is definitely a measurement of how much we learn, focusing on it is a totally different thing. I hate to end the program in December when the only thing that I gain is three letters: GPA while the rest is blurry knowledge and skills.

Wish everyone a great and successful second module !!!

Kenny

It has been almost two months since ESMT Endurance Expedition started. Last night or should I say early morning, some of us were still around to complete our presentation materials for the Integrated Leadership Exercise. Overall, it turned out well for my team. We expected “harsher” treatment but I guess if you have come this far in the Expedition, why make us suffer more.

Today marks the end of Module 1. After 6 gruelling weeks in the bitter Berlin winter, late nights, doner kebaps and pizzas as your regular meals, it is refreshing to take a breather, for 2 days. Not much of a time. Then again, the Endurance ship is still sailing as there is more to do. As they say, the first month is always the hardest. Having to adjust to the weather and new sleeping environment. Tons of materials to read and working with people from 4 other countries in your team as well as 20 other nationalities in the class. We made pass the first marker on our route to the final destination across our “Antarctic”. Another 10 weeks to go with new team members. I am sure I will miss my team mates. And, all of us will miss our team mates. New teams will be formed and the whole adventure starts again. But, the good thing is in spite of the internal movements, we are still in the same ship. We have grown stronger in the past two months, learning to adjust to the workload and the midnight oils and working as a team. The support and encouragement for each other to success has been warmth and satisfying. This is what I called “Friends Helping Friends Succeed”. At the end of this journey, we will collect our promised bounty and go our way. But, the memories of the year together will be priceless. 10 months is not a long time. Before we knew it, we will see the safe harbour.

Till then, let’s us embrace and keep each other warmth and safe as we did in the last two months. The long, winter nights are not over yet though the signs of spring are emerging. Let us not lose our concentration and stay focus to why we are here – why 40 brave men and women decided to take this Expedition. I can see clearly now, but I still need the support of my other 39 crew members. Thank you for being there, friends.

Just when you think the weather is getting better…it starts snowing! From a warm sunny day to a -2 the next, you just cannot settle. The first module has ended (or almost), and we have received our new study groups. So, just when I thought I was starting to find my comfort zone in Room 00 29.1, time comes for migration…migration to the new pigeon hole! A whole new process of forming, storming, norming and importantly performing. The last six weeks had been a thorough experience of group work…a combination of fun, coordination, achievement, discomfort, learning and fun (yet again!). As a pack of five, referred to as the ‘Helsinki family’, on an endurance expedition (rightly put by Jimmy), we just had one rule: “we dont do rules”. And today, as the race of Integrated Leadership Exercises begins, in a last attempt together, we wish to drive the Ducatti to victory!

The study experience so far has been very rewarding, and I have enjoyed and learnt from each moment of it. The one to follow is expected to be even more demanding, but I hope to make the most of it and come out shining. But, most importantly, I am looking forward to the very first relaxing weekend of the course yet and a start of another expedition next week with four new comrades!

This morning we had the Judgement and Decision making class, where we explored an important case about a Mount Everest climbing expedition gone horribly wrong. It was an eye opener to see how us rational human beings can make life threatening decisions under various pressures. Just the feverish excitement with which we approach a target sometimes makes all our thinking go haywire when we see the target within our reach. Sometimes it also happens that we are so used to doing something effectively that we ignore all the recommended precautions and take our safety for granted. In some extreme cases this could lead to an untimely death and in another extreme scenario, an unexpected bundle of ‘joy’. This may be the circle of life but I believe that most of us don’t want to be in either shoes, so better safe than worry!

Now we have the integrated leadership exercise to complete for Friday, which will be the last exercise of this module and then we would be done with Milestone Eins. This will also be the last group exercise for the current study groups and from Monday onwards the groups change. So I am looking forward to continue extending this learning curve with a little help from four new individuals with four different perspectives starting next week. But before that I look forward to a relaxing weekend after a long time. The course has been great and demanding so far, but I like it. Hope this continues!

Feeling kinda lost today. For the last month, all of us have been spending more than 10 hours in school. Yes, study is important. But, in the race to the finishing line, did we forget to see the world? Endurance Expedition is a journey. For some of us, it would be a soul-searching mission, a mission to rediscover our inner feelings and thoughts. For me, it is. That’s why I am here.

Feeling so cramped in the four walls, I took a break and walked to the back of the school and sat on the bench at the snow-covered garden. Winter is coming to an end. It’s so peaceful. I looked out and up. The Berlin Fernsehturm (Berlin TV Tower) majestically reaching for the blue, winter sky from where I sat.

A flock of birds on leafless tree, looking at me. Or, I am looking at them. It doesn’t matter who is looking at who. We are looking at the world around us.

Take time, my friends, to see the world. Wherever you are, whatever you are doing now. Stop to smell the world.

Many apologies about the gap between posts. Activities at ESMT, hereafter known as “Life inside the bubble”, have consumed much of my own time. In between reading, personal work, group work, exams and the occasional nap, there has been little time for much else. Knowing that this would happen, my wife Sophia agreed before the MBA program started that Saturday nights would be our “date night”, where we would: 1) try to sample available offerings of Berlin’s rich cultural scene, and 2) have dinner at an interesting, but economical, restaurant (very easy to find in this city)

On 6.Feb, we went to Henne, a restaurant on the edge of the Mitte and Kreuzberg districts. The place smells like smoke and alcohol imbibed by generations of Berliners, not to mention the grease of its milk-fried chicken. Cementing its place in the city’s history are its location (at the edge of the western side of the Berlin Wall) and a framed picture and letter from John F. Kennedy, who stopped by here during the visit when he made his famous “Ich bin ein Berliner” speech.

On 13.Feb, we were fortunate to get tickets to “The Oath“, one of the highly-regarded films playing during this year’s Berlinale film festival. It documented the story of Abu Jindal, former bodyguard of Osama bin Laden and now a taxi driver in Yemen, and his brother-in-law Salim Hamdan, who was captured in Afghanistan as part of the War on Terror, spent 7 years in America’s Guantanamo Bay prison, finally regaining his freedom by after trials by the US Supreme Court and a special military tribunal. The film is extremely powerful and a must-see for not only students of contemporary geopolitical history, but also any humanist that believes that, before the war on terror could be won, it must first be understood.

Dinner after the movie was at Maultaschen Manufaktur. Maultaschen can be seen as the south German cousin to Italy’s ravioli – meat or vegetables wrapped in dough, then boiled or fried and served with generous helpings of green salad and potato salad (another German influence). To have the full Teutonic experience, it is recommended to wash your meal down with a refreshing Rothaus beer.

Sophia and I are currently planning our next few “date nights”. If you have any inputs, we’d be happy to receive some recommendations!

Some photos of our Henne and Maultaschen Manufaktur experiences:

I remembered my first public speaking experience back in secondary school. For the first time, I had to speak in front of the class. For the first 12 years of my life, I never had to speak to any group more than three people. I was definitely not prepared to speak to a class of 40 in my first month of secondary-level education. What’s more when we hardly knew each other. As you can imagine, I failed miserably. Not only did I stutter, I was shivering. And, I was reading from my notes. I could not even read properly! My face was lobster red. Since, then I continue to avoid speaking in public.

One day I realised that not confronting my fear will be a mistake especially when I start work and move up the career leader. I scouted for help. I came across a non-profit organisation called Toastmaster International. Formed in 1924, there are over 2,400 clubs worldwide helping people overcome the fear of speaking. I went on to form a club in Kuala Lumpur called CPAKL Toastmasters club (now called KL City Toastmasters). Over the year, I improved my speaking and listening skills as well as working with people from various backgrounds.

During my 10 years with Toastmasters at club and divisional levels, my fellow Toastmasters and I continued to promote the concept of “Friends Helping Friends Succeed“. I think this is a powerful idea as each of us have within us enormous power and experience to make a difference in others’ life. It does not have to be a giant leap but any small incremental changes can have enormous impact.

Yesterday, when my classmates were delivering their Organisational Behaviour presentations, I took a small piece of paper and note down their presentation skills – what they did well and what they could improve. As an experienced Toastmaster and someone who wants to see other do well, I approached them individually and told them that I had took note of their presentation and whether they would like to hear my comments. Only when they say “yes”, I gave that piece of paper to them and explained them when they wanted to know more. I wished I had this when I made my first speech 23 years ago.

After more than one month on ESMT Endurance Expedition, I could sense the kinship and the teamwork within each group and in the whole class. This Expedition is not just about in-class learning but also how we work together and help each other improve, incrementally. I am glad my personal comment notes were well-received. From some of the comments I received, my classmates were pleased that someone is watching them and taking notes on how they could improve. For the rest of the year, we should be watching out for each other. We are in this journey together – a journey of bitter cold and long, lonely nights. Having known that someone is taking care of me and each other is consoling. I hope my classmates will pen their comments for the rest of us to improve. The more comments we received, the more we know what we have done well and what we could improve. The power of 80 oars multiplies when we help each other succeed. In fact, do not just stop at classmates. Give the feedback to the lecturers and colleagues. Whenever someone is presenting, take some notes and pass your comments to him/her. You will be surprised with the reaction.