First-year MBA, Entrepreneurship and Innovation Academy
The last few months have been a mixed bag of emotions – excitement, exhaustion, surprise, anticipation, friendship, acceptance, confidence, frustration, trust, pride, and most importantly, realization. I am starting to realize why the integrated coreis designed the way it is, and how the Kelley MBA is shaping my career and my personality. As we approach finals week and the end of the infamous and relentless integrated core, things are starting to come together and make more sense.
From an academic point of view, I was always curious to see how to make practical sense of all the eight subjects taught in the core. As I prepare for the finals and try to digest the concepts, overlap between the different subjects is starting to surface. The concepts of Pricing and Profitabilitytake varied, yet complementing approaches from Marketing and Economic points of view. Asset Valuation and Financial Leverage are some of the key concepts introduced in Finance, and later tightened up in Accounting. Strategy and Operations go hand-in-hand by preparing us to make crucial decisions on what to do and how to get it done efficiently. People often mix up these two concepts, just like they mix up our almost (but not really) look-alike professors Cattani& Semadeni. Finally, Critical Thinking and Business Analytics pull it all together with quantitative, technological and ethical leadership skills. Well, it’s hard to ignore the fact that Kelley boasts some of the best professors an MBA program can have, which certainly plays a key role in keeping the integrated core truly “integrated.”
I kind of explained how the classes are coming together. But the really cool part is how the people are coming together. I have a great group of friends at Kelley who are incredibly smart, yet down to earth – which is the main reason I chose to come to Kelley from my prior interactions with students and alumni. The journey is getting more exciting as we build stronger bonds and make new friends. I now see why our second year MBAs have formed such strong friendships and are so close with each other. I believe one of the reasons being the highly collaborative culture at Kelley, which creates an environment where we learn together and also learn from each other.
I suppose there could be many ways the rigor of the integrated core impacts a student. This is just my perspective. To sum it up, I believe that the essence of the MBA experience is just starting to surface, and this is just the tip of the iceberg.