will there be a ropes course?
Posted by Elizabeth Dunn
Start another blog? Sure, why not? I already write a blog over here (http://www.smalldots.wordpress.com) and have maintained a personal blog for years (anonymously, mind you), and have been a weekly contributor to a few humor blogs, but never have I blogged my SCHOOL experience...
And that's because when I was last in school, blogs hadn't been invented yet.
That makes me sound hysterically old, when I am not. I am only 37, which I believe technically makes me *adorably* old. Just for the record.
So yes, I am apparently starting my MBA in a matter of days, as orientation begins this Saturday. At least, I *think* it's orientation, despite the SOM's clever attempts to disguise it as an actual, ever-so-brief business course. (I'm sure it's very business-y, really. Something something case studies something.)
But I also imagine there will be a few ice-breakers, and maybe some team-building exercises, and if we're lucky, maybe we will at some point in the weekend do that trust-exercise thing where you fall backwards into the arms of someone you only just met over the coffee station at 8:35 that morning.
I love trust exercises and team-building games! Everybody gets so seemingly earnest and kind, while simultaneously getting insanely, rampantly competitive. Like on Survivor! Which also didn't exist when I was last in school.
The honest truth is, how you perform in some Outward-Bound-inspired activity on the first day of classes is not going to be marked down and remembered by the professors, mentors, and the Dean.
No matter how much you wish it counted towards your final grade, it won't.
I'll tell you who will remember how you behave during orientation. Your classmates. Act like a seething mass of competitive jerkiness delicately sheathed with a thin veneer of barely sincere team spirit this weekend, and it goes down in the only permanent record that really matters -- the undying memory of your peers.
I only speak as the sad voice of experience. I've gone through the grad school ringer once before, and yes, there may have been some jerky competitiveness exhibited. By me.
I got better!
Seriously. In the years I've had to reflect on my first time through the old grad school machine, here's what I have decided are the really important things to remember, as we embark on our little journey together:
1. Be kind.
2. Do what you say you will do.
3. Do it earlier, more thoroughly, and better than you think is absolutely necessary.
Seriously, I have traditionally been the biggest offender in the old first-day-of-classes-olympics. Old habits are tremendously hard to break. So if you see me vying for the reddest apple on the teacher's desk, pinch me, hard. And then introduce yourself. I could use a study partner.
And yes, I promise I will catch you when you fall.
Posted: August 19, 2008 12:26 am | 0 comments
Tags: blogging, fall, foundations of business, new student, SOM, trust
