The voyage of self-building begins!

Dressed in business casuals, we were all set, at 09:00AM for the MBA Welcome Session at the Management School. The MBA Programme Director, Dr.Peter Lenney and Senior Teaching Fellow Mr. Neil Ralph gave an insightful introduction to the MBA Programme. The Lancaster MBA is designed keeping in light Joseph Dunne's quote - “practical wisdom is a fruit that can only grow in the soil of a person’s experience and character”. There was also a session on 'Culture and MBA' by Mr. Oliver Westall. Of course the sessions were interspersed with tea breaks and a nice lunch break.
What mattered most were some key take-aways -

• Knowing HOW versus Knowing THAT (Knowing about swimming isn't sufficient rather knowing how to swim by trying out is going to help)
• Learning 'how to learn' is key
• The Lancaster MBA is going to help one learn how to deploy learning in real world
• In Dr.Lenney's words - learn to fail or you will fail to learn
• Take risks and get comfortable with discomfort 

And most importantly, I liked the mention about 'MBA being a practice ground to deal with contention and conflict, that is prone to happen in the real business world'. That statement gives a lot of confidence, isn't it? Loved it!

 My favourite parts of Day -1.

• I just loved the initial 15-20 minutes hustle and bustle and catching up before the class
• The reflection-before-action activity to probe answers for 'Why MBA' was interesting
• A little exercise on assessing core capabilities and how individuals tend to score themselves was indeed self-challenging
• And yeah the little goodies were definitely my favourite 
• Marking the place where we belong on a huge world map (picture below)
• The best part of Day 1 - version 2016 of me writing a little post to version 2017 of me on what I expect to gain in the next 1 year!  :)

Overall, a very satisfying and thought provoking day 1. Can't believe this is happening, already! #LoveLancaster