Happy New Year!

My last post for the year! Back in Lancaster after a brilliant break in beautiful Spain. a bit tired and sick but all geared up for 2017. You can read about my Spain trip here. 2016 was a mixed year with both good and bad things just like any other year. But the best thing that happened in 2016 for me is Lancaster. Something that I never imagined would happen this time last year. I guess that's what life is all about. A brilliant 3 months so far with lots of learning, experiences, travel and more so, good interactions with some great people around. Thanks to everyone who has been part of it in 2016. While I really hope 2017 turns out to be a great year for me, I wish it is equally rich, beautiful, happy and healthy for you as well. Wish you all a very happy new year 2017!

Thanks to everyone for the lovely cards and wishes!

 

Comienza las vacaciones!

The first term just came to a close! 2017 is going to be on us soon, evidently 'time doesn't want to waste time'! A busy, exciting and thoroughly rewarding business management challenge week came to a super closure yesterday. I had at least - a literally listed down 5 key take aways besides many other small siblings. Very insightful challenge. 

Later in the evening, began the Luau Christmas Party! A Hawaiian themed party saw all of us in at least a tinge of the states' costume. Food, fun and a thorough festive mood. An awesome stress buster after an intense academic sprint. The day didn't end there. Post the party, all of us headed to the Grad Bar to join the international night. Interacting with people while drinking and dancing was so much fun and we were in the bar until late past midnight. 

Saturday was off to a slow start. Laundry, cleaning and a lot other chores but everything with an exciting motive. Looking forward to the holiday. Leaving tomorrow!

Coming to an exciting term end!

A lot of fun, exciting and surprising things happening in the last week of the first term! A brilliant evening with the Executive MBA candidates, knowing them, connecting with them and sharing experiences across the 'years of experience' was amazing. Last weekend went pretty much into closing down assignments, pending tasks, shopping and of course the usual visit to the Chaplaincy center.

This week began with a bang. Business Management Challenge - a business simulation putting into practice our learning from the past 10 weeks. Running through the whole of the last week of this term, this is indeed a good opportunity for us to revisit our learning and more importantly to work together coherently and collaboratively to make decisions and have fun. I am loving this experience. More than winning, I think for me it is the experience from the journey that I take back, that matters the most. And not to forget, I absolutely had goosebumps all the time working with Dr.John Mackness.

Today, I also met Jane Dalton - this was the first time, I connected with someone on social media first and then met in person. Amazing feeling. Very interesting 40-45 minutes interaction. For the first time since I came to Lancaster, I was so excited talking about the things I did back at work. Thanks for your time, Jane!

Just back from the city, preparing for the last day of the challenge, winding up stuff for the term, looking forward to the Christmas party tomorrow before I head off for a break.

Christmassy Evenings | Digital Business | Leadership in Practice

Digital Innovation in Business, the module that is being introduced first time for the MBA cohort this year, kicked off the week. This was personally a very interesting module for me given my prior experience working in CAMSS at IBM. While I had the practical knowledge of Digital innovation in a corporate context, the sessions and guest lectures brought in a lot of supporting theories complementing my prior work. Two full days and we were completely immersed in digitization thoughts, practices and case studies. 

One of those days, Steven Endress, MD of Endress & Hauser was visiting LUMS and we got to catch up with him over lunch. It was good to hear his expansion plans and how he plans to take his organization in to the future. He is also an alumnus of the Lancaster MBA. 

Starting Wednesday, Chris Saunders took us on a completely different tour to explore leadership traits and behaviors. Leadership in practice was demonstrated through class activities and a number of videos including a 2 hour movie. This was one of the best experienced modules so far for me. 

Yesterday, some of us were off to Tim's place for a Christmas evening. Tim was a perfect host and we all had a great time chatting, eating and drinking for a long while. A much needed break for sure. For me that streak continued this evening as well, when I along with my flatmates decided to attend the 'Carols in the Castle' service in the city. Off we were for the first time, all flatmates together - Hiba, Manshuk, Joe, Amber, Raman and Boris to the city to witness this traditional Christmas carol service. We did miss Nadia. I must admit, the carols brought back wonderful memories of my school and I was on cloud 9 when a known song was sung. Some amazing and inspirational quotes and wonderful singing by the kids filled my evening with so much serenity and calmness. The feeling is so good. Thanks to the wonderful company - thoroughly enjoyed every bit of it. We then went to 'The Borough' to chat over drinks, spent an hour there and returned. It was such a wonderful thing that we all decided to go together. We now plan to do this more often. 

I also had a very emotional moment today when one of my friends hugged and gifted me some stuff, to acknowledge a little help that I had offered and more so because of the close connection that we share with each other. I literally had tears in my eyes. MBA is indeed a great experience!

Friday is here and back home one of my best friends is getting married. I hope to watch the live telecast of the wedding later during the day. 

Carols in the Castle	With flatmates at the castle	At the museum
Fun at The Borough	Leading Mindfully	Class exercise
Green sky spotted in Lancaster	Movie time in the class!	At Tim's

2 months down | December sets in!

The school is all set for Christmas! Another few days and then it is the new year! Well, no point blaming time, every time. This time, I would say and my classmates here at Lancaster would also agree that we are keeping up with the 'speed of time'. December is here and we are only 3 weeks away from closing Term 1. 

This week we kicked-off Operations Management - again brilliantly tied down from the Marketing module as Martin quoted - "Marketing promises & Operations delivers". Wading through the Operations model, we traversed round the direct, design, deliver and develop cycle covering key essentials in all the aspects. Making this more action oriented was the visit to Jaguar Land Rover Facility in Halewood that perfectly complemented our learning. A touring of this very interesting site and sharing of lots of insightful information was facilitated by the JLR education center team. I enjoyed it thoroughly, more so because I could connect it with some of the Watson related cognitive automation projects that I was exploring back at IBM a few months ago.

This week, I also had a chance to be on the Inter-collegiate debating competition judge panel and witness some of the best debates I haven't seen in a while. Congratulations to the Bowland College team that won the finals. A big thanks to Katy and glad I could also connect with others on the panel. Found a new friend in Mark Lacy. Exciting week so far. 

Let's see how the 'Deal with December' goes!