As Life Goes Digital !!

Lifehacker.com is popular productivity blog and Scott Berkun from Harvard asks grilling questions of how MBAs can benefit from Lifehacker's productivity tips. As Gina puts it MBA teaches structured learning with problem-solving and case studies and gives less importance to manage one's own time in an effective way.

The advice I like is how to choose from multiple productivity systems ? Choose one system that best fits you and stick to it.

Question #4 about working in teams is the best answer I feel Gina gave :

I think there can be a huge amount of value in cross-pollinating people's work styles. A few years back I did a fair amount of pair programming, and while it was at times frustrating and awkward, I learned a lot from seeing how someone else does things and thinks.
The key is finding and working with the people who help you and don't slow you down. My racquetball coach always told me to "play up" -- meaning, always try to play against an opponent who's better. No matter how bad getting beaten by that person feels, it still raises your game. I think that's true at work as well.

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Labels: Case study, Colleges and Universities, Education, Harvard University, Lifehacker.com, Massachusetts, Master of Business Administration, MBA, United States

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GMAC in its latest survey reported that 2008 MBA applications are highest in the last five years. Specially in full-time programs where 77% of the survied people said they saw application levels increase compared to 2007's 64%. Part-time and executive MBA has applications rise but not at the same level as full-time MBAs.

The 2008 Application Trends Survey includes responses from 521 graduate management programs at 273 educational institutions in the United States, Europe and other parts of the world. About two-thirds of the respondents are U.S.-based.

Here is GMAT trends from GMAC survey :



The Graduate Management Admission Test (GMAT) is administered by GMAC and is used
by approximately 4,000 graduate management programs at some 1,800 business schools around the world to screen MBA applicants.

Labels: Applications, GMAC, GMAT, MBA, United States

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A new innovative challenge from Google to increase the user base for Google apps in engineering and MBA colleges.

From India's GoogleApp team :

1. Sign up for the challenge by September 15, 2008.
2. Get approval from your college's administration to implement Google Apps by October 15, 2008.
3. Work with your IT department to implement Google Apps by December 15, 2008.
4. Achieve the highest level of Google Apps usage amongst all participating colleges by January 31, 2009 to be declared the challenge winner!

Here is video of Kellogg ( Northwestern University, Chicago, US) director of technology talks about how they have benefited using Google Apps for their intranet IT solutions:



This in my opinion is good for colleges as Google will assign one Google employee to each team to help answer questions through out the challenge. Drawback is that they are targeting only Engineering and MBA colleges. Google is trying hard to push collaboration tools like its "Google Talk" , "Google Mail" to compete with "Microsoft Instant Messenger", "Outlook" as Microsoft dominates the corporate as well university accounts.

To learn more about GoogleApps watch this video from google - Googleapps Youtube video:

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Labels: Gmail, Google, Google Apps, Google Talk, Googlemail, India, MBA, microsoft, Northwestern University

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GMAC, owner of the GMAT exams reportedly planning to sue (or sued) GMAT forum , accusing it of illegally obtaining copies of "live" test questions that they then use to help students practice GMAT tests. These are the cases of improperly using official GMAT materials.

This poses a risk to some students' scores and their careers though there is no fault of their own as they were allowed to practice on a test questions with other students in the forums. These kinds of actions of copyright infringement may divert all the attention to the growing GMAT test preparation online centers. This is a good move and I agree it gives some back door test preparers an unfair advantage on GMAT.

As a general thumb of rule If GMAT questions are from material approved by GMAC that's either in a book or some other form, then it's probably OK. Remember as a test taker one agrees that they will not disclose GMAT questions after the test. It's not a good idea to disclose questions from actual GMAT's and they may have some dire consequences.

One forum posted on this topic back in 2007 :

GMAC is also threatening to (a) find out who posted the live questions, ban them from taking the GMAT, AND reporting the names to b-schools, and (b) potentially finding out who looked at or discussed items labeled "live" (that is, people who knowingly looked at live questions) and doing the same to those users."

Here are some forms of GMAC copyrighted material reported in one test prep forum.

GMAT Sets these are upto 20 plus sets that seems to be having live test questions, Gmatter Software has software download that reportedly uses some "live" questions, 1000SC is related to sentence correction part of GMAT which is popular and heavily circulated over internet for practicing sentence correction part of GMAT. Similarly there are 1000RC - Reading Comprehension packages and finally Official Guide or OG is official GMAT tests and practice tests that is bit vaguely mention not to discuss or distribute such material.

GMAT official guide is available for purchase from popular book stores and is a must-have if you prepare for GMAT.

To Sumup all this information is from some forums and websites and though their validity is in question but every test taker signs an agreement not to post exam questions this is just not with GMAT tests but take for example Microsoft certification tests too.

sources:

Don't post copyright questions

Don't post scoretop questions

Labels: GMAT, GMAT TEST RESOURCES, MBA, OG

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SCAMPER is an acronym for • Substitute • Combine • Adapt • Magnify • Modify • Put to another use • Eliminate • Rearrange • Reverse

SCAMPER: This tool helped me to think of changes I can make to an existing problem ( What to do with my MBA?) to create a new/modified one. I used these changes either as direct suggestions or as starting points for lateral thinking. Using SCAMPER here has helped me define new possible career paths. Many of the ideas may be impractical or may not suit the career in Entrepreneurship. However some of these ideas became good starting points for finding solution to my problem.
Demonstration of SCAMPER:
SCAMPER gave me this summary of good points:
• Substitute - use of internships, substitutes experience? Prior-Experience? Domain Knowledge?
• Combine - integrate MBA and previous technical degree? Career plus promotion (combining purposes)? New Business or Acquisitions? Assortment of Industries – Tech, Manufacturing and Banking?
• Adapt – Copy what other my school Entrepreneurs are doing? Is my company R&D best fir for my entrepreneurial career? Emulate Technological evangelists?
• Magnify – Become a CEO? Unique skills? Use MBA School’s rankings reputation card? Duplicate successful entrepreneurial CEO’s resumes?
• Modify – To fit my personality traits? Income stream from many sources? Convert passions into income?
• Put to another use – Copy one passion idea to other ideas? Name, Recognition, Create jobs for others?
• Eliminate - Eliminate the BIG ideas, start with small ideas? Simple ideas break it into small ideas?
• Rearrange – Get degree first and launch career later or vice versa? One idea implementation per day?
• Reverse – Positive – autonomy with ladder of success, Negative – Bankrupt, Stress and No life?

Labels: Entrepreneurship, MBA

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I used Mind Mapping creativity tool to apply to the problem at hand -"How my MBA in Entrepreneurship/Change Management prepare me for a career in Entrepreneurship".
Reasons for choosing this creativity methods:
Mind Mapping - By using Mind Maps, I can quickly identify and understand the structure of a subject and the way that pieces of information fit together. Mind Maps also provide a structure which encourages creative problem solving, and they hold information in a format that my mind will find easy to remember and quick to review.
Also Mind Maps are more compact than conventional notes, often taking up one side of paper. This helps me to make associations easily. Also If I find out more information after I have drawn the main Mind Map, then I can easily integrate it with little disruption.
Mind Maps are also useful for:
* Summarizing information;
* Consolidating information from different research sources;
* Thinking through complex problems; and
* Presenting information in a format that shows the overall structure of my subject
Remembering the shape and structure of a Mind Map can give you the cues you need to remember the information within it. As such, they engage much more of your brain in the process of assimilating and connecting facts, compared with conventional notes.

Demonstration of Mind Mapping:


Hope this helps some one who is struggling to decide what to do with their MBA.

Labels: Entrepreneurship, MBA

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What is the difficult and tedious process in writing school or professional papers ? Bibliography and generating the citations for all the referred sources in the paper.A bibliography is a list of the sources you have used and cited when writing your paper.Even a great written paper is nothing without a annotated bibliography.Sure writing an annotated bibliography for research paper requires great experience and professional advice.

PC Magazine selected EasyBib as site of the week in August'2007, EasyBib is a website dedicated to helping writers create bibliographies. Students provide the easybib.com site with information about sources, and with a couple of clicks, the site automatically creates a bibliography in the correct format and it quickly turns out accurate citation lists.It takes the info and puts it into MLA format for you? A huge help for students or researchers.Moreover Easy Bibliography is free and most used advanced bibliography maker on the Web.It cuts down bibliography creation time from one half to two thirds.All in all, Easy Bib is very useful, you can format any MLA bibliography, whenever you want for free.I was happy to come across Easybib Pro an internet based tool that will format my references, export them as a word document, and has a handy wizard to help with in text citation.

Other Free Bibliography products and info:

Bibliography info

BibMe is another web 2.0 style cool free bibliography generator, offering citations in MLA, APA, and Chicago styles.

Bibdesk: A free bibliography management application.

BibBuilder 1.3 (Free MLA-Style Bibliography Builder)

Labels: free, MBA

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This post is all about clearly defining the problem statement for "Career in Entrepreneurship"

Problem or Opportunity Identification

Generic Problem Statement:“I wish I knew how my MBA in Entrepreneurship prepare me for a career in Entrepreneurship”
Now to choose Entrepreneurship career I may think I need to start my own business. The most significant reason I believe for considering a career in entrepreneurship is the personal satisfaction that often comes with owning your own company, right? Starting ones own business is how to start career in Entrepreneurship? Well, I think I better look a little more deeply at this problem before I instigate a huge effort requiring lots of resources to start a business because I’m going to be very disappointed if that’s not the solution.
Forming a Problem Statement:
Answering the following questions will help me look at my problem more deeply, and will probably help me get at the root causes.
Who? [People who currently are facing this problem or been in this situation before] – Those who wish to start a business and to implement decisions about their Entrepreneurship career. People who create new opportunities that generate benefits for the organization. Entrepreneurs who are likely to be involved in novel startups, and with fast-growing businesses. A student who wants to capitalize on their accumulated skills and experience. A hobby driven student: to enable them to keep doing the thing they enjoy most. A student who wishes to stay in a specific geographic area, or to have flexible hours. A person who organizes, operates, and assumes the risk for a business venture. Individuals who score highly on these measures - need for achievement, need for autonomy, drive and determination, creative tendency and risk taking.
When? [Timescales to start a career in Entrepreneurship] Start a business straight after graduating or later in the career when I have built up more knowledge, skills and credibility?
Where? [Where to start a career as Entrepreneur?] With Current or New employer, Self start or Franchise a business, Existing or in New technology, Targeting Niche or Industry wide markets, or in an early stage venture.
What? [What can I do with a degree in Entrepreneurship?]
Entrepreneurs recognize and evaluate opportunities and thus become venture capitalists, investors, attorneys and marketing specialists.
Why? [Why a career in Entrepreneurship?] Become part of the decision-making and empowerment, it's about following ones passion and doing something to make the world a better place, It is feeling of greatness to know that my contributions have a positive impact on the company.
The answers generated make me reconsider the problem. After I look more closely at the issue, it appears that just starting a business is not one of the main options for starting career in Entrepreneurship. This makes me think that starting own business and succeeding is not easy: Risk is bigger (about 70% of new businesses close down within 3 years. Risks are higher ). I think the problem can be found in the where and the why. Start off in employment to build experience. It is possible that one problem has multiple roots. Fortunately, I don’t have to make that decision just yet. The information gathered now will prepare me for applying creative tools later on.

New Problem Statement:

“I wish I knew how my MBA in Entrepreneurship prepare me for a career in Entrepreneurship” “I wish as an MBA student in Entrepreneurship I was more aware of the challenges in creating my own business to succeed , starting off in employment to build experience and networking to increase skills and knowledge, when combined may help me in preparing my career in Entrepreneurship” My new problem statement will help me come up with solutions that address the root of the cause not just the symptoms.

I'll discuss in future articles of how to apply creativity tools to this problem and solve the question in hand "How my MBA in Entrepreneurship can prepare me for a career in Entrepreneurship"

Labels: Entrepreneurship, MBA

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No brainer if you are in school but out of school and if some one asks you this question, can you answer it?

Finding factors:{If you are preparing for GMAT this should give you a quick review of what factors are?}

One easy way is through prime numbers as they make it easy to find the factors of a number.

What is a prime number : A number is prime if it cannot be divided evenly by anything except itself and 1. For example, 5 is a
prime number, because the only factors of 5 are

1 * 5 = 5

Let's consider a number like 121:

how many factors does 121 have?

121 = 11 X 11, 11 is prime number

So prime factors of 121 are 1, 11 and 121

Let's consider a number like 72 that you want to find factors of It's even, so it's divisible by 2:

72 = 2 * 36

Now, what about 36? That's also even, so it's divisible by 2:

72 = 2 * 2 * 18

What about 18? That's divisible by 2:

72 = 2 * 2 * 2 * 9

What about 9? That's not divisible by 2, but it is divisible by 3:

72 = 2 * 2 * 2 * 3 * 3

And 3 is prime. So what we've done here is find the 'prime factors' of
the number 72.

How does this help us find all the factors of 72? Well, if a number
is a factor of 72, and it's not one of these prime factors, then it
must be a product of two or more prime factors. So we can find all the
factors of 72 by looking at all the ways we can group these prime
factors:

2 * 2 = 4 pairs
2 * 3 = 6
3 * 3 = 9

2 * 2 * 2 = 8
2 * 2 * 3 = 12 triplets
2 * 3 * 3 = 18

2 * 2 * 2 * 3 = 24 product of four prime factors
2 * 2* 3 * 3 = 36




So the factors of 72 are

1 A factor of everything.

2, 3 The distinct prime factors.

4, 6,9 Products of two prime factors.

8,12,18 Products of three prime factors.

24,36 Products of three prime factors.

72 Product of all the prime factors.

Now

1,2,3,4,6,8,9,12,18,24,36,72

Factors vs Multiples basics

Factors
Finite number of factors for any whole number
Most factors are smaller than number – largest is number itself

Multiples
Infinite number of multiples
Most multiples larger than number, smallest is number itself

Here are some online links you can use some of the Math formulas

Finding prime factors online

Online Math calculators - A very good resource for all math calculations online.

Labels: MBA

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In the book ‘the myths of innovation’, Scott Berkun debunks common myths about innovation. This book opens with a chapter that talks about - "Is it really that Newton found 'laws of gravity' when he saw apple falling to the ground" - Author gives explanation of why this is a myth that sold very well for ages.These myths are mostly human short cuts or quick fixes our minds take to help to transmit (promote) the information to other people. Innovation is not something that can be processed