Will current university system survive in 10 years?

I am always a big fan about thinking how to make everything works better and differently. And I am a firm believer that different things always mean good. For example,I fully support both Hilary and Obama even though I am not a democrat. Why? Because they will both make a historical moment in the American history, either the first female president or the first black president. Well, back to the topic, will current university system be able to survive in next 10 years?

I had experienced both university system in China and in US. And I see there are a few critical problems:

1. Customer vs. Student.

University is the only place where I won't be treated fully as a valuable customer like in any other business after I paid a hefty amount of money. Forget elementary school or high school or even undergraduate study since most of them it's your parent paying the cost. Graduate study would be the most appropriate segment to look at . As an MBA student, had you ever experienced the same customer service as with other business? Yes, professors are professors but also remind you it's my tuition fee paying part of their salary.

2. One-for-all vs. customization

We all experienced that kind of student life: sitting in a class with at least 10+ students, no matter case-based or lecture-based environment. Everyone prays for a good professor. If I am paying the same amount of money, why I can't get the same professor as the others in a different section? I have no interest to learn six sigma then why I still need to pay for the class? There aren't enough professors or professors have limited time. How about this? Everyone can select the professor he or she wants for certain course. The more student a professor have, the higher salary that professor would get without increasing the $ student pay for. If Professor A isn't as good as Professor B, why they should receive the same salary? Tenure may be great for academic research but sucks for any job. Babson MBAs, you know what I am talking about.

3. Niche, Niche, Niche, with Internet.

Everyone is different so is every professor, even for professors teaching the same course. Tom maybe great in teaching Macroeconomics of developed nations while John may be great in developing nations. Instead of compromise, why can't I either select the professor I prefer or just learn the best part of each? It's both good for the professors since generally people doing the best in the field they enjoy the most and for students since we can get the best of breed. With Internet, it's very possible. Both Tom and John could publish their podcast or video clips etc or skype-based class. It won't let many professors lost their job. Rather, it will give every professor an opportunity to develop a best niche to focus on. How about teaching marketing classs for Chinese MBA students who want to sell enterprise software in Canada? How about teaching finance for students who prefer professors previous had worked in public accounting firms? Just like Internet itself, variety is the beauty.



It may sound disruptive but I don't think there is anything in the world could avoid change. No way.


Just posted this idea to Ignite Boston! organized by O'Reilly Media. See how it goes.

http://events.oreilly.com/pub/e/736


Technorati Tags university,professor,reform

online publishing with zoho

I used to use notepad/gedit of my windows/linux desktop to write down random thoughts but after using Zoho, It's awesome to replace them since I will never lost my sparkles when laptop crash or running out of juice.

But it's so hard to switch. I mean, the switch cost is really high. But after lost a nice paragraph for my executive summary again, I will never back to desktop writing anymore...I swear.

Babson-Idea

I learned two very interesting perspectives recently:

1. About viral  marketing. Our BCAP advisor Bala Iyer pointed out a very interesting fact: why the general population is willing to help an unknown brand to be successful?Because this makes them feel more achievable. How can you say you make a big achievement by making Toyota more famous since it's already a well-know brand? What if you told us you helped Myspace to become popular?


2. Why not pay professors based on their popularity or student's feedback? I see this is a conflicts with the tenure system. Personally I feel school is the only place that I paid a lot of money but wou

Total Cost - Buy a used car

1997 Toyota Camry LE - 4 Cyl - Color Gray - $4000

---

Date: 2007-05-07, 4:28PM EDT

Automatic,

4 cylinders,

with Power Steering,

Anti Lock Brakes,

Power Door Locks,

Power Windows,

AM/FM Stereo Radio,

Cassette Player,

Trip Odometer,

Tachometer,

Air Conditioning,

Tilt Steering Wheel,

Cruise Control,

Tinted Glass,

Dual Air Bags,

ABS Brakes.

Cloth Upholstery,

Center Arm Rest Fold Down

rear Seat Child-Proof Locks

Cup Holder(s) ,

Power Mirrors.

 

Brand New Brakes (3 months)- Timing Belt done at 115k,

4 new tires less than 15 miles.

 

This vehicle only has 133k miles.

 

Total Cost (In order):

Full inspection at Clair Toyota service Center $98
Car $4,000
Insurance:$333 ($677 due)
sales tax: $0 (arranged as a gift)
RMV Registration: $111 (Plate, Gift $, registration fee)
MA inspectation: $29

Total:

Technorati Tags     car,fee,RMV

Steps-Buy Used Car

1. Open the front roof of engine
    - check the frame. Any accident sign?
    - check the transmission oil. Use a napkin to clean the oil at the bottom of the stick then put the stick back to oil again then take out to see the color of the oil
    - check the engine oil

2. Turn the front wheel right and left
    - go under the car to check any rust and oil leaking
    - for old car, pay attention to the CV Boot to see if it worn out

3. Check the power window and mirror if applicable

4. Drive around, check if there is any noise/sound when you hit brake/accelerator, turn right/left, reverse etc

5. Ask for:
    - when changed timing belt (it's expensive to replace one!)
    - when changed the tire
    - any work on Brake recently

6. Take to a full service center of the manufacture. Pay for a full inspection and ask the technician list top problems to fix. Either have the owner fixed at his cost or ask him deducting the price then you will fix it by yourself later.

Technorati Tags     car,used

CV-Joint and CV-Boot

This is an amazing learning opportunity when you decided to buy a used car and... it's your first car! Thought is not directly Babson related but it happens right now when I am still with Babson so I will post the story here anyway.

I got a 1997 Toyota Camry checked today with M's help. 133K. One-owner. No problem. But you know what, M found there is a CV boot leak at the front left wheel. So what the heck is CV boot and is it serious? Read one...


http://www.cartalk.com/content/advice/driveaxleboots.html
http://autos.yahoo.com/maintain/repairqa/tires_wheels/ques111_0.html
http://www.aa1car.com/library/2004/bf100434.htm
http://www.fwdaxles.com/fwd_qa.html
http://www.pointedthree.com/disc/forums/showthread.php?tid=7011&posts=8
http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index;_ylt=Ai90.fh.cjriQODhaQUrZ6Psy6IX?qid=20060927203215AAtSfoi&show=7#profile-info-d9cc28bb37210ba1e0b933f70b27d970aa


Wow. I guess I may pretend to be a semi-expert to fool someone now...haha

And if you read this post from boston.craigslist.org, it reinforced the importance of cv joint/boot:


White, 5sp, 141,000 miles, aluminum wheels, no rust, good condition inside and out. Front wheel drive only; prior to sale, rear wheel drivetrain and a problematic transmission coupling will be disconnected (alternatively, buyer may elect to repair). Reliable 2.2L engine runs well; brakes, front CV joints, tires and alternator are all new within past year. Photos available upon request. Email or call 617 959 4667. $2500 OBO.




A side not: How to understand a VIN? http://www.vinguard.org/vin.htm

Technorati Tags     cv,toyota,joint,boot,camry

MBA-Software Ball Play

MBA Team Back on Track, Destroys Oponent
April 20, 2007
AstroTurf Field
Babson Park, MA

On a beautiful spring afternoon (Finally!!) our softball field took the field one more time.  With the cheers from the  largest crowd to  see an intramural game (and we are not being sarcastic) and enjoying the great weather our team homered, YES HOMERED its way to a 21-3 stumping of the the AEPi team.  Exclusive press coverage was provided by Alexey “The paparazzi” Amerikov, pictures of the game to follow.

The cheering crowd led by loyal groupies Colleen and Ilya, provided the psychological boost our team needed to bounce back from last week's defeat.

Here are some of the highlights,
Our Japanese imports finally straighten out their issues with their visas and finally ended their contract disputes.
The game started in a great note after a great move from the manager to start Lauren Ratner as pitcher.  The move provided incredible results as Lauren pitched a great game with one strikeout and allowed 3 unearned runs in 5 innings.  Saul “ I just gave up 5 runs in the first inning” Shum was demoted to the minor leagues after conflicts of interest with the team management (mutiny). However, he promised to show his commitment to the team by coordinating next week's events. Also, on the defensive side of the game, Adam Finley shined at shortstop appearing to catch fly balls all over the field.

On the offensive side, our team was led by the powerful left-handed bat of Josh Weinstock that ended the game with 2 home runs and 8 rbi.  Also shinning was Caitlin “ why do you keep batting me eighth?’ Geissler that had an inside the park home run in the first inning.  We cannot forget Dave Sanborn’s home run in front of his biggest admirer, his son.   Rafa continued to display his “piñata” swing but has able to reach base multiple times.  Our team offense clicked batting around in 3 of the 5 innings.  Special thanks goes out to honorary captain Chris “ I am the president” Burdick who played solid first base and provided refreshments to the team and the fans.  

We would also like to thank Katie Brown who trusted us enough to take the prospective women to watch our game.

We had a great time on Friday and hope that everyone that showed up did too.  We would like to invite you to our next game this Wednesday @ 5:00PM at the Rugby Field over at Olin College.  Saul will be sending an email on Monday to coordinate the players and refreshments.


------ End of Forwarded Message
Technorati Tags     babson,mba,softball

DL-Danwei.org

DanWei has a fabulous blog post to demonstrate the reasoning process of western people. I think traditionally Chinese are good on those debate but we are far lagging behind. ANd I agree that Chinese government should put more pressure on Sudan. For whatever reason, killing hundres of thousands of people will make the reason absurd. And for the same reason, even though I strongly believe Taiwan is part of China but if a war really occur because Taiwan declare the independence later, I doubt I will support the war.

Technorati Tags     china,danwei

20070322

I am sitting in my room at Montreal. This will be my last evening in this cozy place at Verdun. And I also feeel that I had lost interest somehow to continue this weekly journal at Babson. For almost one semester, I am writing my weekly experience and I realized somehow I have had enough. You know I am a very interest-driven person, so...


let's see.

BTW, it's great to write my blog via ZOHO then publish to blogspot.com directly via open API...You should try zoho.com for sure.

20070306-0312

It's a late blog but hey, I am in the final exam week for MOD III. Can't you believe it, it's over, the first half of 2007 is almost over while I am thinking about the to do list we had prepared for R last year...

I have a lot to write and here is a list of those topics:

My VCIC experience
My techtalk gathering
My undertanding of the shift of world
My digital living standard

and this will be my VCIC experience that started almost one month ago when J took the initiative to organize a team and M invited me to particiate. I was somehow reluctant as being busy with other things. I just wanted to have the least things I have to deal with. The less the better because anything will consume way more time than you originally think. That's why I hate small things like creditcard payment etc... Anyway, I tried to quite this VCIC team in the very beginning but after I learned that I can not quit otherwise the rest of the team, Maan, Marin, Max and Jin, will not qualify for the internal competition. So I wrote following email:


Team,

My tight schedule did make me considering quit this VCIC in the beginning. But since I will stay, let's try our best to win it!

.....

More info of VCIC, Venture Capital Investment Competition can be found at www.vcic.unc.edu. UNC really created lots of competition in MBA area. Is UNC one of the oldest bschool?

I am happy I did stay with the team and worked together to win the internal competition at Babson. I have to admit it's a good feeling being the finalist even though I am not a fan of any award. A brief about what we had in the internal competition at babson:

Friday 5pm, received 3 real business plan.
by 12pm, selected the one we will invest and prepared the question for due deligence on Saturday

Saturday, 8am, entrepreneur pitch then followed by due diligence with each team (totally 6 teams including us, Snowbasin ventures)
12am, finish term sheet preparation and presentation
1pm team start presentation.

Things are always the same for the regiional competition at NYC from Mar 8th to Mar 11th. We are competing with the 7 of top 10 bschool in US. We got 4 business plan. We had 20 judges, mostly associates from VC firms with office in NYC. It's a real practice. We had chosen the start-up developing digital media authoring software and thought it has a big expansion potential. However, we are the only team chosen this team. Most others choose either the www.collectorsquest.com or Zeroin Media.

What I had learned?
1. Explanation of termsheet used most frequently by VCs
The most useful blog from VCs I had read is from Feld
http://www.feld.com/blog/archives/2005/08/term_sheet_seri.html
who is the managing director of Mobius Venture Capitalbased in Boulder, Colorado

2. Rational about venture selection
Teams, business model, opportunity etc...why VC will inveset $ in this venture rather than that? Why we had seen so many start-ups with ideas we thought no-sense at all but won millions of $ investment? It's an execellent chance for entrepreneurs to review their business model. Not purely for the sake of VC $ but a more objective analysis from another side of the start-up value chain.

3. valuation
Ok, if decided to seek VC investment, the omst important would be valuation. How much d o you think your venture worht today? What you can do to increase the value, immediatley, in short-term and in the long run?

4. Hard working, hard working and hard working.
Hardworkign it self may not bring you the success but without hard working, your chance is trivial.

20070219-0225

Last week is a wonderful week in terms of outcome. The 5-member team I am in had won the internal competition at Babson so that we will present Babson to compete again HBS, MIT, LBS, Cornell, Yale etc in NYC next weekend. The top 2 team of this NorthEast region competition will go to UNC for the national VCIC competition organized by the Kernan-flagler bschool of UNC. It's cool but also means I have less time for Rilik. Because M is in this team, Snowbasin Venture, as well so it's a double time loss. There is a pressure to win the regional competion in NYC, not for the excitement to compete with all those top 10 bschools (only missed stanford/wharton in this northeast regional competition) but to compensate my time spent on it. For more info, check http://www.vcic.unc.edu/. Last year Babson team end up at No.4.


We also had the first Sat gathering as an extension to our Wed lunch session. Surprisingly, totally 17 people had showed up and made T's place kinda crowd. It lasted about 3 hours and the discussion is very good. The intention for this Sat gathering is to have more and longer discussion since Wed version is only 1-hour long. I am very excited to see the atmosphere we had built through Wed session had been continued and integrated more others into it. I do hope we could finally see one or two or more start-ups can emerge from this gathering.

The final exam for MOD III is coming in two weeks. We will have our first DMS/MVC exam next Friday that conflicted with the VCIC event in NYC. Prof.Bliss is tough as usual to negotiate but I quite like his style, give me your reason while asking for anything. Straightforward, is it.


And weather, weather. We had another big snow. It's beautiful, it's winter and it's a pity that my scheduled meeting with J at AV had been cancelled due to the terrible condition of road. And It has to be postoned to sometime in April. It's a long push...



R wise. I feel bad because of the further limited time because of the VCIC competition. Spring break is coming, 9 days, will get the business plan done.

20070129-0203

OMG, We are almost in the middle of MOD III. Can't you believe it! And I did start feeling pressure. Well, the MVC and SCS are really challening. Not in class wise but time wise. Those two do need I to devote certain time into it BEFORE the class like 2 hour per class. My strategy last semester that only reading the assignment and pay attention to the class doesn't work well this time. So now I spent about 3-4 hours per day on course preparation. If just this load, my life will still be totally fine...

My start-up plan makes my wife worse... Anyway, I skiped the DMS class on Friday for a nap at apartment and it's so good after I got up one hour later. And it made me felt SO BAD that I didn't skip the class to attend the MashUP camp two weeks ago in MIT. I will say this is one of the biggest mistake I had made here in Babson.


Interesting enough, the short conversation I had with the so-called Provost of Babson,Patricia G. Greene, at the BusinessDemo of the BacktoBabson event last year suddently pop up in my mind so here it is:

Provost: What is your business idea?
HONG: ^&^&%&^S%DF*(&S...
Provost: Had your professor taught you how to do a business pitch?
HONG: ...

Well, I understood my pitch wasn't compelling but hey, go to check curriculum first before asking. If you pay more attention to the pitch itself, you missed the whole picture.


Just an andecdote.


I had attended an event called WebInnovatorGroups @ http://webinnovatorsgroup.com/ and it's quite good. The details are in the website. I felt the passion, excitement, IT and bubble around the room. It's a cool feeling. Many may say, hey, it's bubble again. But you know what, view bubble as the catalyst. WIthout bubble, I won't be able to be here using fantastic product sucha s ZOHO office. Do you think Google is bubbled at $500 per share before?


I also decided to withdraw further research effort towrds R's idea. It's a good idea but I dont have enough time to pursue. Besides, may end the video talk with J as well as it's an expensive area with too many players. I am quite excited about the event one poped up in my mind a few days ago and I decided to puruse this one whatsever as it's really simple and effective.


Again, initiatives pay off. Trust, if you believe anything is possible and never say never without trying. you will see a totally different world..


Oh, at last, the most important part of this week is that I was invited to visit T&K's place. It's so closeby that it only takes them 5 minutes by driving to Olin hall, even faster than my walking from Woodland Hill. How badly the machiney had changed the world... ANyway, that's a very enjoyable discussion with T and I am very glad to meet mroe and more people who share similar mentality. No, don't get me wrong. I dont' mean we are the same and I dont want that. Just totally different people but similar mentality. Open, risk-taking, straight-forward... I just love it. Good period. Good week. and I will start catching up the MVC now...What's the cost of capital, Bliss?

20070122-0128

We are almost in the middle of Mod III now. A MOD with lots of detailed operation-oriented courses such as strategic cost managemen and manage venture cash, it's relative an easy mod for me. If I could live without any start-up plan/idea, I will have a mucch easy life and could spend more time to read some interesting books such as "The queen's Gambit" by Walter Tevis. However, I can't.


Well this week is much better than last week since no additional fellowship work had been assigned to me, NN's proposal to look at the international education market caught my eyeball. It fits our background so well and it's a growing market that will last at least for next 20 years. I like its potentil and the entry barrier that it has since you really need to be an international student to understand the opportunity first. Well I learned to be more rational while feeling excited. We agreed to have two weeks study to evaluate the feasiblity as a business. We met in Sat and realized there is some challenges to design a simple yet effective business model. And we will meet again next weekend to make the final decision.


R had another final meeting and I started appreciating the potential of the travel segmentation we will target at. It could be a nice marketplace for small service providers who may never be able to list in travelocity/expedia/orbitz. It also could be an ideal place to bring surprise for individuals. That's really the core spirit of the original model. Yet I am wondering when to start the R&D process. the UI design would be key and I should spend sometime next week to scratch...


Besides above things, this week is relatively a quiet week. Oh, not really. I am so glad to learned T in my group is also thinking of doing some startups on the way he driving me back to woodland hill. Again, the besti gift I would like to receive is to know one more entrepreneur or entrepreneur-wannabe. The talk with those type of people is full of fun and joyful. I like his political tree idea and would like to see the final launch.

I am also glad to have our seond Wed tech-talk lunch session. A recent undergraduate from Austraia also joined us. It's wonderul. Since next week, We wil start having one or two people providing an in-depth presentation of a certain topic so that could lead to more insighful discussion.I am lookng foward to that!

My wireless keyboard sucks again. stop now..

20061211-1216

Home, sweet home.

One week almost passed. I had some nice family food while not really too much sleep… What a surprise. I had got up once at 4:30am to catch the greyhound bus to Ottawa for my wife’s F-2 visa interview. I had got up again at 7am to have the skype meeting with folks in China. I also had one skype phone call from 12am to almost 4am with JG in Thailand then got up at 9am. Enough sleep like a pig? Far from it…

Montreal to me is the same but to my wife I know it’s much different. I really felt envy her French now. She can speak quite some sentence as well as reading newspapers. She is going to be a local Quebec resident while I am still a foreigner. I definitely should learn another language as well. Germany? Very possible since I can have Marin’s help at anytime while Spanish could be another good choice too since it’s so widely used in both South America and North America now. But the pronunciation of r will kill me…

There isn’t much news happened this week. Like a week for me to catch up various things I had missed or failed to do in last two BCAP weeks so next week will be a very productive week.

Some hints:

Business 2.0 Magazine is really a great magazine to read. www.business2.com. It’s part of CNNMoney network.

Businessweek is great too.

I should continue my habit to read in the Library one hour everyday, to catch up all the newest stuff. It should cover books reading as well.

The other hour should be spent on techcrunch and venturebeat everyday too.

Then swimming twice a week in the weekend? Jogging every the other day?

20061204-1210

Finally, I am sitting at my lovely home in Montreal. Now I am using my wife’s lovely Dell laptop to write my first weekly blog in Montreal, to wrap up the last week of my semester in 2006.

It’s a BCAP week. It’s the final academic presentation week for our BCAP project. It’s academic because our BCAP team needs to present in front of a faculty panel consists of professors from our MOD II. We had DA professor Terry Reilly, MEIA professor Kevin Jones, Law professor Petty and FIBD professor Soydel. We are really lucky to have Terry. His DA class is always wonderful because he has such a good comedy talent to add various hilarious comments to the class. The presentation went well as well as the Q&A session after the presentation. All of our seven team members answered various questions and the professors are quite satisfied. I am quite confident we may get an EPS for this BCAP project.

I guess we are one of the few BCAP teams that don’t have a female member. And we are also one of the few BCAP teams that have seven team members. That’s a lot. Fortunately, all of my team members appreciate straightforward and open conversation. There is neither dirty political fight nor personal attack at all even at a few fierce arguing moments. I love my team. We are also quite relaxing during the BCAP time. Considering quite some team almost met everyday for three to four hours, we are really like in vacation. But when the time comes, we just work around the clock. I love this way of working. It’s much more efficient when you in a tight schedule. This reminds me the TechMark time in the orientation week.

After the final BCAP presentation, I met my team members in another team’s BCAP room and I had three cup of Russian Vodka. That’s a lot! Fortunately, I had some baked fish fillet in my woodland hill apartment before returning to the Olin hall with GZJ. Otherwise, I may be hammered already. The lovely BK and ML are struggling at the edge of getting drunk. That’s really funny. Later I went to a nearby bar at Newton with JD and ML to see what other classmates were doing. Man, I really don’t like the bar, a noisy place with poor but expensive food. Is it the only choice for relaxing for American? Poor dudes…

I hate BCAP too. First I am in the IT industry while I’d much prefer any non-IT industry to learn something new. Second it greatly damaged the R project. BCAP drained people’s energy and enthusiasm. When you returned to home, you just don’t want to do jack. That’s bad. Even worse than the normal school days. R almost stalled for two weeks. The Chinese team could still work on the R&D side but the US team was much under performed. I foresee the winter break going to be a busy month for R.

Finally here is the good part. I had talked and met two partners of local VC firms. The talk was very informative and helpful. It’s great to learn others perspective about who I am, how valuable I could be and what I could bring to the table. It made me more sober about myself. Thank you, Mr. Steinberg. Your words I’d learned from the Babson Innovation Forum, “courage never hurts”, gave me a lot confidence and brought me so many unbelievable results. I am still kind debating about a career in VC or continuing doing start-up things since I always have ideas to do. Even VC partners gave me different advices. Some prefer the first while the others prefer the latter. Well, I will continue focus on entrepreneur track for now. Focus…

What I had learned the most from this first semester?

1. The important of a purpose and the execution. I had benefited so much from this one.

2. Networking skills. Now I think I almost learned the most suitable networking skill for myself. I have my own need and my own style. I am glad to find my way rather than following others’.

3. Confidence. Yes I am in the States now. So what? My own style fits here so well.

Thank you, Babson. This second half of 2006 is such a wonderful period for me.

Books for Entrepreneurs

Here is the URL of the original post at businessweek about books for entrepreneurs...
http://www.businessweek.com/smallbiz/content/dec2006/sb20061205_376107.htm?link_position=link1

"Why Should White Guys Have All of the Fun?" - Blair Walker and Reginald Lewis, (John Wiley & Sons, 1995)
"The Portable MBA in Entrepreneurship" - William Bygrave and Andrew Zacharakis (John Wiley & Sons, 2004)
Herman Melville's Moby Dick.
Ship of Gold in the Deep Blue Sea by Gary Kinder (Vintage Books, 1998),
Fierce Conversations by Susan Scott (The Berkeley Publishing Group, 2002)
Execution: The Discipline of Getting Things Done by Larry Bossidy and Ram Charan (Crown Business, 2002)


Though many doubt entreppreneur could be taught, certainly some reading would be helpful for entrepreneur-wannabes. Beside those books, the best place to start reading maybe those blogs posted by venture capitalist or entpreneurs such as:

From the Eyes of an Enterpreneur
&
http://avc.blogs.com/a_vc/

第一学期总结

学期结束，几点个人经验希望帮助大家下学期生活更加愉快

1。有个明确的目标。 明确的目标以后可以随时改变，但是它可以让你在有新目标之前的时间效率更高，譬如是看DVD还是给自己的目标工作，譬如研究开公司的问题。一个后果是你会放弃很多个人娱乐，但是是在心甘情愿的情况下放弃

2。利用2年时间开个公司。其实真正关键的不是一定要开个公司。而是利用开公司的过程更加深入的利用babson的各种资源，课堂/教授/校友，还有周围的一切。这样会让你更主动，而不是天天被Mod Map签着鼻子走。因为打算开公司所接触到的资源绝对和因为找工作所接触到的资源绝对不是一个层次的。原因如下：


虽然说找工作要和CCD打交道，但是周围是由无穷多的资源可以用的，只要你主动发掘。CCD或许可以给你找到工作，但是绝不会帮你找到好工作。大家都知道的，都用得资源，一定价值不大。大的你能享受的也很少可能。你自己发掘的，自然独特。。

另外一个开公司的好处如下。假定你是一个教授，只有30分钟的时间见一个学生。李四或者张三。李四的目的是开一个公司，或许失败或许上市（切记：每个公司都有上市的可能，而且只有公司能上市）；张三的目标是咨询找工作的建议。你会见谁？为什么？90%是李四，因为你想认识未来下一个google的创始人，而不是google的一个产品经理。教授这个例子可以推而广之。。。


3。美国人最看重的是过程。所以才会发明各种的ISO9000,CMM5，等等认证体系。如果你完全遵循一个过程，结果不好。美国人不会认为是你的错，而是说过程需要改善。重视过程才会确保成功的可重复性。这个适用于任何方面。学习亦然。教授最重视的你是否会用教授的framework等去思考，而不是你的记过是否正确。多少不同的教授重复过说，只要你把过程写出来，就会给你分数？
其次，中国的哲学思想是先宏观。从大到小。在babson同样适用。每门课一定要明白为什么上这门课。是否大家还记得babson是如何安排1年级的4个模块的？mod 1: idea generation；mod 2: market analysis & opportunity evaluation; mod 3: launching a start-up and mod 4: growing。这个就是过程。怎么学最好？就是从mod 1开始就打算做个公司，即使完全是为了上课的考虑。譬如mod 1结束，你确定了一个开公司的想法：在babson开个小零售店。mod 2就是帮你分析可行性的过程。CSCA是竞争策略，如何和附近的star market/shaw's和wholefood竞争？如何和市里面的88超市竞争？Moda是市场，如何确定目标人群？如何定价？MEIA是给你一个数学工具来量化的分析各个结论的好坏。定价的方案是否和附近人群的收入水平合理挂钩？elasticity? 你是否涨价，如果star market涨价，cross elasticity? 如果你有一个真实的机会来应用这些课程/framework，课堂很容易，考试也不难。


4。英语。提高听力的最好方式就是听。提高说的最好方式就是说。我们现在就是美国的小学生英语水平，没有捷径。当然，听要主动的听，即使听起来一知半解。被动的听，英语只是背景噪音。说话有口音没有任何问题。重要的是你说话的内容和质量，而不是你的发音。如果你的咨询方案能帮一个客户升100万美元，你再有口音也无妨。所以一起讨论问题的时候，主动地听，你大脑才会被调动起来去进行英文听力识别。这才是锻炼。当然，如果你找一个老美一起创业，英语提高最快，对不对。


5。拿掉心中的假设。每个人的心中都有或多或少的假设。一定要尽量的拿掉，尤其在学校这种周围风险极低的地方。譬如，我假设日本人不喜欢中国人，虽然我从来没有和日本人交往过。或者美国的牛排一定比中国的好吃，虽然我从来没吃过。每个人告诉你一个建议的时候，当然是出于善意的。但是接受这个建议的同时，别忘了他/她一定是他自己的假设的。所以要主动的接受，而不是全盘的被动的接受。你想进金融行业，你的mentor是搞房地产的，你有抵触情绪？这是因为你的假设是房地产行业和金融关系不大。而且一定是一个门外汉才有的假设。美国房地产和金融行业之间的关系之大比小于高科技行业和金融行业的联系。放下假设，才有收获的可能


我的这一个学期收获很大，还顺便拿了个圣诞礼物。CSCA/MPS, MODA/MEIA/ESC。希望大家下学期生活愉快。

个人建议，仅供参考。

20061113-1118

Indeed a busy week, but with a happy ending. We finally finished the joint final exam of MODA and MEIA. MODA stands for Marketing Opportunity and Demand Analysis. MEIA stands for Marketing Environment and Industrial Analysis. The final exam is much easier than I expected and I even think of having an EPS rather than originally dreamed MPS. (For folks wondering EPS/MPS, Babson MBA is using an alternate grading way: we using ESC/Excellence, EPS/Exceed Professional Service, MPS/Meet Professional Service, MP…) Even though I had not spent much time on the classes and assignments, I know the subjects very well and the result of exam will prove so. First of all, you must understand the whole picture. Why doesn’t name MEIA as Managerial Economics since the recommended textbook is called “Managerial Economics”? Why doesn’t call MODA as simply Marketing? If you understand that the principle of MOD II is opportunity evaluation, another important phase for launching a start-up, you will see the rational. More importantly, the professors are focused on teaching us a systematic way to not only make a decision but also make a better decision. MODA is to help us identify and evaluate any potential business opportunity while MEIA provides us quantitative tools, economics, to assess those opportunities. Every chapter of those classes, from 5Cs and 4P of MODA to marginal cost and price elasticity, is simply fulfilling the objectives of MOD II. I find out many classmates easily falls into the details without understanding the whole picture. Looking at everything from a strategic and higher position will benefit everyone a lot.

The preparation of exam took a lot of time of R team inevitably. It even made me a bit anxious. I believe we are in the right track and direction. Even though it makes me feel better when met others who are still idea discussion stage, I know I am running against time and against the other smart guys somewhere in Silicon Valley, NY or Cambridge. I am also running against the class, the assignments and the exam. I am also even running against myself. I realized already that it’s so easy to give up your so called hobbies. I have not read anything about soccer since last Sept after I flied from Beijing to Toronto. The answer is simply time. I believe the whole start-up experience maybe something similar to the effect of coffin addiction. You just want to do it and want to get it done as quick and good as possible. If you realized you are working on something may leave a mark in history, not to mention the positive return in terms of money and other things, you will believe being entrepreneur is one of the coolest career in the world.

Finally we got our formal advisor board established, though I need to give John a call tomorrow evening to convince him. To me, the first “NO” from others is always a clear wake-up call to let you to be better prepare to convince that person next time. Steve, John and Sam would be a very strong board. I am also thinking of forming another advisor board that contains only other MBA classmates, about five students, at least 2 female students. I have a rough candidate pool based on my own experience and recommendation from Marin and Andreas. This could be done after the DA and MCF joined exam next Tuesday.

Now the most important for R is the alpha version. Even though I have found three ex-colleagues who agreed to work on part-time basis, I feel it’s still risky. So Marin and I agreed to put some personal money together to hire a fulltime developer from oDesk.com. We really look forward to finish the development of alpha version in 2006. That would give us a big leap in 2007. We could immediately start organizing the internal test of alpha version, collecting buyer data, using buyer data to develop seller and finally, contacting potential angel investors. We may even be able to develop the alpha version during this Dec to a stage that Marin and Andreas may offer a quick demo to people in California during their winter trip. I may join them too!

Oh, we had also went to the second workshop for start-ups organized by NECINA. It’s hosted at the Boston office of Brown Rudnick LLC, located in downtown Boston. Much less people than the first workshop hosted in Highland Partners, even though the subject this time is Financing options for start-ups. One senior associate from Highland Partner, one local active angel investor, one VP from Silicon Valley Bank (The same guy I’d met in Cyberposium last week in Harvard) and an entrepreneur who received venture capital investment together formed the panel. The discussion was interesting. It just brought me and Marin a strong feeling to have our alpha version website done as soon as possible.

Time flies. Yes, just three weeks left before the winter break. Just five weeks left before 2007. I am so happy I had this opportunity to launch R with Marin and Andreas. 2007 is going to be another fun year.

20061106-1112

I know I should start writing the weekly journal no later than the weekend. But I failed to do so for the past two weeks. It’s really a pain to recall what had happened but also a good way to review the past as well. Right now I have a could-not-been-better morning: class started at 10am (Yes, we are in the luckiest section!) and there is only one new email this morning (though this makes me feel a little bit disappointed…). Anyway, let’s turn the clock back to Nov 06, 2006.

For R, the most important thing is we have a new member now. His passion about R is the most impressive and I’d like to have him on board. The good thing of a larger team is there are more brains. We had couple of fierce discussions about the business model and the action plan. Our classmates are really helpful. A few discussions with them in woodland hill and Olin hall did give us some fresh ideas. We really should move on to build our student advisor board. Ah, as one suggested, we would better off to have female classmates in the advisor board if we can’t find a female team member.

The 12^th Cyberposium event held in Harvard last Sat is fantastic. We had some great panelist and I’d met a couple of interesting person and built a good relationship with. As I previously mentioned, be proactive. This is a big big factor to differentiate you from others. Besides, this reminds me the words from the keynote that Mr. Tom Steinberg, founder of Staple and partner at Highland Capital, had given in the Babson Forum of Entrepreneurship and Forum,. What he had said? A couple of things. Be brave. Be rule-breaker. Be xxxx. Courage never hurts. I benefited from them a lot. Everyone should ask themselves, do you want to be an audience or you want to be part of the event? I would choose the latter and I’d approached a few other people, MBA students from Ivey that I will meet in Montreal during the winter break, a Bentley MBA who also working for a VC firm, an interesting dude from SVB… Especially with the VC guy, we had talked a lot in the whole morning and I am very happy I’d talked to him first. Yes, there are many people like me who may not want to initialize a talk but would be more than happy to accept an invitation to start a talk.

This whole week had a lot discussion about R. Especially a lot about various different aspects. It’s necessary to bring Andy updated about where R is and this introduction process inevitably led us to review quite a lot of our previous conclusions. This is very similar to the teaching process. The only time you will know whether you really understand a topic is to explain it to someone else and to answer all his or her questions. It’s quite painful to be challenged about the previous conclusions for everyone but it is really helpful to force yourself calm down and review your past decisions. Is it really right? Is it really good?

I kept the swimming in the weekend. It’s really a wonderful feeling to be in the water. Free, comfortable… One research hypothesis said that in part of our history, our ancestor had been forced to live in the environment where they need always standing or swimming in the sea. And this hypothesis believes that’s why our skin is closer to sea animals such as dolphin rather than other ale or monkeys with long and thick hair allover our body.

I decided to place this journal at my personal blog. It’s a big change to publish your personal life on the public domain. Is it good? Does courage never hurt? Let’s see.

20061023-1028

Another busy yet great week this week is. Can’t believe how many things I had done. It reminded me again the great words from Mr. Lu Xun: “Time is like water in the sponge. It’s always there if you squeeze.”

With my mentor’s help, I finally heard from the Babson alumnus who is working for a local VC firm. What I really learned (needs further improvement) is to write email to strangers such as this alumni. The revised email from my mentor made that happen. I’d talked with this alumnus in phone for about 20 minutes and I am quite thrilled. Pro-activeness really makes difference. I am happy I always believe nothing is impossible. While on the other hand, my follow up Thank-you email didn’t get his reply. Maybe…? Anyway, I’d decided to make an appointment with the writing resource center next week (originally schedule this week but…) to learn more about how to write COLD email.

The other big thing is the Rocket Pitch.

I had attended two Rocket Pitch practices before this Friday and the result was very good. My partner and I had learned from the feedback that our initial scope, the one described in the summary I'd sent to you, was too broad and too general. It's hard for the audience to clearly imagine what we are doing. So we significantly refined our biz model with a much smaller scope yet much more clear and clever business model, an online shopping place that organize sellers to provide best offer to meet your need instead of letting you spent hours to search at Amazon or EBAY to get the best deal. We are revising the executive summary now.

The Pitch is a blast. This year totally 108 teams had signed up. Personal skill wise, my public speaking skill was significantly improved. Your 6Ps were proved to be correct again. I also learned how to concisely and clearly pitch my idea in public. So instead of speaking for 3 minutes (the Pitch limits any pitch to 3 minutes with 3 slides) with an unclear impression left to the audience, I finished my pitch in 2 minutes and everyone in the room got my points. However, the only pity is that the organizer put us in a place with lots other traditional business such as dog walking or wasted vegetable oil recycling businesses. So our initial plan to receive enough attention and feedback from various potential investors was not succeed as most of them like VCs were in the other room.

Anyway, overall the preparation and actual pitch significantly improved my confidence and skills in public and I know I will benefit from them in a long run.

I also signed up for the annual Babson Coach program that organizing Babson MBA students and alumni to offer one-on-one coaching for Babson undergraduate. This year is the 10^th year and the first time non-Babson people are allowed to register as a coach. I want to be helpful for undergraduate just like how helpful my mentor did for me. And since I am not a bar person, I also enjoy this kind of light social events. Every group includes 5-6 coaches and 5-6 undergraduates. I had coached an undergraduate, Scott Fletcher, who has strong interest of start-up and is currently working for a start-up, http://www.dormitem.com/, founded by another undergraduate. I am very happy to share my past experience with him.

Overall, another very valuable week this week is and I looking forward to meeting my mentor in Nov.

Other things? BCAP (Babson Consulting Alliance Program) finally officially started. I mean, we now had real work needs to be completed. We need to apply what we had learned from various courses in MOD II so far such as CSCA and MODA. It’d be a very valuable process to apply those theoretical frameworks such as Michael Porter’s five forces, the 5Cs of marketing opportunity analysis and others such as S.T.E.P, S.W.O.T and value chain. And it’s also a good opportunity to practice those frameworks. I really enjoyed to immediately apply those framework to my R project in the class though taking the risk to miss something in the class. But I enjoyed the freedom of my mind.

That’s almost everything. Raining outside and tomorrow could have a wonderful sleep.