{"id":1154,"date":"2016-01-14T16:31:32","date_gmt":"2016-01-14T15:31:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.iese.edu\/mba\/?p=1154"},"modified":"2016-01-20T15:50:46","modified_gmt":"2016-01-20T14:50:46","slug":"an-investment-with-guaranteed-returns","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.iese.edu\/mba\/an-investment-with-guaranteed-returns\/","title":{"rendered":"An investment with guaranteed returns"},"content":{"rendered":"

Risk.<\/strong> Risk-management. Risk-aversion. Risk-tolerance. Inherent risks. Risk mitigation. Riskiness. Eliminating risk. I\u2019ve certainly heard a lot about \u201crisk\u201d during my first term of the MBA.<\/p>\n

A year ago I was prayerfully considering what felt to me like the BIGGEST risk of my career. I had just been accepted to my top-choice MBA program \u2013 IESE. My risk\u2026 Quitting a perfectly good job, a job that I really enjoyed and where I felt like I was truly making a difference, moving away from not only my family and friends, but to another country, and to what could only be described as an uncertain future. Then, added to these feelings, the uncertain impact this would have on my wife and two young children. Well, it certainly felt risky to me.<\/p>\n

My risk\u2026 Quitting a perfectly good job, a job that I really enjoyed and where I felt like I was truly making a difference, moving away from not only my family and friends, but to another country, and to what could only be described as an uncertain future<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

At the very start of my MBA journey, now almost two full years ago, I wasn\u2019t even completely confident that I was going to quit my job and go full-time. I figured I\u2019d take the GMAT and see how I scored. I did, and my score indicated that elite MBA programs were within grasp. Then I started reading up on top schools and discovered IESE. Then I fell in love with IESE, but even that seemed risky because I didn\u2019t want to set myself up for too big of a disappointment if I didn\u2019t get in. I applied to four schools in Round One. I did interviews with three of them, and IESE asked me to come to an Assessment Day<\/a> in New York. My hopes were increasing.<\/p>\n

Then I got the official acceptance letter, and\u2026 it wasn\u2019t strictly hypothetical anymore. What was I going to do?<\/p>\n

In August we arrived in Barcelona. Our friends thought we were crazy. They were right\u2014it wasn\u2019t easy. We came with our allotted baggage and nothing more. Just navigating the airports was challenging. How do you corral a two-year-old while pushing a baby in a stroller and piloting six full-size suitcases, three rolling carry-ons, two car seats, a laptop bag, diaper bag, and more?<\/p>\n

\"Eddy

Eddy and Autumn – El Nacional, Barcelona<\/p><\/div>\n

When we arrived in Barcelona we didn\u2019t even officially have a place to live \u2013 we signed the lease on our apartment on Monday after arriving on Friday night. More risk.<\/p>\n

But now\u2026 we\u2019re done with the first term.<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s a typical day in my life:<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Wake up at 7:00 and eat breakfast with my family. Leave for school at 8:00 on my scooter, this is a great way to travel in Barcelona. Arrive by 8:30 for my team meeting that lasts until 9:45. My team is composed of eight members including me, and we represent Spain, Brazil, Japan, the United States, Hong Kong, Belgium, and India. We discuss the three cases we\u2019ve been assigned for the day and stretch and improve each other\u2019s thinking and work on group projects. At 10:00 we have our first class. After a 15 minute break, our second class starts at 11:30. Lunch goes from 12:45 until 14:15, and then my final class goes from then until 15:30. After another short break I transition to Business Spanish which I\u2019ve voluntarily continued and feel is an amazing opportunity. My Spanish classes take place from 15:45 until 17:45 on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. After that it is home for dinner and playing with the kids, and then studying typically from 19:30 until 1:00. Anytime I\u2019m in bed before 1:00, I\u2019m happy. And I wouldn\u2019t have it any other way.<\/p>\n

\"Team

Team C8<\/p><\/div>\n

What am I glad I did or would recommend to others?<\/strong><\/h3>\n

We got here about a month early. Did we have to? No. But it was perfect for our family. It allowed us to work through the complicating factors of being a family in a foreign country. My wife could go grocery shopping without the kids. I could get our cellphones switched over. We took care of our immigration paperwork. We found a doctor and learned the public transportation system. We could take three trips to Ikea if we needed to. We didn\u2019t have the pressure of having only two or three days to get this done. It also gave me the chance to mentally switch from being a busy marketing and business development executive to being a busy MBA student. It doesn\u2019t have to be a month, but I\u2019d strong suggest planning in some transition time.<\/p>\n

The Business Spanish<\/a> Intensive was my first true return to the classroom since college. \u201cIntensive\u201d is the right word. It gave my wife her first taste of what was to come once my actual MBA classes started. It was a great entrance back into the \u201cacademic\u201d realm, and I would strongly suggest taking at least the first block of classes \u2013 it will unlock the city and people of Spain for you in a special way.<\/p>\n

For the partners of MBA students, prepare for your student to be gone a lot \u2013 and if not physically, at least mentally. There\u2019s no question that an elite MBA requires a ton of work. My wife works hard to keep the family going when I can\u2019t contribute as much. My children still know who I am, but I have to budget time to be with them and maximize these moments.<\/p>\n

For the partners of MBA students, prepare for your student to be gone a lot \u2013 and if not physically, at least mentally<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\"Eddy

Eddy and Jonah on the Bus<\/p><\/div>\n

If you are coming to Barcelona with children, you\u2019ll probably be amazed by how flexible they are. Our children are three years old and one year old now. My daughter has spent half of her life in Spain. She only knows a few words, and her fifth word was \u201cHola!\u201d There is a wonderful Families and Partners Club<\/a> that provides ample opportunities for making connections, and the families are constantly finding fun ways of getting together to make amazing, internationally flavored memories \u2013 beach days, cooking classes, birthday parties, baby showers, holiday parties, day trips, and more. This is a huge help in getting established in Barcelona, and I\u2019d strongly suggest incoming students look to this group for advice, as everyone is happy to share their story of what they did right and what they\u2019d do differently.<\/p>\n

The families are constantly finding fun ways of getting together to make amazing, internationally flavored memories \u2013 beach days, cooking classes, birthday parties, baby showers, holiday parties, day trips, and more<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

You\u2019ll get some mini vacations along the way. The MBA Office does a fabulous job of trying to meter out the schedule so that you get breaks from time to time, and the Spanish and Catalan community plays along nicely by providing wonderful little holidays that don\u2019t appear on other countries\u2019 calendars. Use these days. The festivals are so much fun, and the city is bursting with things to do, and sites to explore.<\/p>\n

\"Belgium<\/a>

Belgium – Christmas Break<\/p><\/div>\n

So how does the \u201crisk\u201d feel today?<\/strong><\/h3>\n

At the beginning of this adventure the pendulum of my emotions would swing wildly back and forth from \u201cthis is a really good idea\u201d to \u201cwhat are you thinking, this is crazy\u201d with startling frequency. Today, the pendulum is pegged to the side that says, \u201cThis is a really good idea.\u201d Sure, every once in a while the what-if\u2019s creep in, but my confidence in the decision that I made has grown and grown. My family has grown. I\u2019ve grown. And my opportunities have grown.<\/p>\n

I know today that I am in the exact right spot for me. From meeting my team, classmates, and professors for the first time, to participating in case-method<\/a>-driven classes, to sharing meals in the cafeteria, interacting with MBA Career Services<\/a>, and talking with alumni, my perception of this institution and my decision to accept the \u201crisks\u201d have only been reinforced.<\/p>\n

\u201cOpportunity cost\u201d is a parallel topic we\u2019ve discussed a few times alongside risk during the first term. My decision had risks, but now that I better understand the alternative I\u2019ve chosen and can frame the alternative I\u2019ve \u201cforgone,\u201d risk<\/em> just isn\u2019t quite the right word anymore. It\u2019s kind of like seeing things as a cost or an investment, and an IESE MBA, for me, is an investment with guaranteed returns.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Risk. Risk-management. Risk-aversion. Risk-tolerance. Inherent risks. Risk mitigation. Riskiness. Eliminating risk. I\u2019ve certainly heard a lot about \u201crisk\u201d during my first term of the MBA. A year ago I was prayerfully considering what felt to me like the BIGGEST risk of my career. I had just been accepted to my top-choice MBA program \u2013 IESE…. <\/p>\n

Read More<\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":2059,"featured_media":1165,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[85920],"tags":[86384,86386,19,86327,86387,86383,67298,10,86277,86385,86339],"class_list":["post-1154","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-students-corner","tag-eddy-zakes","tag-family-and-partners-club","tag-iese","tag-iese-experience","tag-iese-family-and-partners-club","tag-iese-life","tag-iese-mba","tag-mba","tag-mba-experience","tag-mba-family","tag-mba-life"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.iese.edu\/mba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1154","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.iese.edu\/mba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.iese.edu\/mba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.iese.edu\/mba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2059"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.iese.edu\/mba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1154"}],"version-history":[{"count":11,"href":"https:\/\/blog.iese.edu\/mba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1154\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1173,"href":"https:\/\/blog.iese.edu\/mba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1154\/revisions\/1173"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.iese.edu\/mba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1165"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.iese.edu\/mba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1154"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.iese.edu\/mba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1154"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.iese.edu\/mba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1154"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}