UCD Smurfit MBA Blog

Posts Tagged ‘Academic Programme’

Wednesday 7th December saw the 2011 class being conferred in the O’Reilly Hall in Belfield.  It was a great occasion for all the graduates and their families some of whom had flown in for the day and a fitting event to mark all the hard work and effort put in by the MBA participants from the beginning of the applications process, in some cases year ago, to the handing in of the final assignment and putting the pen down in the final exam.  The conferral was a joint one between the MBA and the Masters in Accountancy programmes.  The ceremony itself was conducted by UCD President Hugh Brady and Professor Ciarán Ó hÓgartaigh.  The address was given by Dr. Tony Brabazon, Director of UCD Smurfit Business School.

As usual the run up to the conferral was marked by lots of running around getting gowns and scanning of the hall to locate family, not an easy task in such a large hall.  After the official part of the day was successfully completed by graduates the 670 men, woman and children present adjourned to the O’Reilly Conservatory for the Conferring Reception.  There were lots of introductions of family to class mates, photographs taken with classmates and family with a rather splendid Christmas tree as a back drop and discussion of everyone’s plans for the evening.  A couple of the classes had arranged group meals or events for after family meals were over.   By all accounts some people didn’t finish celebrating until the early hours of the following morning.

Congratulations to the UCD Smurfit class of 2011 from all in the MBA Office.

- RoisinO’Loughlin | EMBA Programme Manager | MBA Office

It is 7 PM, Just finished reading a chapter from competitive strategy on “Analyzing resources and capabilities”, one more to go and then two articles to be read followed by a case-study. All this is to prepare myself for tomorrow’s strategy class. Can I afford to sit quiet and trying to hide myself from Professor Gibbon’s cold calls?

From my 14 years of career in IT and telecom, I can’t quite remember how many technology solutions I have architected and how many clients I have consulted. But did I know how tightly coupled are the IT strategy and the business goals of an organization? Did I know how Conway’s Law works while developing an IT strategy? Everything that I have done so far in my career was based on my industry experience, common sense and intuition. Did that work? Yes it did. However, with this new knowledge that I am gaining, I hope not just to make things work in future, but to make things work the best way possible.

It’s not all about reading and assignments, here at Smurfit. Last week we had a Career Leader workshop and a week before that we had a 16PF workshop. I was little shocked and equally thrilled to learn some of my unexplored career interests from the Career Leader report and some personal attributes that I myself was never aware of.  Can’t really say how much of these workshops are going to help me in my future endeavors career-wise, but they certainly helped me knowing myself better than before.  And an MBA after all, is not only about learning from books and earn a credential, but also to learn about yourself, come out of your limitations and to challenge the heights.

- Nihar Panda, FT MBA 2011/2012

Today, on my way back from my trip to Glendalough, Wicklow on a rainy day, I feel that I love my MBA friends, my room in Proby House and my flatmates more than ever before. And I want to say my thank you to all people around me who make my time meaningful and invaluable in every single moment.

My special thank to Rikke who has been organizing everything for us since we arrived here in Dublin in August, to my classmates who comes here to share and learn for whatever reasons, my Group 6 who helps me to get things done together, and Linda who encourages and motivates me to study Read the rest of this entry »

Six weeks into the MBA, I am still trying to find my feet on this program. Speaking for myself,  I truly enjoyed the hard work, fun of group work, excellent class discussion, international atmosphere, the positive energy and a lot more. Its only when I listed them down I found there are so much being offered in my MBA class from both lecturers and classmates.  While it seems it is unbelievable that six weeks have passed, I am still trying to juggle among articles, case studies, reading, assignment, presentations and my beloved sleep. We were told on day one of the foundation course, the rule of this game is “how much you put into it, how much you get out of it”. I can now totally see the point. As suppose for everything else you do in your life, this rule always holds true.

I feel spiritual today, so I will continue on this track Read the rest of this entry »