Stress mode: Activated

I haven't blogged for a few days because I've been really stressed out trying to sort out my project. After I found out that my own business idea wasn't worth pursuing it has been a bit of a roller coaster ride. On numerous occasions coming close to choosing my research topic only to be told by a member of the relevant faculty that my idea was a steaming pile of shit (exaggeration implicit), not only this but my idea was based on what another faculty member had told me. So this went back and forth for about a week, with no official supervisor I had no one's final say on the matter. To add insult to injury the whole of the bloody uni has practically buggered off on their holidays for a couple of weeks, most of whom are supervising other peoples projects.

Anyway, so after my own business project plan fell through I teamed up with a fellow classmate to do the project with. He is someone I've worked with before and I'm confident that we'll come up with something good (if not great), especially given the lack of time. We have just about sorted out the topic which will focus of the future of distribution in the film industry. We plan to make use of the film business academy at the uni as it home to some of the best film business minds around.

But like I said, it's still not approved as a topic so there are still some hoops to jump through. Our only hope is to work on it solidly until most of the faculty return with their tans and then force them to approve the topic due to the impending deadline. Wish me luck.

What does an MBA mean in this economic climate?

All the students in my class are currently preoccupied with final projects or their job hunt, probably both and I am no different. One thing to note is how the economy has changed during our year of study, before the property bubble in the States burst and liquidity dried up in the UK the economy, at least on the surface, appeared to be booming. What better time to do an MBA!

By the time we were two or three months into our studies, reports of mass layoffs and huge losses (most notably in financial institutions) were saturating the media and furthering the decline in confidence in our economy - and with it our confidence in the job markets that awaited us upon graduation. Still, we clung to the hope that the economy would sort itself out by September this year. There was nothing we could do to change the situation so blind optimism seemed like the best course of action. Still, as recently as March this year reports of job losses still plague the financial sector.

The time has now come to face reality; in approximately 7 weeks we hand in our final projects after which we are officially unemployed. A few on my course have already secured placements, one of whom has moved to Singapore where the financial market is booming, but most of us are still weighing out our options. Those of us looking to move into finance from another industry are probably going to find it quite difficult. Thankfully I am not one of those people and am most likely going to move into marketing (if things go to plan).

Either way, I feel that MBAs graduating this year are at a disadvantage when compared to graduates from previous years, all you have to do is look at the company sponsored projects available this year which has left approximately 10-15 (out of 80) students with no choice but to work on a desk-based research project and compare it to 2007's MBA graduates number of 2 out of 65. That's an increase of about 12% of students doing unsponsored projects. For those of us wanting to change career this is a big deal, a company sponsored project often gives you the edge when job hunting as it can classify as experience in your chosen field.

Impending recession is great for business schools though. As competition for fewer jobs in the market increases, the need for further education in order to differentiate oneself from other candidates becomes a requirement for more senior roles. If I follow this logic then it makes sense that there will be overall fewer MBAs in the job market this year since the economy was at its strongest during my enrolment. Lower supply, higher demand. Hmmm, there's a flaw in that logic somewhere.

If you are considering an MBA this September then it may be worthwhile to try and consider the economic conditions when you graduate (this may be more difficult for those doing two year courses), after all, the end goal of further education (aside from the acquisition of knowledge) is to make you more employable and thus eligible for higher pay and better positions.

Most of my class have been caught out this year but look on the bright side, if you want to turn your business round in times like these, who are you going to employ? Why an MBA of course!

Why an MBA and Facebook are not compatible

Prospective MBA students amongst you should know, that before you decide to embark on the roller coaster of a journey that is an MBA, you can expect to be reasonably poor during your studies.

Just to give you a flavour on finances, you've got the fees, in my case £27,000 (or $53,565) for the one year full time course. I would say about 50-60% of students on my course have various scholarship schemes which contribute anywhere between £10,000 and the full £27k. I'm not one of them.

Then you've got the living expenses, and this is where it hurts, because London ain't cheap. I would say as a rough estimate you'd need the same amount for the year's expenses as the fees if you include things rent - something I was lucky enough to avoid. To be honest I really feel for the Americans on my course who have seen the exchange rate change rapidly forcing some of them to take out additional loans to keep afloat.

Altogether you are looking at around £50,000 for one year's study which, quite frankly, is an obscene amount of money! Is it worth it? It depends on you I guess, an MBA is something different to each and every person doing it. Asses your goals and see if that £50,000 is a reasonable investment to get you there, I think a lot of it comes down to the level of risk you are comfortable with.

SO what has all this got to do with Facebook? Well, I'm a poor student, stop rubbing your sunny holiday photos in my face!!

Global food crisis versus the culture of excess

You only have to peruse the supermarket aisles to realise that food prices are spiralling out of control, staple items like bread, pasta and rice have seen some supermarkets impose rationing to prevent bulk buying. Prices of rice alone have increased by 93% over the last year (granted some export restrictions have affected this) and they show no sign of stopping any time soon. These kind of scary statistics should give us serious food for thought (I'm so sorry!), living in a western society often blinds us from the global implications of the food crisis. The US and most of Europe (including UK) spend less than 25% of their annual income on food, fuel and drink, essentially most of us can take the hit, but those who spend closer to double that are struggling and rising prices could see an additional 30m fall into poverty in Africa alone. This map below shows world spending on food, fuel and drink in relation to income.

The recent G8 summit made these rising prices a priority but just how much can be done by the nations who are least affected by it, where is the incentive? Well now that the summit over we can see that the only consensus to improving the situation is to throw a little more aid to Africa. Honestly, I'm not turning my nose up at a few extra billion but it's not enough, nowhere near enough, world leaders need to get creative.

The truth is that in the west there are no signs of us relinquishing the idea that excess is a good thing (insert random obesity statistic here). Only three days before the G8 summit in Japan, Americans around the world were celebrating Independence Day and since 1916 (and growing in popularity ever since) the International July Fourth Hot Dog Eating Contest was taking place. Contestants see how many hot dogs they can shove down their throats in a certain time and are awarded prizes for their gluttony. Is it just me or do events like this exemplify a level of ignorance that I can only describe as sickening.

I admit that I'm using an extreme example here but in a country where food spending in relation to income is the lowest in the world (9.5% in 2007) what do we expect? There is a definite need to educate ourselves in matters like these and I would hope that in the future events like the International July Fourth Hot Dog Eating Contest are boycotted but I'm probably asking a lot.

By the way, why aren't we teaching current affairs in schools? It seems to me like current attempts to raise awareness of any global issue is often futile once people are set in their ways. Get 'em early, that's what I say.

Who said starting your own business was easy?

Well, no one really ever said that. In fact I'm pretty sure I've heard on numerous occasions that starting your own venture is a very difficult thing to do. I requires more than just a good idea, it requires hard work, a lot of networking and perseverance.

The progeny for any good business is a good idea and I had an absolute blinder, it was going to change the world (maybe). However, yesterday I discovered that I wasn't the only one to have this idea, it had apparently been knocking about for a couple of years albeit in a rather inferior guise (if I do say so myself). Inferior or not, it was just too close to my idea to warrant pursuing.

So where does this leave me with regards to my MBA project? Your guess is as good as mine. It's all a bit up in the air at the moment, so I've set myself a target of the end of the week to get a decent project idea by and I'll speak to some of my professors to point me in one direction or another. I've reached the point now where not having this sorted has transcended the realms of frustration into mild depression.

Watch this space for a topic (probably in marketing) that will blow your socks off!!!!

I'm going entrepreneurial!

As many of you will already know, a large part of any MBA program is the project. Many students spend countless hours applying to big investment banks and enduring round after round of interviews only to be worked to the brink of death within an eight week period as well as find time to squeeze a fifteen thousand word report out of their arses as well.

I have not chosen this route.

"Why!?", you cry, well, I hardly applied for any projects at all now I come to think of it. The reason being that there aren't really any projects in media (my chosen industry) and the thought of working in finance again leaves me with the taste of bile in the the back of my mouth. To be fair, I did have a project lined up but it all fell through due to an administrative cock-up in the course office. The morning I found out it wasn't going ahead the C-word was used repeatedly. It eventually dawned on me that there was no time to find another project with a company and that I would have to resort to the dreaded desk-based project. Now, I've never been much of an academic and researching a business niche really held no interest whatsoever for me, so I have decided to start my own business and build my project around it.

I'm either very brave or very stupid, I suppose time will tell. The annoying thing is that I'll probably be working twice as hard in the next few weeks than those doing projects at investment banks. I guess the joke is on me but hopefully I'll be having the last laugh!

Knife crime, knife crime all we hear is knife crime...

No doubt you've already heard about the murder of the 2 French engineering students in London earlier this week. Every day we see the increased coverage on knife crime in the capital and there is a feeling amongst many Londoners that the problem is spiralling out of control.

The murder of the French students is very different from the knife crime that usualy graces our front pages. Take for example this story about a teenager getting stabbed to death, to me and to most Londoners this kind of story is representative of a growing endemic of knife crime (usually perpetrated by teenagers themselves). But is what we see in the newspapers representative of true crime figures? Are the headlines we see day in day out just fear mongering, or is London becoming incredibly unsafe?

Well according to the British Crime Survey overall violent crime has decreased by 41% since a peak in 1995. This is good news but what about knife crime? Knives are used in about 8% of violent incidents and that number has remained pretty stable over the last decade. But we would be wrong to assume that this evidence is proof of anything at all since they don't include under-16s and if the level of newspaper coverage given to these crimes is in any way proportional to the actual crime figures then the last two years has seen a huge increase in crimes of this nature. And guess what, up until May of this year, these crimes weren't even being recorded.

So what's being done? Knife amnesties and metal scanners at school all seem very reactionary and employing the use of methods from other big cities such as New York doesn't really inspire me with confidence either, since their murder rate is higher than most of the UK combined. Don't get me wrong, hats off to New York, they have more than halved their murder rate in less than a decade but a large proportion of their murders are due to gun crime, so should London be looking to them? I don't think so, I think we need a better role model...

Some China pics

Here are some pictures featuring myself and some of my fellow MBAs in China doing what we do best...

Many nights started like this - good ol' Johnnie Walker

And the days were spent like this!

Some were worse off than others...

Most of us made it to the top of the great wall though.

And then we partied some more...

GET YOUR MBA TODAY! ;-)