Champagne reception at Harris Manchester College. The weather was perfect and the ash cloud from Iceland made way for all of the guests!

Rosalind, Liam and Kristina

Arlosh Hall, before arrival of the guests

Thinking back to January 2008, I can still relate to the anticipation you’re feeling, not only because I remember all too vividly how anxious I felt during this same time two years ago, but also because this January, I stand on a different sort of threshold, with a significant birthday approaching swiftly on the horizon (and for the record, it’s not 30!).

I’d like to think our anxieties are not so different. You stand on the threshold of a most challenging, captivating and rewarding journey. You have as much to look forward to as you have to learn. You will further define and improve your standing within the Oxford community, at home, and within and beyond your organisations. You have embarked on this journey during a tenuous recovery from a crisis of global dimensions… You will approach this crisis by grasping opportunity with both hands…And you will of course soon come to appreciate that 63 is a number just as meaningful as 40!

No doubt you will want some advice about how to navigate through the EMBA and the ancient if even arcane traditions at this fine institution.

Firstly, don’t panic! You’ll soon master the mechanics of the EMBA, so don’t distress yourselves with the series of induction lectures concerning plagiarism, the examination schools, proctors and group assignments, that you have been listening to throughout this past week.

Secondly, focus on people at least as much as process. Process is crucial in time management, which will take on an entirely new dimension as you will soon master the timing and mechanics of assignment submissions, exam preparations, managing logistics of travel, work and family…

As regards people, although you were all strangers to one another just a few days ago, it won’t be long before the unique character of your cohort emerges. The Oxford EMBA, now in its 7th year, is not unlike wine; each cohort brings with it its unique vintage. Together, all of you will define what it means to be EMBA VII…  

At SBS and beyond, we await with eager anticipation!

We would also like to thank the Dean, Colin Mayer, The Director of the EMBA Programme, Stephan Chambers, the members of Faculty and all the EMBA staff who have assisted to make our lives as easy as possible over the last 21 months.

Kristina
In some ways it seems like only yesterday when we first arrived here in Oxford, apprehensive and excited about the journey upon which we were about to embark.  Since then there have been many trials and tribulations; the midnight oil has burned long and bright, and principles, beliefs and ethics have been tested to breaking point. We have been thrust into study groups and have toiled through individual assignments and dozens of case studies; by the end of this month we’ll have written more than a hundred thousand words and have submitted more than 40 assignments…

We have learned to speak confidently and persuasively using the most convincing MBA jargon that would impress even the most experienced business people around the world.

Cliff
However, we think we are quite safe in saying that although the entire class is extremely impressed with Saïd Business School faculty, and we are grateful for all that we have learned from them, they really have not made life very easy for us in any way whatsoever!

As a result of their efforts to equip us with the business wisdom required to fulfil our professional aspirations we have, to a large degree, become absent partners, parents and friends immersed and focused on a parallel and alien world of assignment deadlines, weekend conference calls and endless reading lists.

I am certain that I speak for the majority of students in saying that in order to manage the competing commitments between work, family and friends and studying, we have made a number of significant sacrifices.  We must remember however, that it is the silent party, those who have effectively lived through this MBA with us, who have had to make the most sacrifices.  Despite this, all the guests here today have all continued to support us throughout the course of our studies.  The time has now come for us to emerge from our shells of introspection, to recognise that our destiny is intrinsically linked to the destiny of those who support us, and for us to celebrate them.

To all partners, children, parents and friends, although this ceremony is billed as a celebration of our achievements, we think it only fitting that we should celebrate you.  We commend and thank-you for all that you have put up with over the last 21 months.
 
Kristina
Living in a modern world of instantaneous digital communication, and thank-you Sir Tim, we sometimes found that navigating through the ancient and arcane traditions of Oxford could be incredibly frustrating.  However, in much the same way that a conductor skilfully orchestrates complex harmonies and elusive melodies to create a symphony, so have the last 800 years of teaching allowed Oxford to master the art of educating and preparing students to become world leaders, innovators and beacons of inspiration.  Building on these foundations, SBS and its proud spirit of entrepreneurship fosters a culture that encourages and facilitates the germination of ideas that can be transformed into life changing applications.

As the final curtain draws to a close, the EMBA 5 cohort have begun to consider how we might realise the fruits of our investments and turn some of the ideas that have bubbled to the surface, into reality.

Whether these are new and innovative business ideas, or ways to improve our standing within our existing organisations, as we ruminate on the best way to achieve our goals in the face of one of the deepest financial crises that the world has ever seen, we must remember that the bank of opportunity is not bankrupt.  We are but an island in a vast ocean of opportunity and although potential investors may appear tentative at present, we must carry the conviction of our beliefs through to fruition.

Cliff
However, in looking to achieve our dreams we must also remember that the privilege of holding a degree from Oxford University brings with it responsibilities that, in our haste to better ourselves, are far too often forgotten.  Although it makes perfect sense that the journey may have started as a course of action to improve our individual brands and saleability, it is vitally important for us to remember that this undertaking is not solely about us.  We should ask not what an MBA from Oxford University can do for us, but what can we do for our MBA from Oxford University!

By challenging ourselves with this question, we’re not suggesting that we should all become philanthropists, but that we should have the courage to continue the process of change that started when we elected to do an MBA.  We need to change the way in which we think. 

Our macroeconomics lens shows us how growth is a result of both accumulation and progress. And whilst there is nothing inherently wrong with accumulation, we should remember that it is growth from progress that shifts the curve upwards…

When thinking about accumulation, FDR challenges us with these words:  “The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who already have much; it is whether we provide enough for those who have too little.”
 
Kristina
When thinking about our next steps, it’s also important to acknowledge that whilst the financial investment in our education may well take time before generating a return, we are already considerably more wealthy than we were when we started this journey, when we think about things from a social capital point of view… Social capital being the sense of civic-mindedness, shared values, trust and participation within our communities which grow ever wider as we exercise the impact of our education.

And just as we are now much better equipped to generate growth in financial capital, so must we endeavour to promote and share our wealth of social capital. We’ve become fluent experts in complex financial capital structures, instruments and transactions that are intended to generate growth and returns to investors; let us think with equal sophistication about how we can contribute our growing resources towards inclusion and social enterprise; let us include all of society in our definition of investors, because we are all bound together by a common future.

Indeed, objectives to raise financial capital and social capital are neither mutually exclusive nor incongruous. We are now better positioned than ever before to apply our tools towards the reconciliation of these intents.

George Bernard Shaw reminds us that, whilst “reasonable people adjust to the world around them, unreasonable people attempt to adapt the world to themselves. All progress in the world therefore depends on unreasonable people.”

Let us aspire to be unreasonable when answering the question, what will we do with our Oxford MBA?

So with these very forward-looking ambitions to consider, let’s set them aside to today celebrate the family and friends who have and will continue to support us throughout the very colourful journeys of yesterday and tomorrow.

EMBA V Class Reps, Cliff and Kristina

Firstly I’d like to say thank you to Owen, Pembroke College and SBS for this very warm welcome. It’s truly wonderful to be here this evening with EMBA VI, especially considering that next time we’ll be here in Oxford together, it will be farewell from EMBA V.

There’s an ancient Chinese saying, “when the student is ready, the teacher arrives.”

We all arrived here as students ready to learn about management and leadership, finance and economics, strategy and all of its flavours…

It’s also true that we arrived here as students ready to learn about ourselves, about friendships which transcend companionship and entertainment to those which nurture our greater capabilities and new ways of thinking… internal resources we may neglect or overlook under more comfortable circumstances.

Here in Oxford and especially with the EMBA, the distinction between teachers and students is often less defined than in a more ordinary class room.

Everyone in the class has been a teacher to me.

It’s also been said that an education is what you’re left with when you’ve forgotten everything you learned at university.

Thinking back to September 2007, when I attended an open evening at SBS and the formal college dinner at Worcester, I think that this must be what Stephan meant when he declared that the EMBA is transformational.

The data and information we may well forget, but the knowledge, wisdom and comradery will endure.

So as we begin to prepare for our next steps after we finish the EMBA, I challenge all of us to remember that we’ll always be both teachers and students.

We may be teachers in the board room, and students in the lunch room. We may be students in the lecture theatre, and teachers in the EMBA dining room or SR11…

After each module, we part and go our separate ways, back to our real lives which, in my experience, has departed every further from status quo with the conclusion of each module.

Let’s not forget, when we leave these ancient pillars of wisdom, when the curtain falls on our grande finale here as students, that Oxford and SBS have granted us with a most captivating opportunity for an even greater encore in the wider global theatre.

Indeed, that’s the very reason that we’re here… so that the channels of teaching and learning may flow distant from the fountain of education and leadership that Oxford is.

So Ladies and Gentlemen without further ado, please raise your glasses, to Teachers and Students…

On offer for our EMBA V class during modules 12 and 13 were Capital Raising, Theory and Practise of Negotiation, Social Innovation and Entrepreneurship, Branding, Business in China, and Business State Relations and Political Risk. With a total of nine summer electives from which you may take four, how does one go about choosing which of the courses to take?

Within our class, a number of considerations emerge in how to answer this question. There are the people who opted to ‘build to their strengths’ by taking courses in which they have considerable experience and aim to advance them further. There are those who had the foresight to look at the timetables in advance and choose the courses which best fit their own professional and personal calendars. So whilst some have deliberately condensed four summer electives into two weeks (which is no trivial challenge I might add!), there are others who chose their courses so as to spread the work load evenly across the four weeks.

Then there are people like myself who, on the principal of maximising the value of my education, took the courses where I have had no earlier experience. For example with the core electives earlier in the year, I opted for Finance II in favour of Technology and Innovation Strategy. Given that I work for a Silicon Valley software company and have been in the Internet sector for fourteen years, it could be arguable that the TIS class is more directly relevant to my career.

Whilst this is a valid point, I’m happy with my choice to focus on the finance and global business courses. I may never be a finance director or work for an investment bank, but Finance II and Capital Raising have taught me new ways of thinking… They have offered a very captiviating view into a world I may otherwise never have seen from an insider’s perspective. And not surprisingly, they have stretched my capacity to learn, work and manage my time.

At the end of the day and as arrangements for the End of Course Ceremony in September start to take shape, I note that the EMBA is in fact not so different from the final set in a tennis match. You may lose a game here and there – miss a lecture, submit an uninspiring assignment or earn an underwhelming mark…  You find that your opponent is not nearly so desirable as Andy Murray, Andy Roddick or Roger Federer; on the other side of the net is in fact the inner anxiety which could threaten your stamina and undermine your focus.

But just as in Wimbledon, it’s the big points which matter, and when we do finally submit our last assignment and (fingers crossed!) receive our passing marks, we will cherish the victory for having defeated a very formidable opponent indeed.

The formal college dinner was at Worcester, my college.

Mid-January, and I’m back in the London office after module 9. With module 10 nearly three months away, it’s as good a time as any to set the pace for 2009.

For many of us, the Christmas break was about disengaging from work and studies (i.e. putting off writing the Global Strategy assignment until our arrival in Oxford), so it was a relief to have six hours of lecture each day as opposed to nine.

Thinking back to the summer modules, the temperatures in Oxford plummeted since September, right alongside the FTSE. In spite of the constant pursuit of warmth, the mood was decidedly more relaxed in January than it was during the December module when we had the Finance and Financial Reporting exams to prepare for.

Having started the core electives, module 9 had fewer lectures with the entire class. Indeed, it didn’t escape our attention that we will only meet as an entire class for three more lectures before splitting up for the summer electives.

Judging from the past year, the next nine months will pass quickly; only too soon it will be time for the EMBA V class to progress from our multi-faceted work/home/Oxford existence, and onto our next steps.

What awaits us at the other end of this journey?

Cliff in evening study sessions in SR10

This time last year, many of the EMBA IVs had started new jobs or formed new companies.

Not so for us. With a few exceptions, most of us in EMBA V remain in the same jobs – we may perhaps be even more unclear about what we’ll do in September 2009, than we were when we started just over a year ago.

Naturally I’m not thrilled about the financial crisis, but have arrived at the conclusion that studying Finance at Oxford in the midst of it is deepening my understanding of the central issues of corporate governance and industry regulation. And whilst we may not leave Oxford with a fistful of job offers that are multiples of our previous salaries, I maintain that the financial crisis is in fact maximising the value of our education.

Attention is heightened. Theories are questioned. Lecturers are challenged (in both the lecture theatre and in the pub!)… How the financial crisis will affect our plans is yet to be determined; that it will is assured.

Making big choices which span our personal and professional lives is difficult; tragically, few people have the courage to take the risk. If you’re contemplating starting the Oxford EMBA next year, consider this: September 2011 will arrive anyway, and while there’s no way of knowing whether or by how much the financial crisis may have eased by then, one thing will remain very, very binary.

Either you will have an Oxford MBA degree, or you won’t… And if you do, you will understand intuitively, amongst other things, just how appropriate the Black-Scholes model for option valuation can be in calculating what is effectively a binomial decision tree.

SBS cloisters on a cold Sunday evening in January

So I give in.

What was 2008 all about? What themes emerged? What threads were knit together to weave the fabric of 2008?

With ever so many ways to frame 2008, I would suggest that it was the year that offered far more questions than answers. And only very rarely could the questions be answered in a simple manner of yes or no…

Not surprisingly, there was a bottomless ocean of academic questions to be considered: What’s the difference between a manager and a leader? Do the dynamics of my industry reflect a Bertand or Cournoud model of oligopoly? What are the implications of Modigliani Miller’s Proposition II, and how have these changed in the face of today’s global financial crisis?

Professionally, I find myself asking, how much value can my business plan really create? Will I put myself forward for greater contributions within my company and industry, or explore new possibilities in private equity and social entrepreneurship?

Personally and practically, I find myself asking continuously – how can I stretch myself to reach the next milestone?

As the year ticked away in its seasons and rhythms, I soon recognised that the academic, professional, practical, personal and even philosophical questions cannot be compartmentalised – that they are in fact as intertwined as a tree is to the earth, the sky and everything in between.

Every project that you do, every assignment you submit, every connection that you make between colleagues, friends, family, classmates and professors… You are in fact raising a question.

Sometimes, you may even find yourself asking, is this achievable? Do I have it within me to complete this journey?

To this end, an ancient Chinese saying comes to mind:

Ask the question and risk being a fool for five minutes; don’t ask the question and remain a fool forever.

We’ll be on our own for Module 8, and then the New Year will usher in the EMBA VIs and we will be the ’senior class,’ the experienced ones who can advise the incoming class on what to expect for the first 12 months…

What will I tell them? Surely, when they ask me if it’s difficult, I will answer with a very affirmative YES.

We may not be going to the moon, but as JFK said, we do it not because it’s easy, but because it’s hard.

I will also repeat what we heard from Stephan Chambers that Monday morning way back at the start of Module 1 in January: the EMBA is transformational - professionally, academically and personally.

Professionally, I’ve been engaged within my organisation to lead bigger projects with larger commercial impacts; I will articulate the internal business case for my entrepreneurial project, and the execution for my core project. Though not yet complete, the EMBA has already set me free to think and act as a leader rather than a manager – to do the right thing, instead of just settling with doing things right. 

Academically, we’ve each written about 40,000 words thus far, articulating ideas, consolidating research, analysing outcomes, quantifying performance, exploring organisational behaviours… We’ve become fluent in the language of business. And Edward has already alluded to the lively discussions arising from pursuing the Oxford MBA in the midst of global financial turmoil and oil prices which rise and fall like the tide on the River Thames.

Personally, we’ve forged alliances with people who are globally-minded, dynamic, capable, and crucially, keen to make a difference. We’ve earned the respect of one another – especially those with families and other competing commitments. And for the record, our class has already seen four new births this year!

Of course the aspect of fun is not to be overlooked! Here in London, after picking up lost momentum from our London study group meetings, a bunch of us met for an evening of ice skating and drinks at Somerset House, followed by dinner at the Albannach on Trafalgar Square. Indeed it was a relief to be amongst classmates and friends without being constrained to discussions about the weighted average cost of capital and the vailidity of our assumptions in the acquisition of the Colinsville aluminium plant…

Earlier this evening during our Finance Study Group conference call, anxiety about forthcoming exams was expressed very candidly. Indeed, it didn’t escape our attention that there was as much silence during the call as there was discussion. That said, we also had our moments of laughter – Dave’s misunderstanding that our Operations Management text was a Christmas present comes to mind…

So with that thought and until next year, it’s time to sign off and resume studying in earnest…

Who would have thought that Financial Reporting could be so philosophical? After enduring the mock exam during Lecture 6, we were further reminded by Paolo Quattronne that Financial Reporting is driven by greater motivations than numbers and figures… that it is furthermore our responsibility, as students of an institution that has been educating leaders for more than 800 years, to question these motivations and institutions…

From a more technical aspect, we learned that whilst some parts of the balance sheet reveal insights into the effectiveness of internal management, others provide a way to measure the management of external, market-facing resources i.e. finance and capital.

So a firm can improve its enterprise value by considering internal aspects – operational efficiencies and the value of the services launched to a market…

Alternatively or in combination, re-allocation of finance and capital can have an equally compelling impact on enterprise value.

Considering this on a personal level, it occurred to me that the same methodology can apply to any individual embarking on the Oxford Executive MBA. To complete this journey, which is not an easy one by any measure, you need to effectively manage your own internal resources whilst simultaneously managing your external social i.e. market capital… this being the relationships and energy which nurture your internal resources.

It seems that the rules which apply to a firm are the very same which apply to an individual… You need to know who you are (organisational structure and branding), where you’re going (strategy), how you’re going to get there (operations), why you want to get there in the first place (marketing and corporate social responsibility), and how you’re going to tell the world (financial reporting)…

And if you’ve done your homework, your earnings – whether or not you choose to pay them out as dividends (roof terrace party?!? See my earlier blog), together with capital appreciation… will sum up to a greater return on your own fixed and current assets…

Since starting the Executive MBA, time management has taken on a whole new meaning – you really do need to stay on top of your game to keep up with studying, planning, revising and writing, all on top of the day job! Nevertheless, whether because of or in spite of all the work, the Oxford Executive MBA continues to be a multi-dimensional, rewarding experience.

Returning to the London office after two weeks in Oxford in some ways feels as if I had never left – same commute, same people, same desk, same familiar faces behind the tills at Pret and EAT… And yet, I’m left with the sense that the familiarity is superficial. I find that I’m asking different questions about the business. I pay attention to data in new ways. I think about cost, competition and management control systems from a deeper perspective. My presence and role in meetings have evolved… Eight months as an Oxford Saïd Business School student, I’m conscious that the seeds for greater contributions have already been planted… that last year’s status quo is all but a memory.