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“All the leaves are brown. And the sky is gray.”
Yesterday I walked home from Gleacher Center and marveled at the change in atmosphere: the damp chill that merits gloves, the heavy whiteness of the sky, the bracing wind that whips through wool. Almost overnight it seems, the seasonal ice skating rinks have been erected, the summer awnings rolled away, sidewalk seating packed up for the winter.
Today’s weather was actually warm in contrast, making it possible to survive in only a light jacket and no gloves or scarf. But the sky still wore the mantel of winter, creating a stark backdrop for the bright punctuations of yellow, red, orange and gold in the trees lining the avenue, many of which have already shed their plumage, littering the streets with the moist remnants of their vibrant headdress. Soon, they will all be bare, and days like today but a distant memory. Soon, the novelty of waking to a monochrome sky, the Sears Tower shrouded in haze, will be all but forgot.
I can already anticipate the longing I will feel in a few short months for a blue sky, a warm breeze, a green leaf. But for now, I am relishing this season of change, this departure from what is familiar and my immersion in this new and wondrous world.
Have been listening to the new Radiohead album “In Rainbows” almost obsessively of late. It seems the perfect soundtrack for the current clime. Have pasted a link to the video above so you can “feel” the change of season with me.
6:30 a.m. Alarm goes off. Last night’s study music blasts from iPod dock.
6:37 a.m. Hit snooze. Stumble to kitchen to turn on coffee pot.
6:38 a.m. Back to bed.
6:39 a.m. Kitty joins me. Snuggle time. Sounds and smells of percolating coffee.
6:47 a.m. Alarm goes off again. Groan.
6:49 a.m. Shed covers. Race to dresser for socks, sweatshirt. Closet for fuzzy robe.
6:50 a.m. Coffeeeeeeeeeeeee.
6:52 a.m. Make bed.
6:55 a.m. Open laptop. Alarming amount of new email received. Answer some. Check Facebook.
7:45 a.m. Notice time. Mutter curses.
7:50 a.m. Shower.
8:00 a.m. Stand in front of closet. Indecision.
8:01 a.m. Back to laptop to check calendar for the day. Recruiting event that night. More curses. Check Facebook, blog stats.
8:11 a.m. Try on about twenty things. Nothing matches.
8:37 a.m. Notice time. Check CTA schedule. Metra left 2 minutes ago. Groan.
8:39 a.m. Throw course packs, text books, gloves, chapstick in bag while gulping down third cup of coffee. Consider packing lunch. Remember I have still not brushed teeth, applied makeup, or picked my ensemble for tonight’s corporate presentation. Change music to something more hectic. Hurry time.
8:40 a.m. Make up. Teeth. Deoderant.
8:42 a.m. Pin back hair. Hate it. Remove pins. Repeat.
8:49 a.m. Remember on tight schedule. Leave it.
8:50 a.m. Correctly identify sensation of hunger. Make oatmeal.
8:51 a.m. Shovel it in while standing over sink.
8:52 a.m. Recheck CTA schedule for alternate bus or train. Check weather. Need tights.
8:55 a.m. Trip over cat on way to the dresser. No clean tights.
8:56 a.m. Costume change.
8:58 a.m. Consider shifting mountain of tried on and discarded clothes to chair. Leave in center of bed.
9:59 a.m. Recheck CTA schedule. Vow to make next bus. Ignore 20 new emails received in last 7 minutes.
9:00 a.m. Shove laptop in back pack, recheck for phone, wallet, gloves, course notes, pencils, CTA card, iPod, hand cream. Grab coat, scarf, keys on way out door.
9:01 a.m. Double back for laptop charger. Grab suit bag. Shoes.
9:02 a.m. Lock up. Race to elevator. Push button. Check for name tag. Curses.
9:03 a.m. Back inside. Where is nametag? Check coffee pot. Turn it off. Hear elevator doors open down the hall. Nametag MIA. Dig through laundry bag for yesterday’s suit. Still on lapel.
9:05 a.m. Race back to elevator. Gone. Hit button again. Curses.
9:06 a.m. Wait for elevator.
9:07 a.m. Where is elevator?
9:09 a.m. Elevator?
9:10 a.m. Elevator now MIA.
9:14 a.m. Elevator finally arrives. Squeeze self, pack, purse, suit bag onto car. Mumble apologies to other passengers.
9:15 a.m. Race to bus. Fastest walking ever.
9:16 a.m. Fastest walking up hill in high heels with 30 lbs of books against the wind.
9:18 a.m. Remember to-go coffee still sitting on counter. Sadness.
9:19 a.m. Get to corner. See #2 bus coming. Break into a run. Wave arms at driver.
9:20 a.m. No luck. Continue walk to stop.
9:22 a.m. Spot #6 round corner. Walk faster while mentally calculating time added to schedule by taking slower bus.
9:23 a.m. Made it. Climb steps. Good morning to driver. Swipe card.
9:24 a.m. Text message to study group. Will be late for 9:30 meeting. Apologies.
(to be continued)
Because time is precious, I’m pasting the text from an email I wrote to my pops earlier tonight. (Sorry Dad, this will all be old news to you. Okay, maybe some new news. Just skip down to the line break.)
Dad’s Email:
Teresa, Nancy told me about your grades on your midterms. Just
remember nothing worthwhile is easy to attain. The GSB has a
reputation for a reason, I guess. The good news is that you passed
and get to move on. You’re in an elite program and they won’t make it easy.
I ran across this email [contains a link to this article] today. You could probably benefit from some
deep breathing exercises today too. Remember to stay non-attached!
My response:
Thanks Dad. It’s hard to maintain perspective sometimes. Grad school can feel like an unrelenting series of failures or missed opportunities to shine. But I try to remind myself that I didn’t come here to be the smartest person in the room… Plus, for all the losses or disappointments I have experienced, I have had my own share of (small) successes. And though I didn’t ace my midterms, I didn’t fail them either… In fact, I am learning an extraordinary amount here. For example, a few weeks ago I wouldn’t have even known what an unbalanced cash flow statement looked like (or even built one for that matter!). I may not be able to solve equations for optimal pricing in a monopoly environment, but at least I understand the market forces driving them. This week’s stats assignment may have taken me five hours to complete (even with the help of my study group), but 2 months ago I wouldn’t have even known how to build a 95% confidence interval off of a Normal distribution using sample data … And would have thought se(x) was just sick statistician humor. And though I might not be as far along as some of my classmates, I am being challenged. And that is, after all, what I came here for.
One of the hardest things so far has been prioritizing ‘me’ time. But I am doing better in that respect as well. Funnily enough, this morning (for the first time in 2 months) I actually found 10 minutes to do some poses, stretch … and breathe.
———
[Hey Dad! You can pick up reading here.] So… the background. As you’ve probably inferred from the above, my midterm grades were not exactly what I expected. Also, though we spent 20+ hours putting our deck and recommendations together, our DMAC Case Challenge team was not selected to present in the final round. Honestly, that one totally caught me by surprise. It’s the unexpected losses that really take the wind out of your sails. Friday, after I got the “thanks for playing, but no” email from DMAC, I found myself resorting to some “secret single behavior” I hadn’t indulged in more than 3 months. Yes, it did involve Japanese number puzzles, but don’t worry. It was just minor set-back. I’m not off the wagon yet. 😉
Over weekend I got a lot of great calls from friends back home, which was really amazing. And today I felt a world of difference in my outlook. I still miss the giving and receiving of “real” hugs, but over-the-phone ones are equally comforting. Even though I’ve already made some amazing friends, it’s easy sometimes to feel alone in the crowd here. Nothing compares to love and affection from those who know you well. Speaking of which, I am about to book my Amtrak ticket to K-zoo for the Thanksgiving holiday [so Mom you can quit worrying about me… or about this particular thing… I know you will never entirely stop worrying about me :)]. I will be so glad to see my family, eat good food and get lots of hugs. I may even finally get to have that good, long cry. (fair warning)
L is coming over in a couple of hours for a post-homework debrief with wine and Russian chocolate, so I’d better get my nose back in the books. Long-term asset impairment awaits! Love to all the lovelies…
“If you are idle, be not solitary; if you are solitary, be not idle.” – Samuel Johnson
Samuel Johnson my as well have been referring to life at the GSB. Or at least life in the Harper Center. Between midterms, recruiting, cohort activities, LEAD and career research (mostly just strategic interviews with second year students as I’ve yet to muster the fortitude to play the part of eager-to-be-recruited student at any of the corporate presentations thus far), the past week has been a balancing act between academically productive solitude and socially productive idleness. In other words, I have been splitting my time on campus equally between the student lounge and the study lounge.
In the best news of the week, we finally wrapped up production on our cohort commercial!! I can’t post it now because other teams are still working on theirs, but hope to send out a link following Golden Gargoyle’s (the public presentation and award ceremony) on November 17. To whet your appetite, I’ve posted some stills below. I also completed my ACT seminar (Audience Captivation Training – lord, we love the acronyms), delivering a four-minute speech about how I overcame my speech impediment. I didn’t realize how much this was hanging over my head until it was over. And Thursday was a night of hearty celebration as a result.
Friday night was the first night in weeks that I stayed in and didn’t crack a single text book. Heaven. And? I got a full nine hours sleep. Nirvana. And a long walk in the sunshine the next morning. Paradise. All of this combining to almost make up for the fact that I spent 5 hours at the Gleacher Center yesterday, wading through Revenue Recognition and Inventory Analysis. One more chapter to study today, and then I should be caught up with Accounting. Lord knows I needed it. Which became even more apparent after slogging through the midterm Tuesday.
This evening, my teammates for the Dean’s Marketing Action Committee (DMAC) Case Challenge are coming over to noodle ideas. The challenge? Position the GSB favorably in the minds of recruiters and the business community at large, at dispell the misconception(?) that GSB is weak on leadership and soft skill development. An interesting task, because it is almost more a programatic issue than simply a communications challenge. But it’s also an issue that is near and dear to my heart, so I am looking forward to the opportunity to contribute to the institutional conversation on the topic. Will save my thoughts on the matter for a later post. Don’t want competing teams glomming on our good ideas! I will say though that it borrows from Mike’s model for the “virtuous cycle,” and some of the positioning confluence between McKinsey and the GSB. More to follow.
Recruiting events are now in full swing. And unlike last week, this week there are actually some firms on campus that I could potentially be interested in for the summer. As such, I’ve spent 5 hours this morning (including the free hour I picked up via DST) prepping for my Corporate Conversations by searching the Career Services online databases for company info. Doing this actually helped me narrow my search field a bit. For example, based on what I learned this morning, there is only one firm in tomorrow afternoon’s multi-firm conversation for whom I would be even remotely interested in working. And my research yielded some excellent talking points for the post-presentation networking hour, ex: “I’m attracted to the firm’s obvious appetite for growth, as evidenced by recent years’ multiple acquisitions, particularly in the electricity segment. Do you see growth through acquisition as an ongoing part of Eaton’s core strategy? And if so, what role will your marketing team play, if any?” Of course, I could also be a normal person and chat with the recruiters about life and work in Cleveland (what little I know about it, namely restaurants in Little Italy, the influence of institutions like Case Western and the Cleveland Clinic on the regional economy, the gentrification of urban neighborhoods and the reintroduction of the creative class to the city’s urban core, and – most importantly – the world renown of Cleveland’s own Michael Symon, chef/owner of Lola).
I’m still on the fence about whether or not to attend, but in a surprising reverse move I’ve actually added a couple of presentations for consulting firms, namely BCG, Bain and McKinsey, that are also taking place this week to my calendar. Though, to be honest, as intrigued as I am about the lifestyle, intellectual stimulation and pedigree to be attained through association with McKinsey, even if only for a summer, I’ve been pretty unimpressed by their dealings with the school to date. Friday they hosted a “lunch and learn” presentation at the same time as the gala dedication ceremony of the Harper Center, which all of the GSB’s top brass and alumni dignitaries were attending. On top of that the recruiter showed up 20 minutes late. Also, the same day (Friday) they sent out an email invite to a recruiting event for women at the GSB that they are hosting next week, with strict instructions to RSVP by that evening. Seriously? Unfortunately, I took the night off on Friday, eschewing email in favor of a date with the boys from Entourage and the men of Rome, so I didn’t get this until the following day, when it was already too late. Quel damage. In their responses to last year’s recruiter survey they said that attendance at information sessions is not important (or not nearly so important as the things they really value, like GMAT scores, undergraduate predigree, and case performance). I suppose this means that they like who they like, and no amount of ass kissing is going to change that. Still, I’m not so impressed by their behavior so far… Also, I read the consultant blogs on the BCG website and found the narrative to be overly technical, super dry and (sadly) rather lacking in personality (which was the point?). Disapppointing, given their focus on marketing consulting. Am I too critical? Should I be saying any of this out loud? Or, worse, on online? Perhaps not. Still, I think a healthy sense of skepticism will help to keep me sane in the coming weeks and months, and as such, I choose to continue to cultivate it.
Challenge everything. That’s the Chicago way, no?
Persiflage et Bonhomie 