OMBA World

Hendrik comes from Alaska.  Which must explain why he felt it was perfectly normal to dive into the frigid Pacific Ocean at around midnight in the middle of winter.  The other participants in the First-Annual OMBA Spontaneous Yurt Trip quickly concurred that a starlight plunge in 39 degree salt water was a brilliant idea.  Soon the beach was strewn with clothing.  I suppose such activities have a stress-relieving effect.  Or maybe generous quantities of cheap beer altered the cost-benefit analysis…

Washburn State Park, about an hour Northwest of Eugene, boasts camping sites and yurts for rent.  As an experiment in organizational management, someone decided to pick a weekend, rent two yurts, and see what happened.  At first it didn’t look like many people would be able to attend.  Team projects were piling up, midterms were looming, and the weather forecast, not surprisingly, called for rain.

Enter Erin stage left.  Our Vermont woodswoman was not about to let this opportunity to commune with nature slip through the cracks.  She waged war on the party poopers with her @uoregon.edu e-mail address.  It turned out that Erin was not the only grad student at LCB who was “hurtin’ for a yurtin’”.  Through not-so-subtle arm-twisting, guilt-tripping, and public shaming Erin convinced a critical mass to pack their sleeping bags, fill their coolers, and head for the coast.  Pretty soon everyone from the Center for Sustainable Business Practices (CSBP), along with a few Warsaw and Securities Analysis students, was hopping on the bandwagon.

We arrived at the yurt-site armed with Costco provisions, Brett’s camp stove (you can always count on a Michigander when it comes to camping), several bundles of firewood, and a wide selection of beverages.  Brett manned the grill, cooking up Chinook salmon patties so tasty even the vegans couldn’t resist.

As the night wore on, the fire got bigger and the banter got louder.  Eventually the campground host was obliged to politely request that voices be moderated.  Dan, from land-locked Arizona, had been looking all night for an excuse to venture down to the beach.  He seized the moment, rallying the merry-makers and leading through the Rhododendron and Scotch-broom down to the shore.   Soon the group of future business leaders was shivering in wet underwear on the moonlit sand.

A problem-solving exercise ensued as the MBAs attempted to determine which pants belonged to which person.  Once everyone was redressed (I don’t think Greg ever did manage to find his argil socks), Sara pulled out her camera and snapped several scrapbook-worthy images.  We returned to the warmth of the campfire to roast marshmallows and eat smores.

I came to the University of Oregon from across the country and the only thing that I knew for sure is I would be embarking on an adventure into the unknown.  To be honest, that is the major reason I chose Oregon in the first place.  I wanted to be put into a situation that would allow me to grow through all of the intangible and tangible experiences that can only happen in a new environment.  I’ve learned a lot of things over the past term here in Eugene, and it will only continue as we move into what I’m calling “internship season.”

We’ve heard about it from faculty, speakers, and the second year class – the internship search is a test of dedication for graduate students.  “Start early, do your research, and shake a lot of hands,” is the key take away that we are left with and it couldn’t be better advice.  Over the past couple of months I have had conversations with professionals from the industries that I see myself working around after graduating from the program.  The talks have been in many forms, whether it is coffee at a local café or a trip to Portland to tour a company’s operations from the inside.

So far no offers are on the table, it’s still very early in the season for that, but I’ve gotten a chance to see the business world from many fresh perspectives.  Each time you make the effort to engage somebody you come away with a better idea of what excites them about their career, what fuels their passion for work and life, and how their unique path led them to where they are today.  You also learn more about yourself in the process and what your answers to those questions are.

It’s an important process and it takes due diligence to make the calls, send the emails, and drive the miles.  However, when the time to accept that summer internship arises, I’m sure my classmates and I will be one step closer to the career and life we want to pursue.  Isn’t that the goal?

This winter term the entrepreneurship center is planning a trip to Seattle (February 17-20) for us, first year students. We’ll visit with entrepreneurial companies and with a couple of the big innovative firms that are based there.

The entire planning of this trip is done by us. Everyone had to suggest interesting companies to visit and then contact them to arrange meetings. In some cases that meant cold-calling. Picking up the phone and contacting someone who is busy and knows nothing about us – asking them to dedicate a couple of hours to us.

We are early in the planning stage, but we are optimistic. The school has some connections plus one of us is from Seattle and he is utilizing some amazing personal contacts. Everybody is very dedicated to making this trip as good as it can be.

My favorite class is Recognizing Business Opportunities. Taught by Prof. Andrew Nelson, it is highly energetic and interactive, it get’s you to evaluate all these ideas you keep in a small compartment at the back of your brain (well maybe you’re using a big idea compartment, I don’t know).

The other elective most of us at the entrepreneurship center are taking is a finance class taught by Prof. Larry Dann. It’s very different from last term’s finance class. I was contemplating taking it, and I’m very glad I did. It focuses on real world situations – essentially learning through cases. As an entrepreneur finance seems extremely important and personally, my experience is in technology development, so I’m looking to develop my enterprise skills.

We are also taking the core MBA classes: economics, operation management and seminar in business law. Don’t have much to say on that…

It seems like it’s going to be an interesting and valuable term. Hopefully it will offset the weather.

We’ve all returned from winter break well rested and enthusiastic about the new term.

The first term was a nearly relentless amount of studying across five different courses – none of which we could choose. But we now have the opportunity to take some electives from our respective specialty centers, and I’m relishing the chance to talk sports business in a non-water cooler environment.

More than the course work, however, I simply think everyone is enthusiastic to be back because they are now comfortable in the environment, aware of what to expect, and prepared for the challenges that lay ahead. There’s far less murky water this term than there was last, and that’s comforting.

I can only speak for myself, but I’ve settled into a nice routine: gym, tan, laundry.

…of course, I’m kidding. Tan? In Eugene? You’d stick out like a sore thumb.

My actual schedule looks a lot like this:

Monday: 12pm-9pm
Tuesday: 8:30am-1pm
Wednesday: 12pm-3:30pm
Thursday: 8:30am-10am

Understandably, it’s left me with a lot of time to pursue the other half of my MBA workload: job searching. I’ve been pretty active on the sports front with internship applications at the UFC, Under Armour, NHL, and in the next few days Nike and IMG. The UFC is the one I’m after though. I’m hoping that all the work I’ve done in the sport over the last few years (including my business of MMA website, MMAPayout.com) will pay off.

You’ve likely noted that Monday-Thursday leaves us with a three day weekend, which is great. It’s certainly not an extra day off, but we all work pretty hard during the week and thus going out at night and sleeping in are pretty popular amongst the cohort. Fridays off affords us a nice night out on Thursday, which then allows everyone to concentrate for the rest of the weekend.

I’m about to run, though. Floor hockey tonight and much homework left to do for tomorrow.

Well, everyone says it, “Time flies in the quarter system.”  Things are building up momentum as we near the end of our first quarter.  Thanksgiving was a nice break from the hustle, and whether or not they would admit it, our professors gave us a breather for the weekend.  We now look forward to one final week of classes followed by three days of finals.

Our class has had the opportunity to work with a Portland grocer, New Seasons Market (www.newseasonsmarket.com), to develop sustainable growth and innovation strategies for the future of New Seasons’ business.  The project is a joint effort that our management and marketing professors put together.  This week we turn in our final recommendations and then present to the class.  Presentations are scheduled this Friday, which if you are following any NCAAF you would know this is the day following the Civil War of the Roses.  It will be an interesting week working hard to get finishing touches done on our presentations before we go watch the battle for the Rose Bowl.

I’m sure Kelsey or I will have plenty to say after the following week.  Until then, I’m going to knock out some finance before my Cards take on the Titans.

I fully realize it’s been over a week since Halloween, but you must understand that I’ve just recovered! I think the picture above – me on the far right – probably explains a great deal, but I’ll elaborate on the night anyway.

The MBAA hosted a two-part Halloween celebration this year on account of the Oregon-USC game taking place on the 31st (Saturday). Many of the students engaged in a pumpkin carving contest on Thursday, and then we all converged upon the home of a second year student for a party on the Friday.

The night actually kicked off pretty early: a few first years started out at the house that my roommates and I have rented for the year (where the picture above was taken). Not long after a few renditions of some of the most popular 80s rock songs known to man (“don’t stop…believing!”), our band made its merry way down the road to the house party.

The walk itself kind of sucked: not only was I wearing tights and walking shirtless, but I’d also pulled my groing playing intramural soccer the week earlier. I’m lucky it was Eugene: a shirtless man in tights, wearing neon pink and blue face paint, and walking with a heavy limp isn’t something that people bat an eye at around here.

The party, however, was a great time: beer kegs, vodka, and drinking games. It might have ended a little early, but that didn’t bother many of us as we just made our way to Rennie’s Landing (convenient local watering hole on the side of campus).

In the end, everyone had a great night and got home safe. More importantly, we all survived to party another day, and we definitely needed that as Oregon would go on to crush USC on Saturday.

What do you mean, game of the century?

What did I mean?! The fourth ranked USC Trojans versus the conference unbeaten tenth ranked Oregon Ducks! Pac-10 title hanging in the balance! Gameday with Corso, Herbstreit, Fowler, Howard and all of ESPN setting up shop in Eugene for the weekend! Blackout, Autzen, Halloween night! That’s what I mean! Game of the century?! What an understatement! More like game of the millennium!

And my visiting friend still didn’t get it.

How could she though? She had never been to Eugene. She had never walked through the mist that some call “rain”. She had never passed the Knight Library and the EMU. She had never gone over the bridge and through Pre’s Trails. All of this, so she could be greeted by the “O” atop Autzen Stadium.

It really is an experience though, that she could only understand through being in Eugene for a Saturday night football game. And not just any football game, but the game of the century!

How can you explain to someone the feeling that you get as you walk with thousands of Duck faithful yelling “O” at the top of their lungs when you haven’t even made it off campus yet? It’s almost near impossible! And that’s the problem I was encountering as I attempted to explain the gravity of the gridiron battle she was about to take part in.

The scene outside of Autzen helped. The overflowing tailgates amid the clutter of news vans almost did the trick. As did the enormous crowds of Duck fans shouting “Go Ducks!”. But what really convinced her was the walk up the stairs leading into the inside of Autzen Stadium, the loudest college football stadium on the plant, nay in the universe! It was at the top of the stairs that the excitement in the air started to get to her.

Never mind the fact that the Ducks went on to a convincing forty-seven to twenty win over the vaunted USC Trojans. Or the fact that no team has scored that many points on a USC defense during the Pete Carroll era…ever. Or the fact that Oregon put up more yards against USC in about forever. Forget that the Oregon crowd, from the student section to the alumni, stormed the field as the fourth quarter clock hit zero. Don’t mention Puddles crowd surfing at the fifty yard line.

What made the game that Saturday the game of the century was that feeling at the top of the stairs, knowing you were about to enjoy a beautiful fall evening with 59,000 of your closest friends. It was the fireworks going off outside of Autzen as you made your way back onto campus. It was my friend telling me after the game that she was a Duck fan for life. It was THAT experience.

…OK, it was crushing USC too!

Oregon fans storm the field at Autzen; Oregon 47 - USC 20

By JJ Owen, MBA ‘11

So here’s the deal…I’m a Trojan fan.  Guilty as charged.  Do I root for the Ducks?  Absolutely.  But when it comes to college football, it’s Cardinal and Gold all the way (I did my undergrad at Southern Cal).

Needless to say, last week was a tough week for me.  Not only did I watch my Halos succumb to the evil empire in New York, but I watched the Ducks handout the worst beat down I have ever witnessed the Trojans take.  My roommates are just now letting me use actual silverware instead of plastic sporks. 

And yet, I’m not really disappointed at all in the result of the game.  What it came down to is Oregon is an incredibly talented team, more-so than people gave them credit for.  It wasn’t as if USC played poorly, it was just that, for the first time in a long time, they weren’t the most athletic/talented team on the field.  While I must admit that it felt like Traveler (the Trojan Horse) kicked me in the gut when the game ended, it didn’t take long for a sense of satisfaction to kick in about what I had just witnessed. 

As I sat in the USC section during the second half of the game, I had a great deal of time to take a look at everything around me (because I really couldn’t watch the dismantling of the Trojans on the field anymore).  I’ve been to some big games in my life (The Bush Push Game in ‘05 at Notre Dame, notably) and I can honestly say that what I saw Saturday night at Autzen was one of the greatest college football experiences I could possibly ask for.  Whether it was the student section shrouded in black starting up the “Go Ducks” cheer and pointing across the stadium, or everybody throwing up the Joey Harrington O-sign with their hands as they collectively screamed and pushed a decibel threshold that would make Metallica walk away saying, “It’s too damn loud.”  Basically, Saturday night at Autzen was everything college football should be. 

The chance to sit back and watch everything happening around me was utterly impressive, but I was even more floored by the interaction with all the fans.  Going into the game, I had heard that I would get completely lambasted and ripped to pieces for wearing any cardinal and gold.  Well, it was partly true – people were throwing daggers at me from all angles, but that’s just part of being a college football fan – the taunting.  What really surprised me though was after the initial scathing comment, they just wanted to talk football…they were real fans.

I can recall on my first visit up to the Warsaw Center how Paul explained to me the phenomenon of BIRGing, which is a marketing acronym for Basking In Reflected Glory.  It’s the reason why when your team is on the top of the world, you pull out your old jersey, you refer to your team as “we” instead of “they” – essentially, it’s along the lines that a rising tide lifts all boats.  What I witnessed Saturday night was 60,000 fans collectively basking in the reflected glory of the Ducks tremendous accomplishment, and it still gives me goosebumps.  This only confirms what I already thought to be true – the U of O is a special place, made up of special people, who create an experience that is truly unique.  Go Ducks.

October is over and wow did it go by quickly!  Some highlights:

• OMBA is representing (style, at least) in intramural sports:  The flag football team, Old Man Strength, and coed volleyball team, The Corporate Spanks, help provide MBA-ers a nice break from the week and a good outlet to de-stress.  Unfortunately, neither team has been able to produce a win.  Old Man Strength is 0-3 and The Corporate Spanks is 0-2.  This week looks promising for both teams — I will keep you posted.
• Midterms are [almost] over!  I believe the consensus is that they weren’t as bad as everyone had anticipated.  We may not have skills on the field but we really shine in the classroom!
• Autzen was rockin’ as the Ducks delivered the Trojans their worst defeat since 1997.  The energy in Eugene this weekend was indescribable.  Most would say that returning to reality from the fantasyland that is Halloween is bitter, but the smell of roses couldn’t have made this Sunday any sweeter!