Northeastern Is Moving on Up!

I would like to begin this entry with a little “congratulations” to my school.  This week BusinessWeek posted their annual MBA rankings.  In 2010, for the first time, Northeastern University was ranked! And, not only were we ranked, but we snagged the 56 spot! I’m so excited.  On that note, we were ranked 62 this year in US News & World Report’s list.  I’m so glad to see my school climbing up those ranks.  Let’s give Boston University and Boston College a run for their money (we may need to wait a bit on Harvard and MIT).

Monday is my executive luncheon with Lisa Laich of Ocean Spray Cranberries.  Again, it was a great success and she was very helpful and relaxed.  She even told us about how the REAL Mickey Mouse came to visit her office in support of Ocean Spray’s new partnership with Disney World as their ‘healthy snack’ provider.

On Tuesday everyone breaths a huge sigh of relief as we turn in our 100+ page accounting paper that analyzed the financial data of two companies in the same industry.  My group completed ours on Southwest Airlines and JetBlue Airlines.  I have never turned in a document so large that I had to get it professionally bound; I guess there’s a first time for everything.

Later that day I get my Human Resources paper back and am pleased to say I got an A- on my rewrite! I’m so relieved and feel much better as far as my understanding of the material and requirements.

Also, today in Human Resources we had several prospective students visit our class.  As part of my self-imposed duty as a Northeastern spokesperson, I approach them after class and direct them to this blog.   I also offer to meet with one student next week to chat about the program, its offerings and the trials and tribulations of 'living the Northeastern MBA' (see what I did there? Eh? Eh?)

Wednesday is a very long day!

After class the Marketing Club has a meeting with one of our consulting projects: The Marshfield Fair.  We meet two board members and discuss possibilities on how to increase attendance to their August fair event.

After the meeting the executive board meets up to determine who will head each consulting project.  I’m proud to say that I will be in charge of the Massachusetts Horticultural Society project.  We send out invites for our next official meeting with a list of our upcoming opportunities.  These include: a tour of the Ocean Spray Cranberries facilities, a guest speaker and a holiday party with 2^nd year Marketing MBAs.

That evening we have our International Field Study information session.  I can hardly contain my excitement (though some of my classmates may say I couldn’t contain my excitement at all).  The professors leading each trip gave us a rundown on itineraries.  They all seem very nice and knowledgeable so I’m quite pleased.  Plus, there was free pizza! You can’t go wrong with that.  On a side note: I have become the official promoter for the country of India.  I’m just saying that maybe India should give me stipend for all of my efforts. Why the effort, you ask?  I’m nervous about the trip being canceled if we don’t meet the 15 student minimum.  Another wrench in my plan: Northeastern will not allow students from India to participate in this trip.  I’ll just have to use my persuasive marketing skills to make it happen. 

After the information session a bunch of us girls head to Parish Café, conveniently located just down the street from my house.  It was great to hang out and have a chance to socialize, though I’m sad to report that my sandwich was trés disappointing.  Who would have thought that banana walnut bread, honey-baked ham and cheese could be messed up? 

Because of the Veterans Day holiday we get a day off from classes on Thursday (notice I did not just say ‘day off’- we never get that).

Despite this mini vacation from school, I do not sleep in, instead waking up early to meet with my group for a few hours to finish our marketing presentation.  I will admit that this was one of our more entertaining projects. We had to create a marketing plan for a company called Digital Angel using Web 2.0, or social media.  We spend the next several hours fabricating Facebook pages, Twitter accounts and YouTube channels.  Lesson learned: don’t let MBA students near even a sliver of fun or you’ll have an entire fictional company created online, complete with logos and real Twitter tweets, within a few hours.

On Friday I meet up with my co-leader of the Massachusetts Horticultural Society project.  We make up a slide presentation, pick out our specific project and get ready for our Friday club meeting to lure members to our team.

In Career Management today we have our final career track panel: Finance. We host representatives from Wellington, Staples, Cypress Tree Investments, Raytheon and TJX.  While I’m not a Finance major by any means, it was very interesting to see the differences in attitude between the finance employers and the Marketing or Supply Chain panel.  Case in point: one of the panelists bluntly proclaimed that he would throw away any resume with a 3.2 GPA from Northeastern.  Well folks, if you’re interested in finance, put your nose to those books!

After Career Management, I head to my last executive luncheon of the semester.  I meet up with Jodie Neville, a brand manager at Hasbro and a current Executive MBA at Northeastern.  This time we join her in Dodge Hall and enjoy one of the EMBA’s catered lunches (which they get each class day).  She is so laid back and helpful, even suggesting a potential partnership with the Marketing Club for a project she wants to propose to Hasbro.

Afterward I attend a training session for a virtual MBA fair I will be working.  The fair, put on by the Economist, will host about 20 schools.  Prospective students from around the world will be able to attend.  I will be conducting a group chat on networking while in you MBA.  How exciting!

After all my work is done, it’s time to play.  I join a couple of classmates for the cinematic masterpiece that is Saw 3D (yes, you read that correctly).  It was ridiculous but hilarious and definitely a distraction for the stresses of school.

Besides my normal weekend routine of errands I head out for a bar crawl on Boylston tonight.  My friend’s sister is in town and so a group of us head to Dillon’s and then The Pour House to show her a good time.  What a small world it is because we run into several classmates at The Pour House.  I guess we all needed a bit of a break.

Sunday I discover an alternative to the crowded Marino Center, courtesy of a friend. SquashBusters is a Northeastern gym located near the Alumni Center.  A much smaller version of Marino it, nonetheless, offers everything I need and is much closer to my house.  What a hidden gem! It will be excellent for my weekend workouts.

I spend the rest of the day trying (trying being the keyword) to get back on my routine of having all of my Monday and Tuesday assignments done by the end of the weekend- we’ll see how that goes.  As I look ahead to all of my assignments due in the next few weeks I begin to get a bit overwhelmed,  but I buckle down a finally begin the dreaded Living Document 1.  At 40+ pages I feel as though I at least should start it before Thanksgiving break.  I don't want anything distracting me from a holiday centered around eating. Yum!

* The views expressed in this blog are not necessarily those of Northeastern University, its faculty, staff or affiliates and are solely the opinion of Katrina Graves.