Module 1 is Toast!

It’s been a hectic two weeks to say the least. Module 1 of the term is pretty much toast now and Module 2A with its accounting, finance, and strategy are about to begin. I’m burnt out to say the least, but I feel that I had a fairly successful first term. The last two weeks have involved 15-17 hours of work per day non- stop, and the lack of sleep is taking a real toll on my immune system. I’m still fighting bronchitis and the steroid pump that I was prescribed seems to be useless when I don’t get my sleep. I’ve cut back on the Halls; I seriously believe that I was becoming addicted to them ;)

The busy two weeks has really allowed me to make some real observations about how stress changes one’s personality. We recently conducted a self-assessment test in our “Manage Your Career” class called “Leadership Wheel.” In essence it tells you about what kind of a leader you are under normal situations and under extreme situations. I’m fairly well-versed in normal situations, but become polar North under stress meaning that I become very aggressive as a leader, with one and only one mission in mind; to get the job done no matter whose feet I step on. This was not a surprise to me and I know that both delegation and trusting my peers are key skills that I ought to work on especially when under the gun (also reflected in my 360 feedback). Anyhow, I found that many of my classmates have been acting a bit differently in the last couple of weeks likely because of the stress. I think a key takeaway here is that it’s always important to put yourself in the shoes of others when you find that they are acting differently; give them the benefit of the doubt and it’s likely that they’ll be their old self once the tough times subside.

I had a really rough couple of days early last week. Geeta was trapped in Ottawa awaiting our car to be fixed. Two transmissions later, and 10 days of mechanical work finally yielded a working car that seems smoother then ever ;) Unfortunately, under the spell of stress, the two of us ended up in a pretty bad argument early last week that just seemed to come at the wrong time. I was preparing for my final presentation and a final course exam, and didn’t appreciate the timing; not to mention that it hit me at a low point when I was tired and frustrated. I said a few nasty things (need to practice those crucial conversations) and Geeta wasn’t too impressed, and rightfully so! I was so upset that I embarrassingly walked off on a couple of really good friends after they tried to reach out to me the next day. I have a hard time reaching out to people, however I feel blessed to have met some really good new friends that care. Both of these people reached out to me in their own ways which was really touching. I felt really embarrassed about the whole thing, yet both of these friends made me feel comfortable. One person in particular went out of her way to put a smile back on my face (which couldn’t have come at a better time), and I feel really lucky to have her as a friend.

Coming from Nortel, one of my strongest beliefs lies in the power and emphasis of team work. Nortel has a highly team-oriented work environment and I’ve tried to carry some of those qualities into my own MBA team. One of those beliefs lies in the power to collaborate amongst team members and share information. My most favourite former boss always encouraged knowledge sharing and stressed its importance; I feel that this mentality is permanently engrained in my leadership style. As a result, I’ve tried to make a point of sharing some of my efforts with the team. Furthermore, our team has had open discussions on this and all agree about the importance of knowledge-sharing. We’ve made it a point as a team to spread this collaborative culture across the entire class and to other teams, and we are proud that it’s having a very positive effect. There are increasing signs that others are seeing the power of knowledge sharing; in fact in some capacity it seems to be unifying other teams and encouraging others to do the same. I believe that one’s success in not measured on an individual basis but rather on a team basis. I would like to see this class emerge as a unified team that will support each other and encourage each other’s success throughout our careers. This would be far more useful and powerful to all of in the long terms as opposed to competing for short term high $$ jobs, acting individually, and withholding knowledge that could be useful to others.

We’ve had some very interesting guest speakers over the last couple of weeks; the former Chief Medical Officer (who dealt with the SARS crisis); CEO of ING Direct Arkadi Kuhlmans, and Chief Editor of the Hamilton Spectator (newspaper). Listening to the former Chief Medical Officer made me realize how difficult a job it is to meet the demands of politicians and the media while upholding what’s right for the situation at hand. The CEO of ING Direct told a very compelling story of how his company is revolutionizing the banking industry. Who knew that ING Direct is now the #16 bank in the U.S? Wow! I felt that his presentation was somewhat of a recruiting mission; to stir up interest in working for his new-era corporation but I appreciated it all the same. Finally, the chief editor of the Hamilton Spectator provided a very interesting perspective on how to deal with media; a task that some of us maybe privileged to endure in the future. There seems to be a whole art associated to handling the media, and one has to be very careful not to piss them off; remember bad news stories sell….always be careful on what you say! Sticking to the facts is always a safe bet; talking to assumptions can land you in a pile of trouble.

There’s one professor here at school that has really struck a cord with me. He teaches our “Leading People and Organizations” course …..I describe him as a high energy, wake you up, inspire me to excel type of a professor. I like high energy, especially in the morning when I’m half a sleep. This professor inspires me to push the limits, to find the adrenalin within, and to make an impact. He cares about students and works long hours; a true passion for education and I respect him. No wonder he was voted the professor of the year last year. I know some students tend to dislike his cold-calling during class but in my opinion if you’ve got a professor that cares that much and is that passionate about seeing you succeed, you owe him the respect to prepare for his class.

Until next time,

Sacha

Lose some...win some

I’m writing this entry while onboard a Via train heading back to London. Geeta and I took a last minute trip to Ottawa this weekend to welcome our new niece into the world. We left late Friday (around 7:30PM) and hit Ottawa by 12:30AM on Saturday. My niece (who still remains nameless) is so cute. Mom and baby are doing great, and my brother is as happy as can be. I’m an uncle for the 7th time over and yes I’m the only one in my family (2 brothers and a sister) who doesn’t have kids yet ;)…hopefully soon! I think the coolest part of the whole experience was seeing the reaction of my nephew (Rohan; aged 6), and niece (Rhea; aged 5) when they saw their baby sister for first time. They were so happy and gentle with her…truly a Kodak moment….a great day for the Gera family.

This weekend started off horribly. Everything that could go wrong was. Geeta and I left to Ottawa under the assumption that my sister-in-law was in labour and that she would deliver 100% this weekend. Failure to do so would mean another trip to Ottawa next weekend, which is hugely unproductive for me from a schooling perspective. By Saturday night it seemed like we were out of luck; my sister-in-law showed no signs of going into real labour….I got pretty much nothing done in terms of homework and I was getting a bit stressed. In addition to this, our car (2003 Acura RSX) dropped dead on Saturday while Geeta was at Wal-Mart in Orleans (Eastern suburb in Ottawa). While Geeta was backing out of a parking spot, a ton of transmission fluid leaked out onto the asphalt below and the car abruptly jerked and shut off. A couple of mechanics at Wal-Mart told us that it was likely that our transmission was shot! How could this be? The car is less then 5 years old and has 101 000 km on it. It’s still practically new! We had to tow the car to our mechanic’s which was a pain in the ass. What’s worse is that our warranty on the car’s transmission is for 5 years/100 000km (whichever comes first). The car is less then 5 years old, but is over the mileage criteria. I think it’s going to be a fight with Acura Canada over whether they’ll honour the warranty despite us being 1000 km over. As a result of this car mess, Geeta is unexpectedly staying in Ottawa this week to get it fixed (hence I’m on a train heading home to London solo). I’m a bit stressed about the warranty not coming through. A new transmission on our cute sports car could run us $6k by some accounts…ouch! Not what we need right now. Perhaps we lost a car this weekend, and perhaps I’m coming home without my wife, but I am delighted and incredibly lucky to be an uncle to a beautiful girl…I guess not everything went wrong this weekend!

A couple of knick-knacks regarding school. You know what’s awesome about the people in this program?... They are so friendly and inviting. My sister-in-law was down this week visiting, and we took her over to a classmate’s house (there were a few others there). Immediately, people were asking my sister-in-law to stay until Friday so that she could meet everyone and have some fun with the class. Unfortunately, she couldn’t stay…but it speaks volumes to the type of people in this program…very warm and inviting indeed. Another interesting knick-knack from school; I’ve noticed that a few people in the class keep their hand up even after they’ve been selected to answer the question. It’s like they forget to put their hand down….very humorous to me. By my count, I think there are about 3 people doing this. It makes me laugh every time. What’s interesting is that all three are from the same cultural background (which is the same as mine)… makes me wonder if it’s a cultural thing or not. Anyhow..I can always use a good smile to start off my day in class ;)

In my last entry, I forgot to write about Outward Bound day. Outward Bound day was a team building exercise that pushed each one of us in the class to our limits both mentally and physically. It involved outdoor rope climbing activities, tight rope walking, and team competitions etc. At the risk of being overly-descriptive I’ll keep the details to a minimum….let’s just say that it involved 70 odd Type A leader personalities being forced to trust each other and depend on one another for safety and goal- achievement purposes. Ever heard of the phrase, “ A lion won’t believe in anyone else”? If you’re a U2 fan you’ll know that line from the 1991 song, “The Fly.” In essence it refers to the fact that leaders (i.e. ‘lions’) have a hard time believing in others….i.e. they only trust themselves to get the job done. Well…in Outward Bound day, this wasn’t a possibility….You had to trust your mate or you could get hurt, or fail to accomplish the task at hand. There’s one activity that really pushed me to my limits, and unbelievably it wasn’t the rope climbing activity where we had to climb up a pole with 2 other team mates roughly 30 feet high and use each other’s weigh to counter-balance while perched on top of a 2x2 pedestal. The activity that pushed me to my limits was in fact a much simpler activity: essentially you had to fall back onto your partner without allowing your arms to break your fall (i.e. kind of like tipping a domino over). If your partner failed to catch you, it would certainly mean injury…likely a head injury. Ok I might be exaggerating a bit…but really it was scary! I must admit that I wasn’t trusting of my partner, who happened to be a petit female and likely weighs 40% less then I do. Logically, the physics of the activity surely couldn’t allow her to break my fall without one of us getting hurt. Learning to let go and just go with the flow is hard to do…but I did it (i.e. let myself fall back in free fall) and unbelievably my partner caught me safely. Its weird how a simple activity like that can teach you a lot about yourself, and how trust is a tough issue for leaders. I think I really need to start trusting people more easily!

This week, I started the process of engaging Mike Zafirovski, CEO of Nortel, to visit Ivey and bring some visibility to the company on campus. It’s greatly disturbing to me on how little of a presence Nortel has on campus. As Canada’s top R&D spender, and as one of Canada’s largest companies, one would surely expect them to be recruiting this top talent, but there not there. I am going to do my part to change this. I did send the CEO and his EA (Exec. Assistant) a letter expressing my invitation proposal, and I did get a read receipt from both him and his EA but I have yet to hear back. I had the opportunity to dine with Mr. Zafirovski last March at the Nortel Leadership conference in Ottawa. I had the opportunity to host that conference last year and introduce him, and I hope he’ll remember me from our brief encounter.

Lastly, I thought I’d mention that I’ve been sick for over 5 weeks now. It’s getting really annoying. It started off with bronchitis and a round of antibiotics that failed to clear my lungs. My recent exercise obsession and life-long love of dairy products (i.e. cereal) haven’t been helping. They’ve been aggravating my cough and lung congestion and I’m not getting better. I’ve cut out the dairy and the exercise temporarily in an effort to recuperate. I’ve also been drinking ginger tea, which seems to be working. Did I mention that I’ve been chewing my way through a pack of halls every day since I’ve been sick? My next door neighbour in class (who happens to be part of my MBA learning team) says I’m addicted to them. At first I laughed at the comment, but now I’m wondering if there is any truth to it? Can you get addicted to Halls and the medicine that in it? I do find myself with a craving for Halls on an hourly basis ;) Maybe it’s time to put them away.

Until next time…


Sacha

One Month Down, 11 To Go

One month of Ivey is completed. Wow time is flying by! The experience thus far has been exceptional for me. I’m learning a lot about myself, and living away from home is helping me develop in ways I could never foresee. The interesting part is that most of my learning in the first month has been mostly from a personal perspective and not so much from an academic perspective. I didn’t see that coming. In my last blog entry, I talked about how I felt that I was changing as a person in a very rapid fashion. That change continues to accelerate. I feel like my personality is moulding on a daily basis. I want to be more social, more open-minded, and more comfortable with myself.

Geeta came back to London this week. I’m glad she’s back and I didn’t realize how glad I was until she came through the door. The truth is that my time alone was really good for me in a number of ways, and confusing in others (i.e. dealing with all the change). Within an hour of her being back, we engaged in a very deep conversation on everything I felt like I was going through. You know what’s amazing about the whole thing; our talk was a frank reminder on why we are good together and how good we are with being open about things. She totally gets me and encourages me to keep exploring the path I’m on, and the areas that perhaps I missed out on when I was younger. I respect that she is so supportive and I hope I can do the same for her. I’m glad she’s back because we don’t do as well when we’re apart for long periods of time. We also had to make some personal decisions this week and it was definitely much easier doing that in person then over the phone where our discussions often end up stressing the other out.

I just completed a case reading on GE and Jack Welch, and was blown away by it. As many Nortel employees know, Nortel is under a business transformation process that is bringing many of GE’s Six Sigma and operation strategies into the corporation. I never realized that the changes occurring in Nortel were essentially a carbon copy of those that took place in GE. Reading this case was like getting a copy of the playbook or the master blueprint for the company and where we’re going, what the culture will be like, and how decisions will be made….unbelievable. I think I understand the 10 000 foot view of Nortel’s strategy now; how we are traversing from a hardware company to a service-oriented company to get those higher margins and move a way from a commodity market, how we are aiming to be #1/#2 in a market segment or fix, sell, or close it, how we are weeding out those that don’t deliver and share the same values, how we are de-layering the company and making the environment boundary less, how leadership development is being promoted from within, how we are globalizing….all very interesting to read and relate to.

Exercise has become an incredibly lifting part of my days! I’m trying to do something active at least 4 to 5 days a week. These days I’ve picked up the habit of running outside after class or taking a swim in the evening hours when I get home. Not only has it been fantastic stress relief, but it’s energizing me after those long days in class. I put together a new mix of MP3s that seem to pump me up and get me going. I’ve got a new song stuck in my head this last week; “Viva la Vida” by Coldplay. Great intro and a great hook to that tune: Very ‘U2’; hence the reason I probably like Coldplay.

I’m in the midst of doing a number of self-assessments as per a course requirement. I think that often times when we are buried in our day jobs, we don’t put enough emphasis on doing these assessments. They are imperative to identifying changing interests, strengths, and weaknesses and offer an interesting perspective on how to keep yourself relevant, challenged, and happy. Although many of those surveys are painful, they are worth it in the end. Thanks to all that completed my 360 feedback!

That’s enough for this week. Wish me luck on my first mid-term exam this Thursday…..Did I
mention that I’m in the preliminary process of engaging Mike Zafirovski, CEO of Nortel to visit Ivey and deliver a key note presentation? More on that next time.