It's been almost two weeks since I've blogged, so I promise this is going to be a long entry.
It has been 1.5 weeks since school started, things could not have been better. I am doing four modules this semester:
FNCE213 - Entrepreneurial Finance
FNCE309 - Enterprise Risk Management
MGMT218 - Entrepreneurship and Business Creation
MGMT231 - Business Development: Strategy & Finance
Entrepreneurial Finance is a really insightful course. This is because the course is starting to allow me to understand why BHR, the company which I did my internship at, are doing the things that they are. Perhaps it would be good if I had gone into my internship with the knowledge that this course has to offer; I'd probably do much better in my internship in terms of adding value to my company.
Enterprise Risk Management is a really tough module. My file is about 100 pieces of paper thick already being stuff with Case Study timelines and printed Financial Times articles. On top of that, the lectures are quite difficult to follow because Judy is just way over the scale in terms of the depth that she is trying to cover and the breadth as well. Thankfully, there are no ERM classes next week, so I can take the ERM time next Monday to sit down somewhere quiet and go through everything and see how I can digest them. I would probably need to look up some books in the Course Reserve to learn about the Risks that firms face.
Entrepreneurship & Business Creation is fun. Prof Yoo Soo Jin is really one hell of a character and he knows how to crack us up with his Korean jokes. EBC is quite similar to EF in terms of the project - we are all supposed to think of good business ideas and circulate them around. So I guess this will be pretty good if I do end up using the same business idea on two modules.
Business Development is a special course conducted by a visiting Professor from University of St. Gallen, Professor Klaus Spreman. Most of the students in the class are students from St. Gallen and this is actually a course for their special programme in SMU, the Asia Term. Professor Spreman is quite a funny guy and provides some really outstanding insights into running a business. That, I think, is his real value-add to the students.
As a result of this course, I am also currently in Kuala Lumpur with the group of students in the Asia Term programme on a Cultural Study Trip. Yesterday and this morning, we had a short tour of Malacca, a place I visited when I was 15 while on my Mt. Ophir expedition with HQ NCC. It still looks the same, so it felt quite sad actually, that nothing had changed over the last close to a decade.
This afternoon we had a short tour of Bank Negara Malaysia, the central bank in Malaysia. In the evening, we had a networking session with the German-Malaysian Chamber of Commerce and some Australian SME Association in Malaysia. After that, I went out for drinks with the guys from St. Gallen and we really clicked very well.
I am so going to enjoy this trip. In the meantime I am going to enjoy the view from my Hotel Room on the 18th storey and snap more pictures of the Petronas Tower. :)
