YoVigilo & First period scores

Last Thursday night was the official Venture Lab Projects kick-off, I could meet our mentor, the person who is going to help us through the process of developing our business plan (YoVigilo Project). I had a very good impression about him and I’m hoping to learn a lot from his advices, suggestions and general orientation. It’s quite exciting to think you could get a business started-up , it’s quite a challenge! Let will see how it goes..

My main objective or goal from all of this it’s at least to have the “academic” experience involve in a new business start-up. Market research, strategic plan, and of course, writing the business plan: the four Ps -marketing strategy, business model, operations, finance analysis, organization model and so on... As I said… Let will see how it goes! Fingers crossed!
By other hand, finally we got the last MBA subject score (B+ in RSC for me… :-)). We’re given scores based in a Gaussian curve, it’s something mandatory according to the master rules. From the total of 7 subjects I got (1 A , 4 B+, and 2 B). No subject failed (C) or with a C+ was my personal goal, so have to reckon I’m quite happy with my achievement in this first period!
Thanks and smile,

dk

What do you think about this Blog?

So, what do you think about digital-knight? Is It interesting? Boring? Do you like it or not? Any suggestions to improve its contents?
Blogs are supposed to be a mechanism to interact and communicate with others, accept criticism and try to improve things if you can.
I’ve written a small report about Corporate Blogs, advantages and disadvantages of using blogs from a business perspective. As you know, each day, new corporate blogs are created. More CEOs and company directors are joining the blogosphere each day, trying to get the competitive advantage in doing so. Take as an example, Sun Microsystems, Cisco or Marriot’s CEOs. Anyway, it’s difficult to measure the economic benefit and there are some risks you take but if those clever people are doing it, might be profitable don’t you think?
Thanks and smile,

dk

Eva & Aguila 650 GV in the way to Pedraza

What a nice motorbike trip!

We went this Saturday to Pedraza by motorbike. Departing from Madrid, passing through Navacerrada Mountains, Segovia and finally Pedraza. It was a blue-sky day and the landscape was fantastic. Going down from Navacerrada towards “La Granja” was a fantastic curves driving experience. Another wonderful moment was when returning from Pedraza through a different road (Soria way), we were alone on the road for many kilometers, the speed and the countryside views were amazing. Really enjoyable!
Pedraza is a beautiful small town in Segovia, it seems you are suddenly back in another era, it’s like traveling back in time almost three centuries to Medieval Age! We had lunch there, in a typical “Posada”, and we probably ate the best roasted lamb ever, incredibly soft and tasted.

Dear e-reader, you can imagine how happy I am to be back in Spain!

Thanks and smile,dk.

Change Management or Capitalism’s greed and anger

Change Management is one of the “fashion” subjects these days at any level in the business world. Organizations change, Structures change, the market change, the ways of working evolve too, technology, and so on. Everything is changing so therefore we need to know how to manage it.

Well, fair enough, they want us to think that we’re living in a complex World, and probably it’s true. Competition in the market place grows and grows. We need to react quickly and adapt to the new circumstances. “You people be ready to the next challenge! Or if not, be ready to loose your job…” Those are the types of messages modern companies are launching to their employees.

Sociologists call it the information age, everything goes faster and faster each day. Others call it Capitalism Anger. In order to improve our standard of living we’ve transformed a simple World into a by far too complex World. In the middle of all this madness what I question myself is:
Are we really happier now?
What are we getting in return for our busy and stressed lives? Do we have time to enjoy live?
Is this the model of Society we want to leave to our children?
I’m not questioning the progress of civilization or Capitalism here, what I’m questioning is the number of social rules we’ve established in this modern civilization as the only way to get to our goals as human beings. Do we really need so many products/services in our lives? Is this really the only way to progress?

Who have decided which is our goal as human beings?

Thanks and smile,

dk

Stress-free life

Yesterday, the MBA executive director came to our class to present a new member of the staff. She took the opportunity to talk about a scientific study someone close to the IE is doing. Study about stress management. Apparently, such study needs some statistics and they are interested in interviewing us, the exhausted and stressed out students of the Executive MBA . They are pretty sure they are going to find high levels of stress among us. To be honest I don’t blame them.
I think one of the most important things you learn during this experience (I mean combining job plus MBA plus family plus Venture Lab Project) is to MANAGE the STRESS. I believe the better you manage it the bigger your professional progression will be, and of course, in parallel, the most your quality of live will improve.
According to Sudarshan Kriya (art of living Foundation), our mind is the house where our emotions live, and it goes from the past to the future and back without resting, producing bad feelings for problems of our past and anxiety about the unknown and about what we should do with our future. This is the stress, stress is the eternal doubt of our mind going fast from the Past to the Future and back.

I recommend their web to anyone interested in a stress-free life (http://www.artofliving.org/). The guy looks like a modern Jesus Christ or new age prophet but I think his thoughts and teachings are interesting.

Thanks and smile,

dk