Friday, January 18, 2008

High-Tech and Consulting Clubs

As P3 started, and we are now the senior promotion on campus, we took over all the clubs. Since I have more time now I am actively involved in the High Tech Club and the Consulting Club, two industries that I might seek a career in after the MBA. I was struck by how much the students shape the clubs. It is all a matter of how students wish to contribute from their precious time and their experience.

The High Tech Club is growing. I imagine that 10-20% of the students will end up in a high tech company or consulting to this sector (a third of the students will end up in Industry, so at least a third of that will work in High Tech). We cover the wide range of sectors within the high tech industry, including telecom, computers, software, IT, electronics, equipment, consulting and startups. We ran a poll in P2 to check which are the top 20 companies which INSEADers would like to see on campus. We will try to maintain contacts with those companies in the future. In addition we are planning an industry panel in P4, and an industry trek to Dublin in one of the breaks. We are working on a focused CV book dedicated to those who are interested in High Tech. In P2, when we had to submit our CVs to the INSEAD CV Book, we had a session in which all the members of the clubs gave feedbacks to one another, in order to optimize the CVs. So, a wide variety of activities which will be extended in the future.

The Consulting Club is a much more established club, as almost all students are interested somewhat in that industry. INSEAD is a well-known school for consultants, and the consulting firms have a strong relation with the INSEAD Consulting Club and the Career Services. The club brings speakers from the top consulting firms, organize mock interviews for students, maintain contacts with consulting firms and alumni, and much more.

I took it on myself to help creating the websites for those clubs which will be up and running soon hopefully. Also I help to organize a mock case interview session in P3, in order to help us practice for the most infamous case interviews that we all fear so much these days. I will surely get involved in other projects as P3 continues.

The clubs are an important part of student life, and can help engage in leadership activities. So far it was a pleasure to be part of those clubs, and I will report later (hopefully) how are things shaping.

P3 - Changes

We ended the second week of p3. The campus looks completely different. A new promotion has just started, and the campus is full with unfamiliar faces. Also our promotions changed a lot as 180 of our friends moved to Singapore, and 100 came here.






On the one hand, it is good to meet new people
and it makes things here more intersting. On the other hand several friends went to Singapore, so we surely miss them, and we did not get a lot of time to spend with them. That's the price of a short program on a two campus university.







Also, elective season started. After doing some shopping on the first days, everyone selected the most interesting courses for them. This period is extremely interesting and the workload is significantly lower, so I actually find time to engage in other activities, such as clubs and job search.

And some pics from the break - on the menu was a skiing trip with 80 of INSEAD community to Meribel in the 3-Valles, a trip to Amsterdam, Brussels, and Bruges, and new year's eve in Paris.