Spring in Ithaca!

Spring has arrived (sort of) in Ithaca and with it has come lots of updates! It has been a while since my last post and a lot has happened. First off, Spring Break (I can't believe that was already more than a month ago!) was amazing. I took a spontaneous trip to Niagara Falls with a classmate (who goes to somewhere COLDER than Ithaca for Spring Break, anyways??) and then spent most of my remaining time in Massachusetts with friends and family. I actually spent a lot of the time ironing out last minute details for the annual Community Impact Charity Auction, which was held the Thursday after we returned from break. It went great, thanks to the amazing amount of work and effort that the planning team put into it. At the end of the day, we raised almost $10,000 for two local charities as well as for nonprofit student internships. Some of the popular items were a wine tasting dinner at Dean Thomas' home (always a favorite) as well a ceiling tile (to be decorated by the winning bidder/s) from The Palms, Ithaca's legendary dive bar.

After a quick stop in NYC for the annual Park Alumni dinner on Saturday, where I had the chance to meet former Park Fellows and learn about their experience and careers post-MBA, I was off to a suburb of Philly to interview for a summer internship with a Johnson & Johnson company on Monday morning. I am excited to report that as a result I now have my summer plans in line, having accepted a position in the company's marketing group. I am really excited about the company and opportunity, and am looking forward to getting started on some of the projects they have lined up.

After Philly, I met up with my marketing classmates in NJ for the annual Marketing Immersion / Brand trip. We met with about two companies each day, including Colgate, Bayer, Johnson & Johnson, Coyne Public Relations, American Express, Lippincott Mercer, and Priceline. One of my biggest takeaways from the trip is that marketing is different in but central to all of the organizations that we visited, and that "cross-functional" is not just a buzz word. While Johnson & Johnson, American Express, and Priceline all have vastly different organizational structures, business models, and products, the marketing function is critical to the strength of the brands and growth of the companies. In each of these organizations, reliance on multiple departments was crucial to effective marketing. While we have heard about the importance of "cross-functional communication" many times over the past several months, it was useful to be presented with tangible examples at many of the organizations that we visited. The trip also provided a valuable opportunity to meet with company representatives in a setting outside of the corporate recruiting process, which I think allowed for richer interactions and the opportunity to really understand what happens on a day to day basis.

After returning to Ithaca on Thursday night, I geared up for Destination Johnson weekend - where I had the opportunity to meet many of you! It was really exciting to be here on the current student side of it and share what my experience has been like with prospective students, and it felt great to be a part of planning an event that was so massive in scope and helpful to prospective students.

Somewhere in the middle of all that, I also found out that I will be studying abroad in Monterrey, Mexico during Spring 2010. I am really, really excited about the opportunity to learn more about the Mexican culture and international marketing. (And for more about Monterrey and the study abroad experience, check out Ben Rollins' blog - Ben is a second year who just returned from studying in Monterrey).

So hopefully after reading what the past month or so has been like, you won't hold it against me for not writing sooner - and will also understand how incredibly exciting and enriching it is to be here in business school at Cornell. As always, please feel free to get in touch with any questions you may have...

Destination Johnson - April 3rd - 5th!!

Hi all - I am going to take this opportunity to make a shameless plug for Destination Johnson (DJ), our weekend for admitted students here at the Johnson School. I am the Marketing Chair for the weekend, so you will be receiving an email from me shortly with details about the events we have planned and what you can expect. In the meantime, check out the DJ website (www.johnson.cornell.edu/newstudents/dj/intro.html) for additional information. I had an amazing time at DJ last year and am excited to be a part of the planning committee this year.

In other news, I applied to study abroad during the Spring 2010 semester and will know by Friday if I will have the opportunity to participate in one of the programs that I am interested in. Keep your fingers crossed, and I will let you know when I hear!

Johnson Night Out

After a really relaxing weekend - beautiful weather (for this time of year in Ithaca, anyways!), a hike through Six Mile Creek, and an amazing Valentine's Day dinner, the week was filled with an unusual amount of case studies, presentations, focus groups, and homework assignments - even in the context of business school, it was a really busy week!

Thankfully this weekend allowed for a change of pace - on Thursday, I boarded a bus at Sage hall with fellow first-years as well as second-years to attend the seventh annual "Just About Jobs - Day in the Back Bay" event that took place on Friday at the Taj Hotel in Boston. The recruiting opportunity started in 2003 as a way for employers that don't traditionally recruit at Cornell to meet and interview with Johnson School students. Over the years, this has translated into new corporate relationships with the Johnson School and more opportunities for student internships and full time positions. In March, the "Just About Jobs" tradition continues with a similar event in San Francisco for those students looking to get out (or back) to the west coast for the summer or after graduating.

On Saturday night, Johnson School students participated in a new version of an old tradition. Johnson Night Out is an annual event at the Johnson School - during the first semester, first-years were invited to the homes of second-years and faculty for a pot luck dinner and get-together. This semester, the Student Association decided that it was time for the first year class to return the favor, so along with other first-years I had the chance to host some students at my house for dinner and drinks, followed by an after-party at Dino's in Collegetown. Over appetizers, roasted chicken, homemade fried rice, and apple pie, it was a great opportunity to get to know some of my fellow first and second year classmates a little better.

It was also the second Park Finalist recruiting weekend, so between writing thank-you notes for Friday's interviews and pot-lucking with classmates, I had the chance to meet and get to know prospective students over bowling and pizza. Through the finalist weekends as well as through the Admissions Ambassadors program, I have been really impressed with the caliber of prospective students and their backgrounds and experiences. Forming a class with such a diverse range of strengths and talents is not an easy task, but is definitely something that the Johnson School does very well. I am looking forward to getting to know more prospective students as the semester progresses. And on that note, if that's you and you're reading this, feel free to shoot me an email (kaq7@cornell.edu) with any questions you have or about my experience here so far - I would love to hear from you!

Back in Ithaca

So I know I wrote that I would post over break - but somehow even then, I don't know where the time went. Right now, I am enjoying a lazy Friday morning at home after the pre-term Strategic Marketing Immersion course and first week of classes. One of the things that I am enjoying most so far is the pace of semester-long classes after all seven week courses during the fall. More time to think and reflect on the material is something that I really value, and I think I am really going to like my classes. With the Strategic Marketing Immersion, I am working on a team project for a client in CA, and I am looking forward to hands-on, real-time experience. The class and project approach is closely integrated with what we are learning in Marketing Research, which is my favorite of the classes I have taken at the Johnson School (so far!). Before coming to business school, I worked in market strategy consulting, so there are a lot of overlapping approaches and themes that are emerging, but I am excited to have some formal educational context around my previous work. I am also taking Cost Accounting and Operations (Operations is one of the two final Core classes - we switch to Managing and Leading Organizations after seven weeks).

In addition to classes, I have really started to focus on planning the annual Community Impact Charity Auction, which will take place on March 26th. Community Impact is a club with a mission that mirrors some of the themes at the Johnson School as a whole - the club is committed to strengthening the community through volunteer work and through learning from the relationship between the for-profit, non-profit, and public sectors, as well as through promoting socially responsible business. Last year's team raised over $12,000 for charity, and I am excited to have the lead in working on surpassing that this year.

Interview season has started up in full force, so the next two weeks promise to be pretty hectic, This weekend is the first Park Finalist Weekend, and I am really looking forward to hosting two students as well as meeting other finalists at the weekend's events. On that note, I am going to start some homework before time (once again) gets away from me....