The American Dream

My American Dream has ended and I am back in Europe (Amsterdam to be more precise). But even though I am long gone from Williamsport, I continue to struggle with shaping up a coherent answer to the question that I have asked upon my arrival in the USA, namely, how real is that image that we are buying into when watching American movies, listening to American music and buying American brands?

United States Capitol

Now, I still need more time (and probably more hands-on experience!) but I am becoming more and more convinced that that image is certainly true in one aspect: America is Freedom. In this context, using American brands etc allows us to get a bit of that freedom for ourselves. It is this feeling, of being able to achieve anything one wishes for, that I certainly had when living there. It was the sense of immense liberty and independence that made me feel as if there was nothing that could stop me from achieving my dreams. It is a whole another question whether this freedom is actually fairly utilised by the American people, but one thing is for sure: freedom in America is like nothing else!

PS. The funny thing was, after coming back, I decided to sign up to a local gym. On my way there I thought: "It was fun to listen to American radio (Kiss Fm!), I liked the songs that they used to play. Will miss that...". To my surprise, the first thing I noticed when entering the new gym was the same song I used to hear over and over again when working out in the gym in my college:D

Great Success!

Last week the Business Plan Contest ended and guess what? I won the “Best New Technology Product” award for Integrain Technology!!!

It was really an amazing experience. Not only I learnt about the difficulties (cost!) of starting up a company, but also had a great time, challenging myself everyday to find new and innovative ways of making it all work. The presentation I had to give in the final round taught me a great deal as well. I learnt so much about the art of rhetoric (Yes, one of the judges could easily replace Simon Cowell on the American Idol jury board!) and about the importance of enthusiasm in presenting to others.

I would like to thank all the people that had an input to this work as well as those who supported me in what were sometimes difficult times. Thank you! You are really a great bunch!

And of course, thank you America! You are the greatest!

Click on the image to follow the link to the Keystone Innovation Zone website (sponsor of the contest)

Click on the image to follow the link to Lycoming College News website

PS. You can see my professors, Dr Bonita Kolb and Dr Mehrdad Madresehee on the left and right hand side of the picture respectively. I will miss them so much...

Shaking Hands With Mr President!

For the past few months I was intensively following the primary presidential campaign in the US. It is a great source for learning about leadership, communication but also discipline and perhaps most of all commitment to hard work. I hoped for the presidential race to come to Williamsport. And guess what? Yesterday, the former president of the United States of America – Bill Clinton visited Lycoming College!

How was it? Well, of course - GREAT! What happened then?

Let’s start from the beginning. After coming to USA I was very sceptic about the country. A lot of things did not seem right. In general, it looked as if people were overwhelmingly focused on consumption, living without any consideration for the consequences of their actions. One recent example was in my marketing class. We were talking about product life cycles and the professor asked how many people in the class used energy efficient light bulbs in their houses. Only two out of almost forty people raised hands… It was very worrying. President’s Clinton speech made me realise there is still hope for a change, though.

Topics of the speech

During his 1,5 hour speech Mr Clinton addressed a number of issues. He talked about the war in Iraq, the housing bubble, international relations and global warming.

High performance leadership

Interestingly, global warming was the part of his speech that he put the most effort into. He said some pretty obvious stuff, but approached it from another angle. He basically said that countering global warming would create new jobs. First, infrastructure for increasing energy efficiency would have to be built, creating demand for electronic engineers. Second, somebody would have to lay this infrastructure down. This way new jobs would be created, but even more importantly, jobs that cannot be outsourced to another country (big deal in America right now). Anyway, what he said might not have been a revelation but it was definitely inspirational. It was good to hear directly from somebody in this position that these issues matter.

Rallying the crowd

In the end the crowd looked like hypnotised. I wondered how Mr. Clinton achieved that. A couple of things came to my mind. Most of all, he was a person like everybody else. He did not use a difficult language; he talked about people’s problems and not about superficial and unrelated matters. 

In person

Mr. Clinton used metaphors to explain complex issues to the crowd and also humour to brighten everybody up, constantly pointing at the future. He did say that America's bigges concerns were the economy and the country’s relations with the rest of the world. But rather than using complicated economic terms he said that the aim of this campaign was that when his wife leaves the office, people are better off, seeing a brighter future for their children and coming together rather than moving away from each other.

So in the end I learned two things. First, that there is still hope for America. Second, if you want your message to come across, keep it simple. It will save you time, energy, and it will work best!

UPDATE: video snapshot of the speech on YouTube — Bill Clinton at Lycoming College

Spring Contemplations

The spring break is long over, but it is only now that the first signs of spring start to appear. Indeed, it seems that the world is returning to life. Interestingly, the best evidence of spring this week was my professors' performance, as they all delivered exceptionally good lectures. It is amazing what effect the arrival of spring can have on us!

Fed arrives

An important event took place this week, namely the guest lecture by William H. Stone Jr, the vice president and COO of Federal Reserve Bank in Philadelphia. It was probably the first time that I had an opportunity to meet such a prominent figure and will definitely not forget it. Mr Stone spoke mainly about the responsibilities of the Federal and Central Bank, the difficulty in balancing free market policies and regulations and of course the subprime mortgage crisis.

Bleak economy could use some spring colours

I will be honest, the lecture was very hard to follow. One of the things I learnt was the incredible complexity of financial systems in the market economy. I also realised how many years of practice it takes to develop the level of expertise that Mr Stone has. I can learn about the recession of 1991 and how it was handled from the books, but by no means I can learn what it really takes to handle it well in a real life situation. That is because only experience can utilise knowledge. Or is it the other way round? Or maybe both?

Well, towards the end of the talk I asked Mr. Stone what where his thoughts on the steps the US should take to maintain its economic leadership in the world. In response I heard that the US has gone through many periods in the last decades when similar concerns were raised. Nonetheless, the country always emerged from these battles, becoming stronger at each time. Mr. Stone had no doubt the story would repeat itself this time and after. And it makes sense, considering the cyclical nature of the economy.

The greater danger

But whatever is the true answer one issue here must not be missed. Namely, that, too much experience can cause people to “stick to the script”, neglecting the possibility of things going in way they never went before. That’s where the greater danger may lie. As with anything, having too much of experience seems to have downsides as well. Therefore, I would argue that knowledge is the key to experience, not otherwise, as it allows people to think perceptively, and in a truly innovative way. And it is the common truth that innovation is the only way forward. Additionally, as argued in the previous post, how much we learn from experience is determined to a large extent by how much we know prior to it.

It is a tough subject, hopefully this summer I will be able to put my hypothesis into test and learn more about it. Stay tuned!

Spring, we love you!

PHOTO: By annia316, available under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial license

It's Spring Break - Time to Work!

It is the Spring Break here (Spring in February?), meaning that there are no classes! But that also means there are no other students… Well, I guess some quiet time can be just as much fun. I have a lot of work to be done actually, so I do not expect boredom to get in my way!

Four things on my to-do list

1. I will work on the business plan for The Third Annual Quad College & University Business Plan Challenge. This is the second stage of the competition, the third being the final. I am planning to start a software/hardware company – Integrain Technlogy – details coming soon (I must decide how much information to disclose – this is a serious idea!). I am going to do more research to assess what exactly my product has to be to satisfy the customers’ needs in the most profitable way. There is also a great deal of work left in terms of the technical specification of the product. 

Spring?

2. I am doing a part-time internship at a recently launched local microbrewery. I am helping the owners – Mika and Kira with marketing. While working with them I get to understand so much about running a business. I learnt about planning and raising start-up capital, managing customer relations and creating value for the customers. This week we are working on a new marking “stunt”. Mike is planning to launch a new beer but has two alternatives in mind and wants the customers to decide. So we came up with an idea of creating a presidential-election-eque campaign for the two options where customers will cast votes in a poll dubbed the “SELECTION 2008”. I will keep you posted. 

3. Apart from that I am putting a lot of effort to improve my language skills. I am working mostly on my Korean (it’s an incredible language), but also keep revising German. This week I will compile a list of all the Korean words and grammar that I have came across to make an easy reference point for the future. I also have a list of approx. 50 new and old-but-forgotten German verbs in their present, past and future forms that I will start studying this week. 

4. Finally, I bought some books from amazon.com and I want to read them all by the end of the semester. I started with “The Price” by Machiavelli, will proceed to The Art of War” by Sun-tzu and finish with “The Four Pillars of Investing” by William Bernstein. I love reading and these books seem like it is going to be a hell lot of an experience! I am looking forward to it!

Exchange Student in the US

At the moment I am studying in Lycoming College in Williamsport, Pennsylvania. This is truly a great place and I am enjoying myself so much! I came here as a result of the exchange programme between my university (University of Westminster) and the college. But what made me come here? I’ve heard this question a great number of times recently but will try to give a non-standarised answer – wanted to learn about America. Most of us watch American movies, listen to American music, use American brands. But how real is that image that we are buying into? I came here because I wanted to know. Don’t ask for the answer yet, but I can tell you – it’s coming!

PAtriotism

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