About Bowen: Bowen Wang (‘23) is a first year at UCLA Anderson hoping to move into Product Management in the high-tech industry. Prior to Anderson, he was an engineer in the Process Control department at Marathon Petroleum in Los Angeles. In his spare time, you can find Bowen on the mountains of California going for hikes, failing to make pasta as delicious as shown in the pictures of the recipe and subsequently giving up and going out for food, or at Kinross gym trying to make up for his pasta dinner from the night before.
Before even the very first day of Anderson orientation, I received perhaps the most anticipated email of the summer: my team assignment. These were the people I’d be working with for the next year, the people I’d see every day in class. I couldn’t wait to meet them on the first day. No really, I went ahead and checked them out on LinkedIn before we met. We had a non-profit consultant from Washington DC, an accountant from San Francisco, one who worked in marketing in Korea, one who worked in banking in Peru, and one who worked in finance in San Diego. And there was me who was an engineer. My first thought reading their backgrounds was how incredibly diverse our team was; we were all from different industries and functions and we all came to LA from different cities.
One of the most important moments for me was filling out the group contract. In this document, each of us laid out what our expectations/goals are, how we conduct meetings, how we make group decisions, and what penalties exist for failing to abide by the guidelines laid out in the document. For me personally, the most important lessoned learned from the group contract was discovering what we expected out of each other. Some people want to get straight A’s while some were ok with just passing; some focused all on career search while others weren’t as worried; some were more focused on the social aspects of school. It’s perfectly okay if your goals and expectations don’t perfectly line up with your teammates’ and knowing their goals should not sway your own. But it's still a good start to calibrate your expectations and set a baseline of how you’ll be working.
Speaking of work, there will be, of course, going to be plenty of it with your team. Many guidelines should have been established in your group contract and from your very first assignments which are of course amenable over time. But, I recommend a few baselines. First, always do the reading and at least attempt the assignment on your own before a group meeting. Everyone’s time is valuable, so don’t waste time doing as a group what you could do on your own. Second, meet early and often – well before the assignment is due. No one likes staying up until midnight to submit an assignment – hold each other accountable to not procrastinate! Third, if you feel like you’re doing just your share of the work, then you’re not doing enough. If you have a 5-person team, you should feel like you’re doing 30-40% of the work, not 20%. Lastly, know that your group is not just there to submit team homework. Ask them for help in other classes or assignments, or about events on campus, or about anything else. Especially if you’re nervous about speaking up to a large audience (your section has around 80 people and your class has around 370), your team provides a smaller group to voice your questions and opinions.
Lastly, Don’t forget to spend time with your team outside of class. Your teammates have interests and personalities that extend beyond the classroom, and you would be missing out on so much if you didn’t get to know them. Make regular get-togethers at a bar/restaurant/event. I’ve done barbeques, gotten drinks, before-class lunches, and workout sessions at the gym with my teammates and I feel that we are more open and work better because of it.
Student Blogger: Bowen Wang '23
Undergrad: The Ohio State University ‘17
Pre-MBA: Engineer at Marathon Petroleum, ExxonMobil
Leadership@Anderson: Riordan Scholars Program Mentor; Director, Anderson Ambassador Corps; Director of Curriculum, Anti-Racism Committee
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