"You take the good, You take the bad,
You take them both and there you have the facts of life.
The facts of life."
Yes, if you're a child of the 80's like me you're probably already humming the song and thinking of Ms. Garrett, Tutti, and Blair. But why is an old TV theme song stuck in my head and what does this have to do with Business School?
With the Veteran's day off from classes, you'd think this was a low key weekend. On the contrary, this has possibly been one of the most challenging weeks second to mid terms. It all started with Wednesday evening when we got our case for the Deloitte Case competition. We were all very excited and eager to jump right in. Our team spent Wednesday evening going through the case individually and met Thursday morning bright and early at 8am to take our best shot at the case.
We pushed hard, had some great discussions, and felt we had a strong solution at the end of the day. We pushed ourselves until about 2:30 in the morning, at which time the law of diminishing return took effect and we were forced to submit our presentation before the 8am deadline. (Oh yeah, and I discovered that I did the wrong Finance homework that was due at 9am. So after 18 hours of working on a case, I had to stay up and do my Finance homework. I could barely keep my head up, but somehow I pushed through.) We were fortunate to be able to spend time on Friday practicing our presentation, and my team had the pleasure of presenting our case at 9am on Saturday morning.
Overall we felt we were strong. We had some minor slip ups along the way, but felt we had some good insights into the case as well as four strong presenters. Unfortunately, at 1:30 we found out we didn't make the final round. While I was happy for the teams that would be moving forward, I would be lying if I didn't say I wasn't disappointed. We're all competitive, we all worked hard, but only 3 of the 20 teams could move on, and I can say without reservation that all 3 teams that presented in the final round were worthy of being there. I am also really excited for the winning team, as I'm sure they'll do a great job of representing UCLA Anderson at the National Deloitte Case Competition in Miami in January.
So why is the "Facts of Life" song stuck in my head? Well, as I reflected on the weekend, I thought about what I got out of it. I spent the better part of three days working on the case, we didn't make it to the final round, and there was a part of me that felt a little empty handed. I had a huge cup of frozen yogurt with the worst possible toppings and thought about what I really got out of the experience.
- I got to get to know three of my classmates much better and had an amazing time with them, freezing study rooms and all.
- I had the pleasure of presenting a challenging case to a Deloitte employee.
- I was able to identify some of my own strengths and weaknesses as far as tackling a case within a short time period.
- And most importantly, I was truly CHALLENGED.
"You take the good, You take the bad,
You take them both and there you have the facts of life.
The facts of life."
At the end of the day, I realized I got exactly what I came to business school for. I was pushed, I was challenged to a point of exhaustion, and I had an amazing time doing it. Am I still disappointed? To be honest, a little. But if I wasn't, that would mean I'm complacent with how we did, that I don't think there is room for improvement, and that I don't think we could do better next time.
Would I do it again? In a heartbeat!
Matt
p.s. I found a link to a post from last year's Deloitte Case Competition