The Master of Management Experience

Cheerio folks, first hello from Switzerland ! yep, from Australia to Switzerland ….all possible with CEMS ! but let’s rewind one year. …January 2008 – I just finished my last courses at USYD when I got the opportunity to take part in the CEMS year. What a great offer –I gotta study at 2 of Europe’s most prestigious universities – ESADE in Barcelona and the University of St.Gallen in Switzerland. Wow, no question I had to accept ! Looking back I maybe had the most amazing year of my life. I had an incredible time in Barcelona last semester meeting a lot of interesting people, making friends, partying hard in Barcelona and studying at one of the best Business Schools in the world. ¡fantástico! (–> I will try to cover in more detail in one of my next blogs – promise !) As you can imagine the semester passed by way too quickly and I was up for my second semester in Switzerland. The February start promised some nice skiing and a real winter experience ! And indeed, again I was part of an awesome crowd that would make this semester unforgettable. As anticipated February and March was packed with skiing weekend trips, partly cause the nightlife in this little city is not at all comparable with Sydney or Barcelona, but that was part of what I was here for – I will aim to post some pictures soon. Apart from skiing Austria and Germany are very close – both reachable within half an hour and the Uni itself offers a lot of sports activities. And, of course, there are also some clubs in the city and the international crowd is always up for some partying. Germanic beer is the best by the way! Uni life is quite different from Sydney as the Uni is relatively small. The line-up of lecturers, however, is impressive as we had lecturers from the best universities in the world. E.g. one of my professors also taught in Harvard and Peking University and the general level is quite demanding yet inspiring and quite fun. Classes on master level are normally limited to a max of around 40 students that come from a very diverse international background. All in all – a very good university ! Could go on forever but will leave it for now hoping you got an first impression of the CEMS Program. I will aim to update you on some awesome Barcelonian stories, talk about the CEMS network a bit more and, of course, about Switzerland and my stay here! Goodnight from the other side of the world Jan