More MBA

I started a new course for my MBA degree a few weeks ago, economics. I took a course in micro-economics 25 years ago with the Open University, but I'm not getting any credit for it. In fact, I barely remember anything from that OU course, not that it matters. The Heriot Watt courses start from the beginning and assume no prior knowledge of the subject, which sometimes can be a bit unsettling, as they insist that their's is the only true gospel.

Anyway, I am very much enjoying the course so far, which makes me remember one of the primary reasons for spending a lot of money and giving up my free time for three years: intellectual challenge. On Friday, we had a nice exercise about a man who owns a boat designed for catching ocean salmon, how each fisherman contributes a different amount of fish (what is technically known as the marginal amount or contribution), how there is an optimal number of fisherman, how things change when the cost of the fisherman is taken into account, and finally how to calculate how many kilograms of fish should be caught (or how many fishermen to employ) when the price of selling fish is such and such. It seemed that the lecturer was going slow and not explaining things too well, so when he asked that ultimate question, I jumped in with the answer: stop when the marginal cost is equal to the selling price. The lecturer then asked for my name (we are all anonymous in the classes) and used it several more times in the ten minutes before the end of the lecture.

If I were still a schoolboy, I would be alternately pleased and annoyed at this: pleased, because the lecturer now knew who I was (although I should admit that we had a conversation during the break of the previous week's lecture) and annoyed, because the other students will see me as a teacher's pet. But we are not competing against each other, and the lecturers exist only to explain the written texts which we all receive at the beginning of the semester. Even so, I hope that he doesn't continue with this practice.

The text itself is very well written and is enjoyable to read (as opposed to the text on Organisational Behaviour, for example), although this may be my bias stepping in. I barely looked at the text for Accountancy, because the lecturer seemed intent on plowing his own path – and I knew most of the material anyway.

At the moment, I am trying to restrict myself to devoting the minimum amount of time possible to the Economics course: five hours on a Friday morning (three hours lecture and two hours travelling) along with another hour or two maximum reading the text. I have to devote my time to OB. I had more dreams about OB last night, which I take as a good sign as it means that the material is settling into my head. There are more parts of the text which are getting absorbed, which is just as well as the exam is only a week away. Tonight we have a revision meeting with the lecturer, who is also the marker. It will be interesting to hear what he has to say. I don't remember whether I wrote that the author of the OB text visited us and gave three lectures about the course and how to pass the exam; it's a shame that he came at the end of January and not at the beginning of March, as I feel that we would have appreciated his visit much more had it been now instead of then.

I am not expecting miracles in the OB exam; I will try my hardest and be pleased if I pass. Unfortunately, we won't get the results for two months after the exam, by which time I expect to have forgotten all I ever learnt and to be in the middle of revising for the Economics exam. Should I try to take the exam again in the same week as the Economics exam? It may be too late to register (one can sit the exam without having to retake the course). The most annoying aspect is that one can only sit a maximum of two exams in any core subject (of which OB is one); if one fails the exam twice, then one is out of the MBA programme.