This is the first, and perhaps the last, of my letters from California.
Last perhaps because I will be very busy this next semester.�
I will take
17 credit hours and be reading non-stop.� Luckily for you I decided
not
to do any volunteer altruism today so I could relax and write another
one
of my intimidatingly long letters.
Berkeley is a little weird for me, cold in the morning, with heat
steadily crescendo through the day. I often change clothes to maintain
homeostasis. The Golden Gate bridge is visible from International House,
although weather (fog/glare/mist) always seems to obscure its presence.
I dont like the hot showers in a cold bathroom. But, that is the breaks.
I am so close to campus it is ridiculously convenient.� It never
rains
here in the summer -- it is an arsonist's delight!
My class has 240 students, 1/3 international, 1/3 women -- diverse
by MBA standards.� Most of the
women have boyfriends/fiances/husbands .. not that I am keeping track,
mind you.� We have a variety of strange backgrounds, none stranger
than
one of my friends, Debra, an ex-Shakespearean actress who lives down
the
hall from me.� Having lived in Brazil, she speaks Portuguese,
and we
reminisce.� Also speaks Norwegian.� She is also living next
door to
the Crown Prince of Norway, but we hardly see him.� Maybe its
the food or
the Abba blaring from Debra's room or our deliberately blase attitude,
since he hasnt told us who he
is in reality.� I amused myself when I automatically said a particularly
sacrilegiously Danielesque "hey hey" to him in a brief
post-lunch hallway acknowledgement.� When he outs himself, I can
move to
"hey hey, princey baby" or maybe, "hey hey, your royal highness," I
suppose.� Also amusing to ask him what he studied -- he was with
a
matronly blonde minder and looked confusedly at her for a few
seconds until they both arrived at "political science."� You know,
I hope
he never outs himself, cause we will have more fun that way. Actually,
I
am just having fun using "out" as a verb -- that's San Francisco.
The second element was simply a high wire, 50 feet long, strung between
two redwoods. Object: with a partner, get from one redwood to the other.�
To
help, there were only 3 short ropes, placed at 10 foot intervals, dangling
from high above to knee level.� Seems impossible?� We thought
so too.� In
fact, I was sure of it when I decided to be head of the second pair
that
went. I got to the top of the tree (~40 feet up) tested my foot out
on
the slippery wire, and decided, this tree feels, really, really good.�
I
mean, redwoods to seems to have a lot of fuzzy lint, but this redwood
was
something special, and I really didnt want to let go of it, given its
1000-year survival in an upright position, to climb onto a wire which
has
just been drilled in by my forest-gnome-like mediator a week ago.
I asked, and they lowered me down.� Disappointment all around,
yes?
Well, after a few people went, I decided I MUST try again. In fact,
after
2 girls went it was ineluctable for a He-Man like me. At least
if I fell, it would (could) be fun, I rationalized.� So I went
up with
another equally
apprehensive guy, and we made it.� Excitement city, which I wont
try to
describe -- as we learned later, there is nothing more confusing (with
sidetrips into boring) than
a Ropes course participant trying to describe what they did ("and there
was
this plank
swinging back and forth in four direction with no support, with a wire
over here, sort of parallel, but you couldnt touch that, and Yoshi
--
you know that Japanese guy with the kid? [Editor's Note: No....]
-- he slipped off and..." blah blah blah for ages. I did it too, so
I
know).� Anyway, we all bonded, and some people had an experience
bordering on religious.� I decided it would be good to do it again
someday, although our mediator/guard could have been better (Q: So,
uh,
what did we all, uh, learn from what we did here today and, uh, how
are
you going to apply that in the real world out there?� A: I learned
the
value of
friendship. Next person answering: Well, in a lot of ways, I had the
same
experience....)� All in all it was the second-most fun thing to
do in
harnesses in the Bay Area.� Actually, I just wanted say that.
We have been divided into cohorts of 60 for greater intimacy, though
the
word cohort to me implies fur-wearing Mongol cavalrymen (perhaps I
am
associating it with the word horde) or self-hazing goose-stepping
Latin American military classes. I
will take all my classes this first semester with them -- one big
stessed-out family.� Interestingly, we are relatively old students
here..even Phds get an earlier start than MBAs are permitted.�
I suppose
it is because they dont want PhDs to have any work experience in
preparation for the dearth of employment opportunities ahead.�
Ha ha, the
blithe jokes of the ultra-employable!� On the whole, we do "get
off" on
that, and it can inspire� a little bit of resentment.
Stats: Avg salary on graduation: ~$80,000.� What will I learn now
to
possibly
justify that amount of money?� Or, by being in the MBA program,
have I
simply put myself in the elite of Adequately But Not Ferociously Smart
People Who Will Do
Anything For Money When They Get Out? Will I earn three times as much
by
working twice as many hours? My mentor earned $1750 a week on
her 10-week summer job.� Annualized, it's $91000.� And she
was a German
major. OK, she spoke Korean too, but so?� Anyway, no wonder we
are as
puffed up as the floats in the Macy's Parade.
My mentor also did a project where you get sent to a developing country
for a mini consulting project -- free!� Sounds as easy as falling
off a
log -- I will definitely do it.� Would do it next summer for 3
weeks....
Math camp was nice. Algebra and calculus slowly came back to me. Welcome
back, friends! The critics were right--I WOULD never use you in the
real
world!� We had probability too. If any of you know the Monty Hall
problem, I NOW UNDERSTAND IT.
I went to Sacramento on an I-House tour. It got to 110 degrees, no joke.
The
whole Central
valley apparently does this (think of California as a mountainous area
with a long ice-cream-scoop scrape gouged out of the center), enabling
them to grow lots of raisins with exploited Mexican migrant
laborers, or something.� Aside from the heatstroke weather and
the
world's most garishly decorated capitol building (Senate all in
Glowing Stomach-Turning Fuschia!
Assembly in Ferocious Shimmering Lime Green! And sticking out everywhere,
carved wooden bear
heads that looked like aggressive, retarded dogs!), nothing outstanding.
I dont get into San Francisco much, and I kind of like it that way,
cause
San Francisco is always a little too cool for comfort we have trees
in
Berkeley.� Biggest problem with UCB is that people wont leave
to go for
highpaying jobs in unpleasant places like Connecticut.� Not like
us
vicious East Coasters.
Anyway, time to go. Writing online is a drag, but I am postpoing the
computer purchase for some time when I am more stressed out.�
Email is
best. My webpage is making slow progress: catch it at:
http://haas.berkeley.edu/~silver
you can see The World's Longest and Dullest Puffed-Up Curriculum Vitae,
and other treasures. Heck, now I can put everything on the Web. Even
this
letter.� Who knows?
Anyway, emails are welcome, I read everything, though I may choose a
forum like this one to respond to "general interest" questions.
have fun everybody
Daniel
�
Well, I survived into the third week of business school, without too
many
ill effects.� There is a lot of work and reading to do, but it
is
manageable.� I read everything the weekend before I need to know
it,
because there simply isn't time to get anything done on weekdays.
Actually, the work would be a lot easier if we didn't have to work
in
groups. In order to encourage teamwork, we must do seemingly dozens
of
group projects.� In this way we simulate real-world activity,
i.e., we
identify joint procrastination methods and soon learn to secretly loathe
our colleagues.� The group work process takes about three times
as long
to do what I would normally slap together.� On the other hand,
my quality
alone is perhaps 25% of the finished project, so maybe it all works
out
in the end.
Luckily on my stats group there is an Excel junkie, and two others who
I
think have computers.� Since I have put off the purchase of a
computer
(counting on Moore's Law to take half off my new computer by, say,
graduation day), I have to work extra hard so as not to appear to be
The
Loathsome Group Parasite.� (There is almost always a Parasite
in any
Group; the only problem is that it is very difficult to identify the
Parasite at first, and by the time you know who it is, it is too late:
you have to work with them for the rest of the semester.� Thus,
when
everybody formed their stats groups, they sought out people who had
some
similarity to themselves, on the assumption that people like themselves
could not be Parasites.� They were wrong.� Thus, those who
formed early
are usually undiverse AND have Parasitic elements.)
Actually, I like my group but maybe we are not as ambitious as some.�
I
noticed that some groups, with seemingly oodles of time to kill, created
cover sheets which even have the UC Berkeley seal on them and have
invested time in all kinds of clever formatting. Maybe that works in
BusinessLand, but I prefer the stark white directness of our all-text
cover sheet. I think our graphic statement is: "Life is too short to
dork
around with graphics like those other, more superficial groups. Don't
they have LIVES? Quick, turn the page and see analysis so dry it must
be
good for you."
We have to do this massive project at the end of the semester called
the
Capstone where we try to value a large, publicly-traded company. This
is
a fairly big task, when you think about it. Likewise, we do this in
groups.� I think I have a good one, with a nice mix of skills.�
We also
have a smaller project, which is a little like consulting, where we
visit
a company and find some way in which they are organizationally
dysfunctional.� And if we are lucky, we may even figure out some
recommendations (which, I bet, will boil down to: (1) Fire current
CEO;
(2) Hire me in his/her place.) Speaking of which, let me talk about
Additional bribes ran the gamut from mechanical pencils with the company
name on them to yellow highlighters with the company name on them.�
(Of
course, they will never sate our ferocious hunger for free office
supplies until we are summer interns with full access to their
running-over cabinets.)� Then they have their speech.� Problem:�
they all
want the same thing in prospects (analytical ability, teamwork, blah
blah) but they also want you to "fit," which is an intangible quantity
nobody likes to define.� Every firm has its own criteria, which
are
probably selected from the following:
(NOTE TO RECRUITERS: The following is intended for humorous use only.
Views expressed do not reflect the opinions of Daniel M. Silver, no,
not
one little itty bitty teensy weensy bit.� Moreover, these apply
to your
competitors.)
* you are a self-centered arrogant butthead
* for short, critical periods of time (i.e, during job interviews)
you can pretend you are not a self-centered arrogant butthead
* you love working like a rabid donkey on amphetamines for big money
* you have high tolerance for ambiguity� i.e., you don't give
a
tinker's damn whether they implement your recommendations or not
* you can read the executive summary and successfully pretend you
read the whole thing
* you live to rack up frequent-flyer miles and collect tiny,
ineffectual hotel soaps
* you feel naked unless you are wearing a crisp white shirt every day
Well, I have been doing a lot of research, and it appears I am most
qualified to be a consultant. This is a little bit disturbing because,
after Thailand, I decided a normal life would be good to have.�
But now I
seem to have an unyielding desire to accumulate free stationery from
European hotels, although with my luck I will get the Great Marriotts
of
Indiana Tour.� Plus it is good money.� Actually, you can
make more in
investment banking but that often requires you to sit in one place
for
long periods of time.� Consulting is better for those with
attention-deficit disorder (which most MBAs have, because if they didn't,
they would still be at their old jobs).
I went to a consulting career night recently, where successful
second-years and alumni told us various ways to suck up to recruiters,
none of which I will relate so as to better my chances for squeezing
out
the competition.� Needless to say, the above jokes were not among
them.
The night was set up by one of the
Well, I could tell you how my classes are, but then everyone would
know
what I really think, and that could get me in trouble and lead to my
being a social and academic outcast. So without further ado:
FINANCE is interest rates 'n' stuff.� Taught by a motormouth Long
Islander, a man after my own heart. All new, I never get bored.�
No
foreigners (and few Americans) can understand him, but so what?�
Their
confusion is my higher place on the grading curve.
ECONOMICS is mostly about stuff which sounds great in theory (like
decision trees) but which no manager I know does in real life.�
Not so
badI am familiar with nearly everything so far.
ORGANIZATIONAL BEHAVIOR could also be called Individual Manipulation
with
Loads O' New Jargon, because that is what I am learning, and that's
pretty cool.� Prof likes to imagine she isn't letting her opinions
through when she facilitates, but observe following Freudian-slip-like
behavior:
* person says something she doesn't mind hearing:
"Would anybody like to address that issue?"
* person says something she doesn't agree with:
� "Would anybody like to redress that issue?"
(After six classes, I have observed this often enough to be statistically
significant.)
Most of the time though we all sit around making inane comments and
boring each other with long stories starting with "At my company.."�
What
we all really need is a gesture that indicates: "Would you please shut
up, because with all your talking you are making me forget what I want
to
say next!"� I am also really bad in class because I am a blurter�
I say
whatever, violating the class covenant (you can't bore people without
being officially recognized first).� Luckily, I haven't yet been
"redressed."
ACCOUNTING is what it is, and I finally understand what it is for.
Mercifully class is only an hour long� the others are 1.5 hours.�
As they
say, learning accounting is like learning a new language (High Geek
Esperanto, perhaps?).
STATISTICS is relatively painless, although I estimate I miss 25%, with
a
10% margin of error, of what is going on.� Our teacher keeps reminding
us
if he really knew how to predict anything critical with statistics
he
wouldn't be teaching us this class, he would be raking in the Big Bucks.
Actually, I guess that applies to all our professors.
COMMUNICATIONS is this grab bag of stuff.� We are doing speeches
now.� I
really screwed up my first one, but in so doing I cunningly (well,
unintentionally) set myself a nice low baseline against which I could
demonstrate strong improvement, which is one of our final evaluation
criteria.�� At least, that is how I prefer to rationalize
it.
All that adds up to 17 credits, a truly awesomely superhuman work load.
We let off steam by making stupid jargon jokes (see Statistics above).
Luckily I live at
A lot of guys live here too, and (hey, let's give them credit) they
provide some marginal entertainment value as well.� I-House really
gives
you the strong motivation to concentrate on you studies because you
would
shoot yourself if you concentrated on the low quality of the food or
the
obscene rent paid to live in your little cell.� As I mentioned,
poorly-prepared food magically appears without my intervention.�
Needless
to say, all my cooking ambitions have gone out the window.� We
had
stuffed lobster the other night.� The carapace was filled with
some kind
of doughy paste and the tail had been steamed to old-second-rate-bagel
chewiness, though without the charm.� Well, they tried.
They also have free social events, where you can meet all the same
people
you eat with every day in a darker setting with swirling lights.�
Oh, and
they have a dance class every Monday night.� Last week I learned
Zee
Dance Of Passion, merengue, which consists of (1) constant hip-jiggling
and (2) swinging your partner around into various positions. Watch
out
Latinas, I am feroz!� The main advantage of the dancing lessons
is the
chance to literally get your hands on all those available women of
miscellaneous origins, and to demonstrate how manly and fun you are
despite the collective embarrassment of synchronized hip-jiggling.
�
Speaking of which, I should give you a break to get back to your own
lives. Please write! I have time to read, but not much time to respond
;-(� (you caught me at a good time)
bye bye
Daniel
�
Sorry for the delay in writing.� The computer I wrote my message
on last
week turned out not to have any functioning disk drives, and as you
know,
I feel life is too short to do anything twice.� Today is a Wednesday
evening, quite chilly. There was an ethereal fog clambering down the
hillside when I last saw the day.� Now it is night, and I just
returned
from having a single beer, which has me slightly inebriated.�
I recall I
wrote a letter in this state previously, but please do not think I
am
attempting to imitate a hard-drinking writer stereotype.� Rather,
the
source of causation is similar: when I have time for a beer, I definitely
have time to write.
Here I was going to display the old letter, or ur-letter perhaps.
Unfortunately, I have just learned it was deleted when the computer's
hard
drive was formatted -- a measure designed to head off a vicious hacker
who attacked the I-House computing lab.� Perhaps my old letter
was a
Xanadu of wit, but now no one will ever know....� Frankly, if
all my
works had to be destroyed, I would prefer a bonfire rather than simply
knowing all my unique Ones have become anonymous Zeroes.��
I wonder if my
Ones ever flake off my old 5-1/4 inch disks?
Well, you all know how good my memory is.� I seem to recall my
topics
were intrasession, my midterms, and well, not much else.� I will
add
investment banks and some other things.
�
The last few weeks were occupied by midterm studying and fretting.�
I
didnt bother, much to my chagrin when I walked out of Economics thinking
I had failed. At times during the test I felt like either (1) crying
or
(2) verbally abusing the professor in as spiteful a manner as my delicate
tongue could muster.� Afterwards I polled others, and learning
they were
equally clueless, I realized the curve would save me, and it did, giving
me a grade in the B cloud.
Everything else seemed to go OK, with As.� I think my lackadaisical
attitude came through for me again...I studied just a few hours for
each
one of the tests.� So this isnt so bad after all.� Snapshots
from Hell,
hardly.� Unfortunately, it now appears things will get much tougher
in a
few classes, and some long-term assignments are breathing down our
necks.
�
Last week we had no real classes and supposedly did things to advance
our
career, or at least our career-searching capabilities.� God forbid
any of
us should graduate unemployed.� Everything I learned could have
been
placed on a one-page handout, but I was prompted to completely redesign
my web page and edit my resume (you can see both at
http://haas.berkeley.edu/~silver), so you can see the results yourselves!
�
I have been looking at finance, because I seem to have a little
facility
in it.� Apparently good finance-loving MBAs all go off to New
York City
investment banks when they graduate, where they work 80-hour weeks
and
never see their families except in a dormant state when they hit home
at
midnight.� (Some of those 80 hours come from Saturdays and Sundays
as
well.)� By the way, as I understand it, Investment Banks basically
make
and sell pieces of paper called bonds and stocks and things.
Investment banks often dont come looking for us at Haas because we
generally arent looking for them.� Why come to California if you
want to
go to NYC?� Why work like a dog?
It is the money, very big after a few years if youre good.� And
I guess
the challenge.� So I am visiting all the banks when they come
to town.
During intrasession, I did a presentation comparing investment banking
(affectionately called I-Banking) and consulting, where I went into
all
this detail.� Here is what I have really noticed from their presentations:
1 LITERATURE. I Banks have nicer prospectuses in more colors.�
But
like consulting firms, they show photos of happy, productive employees
in
a variety of positions:
* leaning back smiling (there will be lots of these....even if you
only have a head shot they all look like they are leaning back in a
big
leather chair.)
* sitting around a table working collegially (gotta have at least
one women, and one person must be standing for that dramatic je ne
sais quoi)
* the ever-popular Pointing a Stick at a Presentation Chart
* a pair of people, with one in playful paper-thrusting mode to the
other (we can imagine the former frat-boy thruster saying in vestigial
MTV-absorbed street jive: yo yo dude, perform a discounted cash-flow
analysis on this!)
* loads of minorities, depending on how white the firm is.� Very
white = Benetton-like colorization levels.`
�Unlike consulting firm, I Banks tend to name their victims.�
Plus
they usually show big two-page maps with all their deals (example:
provided innovative double-leveraged financing with SWAGs in conjunction
with the privatization of the Cameroon Tobacco Monopoly).� The
Big Lie:
nobody in the pictures is bald.
2 DRESS.� Dressing at I Banks does not vary much.� Guys do
blue.
Women wear conservative suits, also blue.�� I guess everybody
goes to
Barneys and says� I like this. Gimme 8 of them.� Like Hasidic
Jews, I
guess they never have to worry about what to wear, and this keeps them
focused on what counts.� Consultants let themselves go more.
Nevertheless, the observed Blue Shirt/White Shirt ratio is approximately
equal.
3 MANNER.� I guess to handle or make big money it is best to look
and sound a little boring, and it appears theyve mastered this skill.
Not that I Bankers deal with real money or god forbid, make anything
real.� (People who handle actual money of course earn less.)�
On the
other hand, most consultants sound excited even when they are all saying
the same thing, i.e., I am now working on a project with a medium-sized
hi-tech firm in Silicon Valley.� We are helping them to restructure
their
blah blah and then it starts getting vague because they are worried
they
might accidentally let out a secret which could make the talk
INTERESTING.� Yo, guys?� Discount-cash flow this!
4 FEAR.� I Banks know they scare normal people, and thus they try
to scare you so as to avoid recruiting normal people.� Our Organizational
Behavior professor told us this makes sense because this makes those
who
squeeze through the process think they are special and gets them to
believe 80 hour days make sense.��� Note: I am not scared
yet, but that
is because I have an ego the size of a house.� Consulting firms,
however,
like to drone about fit, and let you decide if you do so.� (Imagined
presentation interruption: Excuse me? I think you guys are boring me
to
death.� Does that mean I wont fit in?)
How to avoid all this?� The three other options in Finance seem to be:
a) Sales and Trading.� These guys sell the pieces of paper the
I-Bankers think up.� They also sell foreign exchange and pork
bellies and
things.� They stare at computer screens.� They also talk
on the phone and
curse a lot.�� You can make a lot of money if you are good.�
If you are
not, a la Nick Leeson, you may blow up (a gentle I Bank term for
bankrupt) your employer.
b) Private Banking.� They sell the pieces of paper to extremely
rich
people.� They get good at sucking up fast.�� This sounds
not so bad to
me: rich people are apparently not demanding, because they dont have
much
time to waste what with all their exploitation of the poor to do (ha
ha,
just kidding :-) never mind me you admirable plutocrats).� Of
course, if
you lose their money, you will be skinned alive and made into beef
jerky.�� I have heard washed-up traders go do this.
c) Work for a real company doing finance.� I think you mostly sit
around all day rejecting proposals.� I can do that.� Plus,
I think would
have a button which made a screaming sound whenever I sent someones
project to Unprofitability Hell -- maybe coupled with a
Jabba-the-Hut-inspired deep gurgling laugh.� Ah, the possibilities
are endless.
�
Classes have started again.� A new course, Quantitative Methods,
has
replaced Statistics.� We will learn to optimize things.�
You probably
need to go optimize you own time commitments by stopping the reading
of
this letter.� Ever the gentleman, I say: Goodbye.� Please
write.
Daniel
PS It finally rained today (the day after I wrote that......)
California is mystifying:� It basically does not rain at all here
suring
the summer and fall.� Now it has started; the days will be gray
and dark,
like today.� Our sun-bleached courtyard in Haas even looks a little
smaller and bleaker.
Nevertheless, because I am here, hope springs eternal: I predict a
fun n
sunny winter.
sunny winter.