mba

 by Brendon J. Wilson

Crazy Or Feisty?

It’s internship time! Given that the UBC Commerce Career Centre has a grand total of seven jobs listed for the Lower Mainland, I’m taking matters into my own hands these days. But where to work?

On an impulse, I remembered my old friend Mark Hanson, VP of Sony VAIO Marketing. Given the amount of work I’ve done to solve Sony laptop problems for Sony customers, I figured I’d be a shoo-in for an internship position there. After all, I’d pretty much been working for them for over the past year anyway, right?

I fired off the following quick email to Mark Hanson last night:

Hey Mark,

Don’t know if you remember me, but I’m willing to bet you remember this website:

    www.brendonwilson.com/ideas/sony/getangry.shtml

I’m still getting email on a weekly basis regarding the Sony thermal shutdown problem, not just on old Sony models but on new ones as well. That got me thinking:

I should work for Sony.

What I’m going to suggest might be classified as either ballsy or just downright crazy, but I think it makes sense: I’m currently in the middle of my MBA at the University of British Columbia, and it’s coming around to internship time (June – August). I’m already helping Sony to solve its customers’ problems when Sony’s own customer service seems incapable of recognizing and addressing customer issues, or addressing them in anything but the most ham-fisted manner (ie: replacing whole motherboards for $800).

The failure of their laptops is costing people more than money or lost work: it’s costing Sony the loss of a lot of street credibility. I talk to people and see just how disappointed they are with their laptops, especially given that they bought a Sony specifically because of the dependability they’d come to expect from Sony. Now they’re swearing they’ll never buy a Sony again. Not just a Sony laptop. Any Sony product.

So, here’s what I propose: you hire me for my MBA internship and I track down your customer service and your quality assurance issues.

You already know my attributes: I’m smart. I’m technologically savvy. I’m an evangelist. I take service seriously. And I get the job done. It’s all there on the resume on my web site.

I look forward to hearing from you soon,

Brendon

I just can’t decide: would this be considered “crazy” or “feisty”?

in Personal 0 comments
 by Brendon J. Wilson

BusinessSpeak/BusinessThink

The secret to most professions is knowing the language, or so they say. Sure enough, the business language is slowly creeping into my brain like Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, and my typically geeky vocabulary is slowly being replaced with BusinessSpeak. Value Chain. Net Present Value. Key Success Factors. Hell, I even used the word “synergy” the other day without so much as cracking a mischievous grin. The business world has gotten a hold of one of my legs and is slowly slurping its way up my body. Eep.

It’s insidious, and what’s worse is I’m starting to suspect it might be an intentional part of the program. Business terminology? I was just going to wear a tie and collect a six-figure check before retiring on the backs of my employees’ pension fund. Nobody told I had to speak like them, too! That wasn’t part of the deal!

And language is only the first step. Soon, you start to think like them.

Every week, we analyze a business case in a vain attempt to cram our views on a particular business’ woes into 600 words, an exercise that really improves your ability to focus blindly on numbers and the blatantly obvious. It’s amazing how quickly you forget to suggest simple things like, “Hey, maybe we should ask the guys who actually run the manufacturing plant for input.” No time for that, just look at the numbers! They must prove everything!

I swear, my hair is getting pointier by the day.

in Business / Personal 1 comments