More than just work

It has been more than a month since I started my internship in Lear Corporation. I have learned a lot during work and enjoyed working with my coworkers. They are all quite humorous. The social life here is quite enjoyable. 

Every week we try to schedule a lunch to gather all the employees in the office together. Although probably not everyone attends the lunch, we can still have about ten people every time. The lunch gives us a chance to communicate with each other and learn about what is going on in the other departments. 

Cute cat from the animal shelter

What I like most here is that we have a “Casual Friday” rule. Every Friday we can wear jeans and T-shirts, which requires us to donate at least one dollar every time to an organization that changes every month. Last month we donated about 200 dollars to the Animal Shelter in Taylor. Some coworkers and I visited the animal shelter when the HR person sent the money there.  The cats and dogs there were all adorable. Also they need more volunteers to be there, so we decided that we would help there sometime this month to walk the dogs. 

Besides, Kim from the HR department has worked on getting discounts for us to go to the gym nearby. She has got us a great deal. It’s only a $10 dollar sign-up fee and $5 monthly fee for us to go to the gym nearby. It is kind of hard for me to maintain going to the gym, but I am trying to go there at least once every week during lunch time with my colleagues. I definitely need more exercise.

In all, I am enjoying myself right now. The social life in Lear gives me a lot of fun and I am glad to work with my colleagues.

Sleepless in Seattle

Pushing through my first presentation

                Three weeks into the internship and I had my fist presentation for 8 people. I promise you it wasn’t a walk in the park that one. As I wrote in my previous post, I’m working on the assessment of a new and exciting product for the Lync team. Everyone has something to say about that product since they either think it could have a huge success or a huge failure (nothing in between). So you see, it gets lots of attention from all the people that even remotely are connected to Lync.

                I managed to work for 10 days on the 50 minutes presentation, which was my “Kickoff Presentation” and even spent 4 nights crunching data and slides so I won’t screw things up badly. I even prepared a little show for the presentation, and made a model of the product so people could actually imagine it. Eventually all went well, and now I’m off to the second quarter of the project.

                The most important thing on the last two weeks was the arrival of my family. My wife and two kids got here during the weekend and we immediately went for some trips in the area. So till now I can say that every weekend I do something great. I visited the Snoqualmie pass in the Cascades, Tiger Mountain and Deception Pass, rode the ferry across the Puget Sound and some great HH’s.

                For my project a mentor was assigned to me to guide me through it and help me in every aspect of the work related issues. In addition I got a ‘buddy’ who is my Microsoft connection to all the off-the-record questions that I have (from salary through networking).  I can tell you that I really enjoy my work here, not only because I have such a great time with the people in my team and an amazing project but also because my building is on the edge of the campus and I can see deers right outside my window!!!

                                                                                                                See you next post,

                                                                                                                                Barak

The first couple of weeks!


After two weeks of my internship and getting my hands sort of dirty what would my next advice be for international students.

Follow you heart, your passion when applying for internships and not the herd mentality. Business school students are notorious for focusing their efforts where the "crowds" go. Many come with dreams of doing something different perhaps entrepreneurial but they get sucked into the vortex of recruiting  for Consulting or Investment banking firms. The truth be told, many miss the boat....landing nowhere...in a  tough economy where beggars cannot be choosers, one needs to network like a rockstar for most positions  - international students do not understand the importance of networking and hence need to develop a special appreciation for what they are getting into. Of course, some might genuinely want to get into consulting - my advice is to pull up your bootstraps and focus on developing a networking rulebook - early bird gets worm.

More about that in my next post.

For now more about my internship location – CA

The weather in San Francisco is absolutely great. Mild between 15 C and 25 C – Cloudless skies and some great tourist sites near by. I just returned from a visit to Monterrey Bay, Carmel Valley and the world famous Pebbles Beach Golf Course on the 17 mile drive.  Planned next week are trips to Sonoma Valley, Nappa Valley for wine and olive tasting tours.  The week after, I will be travelling to Mt Sahasta. Also in the pipe lines are trips to Las Vegas. So during the week I will working but in the weekend I will be visiting a new tourist attraction.

I advise all prospective interns to explore their new territories and have fun. After all, all work and no play makes Jack a dumb boy.

As mentioned earlier, my next Blog will talk about managing the networking process effectively during the internship.

Austin, the Great City!

My summer journey started on a sunny Sunday with a delayed flight from Detroit to Austin, I had boarded a taxi from Ann Arbor to the airport before I got Delta Airline’s text massage saying the flight has been rescheduled from 2pm to 4pm. Eventually, I had a very smooth 3 hours flight to Austin, the great city. On arriving at Austin, I moved straight to the lovely furnished apartment that Dell has secured for me and my family in a beautiful area of Round Rock, Austin. It’s about 4.4 miles to my office.

My resumption day was the following Tuesday, I was warmly welcomed to the company with a one day orientation program, where I met my recruiter, Lisa, one on one for the first time. She is such a pleasant lady. She introduced me to my manager, Roberto, during the meet the managers, who happened to be Ross alumnus. Roberto was excited about me; he gave a brief on my summer project- Marketing Investment Framework-China focus. But we spent most of the time discussing Ross because he hasn’t gone back to Ross since he left in 2000.

Dell’s working environment is new to me, coming from banking. Everything is super-automated. Roberto took me round the department introducing me to his team members and key people I will be working with. They showed knowledge and enthusiasm; and willingness to assist me on my project. I spent most of the week in series of meetings, understanding the nature of my project. We also developed a project plan that specified my weekly deliverables.

Meanwhile, I must express my excitement about Austin with the little time I have spent here. I had the opportunity to tour the city during the weekend; it’s really an awesome city. There are great bars and restaurants everywhere, good food –Italian, Mexicans and Asians to mention a few. The night life also can’t be overemphasized, Friday night was crazy! I was on the popular 6^th street with some other MBA interns, we all had fun. I can’t wait for another Friday. 

Getting Started

I'm now through with the first week of my internship, and it seems like there is going to be a lot on my plate all summer long. For those who haven't read my first post, I am working at Four Wood Capital Partners, an independent private equity and advisory group.

Four Wood just started up in November, so the office environment is extremely dynamic. To start, I found out the day before I began working that our office had already moved from Avenue of the Americas to Wall Street. As for the new office, it's still being put together. There were construction and maintenance crews in and out of the office hanging up art and TVs the first few days. Nonetheless, we still had clients and partners coming in and out of the office every day.

There is a really interesting culture in the office. There are about 25 employees who have all come from really impressive backgrounds in finance, many working on high (and some executive) levels at firms like BlackRock, Guggenheim Partners, and BNP Paribas. Everybody had left very successful and lucrative jobs to join FWCP at the ground level, so everybody there is very driven and collaborative.

This week, I worked on a few projects. First, I set up a spreadsheet for the firms partners and prospective partners with the other interns. I also worked on an investment prospectus for a gold bullion holding company, and set up a PowerPoint for high net worth client strategy. I learned a lot through the process. The rest of the summer will be more concentrated in the private equity area.

Finally, getting settled in New York. I moved in to Union Square at the start of the week. It's a very young area and it looks like there are a lot of people to meet and a lot of things to do. I'm looking forward to what's next.