EDITOR’S NOTE: As we approach the halfway point in the program’s intensive one-year experience, we’re publishing a number of student reflections on how found professional and personal balance over the last few months. This post was written by Tor Dworshak ’19
You can manage extracurriculars while in this program; just be sure you’ve got tact, a willingness to work at odd hours, and a vision of productivity.
While most incoming Sustainable Innovation MBA students were worried about academics or moving to a new city, my biggest concern was whether or not I would have the time for bike races. Maybe my priorities weren’t totally in order, but the drive to ensure that I made time to train and race my bike brought me some success in the program. On the first day of orientation, I had convinced myself I would be too busy to race, and that my focus needed to be on nothing but school. Being a bike racer though, I can be competitive at times, and decided that I would compete with myself to race as many times as I could between August and December. The thing standing in my way was fourteen courses. My only option was to create productivity strategies that forced me to stay far in advance of deadlines and deliverables.
There is no denying that this program keeps even the most astute students incredibly busy for the larger part of their waking hours. Case studies for breakfast, problem sets for lunch, research paper for dinner, and studying for dessert. The workload is predictable though. With some proper planning and forward thinking, assignments can be done far in advance, which offers the ability to take a day off for extracurricular activities.
Have a paper due on October 23? Why not force yourself ahead on it by scheduling a meeting with the teacher on October 2nd, at which point you’ll need to have some outline in progress. Two cases due on Wednesday plus a handful of readings on Thursday? Forget about sleeping in on Sunday, get through as many of those as possible. Weekdays are busy no matter what, so the more you can lighten the load Monday to Friday, the more you can focus on larger deliverables during the week and get ahead on them. The ultimate goal is to avoid ever doing an assignment the night before it is due. This gives insulation in case something takes longer than expected, or you need a night to yourself. And just like that, you just freed up enough time to enjoy an extracurricular activity of your choosing!
And since I have been counting, I have raced nine times so far since the program started…
Photo by Angel Santos on Unsplash
I first encountered this quote by Gandhi on Pinterest last fall, when I was beginning the grad school application process. I found it to be a comforting reminder that although my aspirations were large (telling people you want to save the planet can result in a lot of blank stares), I could find a way to make an impact on my own terms. While, I’ve never been a particularly loud or forceful person, I’ve never lacked conviction. Ultimately, I knew that because I would probably never be the person leading a protest or going door-to-door, I needed to find the avenue that best allowed me to use my interests and abilities to bring about change. This is what drew me to The Sustainable Innovation MBA. I knew it would hone my current skill-sets, provide me with the tools needed to make an impact, and expose me to avenues for change I didn’t yet know existed. In this regard, the program has most certainly not disappointed.