Blog 50 - Trips Home and Family

Hey everyone... this session is winding down and soon I will be on my winter break. Looking back at this last session, I really enjoyed being able to go home and visit my family a few times. Being home allows me to see old friends, relax in a comfortable environment and hang out with my family. I even got the chance to go to a Fresno State football game with my Dad. It is a really nice break from the MBA program to be able to take a few days off and visit family.

As I am getting older I am beginning to realize a few things in life. One of them is that regardless whether my next step is another school or a job, it will take me far away from my family. I am finding that I value the time I get to spend with my family more and more. So in this blog, I am going to introduce you to my family.

John Jenkins

My father is 57 years old and has worked for DuPont in their Agricultural Chemical Division for 35 years. His job involves a lot of client relationship management and business development with local growers. He oversees the sale of various herbicides, insecticides and fungicides. My Dad grew up in Yakima, Washington and has lived in Davis, CA and Yuma, AZ. My father has always been an important mentor in my life and I try to keep him up-to-date with all of the latest happenings in my life and career plans. He has a very logical and analytical mind which helps me a lot in my decision making. In his spare time, he enjoys fishing, golf and military history.

Kristi Jenkins

My mother is 54 years old and works as a teacher at a local junior high school. She met my father while they were attending Washington State University where she earned her degree in English. She has always been very involved in her children’s lives, from throwing the most amazing birthday parties to keeping up with various dating drama, she has always been in the middle of it. My mother is quite the social butterfly. Various parties occur at my parent’s home for every occasion imaginable. As you could imagine, holidays are a very big deal in my family. I’m not just talking about the big ones... we throw a huge St. Patrick’s Day party every year! My mom is very outgoing and loves to have a good time.

Suzanne Jenkins

My sister is 22 years old and attends Fresno State University. She is majoring in Communication, with minors in Mass Communication & Journalism and Philosophy. She holds several part time jobs including medical billing and babysitting. She has 2 semesters left until she will graduate from college. Next summer I am going to try to get her an internship at Pelco, the company I interned with last summer. Post graduation, she is looking at attending a graduate program in public relations or marketing. In her free time Suzanne enjoys the things most girls her age do, such as partying, shopping and dating. My sister loves to be the center of attention and lives for the moment at hand.

I am really looking forward to December and the time that I will get to spend with my family. Only one more week of school until winter break! Alright... back to studying for my Quantitative Business Analysis final :(

Blog 49 - The Best Group Member I Have Ever Had...

In some of my past blogs... I have written stories about my roommates and some of my close friends. This past semester I met a new student whom I have been very impressed with. I knew from the first time I saw her notes accented in three different colors of highlights that she meant serious business! Without any offense to any of my past group members (Frankie Warren and Mark Cathy particularly)... this girl has been the best group member I have had at Pepperdine.

Her name is Jenna Burkey and you couldn’t ask for a better group member. Ya know when you’re working on a group project and there is something that needs to be done for the group that no one really wants to do? Jenna is your person. When your group is bummed out because you have to meet on a Saturday morning... Who has brought cupcakes for the group? True story. When you have to do background studies for a particular project topic... Who actually enjoys research? Yes, also true. When you’re juggling multiple classes, many deadlines and are confused as to what has to be done... I think you’re starting to get the picture.

Jenna Burkey is easily worth two or possibly even three group members in terms of adding value to the team. I was fortunate enough to be able to work with her last session in our “Designing and Managing International Organizations” course and now once again in our “Creating and Leading Teams” class. When we got the chance to select our teams for our current class, I jumped at the opportunity to work with Jenna again. Having Jenna as a member of my current group gives me the upmost confidence that not only will our project turn out well, but that the group will have a great time during the process. I know that if it comes down to the wire... and we needed to overhaul the whole project the night before, I know that she would be there with me until the end.

Jenna is a member of a program at Pepperdine called “The 5-Year MBA”. In this joint undergraduate and graduate program, she will earn both her Bachelors in Business Administration with a concentration in Non-Profit Management and her MBA in Organizational Leadership and Change Management. The fact that she came straight from college into her MBA makes her contribution level that much more impressive. In terms of group performance, Jenna outperforms experienced professionals with 5-10 years of work experience.

Post-MBA, Jenna is planning on continuing her work with her family’s nonprofit foundation called “The Wood-Claeyssens Foundation”. The foundation provides grants for select organizations in the Santa Barbara and Ventura counties. Jenna is already very active with the foundation holding a director position and attending many foundation-community events. You can check it out at woodclaeyssensfoundation.com.

When I try to picture my future career performance, I will strive to be seen as “The Jenna Burkey” of my future teams. And yes... the picture below is the thank you card she gave out to each individual group member on our team after the successful completion of our final presentation. Yes I'm serious... that is the spirit of Jenna Burkey. We love you Jenna!!!

Blog 48 - Introducing a Standout Professor... Dr. Kenneth Ko

Pepperdine’s MBA program, like every academic institution, has its standout professors, its average professors and those professors whom students avoid at all costs. I’m writing to you today to introduce one of our truly outstanding professors, Dr. Ken Ko. I am in Dr. Ko’s monday morning Quantitative Business Analysis class. Now throughout our MBA, there are classes that are generally considered more exciting than others. Classes like strategy, marketing and organizational behavior seem to be enjoyed more than some of the quantitative courses like accounting, finance, stats and QBA. While we understand that all of the courses are required for a well-rounded MBA experience... that doesn’t mean we enjoy them all equally!

With that being said... QBA is a course that has the ability to be really, really dry. It wouldn’t be hard to imagine an older, monotone professor discussing the details of linear programing and decision trees. In the class, we study how to apply mathematical models to business constraints like budgets, the labor supply & raw materials. When the models are properly implemented, we are able to make the best business decision available to us. QBA is definitely a vital course to our MBA, but again... I’m sure you’re thinking, “Creating and applying mathematical models... how could that be fun?”

The answer to that question... is Dr Ken Ko. Without a doubt, Dr. Ko is the most engaging professor that I have had at Pepperdine. His classes are so easy to understand and so engaging it’s almost as if you’re surprised when the class time is over. Dr. Ko’s energy, enthusiasm and truly unique personality make him a favorite among his students. Sometimes Dr. Ko will start a class with a funny story or an engaging experience of his. He gets the class involved throughout the class period, referring to his students as “his players” and himself as “our coach”. While it took about a full class period to get used to his style (example: he routinely calls his students “baby” lol)... I am incredibly impressed by his teaching style. Before I wrote this blog, I knew that it would be impossible to really capture the brilliance of his teaching style without adding some video clips. So one day in class, with his permission of course, I took a couple clips for you so you can see what I’m talking about!

During the first class period I had Dr. Ko, I was so shocked by his teaching style that I wanted to figure out where he came from. While I’m always interested in my professor’s academic and professional backgrounds, I was even more interested with Dr Ko because of his crazy and outgoing personality. Upon further review, I found out that Dr. Ko had graduated from UC Berkeley with honors for his undergrad and then went on to Stanford for his PhD in Management Science and Engineering. Very impressive academic credentials to say the least! Dr. Ko has worked as a product manager for Hewlett-Packard, a business manager for PricewaterhouseCoopers, and a management consultant for Strategic Decisions Group where he is currently an outside consultant. His combination of academic background, work experience and unique people skills makes him a very valued asset to Pepperdine’s MBA program. To any first year or prospective student, if you have the option to take a course from Dr. Kenneth Ko... I would very strongly recommend that you take him.

Blog 47 - Session A Down... 3 More to Go!!!

After a short break... I am back blogging again! So here are the latest updates!

Session A this fall was the first time that I had attempted 5 classes in a single session. It was an interesting session for me particularly because many of my team projects focused on my summer internship experience with Pelco. It was cool to be able to see the interconnectedness of what we learn in the program and my real-world experience. The above picture is of my group’s final project presentation in our Designing and Managing International Organizations class. My group did an overview of Pelco’s future business ventures in China.

Looking back at session A, I had a much different experience than I did during session A last fall. When students first get to the MBA program, they generally become very social and work to develop their new friend base. First year students attend most mixers, school events and fundraising functions. They must balance this active social life with a very demanding workload from their classes. If you look back at some of my posts from last year (archived to the right under the drop down menus), you see posts of ‘Red Bull Nights” and “Finals”. This past session had a much different feel...

This past session I felt that I was much more in control of my life. I had free time that I could allocate to things like trying surfing, hanging out with Frankie (the roommate) and seeing friends visiting from home. My classes seemed easier (other than business law) and the work was much more interesting to me as it seemed more relevant to my future career. Another big difference I noticed was my own physical health during the 7-week session. Last year, from the beginning of school through December, I gained 25 pounds of “not muscle”, didn’t sleep regular hours and ate horribly. This past session, I went to the gym every day and got much more sleep. In all, I really enjoyed the lifestyle change from last year.

When I received my grades for the session I was really excited to learn that I did really well. This past semester was my best session thus far in terms of overall experience and GPA. It is so nice to be able to mostly focus on classes that are in my area of interest, as apposed to “foundational classes” such as economics and finance.

Session B should consist of a much easier workload for me, as I am only taking 3 classes this session. My classes for session B are Quantitative Business Analysis, Creating and Leading Teams and Business Law (continued from session A). Business law is seeming to become more difficult by the week and I look forward to the day when that class will be over. If I ever had the idea that I wanted to attend law school, my business law class has definitely confirmed that’s not for me!