Applied Strategies

After a much needed break over the holidays, I came back to Foster excited for a fresh course load. I learned a lot last quarter, and loved my professors. But I was ready for new topics!

I think most people (myself included) were especially excited for one class in particular – Applied Strategies. In this class, each team is assigned to a consulting project with a local company. The format of the class is fairly open ended… It’s all about delivering results to our clients.

My team’s project is with a company selling medical devices. The scope includes some operations and some marketing. While I’m familiar with marketing and a bit of operations, I know nothing about the medical industry. I’m excited to get out of my comfort zone a bit!

We spent the first couple weeks of class talking about consulting best practices – scope, client communications, and project management skills. The classes included panels of students who did projects last year, and professionals who currently work in consulting.

On Wednesday we finally met our clients in person! My team is fortunate to be working directly with the President of the company. She was very excited to have us, and came to our meeting with a lot of information to share.

Now that we’ve kicked that project off, the real work begins, starting with an on-site visit next week!

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p style=”line-height: 120%;”>Guest Blogger: Allison Bilas, Foster MBA Class of 2011