Babson: Semester Two

25.01.12 | 15 notes | dataapplegoogleAmazoncloudcloud computingAlaska airlinesebscohbshbrharvard business schoolbabsonmba

I just started my second semester of graduate school at Babson. I waited until I was really ready to apply to an MBA program, until I wanted it only for me and not for my parents, for my employer, or for society. And now I have to say I love it. It feels like hope and education and fuel to me.

My econ professor apparently jokes that people go to HBS for the name and they come to Babson to learn. Still I derive joy from trolling the EBSCO database for pearls from HBR and I have to toot my own horn because HBR included a company I’d been thinking about while on holiday — Alaska Airlines (AA). I was fascinated by the fact that AA offers healthy food onboard and has its flight attendants collect all recyclables, which is more than I can say for Sir Richard Branson’s airline Virgin, despite the billionaire’s talk about fostering the search for renewable energy sources.

Alaska Airlines, though was mentioned in a different light in the Jan/Feb 2012 HBR piece entitled Creating Sustainable Performance, which notes that around 2000 AA was lagging so they decided to do something about. To oversimplify, they made the shocking decision to launch a plan that partially involved- wait for it - seeking input and suggestions from their employees and actually letting them act on those suggestions.

Today in class, though, one main message was that marketing is all about pleasing the customer and that marketing  = company strategy, apart from its various other definitions. But one point that came up that echoed one of last semester’s main messages was that one of the driving forces in big technology business these days is data. Amazon, Apple, and Google are all after consumer interests and we give up our consumer interests when we give them our virginity data.

iPhone 4S: Proof Americans Are Unpredictable Consumers

04.10.11 | 7 notes | AppleTim Cookiphone 4siCloudSiriYelp

Americans want it all for next to nothing. They want extreme innovation every year. They want lines of credit without fees. A friend in the financial business was venting to me saying people shouldn’t be mad about BofA charging fees because that’s how they make money. I guess we have a love/hate relationship with capitalism. We always have. Still I can understand getting mad about more banking fees because my bank (unpaid plug: Cambridge Savings Bank) gives me 2% interest and charges no ATM fees, all in exchange for direct deposit, usage of my debit card to pay for things 10X/month, and electronic statements. 

But what I don’t understand is disappointment with the iPhone 4S. I guess now is the perfect time to say I’m an Apple shareholder and a cult member. That said I still have a BlackBerry because Verizon won’t let me “upgrade” until January 2012 (translation: they won’t give me the subsidized price now.)

So Tim Cook gets up on stage and has the world waiting for another near miracle. The presentation was a bit too long and did take too long to get to the iPhone update. That said, they noted these new features, which apparently weren’t enough to wow customers.

• iCloud functionality & iOS 5
• 8 megapixel camera that is 33% faster than the existing model
• Video recording in full 1080p HD
• World phone
• Switches between two antennas to send and receive
• Dual-core A5 chip for faster processing
• “Personal assistant” software Siri, which can read and send texts, set alarms, search for restaurants via Yelp, and change appointments, all from verbal commands.

Oh, and by the way, iCloud, which is free, launches October 12.