Note to Future Self: Access Weekends – DC and San Jose

Dear Future Self,

I wanted to recap the experience of attending classes in unique environments, namely DC and San Jose.  You arrive to a previously unknown place and are subsequently surrounded by all the familiar faces that you’ve come to know over the past few months.  Your cohort and you have bonded in a way that only students cramming for Professor Gérard Cornuéjols’ statistics final ever could.  And there you are, in a conference room inside the US Government’s “Hall of the States” building, or at the Westin in downtown San Jose, a short jog from Adobe’s HQ.  Surrounded by both familiarity, and unfamiliarity.  The unfamiliar has become the new normal.

And there it is – part of the MBA, in addition to the hard skills – is learning how to adapt quickly and feel comfortable in unfamiliar situations.

DC

Now, to recap on DC: Amazing!  After finishing that statistics final, we stopped by NASA’s admin Headquarters to hear fellow MBA and excellent public speaker Phil McAlister talk about current programs, applicability of the MBA skill set to all industries (yes, aerospace).  No trip to DC would be complete without a panel of Tepper grads talking of their current endeavors.  It should come as no surprise given the location that much of their work was focused on government contracting and foundation work.  To top it off, a plethora of us participated in a city-wide scavenger hunt.

Wrapping up DC, we met our professors for the following “mini”, attended class, and managed to find a hole-in-the-wall local pub that could accommodate the entire cohort.

San Jose

As amazing as DC was, the techie within marvels at the experience that was San Jose.  Since there was so much, I’ll outline the items here

*wishes to remain anonymous

Cisco and Google both provided and amazing look at what life is like inside of the Tech Giants.  Further, they show the innovation that can be accomplished when companies strongly value their educated and experienced personnel.  After all, Steve Jobs once said that companies hire experienced staff not to tell them what to do, but so the employees can dictate the company’s direction [paraphrased].

Can’t wait for the next DC and San Jose access weekends!

This is an ongoing series to remind my future self of the foundational and formational experiences of working full-time and attending an intense, collaborative, Part-Time Online Hybrid MBA program at Carnegie Mellon Tepper School of Business.  Photos courtesy of the Pixel.

• Author
• Recent Posts

Matt Moschel | MBA 2021

Senior Managing Consultant at Berkeley Research Group

Matt is a part-time online hybrid Tepper MBA candidate based in sunny Tampa, FL. Originally from Williamsburg, VA, Matt attended the University of Virginia and subsequently worked in DC and LA. As a managing consultant focused on litigation, Matt is passionate about tech companies, data science, economics, and the future.

When not traveling for school or work, Matt spends his free hours working out, enjoying the outdoors, and sampling local breweries in FL.

Latest posts by Matt Moschel | MBA 2021 (see all)

• Welcome to the Online Learning Format - March 17, 2020
• Applying MBA Skills on the Job - November 6, 2019
• Selecting the *Right* MBA [PTOH style] - April 8, 2019