Opening day (or Getting to know you, Parte due)

CIMBA students met in classrooms for the first time on Martedi after arriving in Paderno del Grappa by way of long flights from the states. The University of Kansas, U Conn, University of Oregon, and University of Iowa are particularly well represented in this cohort of motivated undergrads. Other schools with student participants include West Virginia, Iowa State, and Texas Tech Universities and the Universities of Arkansas, Nebraska, Delaware, and Tennessee. During introductions in the management course, I asked students to name a manager they admired and why they admired him/her. The overwhelming theme that arose was that students named managers for whom they had once worked, citing personal care and attention, thoughtfulness, outgoing personalities, and a focus on getting things done while having fun. The idea of what a good manager does is embodied in the type of person and the quality of the relationship with that person. There was plenty of anecdotal evidence of the value of "soft skills" in the management field.

Getting to know you!

I've had the pleasure of meeting most of the new faculty members for the fall 2009 semester and am getting oriented to the Paderno del Grappa campus on the beautiful grounds of the Istituto Fillipin (pictured above). This semester I'm teaching introduction to management and entrepreneurial strategies. Both courses will adopt a strong orientation toward problem-solving (especially Intro to Management, with its incorporation of the Kepner-Tregoe methods of decision-making and problem-solving), and both will be heavily grounded in international contexts.