Good god I can't get going on this final

[Abagadro]

I just can't get going on my last take home final.  It is for one of the public admin. classes they are forcing me to take as my "minor" and its about strategic management. It's all sorts of business school nonesense about value capture and comepitive advantage. Stupid buzzword bullshit.  Gonna be a long night.

[schild]

Hell post some questions. Let us fuck with them.

[Abagadro]

It's not hard, its just stupid so I am having write'rs block trying to cope with the level of  lameness.  Things like discussing the pros and cons of outcome measurement and writing a strategy statement for a god awful case study that the professor pulled out of her ass that makes no sense whatsoever.

[schild]

Awesome.

[Abagadro]

Man, I've never written so much concentrative horse crap in my entire life. A sample:

a competitive advantage can be based upon two concepts. One is positional advantage in the market in which there is an attractive structure with few competitors or the organization has an advantageous network of relationships characterized by brand recognition, customer relations or status.  The second is capabilities advantage in which the organization has a greater ability to perform the its functions than any other organization through advantages such as expertise, knowledge or abilities.  Such an advantage can be undermined or dissipated if entry barriers to the market are not high and the capabilities can be copied.  These two advantages are not mutually exclusive and combine to for the core competencies of the organization which better positions it to lead its "industry" in the marketplace.

[MaceVanHoffen]

Man, I've never written so much concentrative horse crap in my entire life. A sample:

a competitive advantage can be based upon two concepts. One is positional advantage in the market in which there is an attractive structure with few competitors or the organization has an advantageous network of relationships characterized by brand recognition, customer relations or status.  The second is capabilities advantage in which the organization has a greater ability to perform the its functions than any other organization through advantages such as expertise, knowledge or abilities.  Such an advantage can be undermined or dissipated if entry barriers to the market are not high and the capabilities can be copied.  These two advantages are not mutually exclusive and combine to for the core competencies of the organization which better positions it to lead its "industry" in the marketplace.

Ow!  My brain!  That paragraph sounds it was constructed using The Dilbert Principle.

[Abagadro]

There are professors at Harvard making careers with that kind of drek.  The whole semester was my prof. rattling off that garbage. Along with our texbooks we had to read 56 articles from the Harvard Business Review full of it. I can boil down all 56 to "Do shit better or market it better than anyone else and you will make bank." 

[MrHat]

There are professors at Harvard making careers with that kind of drek.  The whole semester was my prof. rattling off that garbage. Along with our texbooks we had to read 56 articles from the Harvard Business Review full of it. I can boil down all 56 to "Do shit better or market it better than anyone else and you will make bank." 

Haha, ya.  I remember reading some of my buddy's psyche papers that sounded a bit like that.  He would take 1 concept (1 sentence to an engineer) and stretch it for 2 pages of garbage.

Talking about not being able to motivate:  I have a 80hr project for work that's due on Tuesday.  My fiancee graduates tomorrow, and she has a party on Saturday.  Mother's day on Sunday.

And what am I doing right now?  Guild wars.

Motivational Levels = Broken.

[schild]

That's because very few professors actually make information compelling.

I can count the number of good teachers I've had, out of over 50, on one hand.

[Margalis]

There are professors at Harvard making careers with that kind of drek.  The whole semester was my prof. rattling off that garbage. Along with our texbooks we had to read 56 articles from the Harvard Business Review full of it. I can boil down all 56 to "Do shit better or market it better than anyone else and you will make bank." 

I tend to think that things like that are better explored through interesting examples that really drive home the points. It's pretty easy to say that you should market better or simply do better - obviously everyone knows that yet not everyone is succeeding. It's a lot more interesting to look at how people who think they can do better really can't, or why people who think they are marketing well really aren't. It's really the execution that matters, the basic principles are absurdly obvious. From my somewhat limited experience in business it seems to me that a huge number of problems have to do with everyday issues like office politics, corporate culture and people not seeing the forest for the trees.

I hate MBA students. Man...I went to College at Cornell and now I live 10 minutes from Harvard, there is really nothing worse than an MBA student. Med students and law students can be annoying but they have MBAs beat by a mile. Not to typecast every single MBA student, but 95% of them are just annoying know-nothing assholes. If there was ever a subject you can learn from a book, that would be it.

[schild]

If there was ever a subject you can learn from a book, that would be it.

I beg to differ. If there was ever a subject you can't learn from a book, it's the shit you need for an actual career in business. It's the people that learn from books that come off as crotchpheasants. Nothing replaces actually doing the work. Ever.

[Abagadro]

All this garbage is MBA nonsense and what bugs me is that they create a whole new language just so they can justify their existence as a dicipline. I agree examples are the best, but they never use that. It is always talking about maximising competitive advatange to accentuate competencies and capture value at the end of the value chain.

Makes me want to channel Jules:



English motherfucker, do you speak it?!?!?!?!

[Murgos]

Haha, ya.  I remember reading some of my buddy's psyche papers that sounded a bit like that.  He would take 1 concept (1 sentence to an engineer) and stretch it for 2 pages of garbage.

Engineering has it's share of gobbledegook but at least when engineering terminology runs amok it is usually in an effort to explain a very difficult concept very precisly and not to simply say the same thing in a new way so as to justify your existence (except for Microsoft tech manuals, those things are obviously written by buisiness majors with a masters in buzz-word creation).

[Signe]

Book learnin' is over-rated.  Edumacate YOURSELF! If God had wanted you to learn from a book, he wouldn't have made paper so dangerous.  I have found that when I have writer's block, plagiarising from the internet works wonders.  Or you could just get stoned and not care.  Or you could just make stuff up... who would know?

OMG!  Where's my feet??

nm.  Found them.

[Paelos]

I don't know about MBAs being worthless. Some parts of them are, yes. I'd argue that a focused MBA, like one with a real estate centered curriculum (sp?) is very worthwhile. That being said, some fall into the category of teaching management. Yeah, everything in management school boiled down to, "It's situational." Well no shit. Teaching management in schools is like teaching someone to hit a baseball by giving them a book about it. Practice trumps all.

[Roac]

From my somewhat limited experience in business it seems to me that a huge number of problems have to do with everyday issues like office politics, corporate culture and people not seeing the forest for the trees.

Same here.  Bad management leads to poor productivity on numerous levels.  Doesn't matter how good your people are if you don't push them in the right direction, or support them when needed.  Likewise, even mediocre people can perform well if pushed to their limit.  Note that limit doesn't mean 80h work weeks, it means like encouragement, incentives, good communication, taking feedback (and acting on it!), clear accountability structure, etc.

[HaemishM]

Man, I've never written so much concentrative horse crap in my entire life. A sample:

a competitive advantage can be based upon two concepts. One is positional advantage in the market in which there is an attractive structure with few competitors or the organization has an advantageous network of relationships characterized by brand recognition, customer relations or status.  The second is capabilities advantage in which the organization has a greater ability to perform the its functions than any other organization through advantages such as expertise, knowledge or abilities.  Such an advantage can be undermined or dissipated if entry barriers to the market are not high and the capabilities can be copied.  These two advantages are not mutually exclusive and combine to for the core competencies of the organization which better positions it to lead its "industry" in the marketplace.

I understood that paragraph. You fail. You have to jargon it up more. There are no synergies or paradigm shifts in the whole lot. You are just too concise and cogent to make a good business executive. 

EDIT: MBA's, that is GENERAL MBA's are total horseshit degrees. Undergrad business degrees are even worse. I think even Philosophy majors have more useful teaching in their major, because at least those teach you how to think logically. Fucking business degrees do nothing but teach a bunch of over-greedy frat boys how to pontificate on the concept of "Do shit better" without ever teaching them how to do shit better. Most of the business majors I ever knew took business to make a lot of money telling other people how to do jobs the business major doesn't know how to do.

[Daeven]

There are professors at Harvard making careers with that kind of drek.  The whole semester was my prof. rattling off that garbage. Along with our texbooks we had to read 56 articles from the Harvard Business Review full of it. I can boil down all 56 to "Do shit better or market it better than anyone else and you will make bank." 

I would be so tempted to just write 'Adam Smith byiotch! Yo!' all over that damn thing. Gods but college was annoying.

[Daeven]

Haha, ya.  I remember reading some of my buddy's psyche papers that sounded a bit like that.  He would take 1 concept (1 sentence to an engineer) and stretch it for 2 pages of garbage.

Engineering has it's share of gobbledegook but at least when engineering terminology runs amok it is usually in an effort to explain a very difficult concept very precisly and not to simply say the same thing in a new way so as to justify your existence (except for Microsoft tech manuals, those things are obviously written by buisiness majors with a masters in buzz-word creation).

Exactly. When I say something is 'non-trivial' I don't mean 'I don't want to do it' but I mean exactly non-trivial - as in possible but way to hard to bother with it within any sort of reasonable budgetary / time constraint so get out of my god damned cube you MBA moterfucker!

And don't even get me started on the precise meaning of 'not possible'.

[Strazos]

Any and all business majors I have been complete douchbags who "just wanna make money". Ok terrific, you're a greedy fuck.

Also, the one single MBA student I have talked to was a complete and utter asshat. He tried to explain why capitalism is better than socialism for a society by talking about how capitalism works more efficiently and is more economically-viable, or some horseshit. He made no sense, and if I ever had a personal conversation with him, I'm pretty sure I would stomp his face off.

Fuck business people. Most of them can't actually DO anything.

[Paelos]

Any and all business majors I have been complete douchbags who "just wanna make money". Ok terrific, you're a greedy fuck.

Also, the one single MBA student I have talked to was a complete and utter asshat. He tried to explain why capitalism is better than socialism for a society by talking about how capitalism works more efficiently and is more economically-viable, or some horseshit. He made no sense, and if I ever had a personal conversation with him, I'm pretty sure I would stomp his face off.

Fuck business people. Most of them can't actually DO anything.

Wow, I've never seen "making money" on par with "greedy fuck". I mean hell, I don't know many people who want to "make nothing and starve for my art." And capitalism is better for a society and socialism because socialism won't function well under the basic premises of human nature. So yeah, fuck business people! We should live in huts and communes and share, man!

Business isn't evil. Trade isn't evil. There are some that really suck, and there a some that do great services to the country. Frankly, I'd rather be in a capitalist society and buy what I need.

[Viin]

I think what he's trying to say is that business people tend to be 'pie in the sky' money people who don't tend to have any useful skills other than brown nosing with other business people.

That doesn't make them evil, per se, but I know a lot of business people who's ethics are questionable and their whole attitude towards money is fairly greedy and grubby.

[Toast]

What do you guys do for a living?

Do you know what finance/accounting people do in their jobs?

Which majors are worthy of respect?

[Paelos]

As an accountant, I can honestly tell you very few people have any concept of what we do. They just chalk it up to "some numbers stuff." Not that I'm going to rattle on about it, because it's like discussing a science. The terminology kills discussions.

[Toast]

My question was sort of rhetorical. The "business people" bashing is pretty stupid.

A finance or accounting major is very different than a management r marketing major. You go tell an investment banker, accountant, or corporate fp&a analyst that his work is "pie in the sky" money grubbing bullshit.

[Paelos]

My question was sort of rhetorical. The "business people" bashing is pretty stupid.

A finance or accounting major is very different than a management r marketing major. You go tell an investment banker, accountant, or corporate fp&a analyst that his work is "pie in the sky" money grubbing bullshit.

<Office Space> Naw...Shit naw, man! I believe you'd get your ass kicked for saying something like that </Office Space>

[HaemishM]

Business isn't evil. Trade isn't evil. There are some that really suck, and there a some that do great services to the country. Frankly, I'd rather be in a capitalist society and buy what I need.

Neither business, trade or capitalism or inherently evil. And neither is socialism. However, the methods used to enact or extend the life of those systems can be. I have no problem with "making money." Shit, I love it. It lets me buy lots of shiny, useless shit, as well as letting me eat without having to kill me a baahhhr with muh bare hands.

I have problems with people who have no goal beyond "making as much money as I can." Those people give no thought to the consequences of their actions. Making money isn't evil, making money without being socially responsible, or without considering ethics, that IS evil. Making money by fucking over everyone you can, that is evil.

Capitalism has an advantage over socialism in that capitalism appeals to the individual's self-centered interests first, whereas socialism expects people to forego their individual needs for the community before anything else. Capitalism works because it is much easier to take care of yourself first, community second than it is to take care of the community before your own needs.

[Viin]

A finance or accounting major is very different than a management r marketing major. You go tell an investment banker, accountant, or corporate fp&a analyst that his work is "pie in the sky" money grubbing bullshit.

Heh, don't get your panties in a knot - I was only responding to the last couple posts. I didn't even mention bankers, accountants, or analysts. They *do* have a job that involves skill and knowledge. The business people I was referring to have neither (mostly VPs or Execs that get by on the backs of their subordinates without contributing a single thing to the betterment of the business - all they want is to improve their own salary, bonuses, and/or power).

[HaemishM]

You mean middle managers.

[jpark]

It's always fun to ask a business prof what senior position he held in industry pertaining to the functional area of his expertise.

No, consulting does not count.

Those who can....

But only for business academics.  They are a unique bunch.

On that topic - I will be teaching in the fall  :-D

[Viin]

Mostly, yah.. though it tends to be the ones higher up in the food chain that seem to follow this trend. There are also people in faux positions like "marketing" that tend to be idiots that can't even tie their own shoelaces. Of course, I have seen Sys Admins and "Programmers" who have this problem as well.. though they tend to get fired. The "marketers", VPs, and Managers just get promoted.

[HaemishM]

Marketing people aren't idiots, they are just without souls. It's hard to remember to tie your shoes when you are thinking of "THE BIG PICTURE (TM) Patent Pending."

[Margalis]

I beg to differ. If there was ever a subject you can't learn from a book, it's the shit you need for an actual career in business. It's the people that learn from books that come off as crotchpheasants. Nothing replaces actually doing the work. Ever.

What I meant was, learn from a book versus taking a class.

[Abagadro]

Well, I cranked out 14 1/2 pages of total BS. Wooo semester ovah!

[schild]

Well, I cranked out 14 1/2 pages of total BS. Wooo semester ovah!

Yea, I cranked out 20 pages on a two paragraph topic once and was told to stop. Apparently there's a bullshit threshhold and you get an automatic good grade because teachers just don't want to read it.

As I've learned in the past, gamers don't want to read a review longer than two pages. Teachers don't want to read anything more than 10 pages.

Of course, there are things that are longer, but they're longer with purpose.