Elective Selection and the Balanced Portfolio Approach

Here's the list of elective selections. Looks like there was some collusive behavior to get some classes voted onto the list. :) In general, the list is pretty similar to Class 31's list.

Here's the list:

TOP 30 ELECTIVES

ACCT 742 Problems in Financial Reporting
ACCT 896x Applied Financial Analysis and Equity Valuation
FNCE 717 Financial Derivatives
FNCE 719/731/748 International Corporate Finance
FNCE 720 Investment Management
FNCE/REAL 721 Real Estate Investment: Analysis and Financing
FNCE 726 Advanced Corporate Finance
FNCE 728 Corporate Valuation
FNCE 750 Venture Capital and the Finance of Innovation
FNCE 751X Mergers, Acquisitions, and Buyouts
HCMG 863 Management & Economics of Pharmaceutical & Biotechnology Industry
LGST/MGMT/OPIM 806/691/691 Negotiation & Dispute Resolution
MGMT 671 Executive Leadership
MGMT 701 Strategy and Competitive Advantage
MGMT 721 Corporate Development: Mergers and Acquisitions
MGMT 773 Managing Organizational Change
MGMT 782 Stratetic Implementation
MGMT 801 (0.5) Entrepreneurship
MGMT 804 (0.5) Venture Capital and Entrepreneurial Management
MGMT 806 Formation and Implementation of Entrepreneurial Ventures
MGMT 809 (0.5) Private Equity in Emerging Markets
MGMT 811 (0.5) Entrepreneurship Through Acquisition
MKTG 753 (0.5) New Product Development
MKTG 754 (0.5) Pricing Policy
MKTG 756 Marketing Research
MKTG 771 Models for Marketing Strategy
MKTG 777 Marketing Strategy
MKTG 781 (0.5) Entrepreneurial Marketing
OPIM 653 Mathematical Modeling and Its Application in Finance
OPIM 654 Product Design and Development

This is for the benefit of those who follow after us: after giving it some thought, I decided that I wanted the best overall business background from Wharton. So I went for a "balanced portfolio". I spread my votes across the most important classes in management, finance, marketing, and entrepreneurship, instead of going for a major. If I end up getting one, then great, but if not, it wasn't a big deal to me. The words from the Alumni panel reasonated with me: those "soft" classes are the ones that they have found over the years as they've advanced in their careers are the ones that have retained their value. The comment that quant calculations don't keep you up at night thinking about them but people issues do affected my decision to vote for more management classes than I would have. However, I think that those in our class that are contemplating a more radical career change (such as in finance) had a different approach, and instead concentrated their votes in one area. For example, no one taking a general management approach would have voted for Financial Derivatives.

Here's what I voted for:
1. Executive Leadership
2. Strategy and Competitive Advantage
3. Corporate Development: Mergers and Acquisitions
4. Marketing Strategy
5. Formation and Implementation of Entrepreneurial Ventures
6. Venture Capital and the Finance of Innovation
7. Corporate Valuation
8. Investment Management

Looks like a lot of us used the same "balanced portfolio" approach, as everything I wanted got onto the list. There's no guarantee that they will all be offered, of course. The process is that Howie is going to work with the faculty to get classes from this list scheduled. Overall, I'm pretty happy that we are in the ballpark.

Speaking of ballparks, Sports Management was one of those classes that I wanted to take but when I thought about it there's no way I'll ever be an agent for the NFL, so I didn't vote for it. I suppose that my willingness to pay was less than the tuition amount for a .5 unit class. If anyone really wants to understand why, it's a story better told over a beer.

It's been kind of hard to choose electives at the end of Term 2 for the remainder of the program; I wish that there was some way to alter the voting process to make it term by term instead of locking it in this far in advance, before we've even had the marketing core, for example. But I'm sure it's a matter of scheduling.

On the lighter side, there's some activity going on for "proper" End of Year 1 Trip for our class. Sounds like there's a lot of interest! Las Wage$, Cabo, and China were all mentioned, as well as the usual questions about the crime rate...:) Kudos to the Sam-ster who's organizing it!

-R