BUS 465 Blog

Let me finish my quote-

"What's in a name? That which we call a rose
By any other word would smell as sweet."

--From Romeo and Juliet(II, ii, 1-2) by William Shakespeare

But as I once read in a magazine, people tend to forget that Juliet was pushing up dasies later, and "creeping vetch" would tend to not be a popular flower. (The vetch link is a link to a vetch, which happens to be poisonous to horses and probably to your fellow companions on the Oregon trail, if only the oxen hadn't of died! And if you don't understand this go here)

But you ask, what in the world does this have to do with Integrated Marketing Communications and our class?

Well, a lot. A name is part of branding. If I say "Nike" what do you think of- a greek goddess? Or cool athletic shoes with a swoosh? Nike has a clear brand, people see the name or the symbol and they think of what the people at Nike have hoped and worked for them to think about. Companies even rank the value of their brand.

We as a class are trying to work promoting the brand of the College of Management, primarily internally to the students. We want all of our wonderful students to become brand stewards of the college- meaning that they would understand what the College of Management is all about hopefully be what the college of management is all about and articulate this to others. We hope to do this by raising awareness through events and also improving internal communication within the college. In case you didn't know, we are a relatively young college so not everyone knows about us, and much less the great things we have to offer! So keep your eyes peeled for new developments and events.

Erin

I put the PRO in Procrastinator. I bet we've all heard that one before. I don't have a good pun for pulling an all nighter. Not that I'm really going to do that tonight or actually always work on a procrastinator basis- I value sleep too much these days for that.

Kidding aside, (well half kidding at least) I am sure that I am in the majority on having really started my homework on Sunday night. After all, who is really being logical in having a midterm on Monday after break? Which brings me to the topic of this blog: our groupwork and it's challenges.

Groupwork can be great and it can be miserable. Since this project spans two classes and three teams among both of them there is potential for both. We have directors and team leaders for each section and work collaboratively on a wiki.

Having the wiki allows us to work together without having to be together- all the benefits of groupwork without having to find a time that is acceptable for everyone. That being said, there are some drawbacks as well.

First, you have to go and check the wiki (big deal you say? well, dear reader I have  four classes and have to check a total of 7 websites and my email, thats a little excessive wouldn't you think?)  and since it isn't advanced enough to have a recent posts option (or at least I don't know about it) you have to click every single link and read to see what is new. This is assuming everyone takes the time to read the wiki. But you know what they say about assuming. We do have group communication from emails as well, and that is pretty effective.

Let me culture you with a little poem that captures some of the problem:

This is a little story about four people named Everybody, Somebody, Anybody, and Nobody. There was an important job to be done and Everybody was sure that Somebody would do it. Anybody could have done it, but Nobody did it. Somebody got angry about that because it was Everybody's job. Everybody thought that Anybody could do it, but Nobody realized that Everybody wouldn't do it. It ended up that Everybody blamed Somebody when Nobody did what Anybody could have done it.

Second, this takes more time up than it should- but doesn't everything? If we physically did meet for some length of time I think we could avoid the vauge uncertanties of just what is everyone doing? What am I supposed to be doing? Luckily as the blogger I know what I'm supposed to be doing, blogging. And I'm sure everyone else knows what they should be doing too- but my point is that excluding the leadership the rest of the class only has a loose understanding of what everyone else is doing, from what we read on the wiki. When we do meet in person in class, if some key person is absent, well you get the idea.

Although I complain I do see the advantages of this- as students we get to learn all those "real world" skills. Like dealing with vaugeness, our future boss might say write up a report on X. We will have to use our best judgement on what they really mean. Perhaps that is more of a problem because of our teach for the test mentality we've been taught all these years and on the other side a deplorable lack of articulation on their part. Another skill is that we'll all have been "self starters" "self motivated." This is also part of growing up. I hope we are all "self starters" to take out the trash and do our laundry these days and our work should be no different.

As for getting along, a key part to any group, I think most people understand this so it's not really new "real world" skill for us. Perhaps we just maybe don't know how to effectively communicate information. "Did you get the email?" and "Yeah I just didn't do it" are phrases I've heard before. Confrontation is key though- if you're in a bad group, things and people can change! Not to say that this is one, I just know we've all been there and I'm trying to give you hope if you're in a bad one now. And remember what Scarlett said, "After all, tomorrow is another day."

It's good experience. That's the bottom line. And I do procrastinate. That's why it's taken me two days to finish writing this, or is it three? and it may be more before it actually gets edited and posted so I'm going to quit while I'm ahead (well behind on the relevance to spring break) and hope for the best. I suppose higher quality writing is found in books, those things that take time and have serious editors.

Erin