[校友答疑] Current INSEAD students taking questions

I've been thinking of initiating this column to CD europe for some time. The purpose is simple: help more applicants get to know about the school, students life here and of course very important to all of us, the job placement for Chinese students. The Qs can be as diverse as the student group is, ranging from student life to vacation in Europe.

As everybody knows, INSEAD has 2 campuses: Europe and Asia campus. I'm now at Fontainebleau Europe campus and nnm is now in Asia Singapore campus, so if you have any specific questions related to different campuses, one of us will be able to reply.  

nnm, I and many other INSEADers will try to answer your Qs about the school regularly. However, please do bear in mind that we are facing a very tough and tight curriculum and extra-curriculum schedule now, therefore, please allow us maximum 2-3 days to update your Qs.

Let me try to wrap up some rough impression about the study life here first before immersing myself into the pre-readings again. The past week was extremely hectic. On the registration day, we each received some introduction materials and a pile of readings that was almost 0.5m high. We started clubbing, career search and networking immediately after day 1. Each INSEAD student was allocated into a study group, which is typically composed of 5-6 people (all men or 2 girls) from different country and different background. My group is perfect. Each worked in different industry (Mck, Merrill&Lynch, J&J, Economist and General management) before joining the program. All of them are cooperative, open-minded and willing to share, which I believe will be important factors to ensure a productive study group. The company On-Campus-Recruitment start from this week. Quite some big names will be here to give speeches. Obviously, no time to take a break but as I said, every day is a new start and the fun of INSEAD is to push yourself to the extreme and still enjoy. Besides all the serious job hunting and classes, INSEAD is mostly well-known for its students' creativity and party skills. Last Sat we had a big party in a fancy Chateau sponsored by Bain&Company. Talking to the peers was fun, but the funnier part was seeing those students who were serious in class turned out to be a party king/queen.

I have to stop here. Again, any question about the school is mostly welcomed. Wish all of you a success in your application.   

Thanks a lot!!! Inseadsh and nnm.

You are so nice!

I know the curriculum is quite tough. Five semesters, 24 courses. A condensed one year MBA.

Could you handles all of these ?

There are nearly 20K graduate so far. So it's doable.

trust me, you'll survive eventually.

Thanks,NNM.

Could you share some of the pic of views of Insead?

Applaud for your kind deeds! My two bros.

I just got home. It's almost 22:30pm here. As usual, it was a long day but still full of excitement. The class started from 9am with Ethics. To us Chinese people, Ethics will always be kind of tricky topic but I do agree with one thing the professor highlighted: Ethics may not pay but defintely matters. Typical class in INSEAD usually varies from 1.5 hrs to 3 hrs, so we finished the Ethics around 12:30.Thinking about lunch? Nope, because I had to take a look at the club fair. I ended up signing up for consulting, IB, bridge and media club without knowing a pc of what the hell bridge is. After a very quick lunch and a light chat with other students, I had to hurry to 2 core courses: Uncertainty, Data & Judgement and Prices & Markets. There were a lot of pre-readings and exercises before the class but fortunately, I did my homework last night. 17:30 sharp, we sat in an alumni meeting, in which we were told that 2 of our alumni each donated 5MM euros and there are supposed to be more donations coming in soon. Good news to the future applicants! More scholarship available! Ok, I was starving but no time for a decent dinner. Merrill Lynch and Bain's presentation would start from 19:15. I joined the Merrill Lynch one because this would be the only choice for Jul intake to land a full time job in IB. Their presentation was kind of dry but the latter cocktail chat was fun. I talked with different people from the firm and got a general idea of how ML differentiated itself from GS and MS.

This is basically a typical day in INSEAD. You will be challenged, both intellectually and physically, but you are still happy and completely turned on. I think this is the charm of INSEAD, and may be universal for any top school in the world.

Hi, my dream is to be an entrepreneur. My short-term post-MBA goal is to start up my software enterprise in 5 years and my long-term goal is to make my company outstanding in the global IT field in terms of creativity and innovation. Is it ok? or Any suggestion?

Thanks ah~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~