I woke to the whirring of the fan. “Thank God they have brought light” I thought to myself. That is a distinctly Nigerian thing. You know you are in Nigeria when your first waking thought is that they have ‘brought the light’. Sigh. What time is it? 5 am! I slept at 7 pm! In other words, I just slept for 10hours straight! ABP. ABP. ABP…!
ABP
This is not fair oo! Is this what I signed up for at LBS?
We have a course called Analysis of Business Problems(ABP). Its name has always amused me because it literarily sounds like you are calling hypertension to yourself every time you say it. ‘Hey, BP!’.
Three days ago ABP tasked us to crack a case, analyze its financials, give our recommendations, and present all these via PowerPoint. We had 3 days to do all these but it felt like 3 hours. Night and day we worked our eyes out trying to first understand what the case was about, then what the financials indicated, then how to analyze our findings, then how to present our conclusions.
These past 72hrs have been some of the most grueling of my life. Well, maybe not the most grueling, but when the source of stress is so very present, I am prone to resorting to hyperbole.
The Future
I hear of analysts at firms like KPMG and McKinsey. Is this what they do? I wonder if this is how they live their lives every day, just moving from deadline to deadline with sleep-laden eyes and no sense of purpose. Sounds like a very draining and unhealthy way to live their lives.
Back to ABP
There’s still work to be done. After submitting our group work, the time has come for us to defend our analyses. I smell blood. Knowing how critical our facilitator can be, I can only imagine what she will say today. This is coupled with the fact that there is a caveat for this presentation. She gets to decide who will present on behalf of the group! So we cannot choose our most eloquent group member to speak, we have to pray that whoever she chooses would be ready. Heck, even I do not feel ready! If she calls me, I may let the group down.
But someone has to do it.
The End
At last, the presentation came. The culmination of our sleepless nights over the last 72hrs (and the reason why I couldn’t blog sooner). My colleague was chosen to make the presentation on our behalf. He did his best. He did well. We don’t know what we score, but I just cannot wait to drop ABP like a bad habit.
The Goal
The whole idea of these exercises, I imagine, is to train our minds to become systematic thinkers. To become analytical, dispassionate, and most importantly, increase our likelihood of making the right decisions in the real world.
While I love the idea, the stress levels I feel every time we have to crack a case make me consider if this is really something I want to make into a career.
I used to admire the guys at KPMG, DELOITTE and PwC. Nowadays, I just feel sorry for them.
Expanse.