Reality Check

If there's one stereotype that's true about MBAs, it's that they take themselves too seriously. Sometimes it's a good thing--taking one's self seriously can lead to higher productivity, stronger drive, and a general hunger for success. Other times, it can show a lack of perspective.

The financial crisis demonstrated that the many MBAs on Wall Street ought not take themselves so seriously, as their world crumbled before them, both because of them and in spite of them. Entrepreneurs today face ongoing reality checks in the form of failures, but there was a time (during the dot-com bubble) when they were guilty too. Not only did they take themselves too seriously, but they felt they were entitled to do so.

For me, Frozen Assets, the women's ice hockey team here at the Johnson School, is a weekly reminder to laugh at myself and with my colleagues, and to find some perspective in my MBA experience. We fall on our butts; we skate in slow motion; we whiff; and we fall again. In the end, we have fun. Women's ice hockey doesn't allow checking, but let's be honest, sometimes the inability to stop results not only in a hard check, but also in a reality check.

There's a special camaraderie that comes with playing on a team--whether competitive or not--that cannot be reproduced in other areas of life. I'm not a psychologist, but I think it has something to do with the physicality of it...the blood, sweat, and tears, so to speak. Next week (Nov. 23rd at 3.45pm), we play the Johnson School faculty. I'm not sure who's going to step up to this annual challenge, and I hear a certain, well-known finance professor is chickening out this year. In any case, I think the game will be a great success...assuming everyone leaves with teeth intact.