Cass business school

I begrudgingly went along to Cass’s open day on Saturday.  I had a really good feeling when I left the open day…but it rapidly changed as I started to write the blog post.  Here’s how my thoughts changed.

Initial thoughts before I wrote this blog post
I really liked it. It would be Easy to  get to Cass from both home and work. It has an excellent vibe and great facilities. I would get to play with both Bloomberg and Reuters and get trained up on both. Excellent! It is really easy to access campus when I would need/ want to and I think I’ve underestimated the benefit that is.

What really sold it was the people who attended the open day. They were bright, friendly and people similar to me. Much preferred this cohort to Cranfield.

Admittedly it wasn’t the most slick operation I’ve ever seen. They will definitely need to work on that aspect before they jump to the big leagues. Here the stuff that bugged me:

• No contact number for the day. Couldn’t let anyone know I was running late.
• No tea or coffee mugs at break time. Not even plastic cups for the water fountain;
• The mess from 2 hours early hadn’t been tided up. Bad!
• And the sandwich selection at lunch was miserly, though I will give them points for providing wine and beer!

Lack of slickness even went to the lectures. The marketing lecture used an example from t-mobile marketing campaign but was unable to answer the question of what impact it had. Said it was commercially sensitive information. Well that what case studies are for…..you gain access to the information and write it up and then present it. Why present half the story? (Ok, as I’m writing this I’m liking  Cass less. Seems a bit half assed. Like I said, it needs to be slicker for the big leagues.)

But now having moaned about the lectures. What about the good stuff. The lectures were engaging, had good class debate and a good class atmosphere. I learnt!

They also focus on careers and for the part-time MBA that is mostly done at the weekend. Which means you can get good access, but potentially  the MBA will consume your life.

But oddly enough I struggled with the finance class; why, because it wasn’t technical enough. The lecturer explained complex issues in a very easily understood way. However as soon as he added the technical aspects he didn’t fully explain it. That annoyed me! I know this technical stuff. For instance he talked about the central limit theorem…the idea that a population tends to the mean…but this key  principle only works if the sample size is big enough! He used that fact in the example by having a hundred observations the minimum needed to make the theory work.) but didn’t explain this fact to the class. Yes, I know it was an introductory class, but if you use the theory, you should also be able to explain when it can be used. (Now, my masters in economics has paid off with this rant alone.)

Thoughts after I wrote blog post
Good MBA course, but not ready for the big leagues….bit half assed! Could do with making better case studies and engaging more with industry. This would mean not only hiring academics, but also academics that work with firms. Didn’t get the feel they engaged much with industry.

Think Cass is a would be a good comprise MBA but I think it shows in the finer details. Cass has great students, excellent location, it really needs to work on the small stuff to really shine. However I’m not certain they really recognise that aspect. They are spending money on getting bigger hitters in terms of lecturers. But I wonder how much effort they are putting into the softer aspects that make a big difference. I’m not convinced its worth the £42,000 fees.