Thunderbird School of Global Management-Taiwan Club

 

I am Helen Wu from Taiwan. Currently a second trimester student. I took the PreMBA class in 2011. 

 

I think it all depends on what's your intention of taking PreMBA. 

 

If your intention is to learn super hard and complicated MBA level courses. 

Then I don't think its a good program for you. 

 

However, if you want to improve your presentation skills, case study ability, or cross culture communication. 

PreMBA will be perfect for you. Meanwhile, it still depends on whether you've had strong international experience before or not. 

 

For me, personally, my global experience was only limited to working with Americans. During my PreMBA time, I got to make friends and study with students from Brazil, Japan, Korea, Thailand, Togo, France, and China. 

I've never had any channel to get in touch with students from different countries. That's a real cross culture experience for me. Compared to the real MBA period, the workload is just way too heavy. No one can find time to build strong relationships with others. I can say that I've made some life long friendships during PreMBA time.  I am pretty certain that my friends and I would not have became so close if I didn't come to study PreMBA. 

 

Networking is very important. But how can you network when you can't even find time to talk to others? In the real MBA time, case studies, group meetings, club activities, and job hunting occupy most of our time. 

Try to find time to make friends or network is a huge challenge. I used my PreMBA time to learn culture differences and make friends whom I believe can stay for life. 

That summer was  the only time that I could take advantage of the relaxed setting to have a in deep understanding towards other culture. 

 

All in all, it all depends. But, welcome to Thunderbird. Hope to see you soon.