While
New York battled with snow and freezing temperatures, 40 Sternies headed to
sunny Sydney to learn about Australia’s robust business world over two action-packed
weeks. Under the guidance of Professor Peter Sheldon at the University of New
South Wales’ Australian Graduate School of Management (AGSM), students were
given access to business leaders across a range of industries, along with
government officials and non-profit professional working on various facets of
Australia’s economic landscape.
Our
diverse group of MBAs stated a number of goals they were hoping to achieve
through the course, roughly falling into the following themes: understanding
how Australia had managed to generate positive economic growth for 27 straight
years while so many other economies suffered multiple recessions; drawing similarities
and differences of conducting business in a place outside of the United States,
especially relevant for those of us who had only ever worked within the US; realizing
the major governmental, socio-political, and geographic factors that impact an
economy as uniquely situated as Australia’s; and finally, learning from our
business education at Stern may or may not translate in a different culture.…