First contact: A Tuck experience for the first exchange student from NUS Business School
By Venkatesh Sridhar, NUS MBA Class of 2024
From a bustling city in Singapore, to a distant town in Hanover, New Hampshire, Venkatesh Sridhar (NUS MBA August 2022 Intake) was prepared for a one-of-a-kind experience as he embarked on his exchange journey.
Student club activities, community events, social gatherings, demanding yet interesting classes, and more – Venkatesh looks back fondly on his exchange journey. On his flight back to Singapore, he pens down his whole experience – from start till the end – of being the first exchange student and ambassador from NUS Business School to Tuck School of Business, Dartmouth College.
As I look outside the plane window and caught a final view of the Golden Gate Bridge with sights of the Pacific Ocean taking over, I decided it is finally a good time to start writing this blog. After spending the first one hour going through the most recent movies list and another hour procrastinating over the title for this blog (which pop culture reference should I slot in?!), I decided to go with a Star Trek reference, as that is where it all started.
It was a warm evening last February; I was going through the list of partner business schools for exchange. If choosing an MBA programme is choosing the right cake, then an exchange programme is its frosting, for it enhances the flavour and enriches the appearance. I noticed something interesting: this was the first time I saw Tuck School of Business on the NUS MBA exchange partner list. To me, this was a unique opportunity: Tuck, Dartmouth ➡ Fall (I personally love cold pastures) ➡ New Hampshire (a perfect getaway place for someone who has spent their whole life in big cities) ➡ To be an ambassador from NUS Business School; the choice was obvious.
The next thing you know, you get the offer letter with Tuck’s big green emblem, and it is time to sort out the big three of logistics – funding, visa, and housing (yes, the boring but important stuff).
Goodbyes from my beloved NUS MBA Programmes Office team
From then on, things go blazingly fast – you are bidding farewell to your NUS MBA family (classmates and staff) and you are off, both thrilled and anxious. For someone who loves travelling to remote places, I enjoyed every minute of this uncertainty. It was going to be my first time in the Land of the Free as well, and the only notion I have about this country is all from social media, movies, and TV shows – which means they must be inaccurate at best. The travel to the other side of the world is 25+ hours, door to door, (there is no Scotty to beam you up) but once you reach Boston, there is this saviour called the Dartmouth Coach to take you through the last leg of this journey to Dartmouth, Hanover.
Arriving at Tuck and meeting my exchange coordinator, Annika Turner
With my fellow exchange students from diverse locations
First impressions of Hanover, New Hampshire – it’s a serene place, better than I had imagined. The people, even better – they are warm, friendly, and extremely welcoming. After Orientation Day, where you get to meet your fellow exchange students and familiarise yourself with the Hogwarts (I mean, the Tuck/Dartmouth Campus), though it’s only been a week at this place: you feel like you are in this tight-knit family, and you got to know every shop owner, staff, and student. Given that the term is only 2.5 months at most, it is very important to manage your time effectively. The following map was my basic strategy towards this exchange programme.
Coursework – I took 5 elective courses (4 full term and 1 sprint course). They were Venture Capital & Private Equity (to further my knowledge in Finance, particularly in the VC space, given my own start-up background), Multi-channel Route to Market (to understand distribution channels and expansion strategies that ties in well with my previous Solution Sales experience), Negotiations (probably the most important skill for any human being today as it is all about maximising overall value in this incentive-driven world), Leadership Out of the Box (a course to pause from the detail-oriented short term thinking and to explore your personal journey and uncover that hidden source of leadership within you) and the sprint course, Horizon Scanning (to highlight the importance of identifying disruptive forces through foresight and insight techniques armed with important values like epistemic humility and Bayesian thinking).
All five courses were a wealth of knowledge and helped me relate with my own corporate experiences; it was also interesting to bring in my own Singapore (and to an extent, Asia)-based cases/stories into the classroom and Tuck was very welcoming to hear these outside perspectives. Also, I had the honour to meet Prof Vijay Govindarajan for an engaging chat about our hometown – Chennai, India, the cricket world cup, reverse innovation and entrepreneurship.
With my wonderful and extremely knowledgeable professors – Gordon Phillips, Kusum Ailawadi, Vijay Govindarajan, Anthony Scott, Ella Bell, and Aram Donigian
Travel – If you are visiting a faraway country, it is super important to travel, not just for the fun, but you’ll learn quite a bit from these experiences. I cannot emphasise how much these road trips (be it solo or with a group) were instrumental in facilitating my interactions with the residents of New Hampshire and surrounding states, as well as being able to learn from their perspectives and world views. You will encounter numerous travel partners – and exchange stories with them – and a LOT of mom-and-pop store owners who give you the opportunity to understand the home business and of course the best part, to get to live and take in some tremendous scenery. Fall is the best season to travel around the East Coast for leaf peeping. As I had planned to have all my classes on Mondays and Tuesdays, I had quite a bit of time and luck to travel across the States.
A collage of my travel experience
Clubs/Events – Heads up! The Tuck Calendar is probably one of the busiest ones I have seen. There are numerous Club activities, Centre activities, and external speakers (either tied to a Club, Centre or Class) coming into Tuck and several of them are Tuck Alumni, so this is a great opportunity to network with past Tuckies who are currently in different industries. While I felt like joining all events at first, it is simply not feasible to do so given the limited time, hence I chose to prioritise events that are closely tied to my industries of interest (past and future).
Extracurricular/Hobbies – This was the most important aspect for me, personally. I am a big believer in deep connections and today these connections happen through hobbies and common interests. It is also a great opportunity to punch your authentic self into the community through your own hobbies. I had the pleasure to teach/play chess as part of the Games Club, teach International Ballroom as part of the Dance Club, introduce people to Indian Carnatic Violin during Diwali Night, go on numerous hikes around Hanover with members of the Outdoor club and represent the Dartmouth table Tennis Team as a player at the NCTTA divisional tournament, held in Boston, where we won the 2nd place! (I reminisce those fond memories of walking back home every Tuesday night in the cozy cold weather after hours of intense practice sessions with the Dartmouth Table Tennis Club!)
Activities with the Tuck Community
Networking – While coursework projects and hobbies help you form those deep connections with small groups, I realised that given the short duration of the exchange term, you really needed to be out there in most social events, else you will likely miss the chance to meet peers with allied/similar interests. Most of the idea/culture exchanges and key discussions happen at random side conversations in a Small Group Dinner, or a party, or a late-night drive back home. What I found the most interesting with the Tuck community is that quite a number of us have secondary interests (long-term interests beyond our primary career goals like Banking/Consulting etc.). These are the areas I am most interested in following up with my Tuck friends, as there seems to be a deep sense of purpose towards these topics like – getting autonomous vehicles into mass market, circular sustainable fashion, use of GenAI in design, music therapy for behavioural health, rethinking the education system in times of AI – to name a few!
I cannot believe that it has been around 6 hours since I started writing this blog (we are entering the Japanese airspace now), for this exchange programme was such an immersive experience that you would seriously lose track of time and soak in it completely.
As I am seeing the Southeast Asian countries emerge on the flight map in front of me, I am once again reminded of the most important aspect of my MBA programme – and that is, the Idea Exchange across different markets, industries and geographies. It is important as a business leader to not get pigeonholed into a region, for beneath the vastly different cultures and geographies lie fundamental human challenges and interests, just expressed in different ways.
In that aspect, my exchange at Tuck was a rewarding experience as I know that I have made an enterprising group of friends for life, and this has been, indeed, one of the many valuable opportunities that The NUS MBA provides through such exchange partnerships.
Farewell, Tuck – this is Venkatesh signing off!
