It’s been some time since I’ve posted. I’ve been studying hard, trying to stick to my 2 hours a day that I think I’ll need. It’s not been easy. Things happen. A holiday, and going through difficult times personally which have made it incredibly difficult to concentrate on studying.
However, I’m back to it now and have scheduled time to play catch-up for lost time. I’m near the end of Module 7 in accounting and half-way through my first run of Marketing. I want to get half-way through accounting and then start alternating between the two.
I have made use of the EBS “Faculty Board” on the course website to ask for clarification on certain review questions at the end of the Accounting chapters, and must say that I’ve always had a response by the following day. So I’m pretty impressed by it.
Bet of luck with your studies. I completely understand thr struggles that come with self study, I’m in the same boat so to speak.
I’m doing Economics and OrgB together. My strategy involves doing an initial quick read, and doing the multiple choice questions as best as I can. This gives me an idea of strengths and weaknesses. I will then do a comprehensive re-read of each chapter, taking notes, re-doing all questions including case studies, and re-reading the chapter again to ensure I know it cold.
I find the material is comprehensive, and 200 hours per course was certainly not exaggerated.
The other program I was looking at was Durham, but the required trip to the UK was a deal breaker. It’s hard to predict if something like thos would be possible for me, and the cost would be unjustifiable. I am also surprised that they estimated ~80-100 hours of study per course, that would mean total study hours would be substantially less then EBS, even taking into account the extra courses needed. What this would ultimately mean is that you would learn less through the program, because logically you can’t learn the same amount in 1/2 the time. So far I am happy with my choice of EBS.
Interestingly, Heriot-Watt is climbing the rankings.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/table/2009/may/12/university-league-table
Comment by Raemius — June 12, 2009 @ 4:03 pm |
Hi Peter
Lovely to find this blog! I’m also enrolled in the EBS MBA programme, and what’s more, I’m a fellow Saffrican! I’m in Durban.
I’ve done OB. It was very interesting and immediately applicable at work so I can see why they recommend it as a first course. It’s also a ton of work. Lots of list learning and you need to know the subject matter down pat. Good prep for the rest of the degree. Warning – the exams are brutal. I’m accustomed to doing well in exams and really knew my work but just scraped an A. I think I was guilty of trying to show how much I knew.
I feel that I did more than 200 hours for OB though am not a dedicated student and didn’t log my hours. I didn’t prepare as properly as I might have because I only started studying a couple of months before the exam and didn’t work my way through all the past papers or profiler. If I had I feel I would have developed “exam techniques” and improved my marks. A lot of it is learning how to learn because I’ve never really bothered to learn ( good memory ) except for highly technical IT subjects during my MCSD and that’s more about understanding how the programming works, rather than mass learning. I guess that a Master’s degree is a good time to finally learn how to study!
I’ve got the Economics, Accounting and Human Resource Development modules too. I’m planning on doing Economics for Dec 09 and possibly the HRD one too ( which I find extremely easy ). Accounting I will do next year, possibly with Project Management. Thought I’d save Marketing for the 2nd half of the year, because I hear it is a monster, and maybe combine it with an elective. I’m in contact with other EBS MBA’s. They say Economics is a tough one ( so far, I agree ). Finance comes with a bad rep as well as being difficult.
I consult to a company which is prepared to pay for my seminar at EBS in October, in Economics. They want economic reports from me thereafter. I provide similar reports already but wish to up my game as they compete in a very competitive global market.
Nice to meet you, and I hope that you’ll post more on your studies.It’s great to meet up with fellow students.
Lorna
Comment by Lorna — August 1, 2009 @ 7:55 pm |
Hi Peter
Thanks for this blog. It is a godsend for people like me who have hardly any contact with other EBS MBA students. Just another reason why learning the course material and preparing for the EBS MBA exams can be daunting. The official forum could be useful if there had been more participation. Apart from the OB course most other forums don’t seem that active.
I wanted to add my own learning/preparation tips on this blog as such blogs are very few and most authors haven’t posted for many years. Its important that other EBS students contribute to build up a valuable non official resource for the EBS MBA distance learning community.
I have completed the OB course and was pleased to have passed with an A grade having missed distinction by only 2 percentage points! I therefore am pleased with the result although whilst preparing for the course I would have been happy with just a pass mark.
I was a little worried about the exam as I hadn’t done a written exam for more than 10years! I was used to exams that only had MCQ or EMQ objective questions. Writing pages and pages of material spanning the entire course book and then trying to integrate the material and explain its application to the problem at hand along with an example wasn’t second nature.
Although I was pleased with having read the entire course material and thinking of ways in which the new knowledge could be applied to my current organisation, I had very little idea of how to answer the questions in the exam.
What did help was doing the past papers and going through the official forum as I could then decide on a structure to writing the answers. I then made my own notes based on the past answers on the keys topics examined in the past.
The one positive think I got from the exam is that I can now speak on any topic in the OB course and explain it to colleagues/senior management if needed. So it gives me great confidence. More so than if the exam had been wholly objective.
I have now begun reading the Economics course and find that unlike the OB course there is more emphasis on comprehension. The initial bits appear to be little more than ‘common sense’ turned into algebraic equations. A little boring but hopefully it would be more interesting further on. The exam has 37.5% MCQs as opposed to 25% in the OB exam and most questions seem to be based on reasoning rather than recall of material.
What do others think?
Merson
Comment by Merson — April 12, 2011 @ 8:54 am |